There are, of course, many objections to
what I say: Milton is a great example of the contrary, but his opinion
with respect to the Paradise Regained is by no means fairly
ascertained. By what trivial circumstances men are often led to assert
what they do not really believe! Perhaps an inadvertent world has
descended to posterity. But, in fact, the Paradise Regained is little,
if at all inferior to the Paradise Lost and is only supposed so to
be because men do not like epics, whatever they may say to the
contrary, and reading those of Milton in their natural order, are
too much wearied with the first to derive any pleasure from the
second.
I dare say Milton preferred Comos to either- if so- justly....
As I am speaking of poetry, it will not be amiss to touch slightly
upon the most singular heresy in its modern history- the heresy of
what is called, very foolishly, the Lake School. Some years ago I
might have been induced, by an occasion like the present, to attempt a
formal refutation of their doctrine; at present it would be a work
of supererogation. The wise must bow to the wisdom of such men as
Coleridge and Southey, but being wise, have laughed at poetical
theories so prosaically exemplified.
Aristotle, with singular assurance, has declared poetry the most
philosophical of all writings- but it required a Wordsworth to
pronounce it the most metaphysical.
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