Library / Literature & Fiction
Mazelli, and Other Poems
- Pages
- about 90
- Category
- Literature & Fiction
- Language
- English
- Reading time
- 1.6 h at 250 wpm
From the opening
Under this head, I desire to say a few words upon three subjects,
--my friends, my book, and myself.
My friends, though not legion in number, have been, in their
efforts in my behalf, disinterested, sincere, and energetic.
My book: I lay it, as my first offering, at the shrine of my
country's fame. "Would it were worthier." While our soldiers
are first in every field where they meet our enemies, and while
the wisdom of our legislators is justified before all the world,
in the perfection of our beloved institutions, our literature
languishes. This should not be so; for literature, with its
kindred arts, makes the true glory of a nation. We bow in spirit
when Greece is named, not alone because she was the mother of
heroes and lawgivers, but because her hand rocked the cradle of
a literature as enduring as it is beautiful and brilliant, and
cherished in their infancy those arts which eventually repaid her
nursing care in a rich harvest of immortal renown.
For myself I have little to say. I have not written for fame, and
if my life had been a happy one I should never have written at all.
As it was, I early came to drink of the bitter cup; and sorrow,
whilst it cuts us off from the outer, drives us back upon the inner
world;--and then the unquiet demon of ceaseless thought is roused,
and the brain becomes "a whirling gulf of phantasy and flame," and
we rave and--write! Yes, write! And men read and talk about genius,
and, God help them! Often envy its unhappy possessors the fatal gift
which lies upon heart and brain like molten lead! Of all who have
gained eminence among men as poets, how few are there of whom it may
not be justly said, "They have come up through much tribulation."
A short sample. Read the whole book
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