{"id":46,"date":"2013-07-13T01:25:32","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:25:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=46"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:25:32","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:25:32","slug":"15-the-sources-of-poetry-vol-03-the-harmony-of-virtue-volume-03","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/03-the-harmony-of-virtue-volume-03\/15-the-sources-of-poetry-vol-03-the-harmony-of-virtue-volume-03","title":{"rendered":"-15_The Sources of Poetry.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n

\nSECTION THREE<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\nTHE SOURCES OF POETRY<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\nAND OTHER ESSAYS<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nThe Sources of Poetry<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nTHE <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/b>swiftness of the muse has been embodied in the image of Pegasus, the heavenly horse of Greek
\nlegend; it was from the rapid beat of his hoofs on the rock that
\nHippocrene flowed. The waters of Poetry flow in a current or a
\ntorrent; where there is a pause or a denial, it is a sign of obstruction in the stream or of imperfection in the mind which the waters
\nhave chosen for their bed and continent. In India we have the
\nsame idea; Saraswati is for us the goddess of poetry, and her
\nname means the stream or "she who has flowing motion". But
\neven Saraswati is only an intermediary. Ganga is the real
\nmother of inspiration, she who flows impetuously down from the
\nhead of Mahadev, God high-seated, over the Himalaya of the
\nmind to the homes and cities of men. All poetry is an inspiration,
\na thing breathed into the thinking organ from above; it is recorded
\nin the mind, but is born in the higher principle of direct knowledge or ideal vision which surpasses mind. It is in reality a revelation. The prophetic or revealing power sees the substance; the
\ninspiration perceives the right expression. Neither is manufactured; nor is poetry really a poiesis or composition, nor even a
\ncreation, but rather the revelation of something that eternally
\nexists. The ancients knew this truth and used the same word
\nfor poet and prophet, creator and seer, sophos<\/i>, vates<\/i>, kavi<\/i>. <\/i><\/font><\/p>\n

\nBut there are differences in the manifestation. The greatest
\nmotion of poetry comes when the mind is still and the ideal principle works above and outside the brain, above even the hundred-petalled lotus of the ideal mind, in its proper empire, for then it is
\nVeda that is revealed, the perfect substance and expression of
\neternal truth. The higher ideation transcends genius just as
\ngenius transcends ordinary intellect and perception. But that
\ngreat faculty is still beyond the normal level of our evolution. Usually we see
\nthe action of the revelation and inspiration reproduced by a secondary, diluted and uncertain process in the mind.
\nBut even this secondary and inferior action is so great that it can<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

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\n

\ngive us Shakespeare, Homer and Valmeki. There is also a tertiary and yet more common action of the inspiration. For of our
\nthree mental instruments of knowledge, \u2014 the heart or emotionally realising mind, the observing and reasoning intellect with its
\naids, fancy and memory, and the intuitive intellect, \u2014 it is into
\nthe last and highest that the ideal principle transmits its inspirations when the greatest poetry writes itself out through the
\nmedium of the poet. But if the intuitive intellect is not strong
\nenough to act habitually, it is better for the poetry to descend
\ninto the heart and return to the intellect suffused and coloured
\nwith passion and emotion than to be formed directly in the
\nobserving intellect.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPoetry written from the reasoning intellect is apt to be full
\nof ingenious conceits, logic, argumentation, rhetorical turns,
\nornamental fancies, echoes learned and imitative rather than uplifted and transformed. This is what is sometimes called classical
\npoetry, the vigorous and excellent but unemotional and unuplifted poetry of Pope and Dryden. It has its inspiration, its truth
\nand value; it is admirable in its way, but it is only great when it
\nis lifted out of itself into intuitive writing or else invaded by the
\nheart. For everything that needs fire rather than Light, driving-force rather than clearness, enthusiasm rather than correctness,
\nthe heart is obviously the more potent instrument. Now, poetry
\nto be great must have either enthusiasm or ecstasy.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nYet the poetry that rises up from the heart is usually a turbid stream; our own restless ideas and imaginations mix with
\nthe pure inrush from above, and turbulent uprush from below,
\nour excited emotions seek an exaggerated expression, our aesthetic habits and predilections busy themselves to demand a satisfaction greatly beyond their due. Such poetry may be inspired,
\nbut it is not always suitable or inevitable. There is often a double
\ninspiration, the higher or ecstatic and the lower or emotional,
\nand the lower disturbs and drags down the higher. This is the
\nbirth of romantic or excessively exuberant poetry, too rich in expression, too abundant and redundant in substance. The best
\npoetry coming straight from the right centres may be bare and
\nstrong, unadorned and lofty, or it may be rich and splendid; it
\nmay be at will romantic or classical; but it will always be felt<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

