Arnold's view of emerson and carlyle 153 



He would get rid of the bulk, the mass, and save 

 the poetry; get rid of the concrete and catch the 

 ideal ; in other words, turn your mountain of carbon 

 into diamonds. 



As a rule, the qualities we miss from his verse 

 he did not aim to put there; he did not himself 

 value them in poetry. He knew the classic models 

 were not for him. He valued only the memorable 

 passages, the lightning strokes of genius, the line 

 that 



"Overleapt the horizon's edge," 

 and 



" Searched with Apollo's privilege." 



He hung his verses in the wind : — 



" All were winnowed through and through, 

 Five lines lasted sound and true ; 

 Five were smelted in a pot 

 Thau the South more fierce and hot; 

 These the siroc could not melt, 

 Fire their fiercer flaming felt, 

 And the meaning was more white 

 Than July's meridian light. 

 Sunshine cannot bleach the snow, 

 Nor time unmake what poets know. 

 Have you eyes to find the five 

 Which five hundred did survive ?" 



This was Emerson's method, — not to write a 

 perfect poem, a poem that should be an inevitable 

 whole, as Arnold would have him, but to write the 

 perfect line, to set the imagination ablaze with a 

 single verse, leaving the effects of form, of propor- 

 tion, to be achieved by those who were equipped 

 for it. His poetry is undoubtedly best when it is 

 most concrete, as in the "Humble-Bee," "Rhodora," 



