The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Edgar Allan Poe [1146]
LXVI.
Here is a plot which, with all its complexity, has no adaptation — no dependency; — it is involute and nothing more — having all the air of G ———’s wig, or the cycles and epicycles in Ptolemy’s “Almagest.”
LXVII.
We might give two plausible derivations of the epithet “weeping” as applied to the willow. We might say that the word has its origin in the pendulous character of the long branches, which suggest the idea of water dripping; or we might assert that the term comes from a fact in the natural history of the tree. It has a vast insensible perspiration, which, upon sudden cold, condenses, and sometimes is precipitated in a shower. Now, one might very accurately determine the bias and value of a man’s powers of causality, by observing which of these two derivations he would adopt. The former is, beyond question, the true; and, for this reason — that common or vulgar epithets are universally suggested by common or immediately obvious things, without strict regard of any exactitude in application: — but the latter would be greedily seized by nine philologists out of ten, for no better cause than its epigrammatism — than the pointedness with which the singular fact seems to touch the occasion. Here, then, is a subtle source of error which Lord Bacon has neglected. It is an Idol of the Wit.
LXVIII.
In a “Hymn for Christmas,” by Mrs. Hemans, we find the following stanza:
Oh, lovely voices of the sky
Which hymned the Savior’s birth,
Are ye not singing still on high,
Ye that sang “Peace on Earth?”
To us yet speak the strains
Wherewith, in times gone by,
Ye blessed the Syrian swains,
Oh, voices of the sky!
And at page 305 of “The Christian Keepsake and Missionary Annual for 1840” — a Philadelphia Annual — we find “A Christmas Carol,” by Richard W. Dodson: — the first stanza running thus:
Angel voices of the sky!
Ye that hymned Messiah’s birth,
Sweetly singing from on high
“Peace, Goodwill to all on earth!”
Oh, to us impart those strains!
Bid our doubts and fears to cease!
Ye that cheered the Syrian swains,
Cheer us with that song of peace!
LXIX.
The more there are great excellences in a work, the less am I surprised at finding great demerits. When a book is said to have many faults, nothing is decided, and I cannot tell, by this, whether it is excellent or execrable. It is said of another that it is without fault; if the account be just, the work cannot be excellent. — Trublet.
The “cannot” here is much too positive. The opinions of Trublet are wonderfully prevalent, but they are none the less demonstrably false. It is merely the indolence of genius which has given them currency. The truth seems to be that genius of the highest order lives in a state of perpetual vacillation between ambition and the scorn of it. The ambition of a great intellect is at best negative. It struggles — it labors — it creates — not because excellence is desirable, but because to be excelled where there exists a sense of the power to excel, is unendurable. Indeed I cannot help thinking that the greatest intellects (since these most clearly perceive the laughable absurdity of human ambition) remain contentedly “mute and inglorious.” At all events, the vacillation of which I speak is the prominent feature of genius. Alternately inspired and depressed, its inequalities of mood are stamped upon its labors. This is the truth, generally — but it is a truth very different from the assertion involved in the “cannot” of Trublet. Give to genius a sufficiently enduring motive, and the result will be harmony, proportion, beauty, perfection — all, in this case, synonymous terms. Its supposed “inevitable” irregularities shall not be found: — for it is clear that the susceptibility to impressions of beauty — that susceptibility