Thus the study of poetry is the study of life, because poetry is the
interpretation of life. Poetry is not a mere instrument for promoting
enjoyment; it does not merely dazzle the imagination and excite the
emotions. Through the emotions and the imagination it both interprets
life and ministers to life. When the critic attempts to express that
truth, that is, to interpret the interpreter, which he can do only by
translating the poetry into prose, and the language of imagination and
emotion into that of philosophy, he destroys the poem in the process,
much as the botanist destroys the flower in analyzing it, or the musical
critic the composition in disentangling its interwoven melodies and
explaining the mature of its harmonic structure. The analysis, whether
of music, art, or poetry, must be followed by a synthesis, which, in the
nature of the case, can be accomplished only by the hearer or reader for
himself. All that I can do here is to illustrate this revelatory
character of poetry by some references to the poems which this volume
contains. I do not attempt to explain the meaning of these poems; that
is a task quite impossible. I only attempt to show that they have a
meaning, that beneath their beauty of form is a depth of truth which
philosophical statement in prose cannot interpret, but the essence of
which such statement may serve to suggest. I do not wish to expound the
truth of life which is contained in the poet's verse; I only wish to
show that the poet by his verse reveals a truth of life which the critic
cannot express, and that it is for this reason pre-eminently that such a
collection of poetry as this is deserving of the reader's study.
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