[69] and this at a time when Coleridge's new theory of versification, now generally accepted, that verse should be read by the accents, not by the syllables, was pronounced by the London monthly Review to yield only “rude unfashioned stuff;” and Burns's poems were described by it as “disgusting” and “written mostly in an unknown tongue.” The Lake poets were described by Jeffrey in the Edinburgh Review as “constituting the most formidable conspiracy that has lately been formed against sound judgment in matters poetical;” and yet they were eagerly received, apparently, in America. It must not be supposed, however, that all the contents of this Philadelphia volume represent the same scale of merit; it also includes a poem of a dozen long verses by one Joseph Smith entitled Eulogium on Rum.
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[69] and this at a time when Coleridge's new theory of versification, now generally accepted, that verse should be read by the accents, not by the syllables, was pronounced by the London monthly Review to yield only “rude unfashioned stuff;” and Burns's poems were described by it as “disgusting” and “written mostly in an unknown tongue.” The Lake poets were described by Jeffrey in the Edinburgh Review as “constituting the most formidable conspiracy that has lately been formed against sound judgment in matters poetical;” and yet they were eagerly received, apparently, in America. It must not be supposed, however, that all the contents of this Philadelphia volume represent the same scale of merit; it also includes a poem of a dozen long verses by one Joseph Smith entitled Eulogium on Rum.
Boston, New York and Chicago. Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1903.
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