collection of true poetry which may justly be esteemed classic and unimpeachable. But it may be observed here that all the poets of this school, though their name be legion, write very much alike. They are generally affected, and often nasty. “All that regards design, form, fable (which is the soul of poetry), all that concerns exactness or consent of parts (which is the body), will probably be wanting: only pretty conceptions, fine metaphors, glittering expressions, and something of a neat cast of verse (which are properly the dress, gems, or loose ornaments of poetry), may be found in their verses. Their colouring entertains the sight, but the lines and life are not to be inspected too narrowly.” Such is Pope’s criticism on Crashaw, and it will apply to any one of the school, certainly to Mr. Swinburne or Mr. Rossetti.
It need cause no wonder that verse-writers of this sort find admirers in proportion to their shallowness and affectation. This has been the case from the beginning, and it is the case now. The poems and plays of the egregious Cartwright, published in 1651, are preceded by panegyrics from all the wits of the time, no less than fifty in number, quite in the style of the Fleshly School and its Critics. Donne was the pride of collegians. Cowley was actually considered the glory and the wonder of his generation. Nowadays the anonymous press is a tremendous check on this sort of humbug, but there still linger old-fashioned journals with strings in the hands of a clique.[1] It is the interest of educated persons and schoolmen to exalt all artificial products, for they themselves can fairly hope to rival the stuff they praise and to get some sort of a position. If hothouse plants are in
