Note * — Chapter XV · Attitudes

Among the experiences which are by the nature of the case hidden from observation are found almost all those with which criticism is concerned. The outward aspect and behaviour of a man reading The Prioresses’ Tale and The Miller’s Tale may well be indistinguishable. But this should not lead us to overlook how great a part in the whole experience is taken by attitudes. Many experiences which, if examined by introspection for their actual content of sensation and imagery, differ very little, are totally diverse in the kind and degree of implicit activity present. This aspect of experiences as filled with incipient promptings, lightly stimulated tendencies to acts of one kind or another, faint preliminary preparations for doing this or that, has been constantly overlooked in criticism. Yet it is in terms of attitudes, the resolution, inter-inanimation, and balancing of impulses—Aristotle’s definition of Tragedy* is an instance—that all the most valuable effects of poetry must be described.