Note 57 — Chapter II · RHYTHM AS THE ESSENTIAL FACT OF POETRY

Essays, Edinburgh, 1776, p. 296. “I am of opinion,” he says, pp. 294 f., On Poetry and Music, “that to poetry, verse is not essential. In a prose work we may have the fable, the arrangement, and a great deal of the pathos and language of poetry; and such a work is certainly a poem, though”—note the concession—“perhaps not a perfect one.” Verse “is necessary to the perfection of all poetry that admits of it,”—and how, pray, is that limitation to be adjusted? “Verse is to poetry what colours are to painting;” and, quoting Aristotle, “versification is to poetry what bloom is to the human countenance.” Here are pribbles and prabbles enough.