UNDER THE MICROSCOPE
need not by any means be identical with tradition: they cannot see that because theories of the present are not inherited they do not on that account become more proper than were theories of the past to suffice of themselves for poetic or prophetic speech. Whether you have to deliver an old or a brand-new creed, alike in either case you must first insure that it be delivered well; for in neither will it suffice you to deliver it simply in good faith and good intent. The poet of democracy must sing all things alike? let him sing them then, whether in rhyme or not is no matter,[1] but in rhythm he must needs sing them.
- ↑ In Dr. Burroughs' excellent little book there is a fault common to almost all champions of his great friend; they will treat Whitman as "Athanasius contra mundum:" they will assume that if he be right all other poets must be wrong; and if this intimation were confined to America there might be some plausible reason to admit it; but if we pass beyond and have to choose between Whitman and the world, we must regretfully drop the "Leaves of Grass" and retain at least for example the "Légende des Siècles." As to this matter of rhythm and rhyme, prose and verse, I find in this little essay some things which out of pure regard and sympathy I could wish away, and consigned to the more congenial page of some tenth-rate poeticule worn out with failure after failure, and now squat in his hole like the tailless fox he is, curled up to snarl and whimper beneath the inaccessible vine of song. Let me suggest that it may not be observed in the grand literary relics of nations that their best poetry has always, or has ever, adopted essentially the prose form, preserving interior rhythm only. I do not "ask dulcet rhymes from" Whitman; I far prefer his rhythms to any merely "dulcet metres;" I would have him in nowise other than he is; but I certainly do not wish to see his form or style reproduced at second-hand by a school of disciples with less deep and exalted sense of rhythm. As to
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