46 JOURNAL AND PR0CH:KDINGS. 



THE FUNCTION OF POETRY. 



READ BEFORE THE HAMILTON ASSOCIATION. 



BY F. F. MACPHERSON, B. A. 



In undertaking to write a paper on "The Function of Poetry," 

 I do not expect to give expression to any novel views on poetry, 

 because, in the whole domain of literary criticism, there is no subject 

 that has received more attention at the hands of writers of all 

 degrees of attainments and of the greatest diversity of opinion. 

 My aim is only to recall to you one of the most important and least 

 understood departments of literature. It behooves us especially to 

 interest ourselves in poetry now, because there is a danger, for 

 reasons that will appear later, of poetry losing its hold temporarily 

 on the public. 



The first question that confronts us is — what is poetry ? To 

 this question one might give almost a score of answers, from Aristotle 

 of ancient Greece to Stedman of the New World. There is no one 

 definition, however, of all that are before us which satisfies us, in 

 which we can see the principles that are found in the several kinds 

 of poetry, simply because there is one, the greatest, principle which 

 defies definition. But to a person of literary taste, who has cultivated 

 that taste in the manner described by Ruskin, it is not so difficult to 

 tell whether a certain poem possesses poetic excellence, though it 

 would be more difficult to explain minutely the points in which such 

 excellence dwells. There are, however, certain requisites to poetry 

 which will bear discussion and exposition without injuring our 

 appreciation. 



In fact it is entirely unnecessary to be able to criticise a poem 

 in a technical way in order to appreciate it ; on the contrary, if one 

 has the proper spirit to comprehend the poet, a descent to technical- 

 ities may injure the purity of the feeling. The lines of Byron on the 

 beauty of Venus de' Medici are apt in this connection : 



