THE ART-PRINCIPLE IN POETRY 185 



same ; that the ideal law of Nature — the predes- 

 tined end toward which Nature moves by force of 

 its immanent idea — is identical with that revealed 

 in the human imagination as the ideal of man ; that 

 the criterion of imagination, as distinguished from 

 fancy, is this conformity with the profound law of 

 Nature — this holding fast to the sobriety of the 

 actual, and pursuing the lines of its ideal-real, as 

 projected according to rational thought. Such writ- 

 ings as show this healthy and prophetic imagination 

 are genuine poems ; such as lack it are not. 



These last, no doubt, may afford a transient 

 pleasure to minds dominated by passion and impulse; 

 such minds are always seeking for some intense 

 experience that will satisfy the craving for novelty 

 and change, and so they fall naturally under bondage 

 to the glittering but capricious illusions of fancy. 

 But writings of this order will have no place in the 

 abiding judgment of man : they cannot endure the 

 test of time. It is thoroughly true that it is not only 

 the quality but the test of a real poem, that, like 

 every other work of genuine art, it possesses a per- 

 petually tjicreasiiig ifiterest ; and this, not only for 

 the individual reader, but for historic mankind, as 

 culture advances in successive generations and from 

 age to age. Indeed, we may carry this test even 

 farther than Professor Le Conte has done, and not 

 only say that great works of art, and therefore great 



