登陆注册
6256900000042

第42章

All the greatness of the man comes out decisively here. It is unexampled, I think, that calm creative perspicacity of Shakspeare. The thing he looks at reveals not this or that face of it, but its inmost heart, and generic secret: it dissolves itself as in light before him, so that he discerns the perfect structure of it. Creative, we said: poetic creation, what is this too but _seeing_ the thing sufficiently? The _word_ that will describe the thing, follows of itself from such clear intense sight of the thing. And is not Shakspeare's _morality_, his valor, candor, tolerance, truthfulness; his whole victorious strength and greatness, which can triumph over such obstructions, visible there too? Great as the world. No _twisted_, poor convex-concave mirror, reflecting all objects with its own convexities and concavities; a perfectly _level_ mirror;--that is to say withal, if we will understand it, a man justly related to all things and men, a good man. It is truly a lordly spectacle how this great soul takes in all kinds of men and objects, a Falstaff, an Othello, a Juliet, a Coriolanus; sets them all forth to us in their round completeness; loving, just, the equal brother of all. _Novum Organum_, and all the intellect you will find in Bacon, is of a quite secondary order; earthy, material, poor in comparison with this. Among modern men, one finds, in strictness, almost nothing of the same rank. Goethe alone, since the days of Shakspeare, reminds me of it. Of him too you say that he _saw_ the object;you may say what he himself says of Shakspeare: "His characters are like watches with dial-plates of transparent crystal; they show you the hour like others, and the inward mechanism also is all visible."The seeing eye! It is this that discloses the inner harmony of things;what Nature meant, what musical idea Nature has wrapped up in these often rough embodiments. Something she did mean. To the seeing eye that something were discernible. Are they base, miserable things? You can laugh over them, you can weep over them; you can in some way or other genially relate yourself to them;--you can, at lowest, hold your peace about them, turn away your own and others' face from them, till the hour come for practically exterminating and extinguishing them! At bottom, it is the Poet's first gift, as it is all men's, that he have intellect enough. He will be a Poet if he have: a Poet in word; or failing that, perhaps still better, a Poet in act. Whether he write at all; and if so, whether in prose or in verse, will depend on accidents: who knows on what extremely trivial accidents,--perhaps on his having had a singing-master, on his being taught to sing in his boyhood! But the faculty which enables him to discern the inner heart of things, and the harmony that dwells there (for whatsoever exists has a harmony in the heart of it, or it would not hold together and exist), is not the result of habits or accidents, but the gift of Nature herself; the primary outfit for a Heroic Man in what sort soever. To the Poet, as to every other, we say first of all, _See_. If you cannot do that, it is of no use to keep stringing rhymes together, jingling sensibilities against each other, and _name_ yourself a Poet;there is no hope for you. If you can, there is, in prose or verse, in action or speculation, all manner of hope. The crabbed old Schoolmaster used to ask, when they brought him a new pupil, "But are ye sure he's _not a dunce_?" Why, really one might ask the same thing, in regard to every man proposed for whatsoever function; and consider it as the one inquiry needful: Are ye sure he's not a dunce? There is, in this world, no other entirely fatal person.

For, in fact, I say the degree of vision that dwells in a man is a correct measure of the man. If called to define Shakspeare's faculty, I should say superiority of Intellect, and think I had included all under that. What indeed are faculties? We talk of faculties as if they were distinct, things separable; as if a man had intellect, imagination, fancy, &c., as he has hands, feet and arms. That is a capital error. Then again, we hear of a man's "intellectual nature," and of his "moral nature," as if these again were divisible, and existed apart. Necessities of language do perhaps prescribe such forms of utterance; we must speak, I am aware, in that way, if we are to speak at all. But words ought not to harden into things for us. It seems to me, our apprehension of this matter is, for most part, radically falsified thereby. We ought to know withal, and to keep forever in mind, that these divisions are at bottom but _names_; that man's spiritual nature, the vital Force which dwells in him, is essentially one and indivisible; that what we call imagination, fancy, understanding, and so forth, are but different figures of the same Power of Insight, all indissolubly connected with each other, physiognomically related; that if we knew one of them, we might know all of them. Morality itself, what we call the moral quality of a man, what is this but another _side_ of the one vital Force whereby he is and works? All that a man does is physiognomical of him. You may see how a man would fight, by the way in which he sings;his courage, or want of courage, is visible in the word he utters, in the opinion he has formed, no less than in the stroke he strikes. He is _one_;and preaches the same Self abroad in all these ways.

