Poems By William Bell Scott. Ballads, Studies from Nature, Sonnets, etc. Illustrated by Seventeen Etchings by the Author and L. Alma Tadema |
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ON CERTAIN CRITICS AT THE BEGINNING
OF THE CENTURY.
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184
ON CERTAIN CRITICS AT THE BEGINNING OF THE CENTURY.
The poet lives indeed. Within the schools
He may or may not have tried on his arms,
Or learnt their dext'rous use: but free of harms
He must have dived and braved the whirling pools
Of his own heart, and o'er the heads of fools
And unbelievers, teachers, priests, tipstaves,
Or censors, held his own, breasting the waves
Of martyrdom, smiling like one who rules.
He may or may not have tried on his arms,
Or learnt their dext'rous use: but free of harms
He must have dived and braved the whirling pools
Of his own heart, and o'er the heads of fools
And unbelievers, teachers, priests, tipstaves,
Or censors, held his own, breasting the waves
Of martyrdom, smiling like one who rules.
And here's the poet's judge! whose learned speech
Of tropes and classics, fixed authorities,
Smells stale, whose outside confidences teach
His fellow-philistines to dogmatise,
Till vulgar scoffers even invade the skies—
Turn, poet! lift thy foot against his breech.
Of tropes and classics, fixed authorities,
Smells stale, whose outside confidences teach
His fellow-philistines to dogmatise,
Till vulgar scoffers even invade the skies—
Turn, poet! lift thy foot against his breech.
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