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\n

\nto be the right thing for its purpose; it is
\nalways nobly or rapturously inevitable.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nBut even in the higher centres of the intuitive intellect there
\nmay be defects in the inspiration. There is a kind of false fluency which misses
\nthe true language of poetry from dullness of perception. Under the impression
\nthat it is true and inspired writing it flows with an imperturbable flatness, saying the thing that
\nshould be said but not in the way that it should be said, without
\nforce and felicity. This is the tamasic or clouded stimulus, active,
\nbut full of unenlightenment and self-ignorance. The thing seen
\nis right and good; accompanied with the inspired expression it
\nwould make very noble poetry. Instead, it becomes prose rendered unnatural and difficult to tolerate by being cut up into
\nlengths. Wordsworth is the most characteristic and interesting
\nvictim of tamasic stimulus. Other great poets fall a prey to it,
\nbut that superb and imperturbable self-satisfaction under the
\ninfliction is his alone. There is another species of tamasic stimulus which transmits an inspired and faultless expression, but the
\nsubstance is neither interesting to man nor pleasing to the gods.
\nA good deal of Milton comes under this category. In both cases
\nwhat has happened is that either the inspiration or the revelation
\nhas been active, but its companion activity has refused to
\nassociate itself in the work.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nIt is when the mind works at the form and substance of
\npoetry without either the revelation or the inspiration from above
\nthat respectable or minor poetry is produced. Judgment, memory
\nand imagination may work, command of language may be there,
\nbut without that secondary action of a higher than intellectual
\nforce, it is labour wasted, work that earns respect but not immortality. Doggerel and bastard poetry take their rise not even in
\nthe observing intellect but from the sensational mind or the
\npassive memory guided only by the mere physical pleasure
\nof sound and emotion. It is bold, blatant, external, imitative,
\nvulgar; its range of intellectuality and imaginativeness cannot
\ngo beyond the vital impulse and the vital delight. But even 
\nin the sensational mind there is the possibility of a remote
\naction from the ideal self; for even to the animals who
\nthink sensationally only, God has given revelations and<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 107<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\ninspirations which we call instincts. Under such circumstances
\neven bastard poetry may have a kind of worth, a kind of inevitatability. The poet in the sensational man may be entirely satisfied
\nand delighted, and even in the more developed human being the
\nsensational element may find a poetical satisfaction not of the
\nhighest. The best ballad poetry and Macaulay’s lays are instances
\nin point. Scott is a sort of link between sensational and intellectual poetry. While there are men mainly sensational, secondarily
\nintellectual and not at all ideal, he will always be admired.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nAnother kind of false inspiration is the rajasic or fiery stimulus. It is not flat and unprofitable like the tamasic, but hasty,
\nimpatient and vain. It is eager to avoid labour by catching
\nat the second best expression or the incomplete vision of the
\nidea, insufficiently jealous to secure the best form, the most
\nsatisfying substance. Rajasic poets, even when they feel the
\ndefect in what they have written, hesitate to sacrifice it because
\nthey also feel and are attached either to what in it is valuable or
\nto the memory of their delight when it was first written. If they
\nget a better expression or a fuller sight, they often prefer to reiterate rather than strike out inferior stuff with which they are in
\nlove. Sometimes, drifting or struggling helplessly along that
\nshallow and vehement current, they vary one idea or harp on the
\nsame imagination without any final success in expressing it
\ninevitably. Examples of the rajasic stimulus are commonest in
\nShelley and Spenser, but few English poets are free from it. This
\nis the rajasic fault in expression. But the fiery stimulus also
\nperverts or hampers the substance. An absence of self-restraint,
\nan unwillingness to restrict and limit the ideas and imaginations
\nis a sure sign of a rajasic ideality. There is an attempt to exhaust
\nall the possibilities of the subject, to expand and multiply
\nthoughts and imaginative visions beyond the bounds of the right and permissible.
\nOr else the true idea is rejected or fatally anticipated by another which is or seems to be more catching and
\nboldly effective. Keats is the principal exemplar of the first
\ntendency, the Elizabethans of the second. The earlier work of
\nShakespeare abounds with classical instances. As distinguished
\nfrom the Greek, English is pronouncedly rajasic literature and,
\nthough there is much in it that is more splendid than almost any-<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 108<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nthing done by the Greeks, \u2014 more splendid, not better, \u2014 a
\ngreat deal even of its admired portions are rather rich or meretricious than great and true.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nThe perfect inspiration in the intuitive intellect is the sattwic
\nor luminous inspiration, which is disinterested, self-contained,
\nyet at will noble, rich or vigorous, having its eye only on the right
\nthing to be said and the right way to say it. It does not allow
\nits perfection to be interfered with by emotion or eagerness but
\nthis does not shut it out from ecstasy and exaltation. On the
\ncontrary, its delight of self-enjoyment is a purer and more exquisite enthusiasm than that which attends any other inspiration.
\nIt commands and uses emotion without enslaving itself to it.
\nThere is indeed a sattwic stimulus which is attached to its own
\nluminosity, limpidity and steadiness, and avoids richness, force
\nor emotion of a poignant character even when these are needed
\nand appropriate. The poetry of Matthew Arnold is often though
\nnot always of this character. But this is a limited inspiration.
\nSattwic as well as rajasic poetry may be written from the uninspired intellect, but the sensational mind never gives birth to
\nsattwic poetry.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nOne thing has to be added. A poet need not be a reflective
\ncritic; he need not have the reasoning and analysing intellect
\nand dissect his own poetry. But two things he must have in some
\nmeasure to be perfect, the intuitive judgment which shows him at a glance whether he has got the best or the second-best idea,
\nthe perfect or the imperfect expression and rhythm, and the
\nintuitive reason which shows him without analysis why or wherein it is best or second-best, perfect or imperfect. These four faculties, revelation or prophecy, inspiration, intuitive judgment and
\nintuitive reason, are the perfect equipment of genius doing the
\nworks of interpretative and creative knowledge.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 109<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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