同类推荐
热门推荐
  • 倾尽一世只为寻你

    倾尽一世只为寻你

    为了前世的誓言,我选择今生无怨无悔;为了今生的重逢,我放弃来生的欢聚。爱没有来生,那只是美丽的传说,爱,只在今生今世。把握住今天的美好,才能与你共度来生的喜悦。多少次望而却步,只在犹豫是否同你共享欢乐的痛楚;多少次风尘仆仆,只为能赶得上你的脚步。流着泪,期待我的幸福……
  • 逆天小姐掌天下

    逆天小姐掌天下

    前世的云舒只有复仇是她活着的唯一支撑,没想到再活一世,仇人依旧是那个仇人,但是云舒已不是那个云舒。好友废我气海?家族养子狼心狗肺?待到重新归来之时,左手灵器,右手灵丹,御妖兽,伏九霄。曾经跌落凡尘的天才少女再次强势回归。欠我的,定会千倍万倍的讨回来!
  • 迎接晨曦最美的时光

    迎接晨曦最美的时光

    我——单shàn纯,我有个对我很好的姐姐——周雨,我有个很好的朋友——朴雨落,我有个哥哥——单晨,我有个弟弟——单豐。
  • 重生之逆天改命YTH

    重生之逆天改命YTH

    遭人陷害,父母惨死,为寻求真相走上了一条不归路!重生归来,且看这一世能否逆天改命!
  • 最后我的生活

    最后我的生活

    用回忆来创造故事。这部算是随记吧,把想到的东西写一下,开始,会用个故事拉开序幕
  • 惠眼的日志

    惠眼的日志

    本人有着写作的爱好,但是文笔不好,发表过几部小说,但是都中途而废了,对自己的信心打击挺大的,其实百万作家中,真正能成为大神的有多少,以前是我想多了,一心想要成为大神,所谓希望越大,失望就越大。现在不一样了,我现在写东西完全就是爱好,喜爱而已,不求功成名立,只求随心所欲,没有太多的想法,就没有太多的压力。想想自己都活了22年了,却没有留下什么美好的记忆,所以这一部日志将会写我对人生的感悟,随笔而落罢了,我写的东西也会随心而写。还有我以前的笔名叫娘爷,这笔名跟了我五六年了,其实挺不舍的,但是现在我改成了惠眼,因为人都会长大的嘛?
  • 天行

    天行

    号称“北辰骑神”的天才玩家以自创的“牧马冲锋流”战术击败了国服第一弓手北冥雪,被誉为天纵战榜第一骑士的他,却受到小人排挤,最终离开了效力已久的银狐俱乐部。是沉沦,还是再次崛起?恰逢其时,月恒集团第四款游戏“天行”正式上线,虚拟世界再起风云!
  • 墨帝独宠之至尊大小姐

    墨帝独宠之至尊大小姐

    君璃陌,二十一世纪的“无冕之王”,遭受背叛掉入异世。她,绝色清冷、腹黑狠辣,当她降临异世,又会掀起怎样的腥风血雨。寻父母,这是她唯一想做的。这条路注定是艰难的、孤独的,可她作为一个杀手,一颗心已经麻木了。以至于让那个男人生命垂危之际,她才发现自己对他早已有了感情。墨清绝,极域帝尊,强大、孤傲、冷酷。可当他遇到那个清冷的少女,他知道他沦陷了。于是开始了他的追妻之路,这条路注定是漫长的,但他不在乎,如果能得到她,让他付出一切都行。[甜宠][1v1][男强女强]
  • 九曲神图之郡主归来

    九曲神图之郡主归来

    重生太子遗孤,开始了保护至亲的皇权争斗,本是青梅竹马的未婚夫君,一朝战死后,改头换面成了帝师,而且还入了敌人阵营,是相爱相杀。还是互相帮助?得九曲神图得天下,是真是假?当重生女遇上穿越男,谁强谁弱?
  • 天行

    天行

    号称“北辰骑神”的天才玩家以自创的“牧马冲锋流”战术击败了国服第一弓手北冥雪,被誉为天纵战榜第一骑士的他,却受到小人排挤,最终离开了效力已久的银狐俱乐部。是沉沦,还是再次崛起?恰逢其时,月恒集团第四款游戏“天行”正式上线,虚拟世界再起风云!