But
poetry in its own nature is certainly
Non hos quaesitum munus in usus.
--VIRG.
He that has an idea of perfection in the work he undertakes may fail in
it; he that has not, must: and yet he will be vain. For every little
degree of beauty, how short or improper soever, will be looked on fondly
by him; because it is all pure gains, and more than he promised to
himself; and because he has no test, or standard in his judgment, with
which to chastise his opinion of it.
Now this idea of perfection is, in poetry, more refined than in other
kinds of writing; and because more refined, therefore more difficult; and
because more difficult, therefore more rarely attained; and the
non-attainment of it is, as I have said, the source of our vanity. Hence
the poetic clan are more obnoxious to vanity than others. And from vanity
consequently flows that great sensibility of disrespect, that quick
resentment, that tinder of the mind that kindles at every spark, and
justly marks them out for the genus irritabile among mankind.
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