Edgar Allan Poe: His Life, Letters, and Opinions — John H. Ingram, 1880, volume II — reading text

solely from the spirit of the perverse. “We perpetrate them merely because we feel that we should not. Beyond or behind this there is no intelligible principle; and we might indeed deem this perverseness a direct instigation of the arch-fiend, were it not occasionally known to operate in furtherance of good.” Thoughts and investigations like these are not the stock of a conventional writer; even if they be not original discovery, they are the result of personal research, and are handled with a power, and clearness, and fascination, that no attempt at depreciation can dissever from true genius. In August, Poe published in the American Review a crucial examination of certain native dramatic works, under the title of “The American Drama.” The poet advances some very strong arguments to prove the fallacy of the often made assertion that “the Drama has declined;” but if the specimens of contemporary native art he proceeds thereupon to criticise might be deemed a fair sample of the efforts of To-day, it would have to be confessed that, in this instance, the vox populi is in the right. The article affords occasion for adducing some very pungent and forcible reasoning. “The great opponent to Progress is Conservatism,” says the poet, “in other words — the great adversary of Invention is Imitation: the propositions are in spirit identical. Just as an art is imitative, it is stationary. The most imitative arts are the most prone to repose — and the converse.” In this and the following month, a series of “Marginal Notes,” in continuation of the “Marginalia” of the Democratic Review, were issued in the Lady’s Book. They vary in value, but embody in a condensed and pithy manner many of Poe’s idiosyncratic ideas. Some of the sayings, indeed, as in the following sentences, are of real autobiographic application: — “So vitally important is this last (i.e., industry), that it may well be doubted if anything to which we have been accustomed to give the title of ‘a work of genius’ was ever accomplished without it; and it is chiefly because this quality and genius are nearly incompatible, that ‘works of genius’ are few, while mere men of genius are, as I say, abundant.” But although, as Poe points out, industry must combine with genius to produce a chef-d‘œuvre, he is very careful to warn his readers against the ancient error that industry itself is genius. The Broadway Journal during these two months manifested numerous proofs of its editor’s industry, and no lack of his genius. In a running commentary, evidently written in great haste, on Thomas Hood’s works, he took occasion to express his admiration of many of that poet’s exquisite lyrics, restraining, however, his enthusiasm until he came to “The Haunted House,” which struck kindred fire from him; calling forth the remark, that had Hood written nothing else, “it would have sufficed to render him immortal.” Many critiques of books and authors — native and foreign — and all more or less marked by his distinguishing traits of thought, appeared in the weekly columns of the Journal. On the 16th August “Lenore,” a most musical chaunt, founded upon its author’s juvenile poem of “The Paean,” was published, and in the following number the weird story of “The Tell-Tale Heart.” This tale well deserves to rank amid Poe’s best works, not only on account of its able construction, and masterly delineation of a homicidal monomania, but because it embodies within its few short pages some of those hitherto undescribed, but universally experienced, “touches of nature” which make the whole world kin. How true — terribly true — is the description of the old man’s agony, while he is listening in the silent night for the uplifting of the door-latch, and seeks, but vainly, to persuade himself that his fears are groundless; whilst he says to himself, “It is nothing but the wind in the chimney It is only a mouse crossing the floor;” or, “It is merely a cricket which has made a single chirp.” There is more of real horror in the hints of such a narration, than in all the imaginary bloodshed with which tragedy has drenched the stage. The same issue of the Journal contained an editorial note defending the editor against an allegation by a contemporary, anent “The American Drama” critique, that he, Poe, could never find anything to admire in Longfellow’s writings. “Now this is doing us the grossest injustice,” says Poe, for “from Mr. Longfellow’s first appearance in the literary world until the present moment, we have been, if not his warmest admirer and most steadfast defender, at least one of his warmest and most steadfast. We even so far committed ourselves, in a late public lecture, as to place him at the very head of American poets. Yet, because upon several occasions we have thought proper to demonstrate the sins, while displaying the virtues, of Professor Longfellow, is it just or proper, or even courteous, on the part of The Gazette, to accuse us, in round terms, of uncompromising hostility, to this poet?” Poe had made too many enemies not to find these anonymous insinuations and misrepresentations of daily occurrence, and it is a somewhat pitiable sight to see him stooping, although often unavoidably, to defend himself against such scurrilities. One of these charges was somewhat amusingly put, and noticed in the Broadway in a not unfriendly manner. The jeu d‘esprit may be cited here, by way of contrast to the generally but too dark shades in the story, of the “Raven,” as his friends liked to style the poet: — “The Rev. Arthur Coxe’s ’Saul, a Mystery,’ having been condemned in no measured terms by Poe of the Broadway Journal, and Green of the Emporium, a writer in the — Hartford Columbian retorts as follows: An entertaining history, Entitled ’Saul, a Mystery,’ Has recently been published by the Reverend Arthur Coxe. The poem is dramatic, And the wit of it is Attic, And its teachings are emphatic of the doctrines orthodox. But Mr. Poe, the poet, Declares he cannot go it — That the book is very stupid — or something of that sort; And Green, of The Empori- Um, tells a kindred story, And swears like any Tory that it isn’t worth a groat. But maugre all the croaking Of the ‘Raven,’ and the joking Of the verdant little fellow of the used-to-be review, THE PEOPLE, in derision Of their impudent decision, Have declared, without division, that the ‘Mystery will do.’ “The truth, of course, rather injures an epigram than otherwise; and nobody will think the worse of the one above when we say that we have expressed no opinion whatever of ’Saul’ “Give a dog a bad name,’ &c. Whenever a book is abused, it is taken for granted that it is we who have been abusing it. Mr. Coxe has written some very beautiful poems, and ’Soul’ may be one of them for anything that we know to the contrary.” Other noteworthy things by Poe, which appeared in the Journal during the two months referred to, were a laudatory review of Mrs. Oakes Smith’s “Poems;” a trenchant critique on “Christopher North,” and an analysis of his critical powers; a defence of Machiavelli spoken of as “a man of profound thought, of great sagacity, of indomitable will, and unrivalled during his time, if not in knowledge of the human, at least in knowledge of the Italian, heart;” — new remarks on “Leigh Hunt,” “Festus,” and the effects of travel on literary wares. With respect to this last item, “it is astonishing to see how a magazine article,” said the poet, “like a traveller, spruces up after crossing the sea. We ourselves have had the honour of being pirated without mercy — but as we found our articles improved by the process (at least in the opinion of our countrymen), we said nothing, as a matter of course. We have written paper after paper which attracted no notice at all until it appeared as original in Bentley’s Miscellany or the Paris Charivari. The Boston Notion* once abused us very lustily for having written ‘The House of Usher.’ Not long afterwards Bentley published it anonymously, as original with itself, whereupon the Notion,: having forgotten that we wrote it, not only lauded it ad nauseam, but copied it in toto.” Charles Lamb next comes under the poet’s critical notice, on account of his “Essays of Elia,” and he is, opined Poe, the most original of all the British essayists.” Of all original men, too, Lamb,” said his reviewer, “has the fewest demerits. Of gross faults he has none at all. His merest extravagances have about them a symmetry which entitles them to critical respect. And his innumerable good qualities who shall attempt to depict?” But literary squabbles still occupied a large portion of the poet’s time and his journal — the literary world was too much with him, either for his comfort or reputation. A certain Mr. Jones now excited his wrath by his [published] opinions on “American Humour,” or rather his attacks on authors he deemed deficient of that element. “The French,” said this Mr. Jones, “have no humour;” to which Poe retorted, “Let him pray Heaven that in Hades he fall not into the clutches of Moliere, of Rabelais, of Voltaire?” and forthwith proceeded to administer a severe castigation to the offending journalist. The following week the skirmishing was resumed, but nothing very desperate appears to have taken place in this case; although a regular hornet’s nest, of pilferers were stirred up by an exposure, in the same number, of their plagiarisms. From these miserable petty matters it is pleasant to pass to some truly noble thoughts on Milton, aroused by the publication of his “Prose Works,” the language of which, said the American poet, after due allowance has been made for the time in which they were written, “no man has ever surpassed, if, indeed, any man has ever equalled, in purity, in force, in copiousness, in majesty, or, in what may be termed, without the least exaggeration, a gorgeous magnificence of style.” In the course of this’ article occasion was taken to defend Bacon from the accusation of being “the meanest of mankind.” “We would undertake to show à priori,” said Poe, “that no man, with Bacon’s thorough appreciation of the true and beautiful, could, by any possibility, be ‘the meanest,’ although his very sensibility might make him the weakest ‘of mankind.’ ” Week after week this work of reviewing books, authors, drama, and fine arts, and attacking or defending people and opinions, went on with more or less skill, as if the poet were aided by some hundredhanded demon. Much parade was made in editorial notes of the literary help received from well-known littérateurs, but, beyond a few verses, little was contributed by any of the persons named. In the last week of October Poe became proprietor as well as editor of the Journal, and inaugurated his assumption of the sole control of the publication by the commencement of an absurd disputation with some Boston newspapers. This petty but lengthy journalistic warfare arose thus: In consequence of the furor excited by the lecture the poet gave in New York, in the early part of the year, he was invited to Boston to deliver a poem in the Lyceum of that city. It is stated that the lecture — course of this institution was waning in popularity, and that Poe’s fame being at its zenith, he was invited as a great attraction for the opening of the winter session. Unfortunately the poet accepted the invitation, having the intention, his earliest biographer avers, of writing an original poem for the occasion, upon a subject which had haunted his imagination for years, but his manifold cares and anxieties prevented the accomplishment of the purpose — if such he had — and he contented himself with the recitation of his juvenile poem of “Al Aaraaf.” “I remember him well, as he came on the platform,” says one who was present. “He was the best realisation of a poet in feature, air, and manner, that I had ever seen, and the unusual paleness of his face added to its aspect of melancholy interest. He delivered a poem that