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Untitled Article
dent of an heroic age , produced in the Iliad an heroic epfck ; thus , the consolidation of the most superb of empires , produced in the iEneid a political epick ; the revival of learning , and the birth of vernacular genius , presented us , in the Divine Comedy , with a national epick ; and the reformation and its consequences called from the rapt lyre of Milton a religious epick * ' And the spirit of my time , shall it alone be uncelebrated ? 4
Standing upon Asia , and gazing * upon Europe , with the broad Hellespont alone between us , and the shadow of night descending on the mountains , these mighty continents appeared to me , as it were , the rival principles of government , that at present contend for the mastery of the world . * ' What ! " I exclaimed , " is the revolution of France a less important event than the siege of Troy ? Is Napoleon a less interesting character than Achilles ? For me remains the revolutionary epick . " 'Preface .
. This is splendid writing , such as the author can pour forth whenever he pleases ; a jet of glittering silver ; and yet the fallacy is evident on the very surface . Epic poems , like pyramids , are built up in peaceful times ; though they , the poems at least , may imply previous storms . It makes no difference , that , with the last two poets , the peace was that of defeat and hopelessness ; while Homer , probably , rejoiced in the passing of the heroic
state into more organized government , as Virgil certainly did in the consolidation of the imperial rule : not one of them wrote during the period of transition : nor can it ever be that so high and intense a soul as is required-for the achievement of an epic poem , should construct such poem while the great conflict is raging toy which society is regenerated in new forms . Minds of this order are ever in the conflict . Ask for them then , and
The Minstrel Boy to the wars is gone , In the ranks of death you'll find him ; His father ' s 8 word he has girded on , His wild harp slitng behind kirn . And there it hangs till the fight is over ; or , if sounded at all , it is in some brief war-song that shall stimulate the combatants , or some low wail that mourns the fallen , or some snatch of
tenderness and beauty that shows duty not to have extinguished nature . To say and sing the whole long story of the war , with due symphony and accompaniments , episodes and descriptions , is quite an after work : for the time , the best bard has other business ; and so has Disraeli , if his be the true vocation to a revolutionary epic . He should not have thought of it yet . Chaos can only be sung after creation . Neither the world nor the bard is ripened for an epic of the times , while the times are only those of transition . Epics are not revolutionary .
It is , perhaps , a question , whether there will ever be any more epics . It is not impossible that prose fiction has so far succeeded to their functions and domain , as to preclude , finally , the restoration Qf any heir of that anciejit legitimate dynasty .
Untitled Article
876 The Revolutionary Epiq .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1834, page 376, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2633/page/64/
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