Friday, December 13, 2013
He Lives in the Days that are Past
Thomas Love Peacock (1785-1866), "The Four Ages of Poetry," Works, Vol. III (London: Richard Bentley and Son, 1875), pp. 324-338 (at 335):
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A poet in our times is a semi-barbarian in a civilized community. He lives in the days that are past. His ideas, thoughts, feelings, associations, are all with barbarous manners, obsolete customs, and exploded superstitions. The march of his intellect is like that of a crab, backward. The brighter the light diffused around him by the progress of reason, the thicker is the darkness of antiquated barbarism, in which he buries himself like a mole, to throw up the barren hillocks of his Cimmerian labours.
