PREFACE. THERE must be Poets, and there must be Prefaces. Perhaps, dear reader, you "don't see the necessity." No more do I; but so it is. It is difficult to discover the precise use of either; and the only reason I can assign for their existence is, that what must be, must. As for the Prefaces, they are prescribed by the unimpeachable canons of the art and mystery of bookmaking, though nobody ever thinks of reading them ; and an author, now-a-days, may think himself lucky enough if he can get anybody to read his book, let alone the preface. As for the Poets, they occupy their appointed place in the scale of creation, in accordance, I suppose, with the inscrutable laws of nature; and fill one of those vacua, which she abhors, in the intellectual world, like flies in the animal, and nettles in the vegetable. I am afraid the Poets, the flies, and the nettles are none of them appreciated as they ought to be; but that is no fault of theirs. |