"Who has traced," says Cousin, "the
plan of this poem? Reason. Who has given it life and charm? Love. And who
has guided reason and love? The Will."
"All men have some imagination, but
The Lover and the Poet
Are of imagination all compact.
* * * * *
"The Poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling,
Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven,
And as imagination bodies forth
The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen
Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name." [8]
Poetry is the fruit of genius; but it cannot be produced without labor.
Moore, one of the airiest of poets, tells us that he was a slow and
painstaking workman.
The works of our greatest Poets are all episodes in that one great poem
which the genius of man has created since the commencement of human
history.
A distinguished mathematician is said once to have inquired what was
proved by Milton in his _Paradise Lost_; and there are no doubt still some
who ask themselves, even if they shrink from putting the question to
others, whether Poetry is of any use, just as if to give pleasure were not
useful in itself.
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