But it should be noted
in each case how free is the poet's view from any idealization of
the poorer classes as such, from the ascription of imaginary merits
to an unknown populace which forms the staple of so much
revolutionary eloquence. These poems, while they form the most
convincing rebuke to the exclusive pride of the rich and great, are
also a stern and strenuous incentive to the obscure and lowly. They
are pictures of the poor man's life as it is,--pictures as free as
Crabbe's from the illusion of sentiment,--but in which the delight
of mere observation (which in Crabbe predominates) is subordinated
to an intense sympathy with all such capacities of nobleness and
tenderness as are called out by the stress and pressure of penury or
woe. They form for the folk of northern England (as the works of
Burns and Scott for the Scottish folk) a gallery of figures that are
modelled, as it were, both from without and from within; by one with
experience so personal as to keep every sentence vividly accurate,
and yet with an insight which could draw from that simple life
lessons to itself unknown. We may almost venture to generalize our
statement further, and to assert that no writer since Shakespeare
has left us so true a picture of the British nation.
Pages:
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206