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AND A MODERN
WALT WHITMAN
PROBLEM
now forty-seven was years since Walt Whitman in the Indian Office because of the from his clerkship of some poems included in the i860 edition of Leaves
It has been dismissed content
the loss of his position did not come to Perhaps with a shock of surprise, for it is evident that he re the fate himself as a teacher of advanced and doctrines;
of Grass. Whitman
garded of prophet
seer
and
has
almost
ever
been
But Whitman
or worse. rejection faith in the ultimate
had already written his it might, with of of much however truth, any message triumph the kindling power of genius, be lighting of the mountain-tops mass of men remained in the darkness below. thought while the He has told us of America that? "
in due it will If its poets appear, there is no fear of mistake. (The
time
advance
to meet
of a poet till his shall be sternly deferr'd, as he has absorbed him as affectionately
proof absorbs
them
?
country " it.)
very recent times the thought of the world has under a revolution to undergo, gone, or at least is clearly beginning sex. and journals with Societies connected regarding problems Within
and the "con for the study of eugenics have been founded In other is words, America spiracy of silence" being broken. have penetrated and other countries where his doctrines have their teacher. to meet" Whitman, It "in due time advanced has anticipated just how farWhitman and in of advance it, just how far thought and is yet of phenonena tolerance which marks the discussion the growing
will be
to note
interesting
this new
with
connected
sex may be traceable to throw decides
to him.
light upon the subject of is not dealing with an attitude of a generation only; nor overcome. to The secret inertia of indifference has he the mere be sought for in in such matters must of much of our attitude When
Whitman
sex he
the Middle allegiance, upon the when
to keep their undivided in order when, or was the Church forced, by by their order, celibacy and of the centuries monk intellectual friar, leaders,
modern
Ages,
thought
was
shaping
itself
from
the
ruins
of a
Walt
and a Modern
Whitman
Problem
87
and pagan past. Then it was that the vileness of woman the degrading of all relations with her were effects taught as a measure to mankind the power of the Church whereby was over the race, and The spell of Rome might be exalted. classic
and
is a voice lifted in protest. The irreverent might snigger in the shade, but a reasoned and scientific he never attitude woman must be had. The race must be continued. Therefore seldom
If she were
tolerated. an added
asset.
The
as a beast
valuable silence
of burden, only once by
that was
a daring with which
is broken
voice, a voice half of jest, as not realizing the weight its words are charged and all unconscious of the new world It is the voice of Chaucer thought thus dimly illuminated.
of at
In the Canterbury Tales century. a as to for the Monk story. turning represents life before him, His eye is struck by the fullness of the physical he reflects likewise the superior mental and doubtless upon a half-humorous of monk. So he this pronounces equipment in it had because the anathema Church upon kept from aiding the
end
of
the fourteenth
the Host
Chaucer
the
production to pass respect man,
even
of a superior on the torch
though
his
crown
race one of were
life.
so well Had
shaven,
he should
fitted
in every
his way, have
every a wife,
and from a feeble the laity are but "shrimpes," for, he continues, a comes feeble scion. stock is outrunning But in this, as in so many other things, Chaucer saint of the Richard the his contemporaries Rolle, (witness a for It remains poet in a land century) by many generations. to in earnest and with some advocate of by Chaucer undreamed observation scientific insight what was to him but uncorrelated and a jest. a natural to the mediaeval view As regarding corollary came the attitude sex human the towards of there questions and must be mortified The nay body disregarded, body. were to vows in of the be if Church the attenuated, spirit kept as in deed.
Hence
the
the holy man drinking water saints that ;hence the skeleton-like
ideal of
only and feeding upon pulse be of our galleries: the soul must fill such a large section True enough there is the Renaissance with saved at any cost. its theory
of beauty,
the
cult
of
the
individual,
and
its frank
88
The
Sewanee
Review
of the flesh, but there is also the of Puritanism ; and the sum total of counteracting as we or is but slowly attitude remains unchanged changing the nineteenth century. approach insistence
upon
the claims
influence
then, we find a collected
When,
of Whitman's
edition
poems
beginning,? "
Of
from
Physiology
Not
physiognomy I say the Form
The
we
Female
complete equally with
feel that a note which
come
into literature.
of the last doctrine noble
line we
top
alone,
to toe
I sing
;
nor brain
alone, far is worthier
the male
is worthy
for the muse.
;
I sing ",?
new in its entirety has is practically when we reflect upon the meaning the fact that a literary impressed with
And are
as the dethronement as revolutionary of the hero of even greater of has taken place. Another step than this first has been taken towards the democratizing
blood
import of human
suffrage, Whitman
Not a class, merely, thought but one half of the race.
has
been
to
admitted
He form. thus becomes the poet of the human as such mere of the not of the form, only strength sings physical or of drew the plaudits in the sunlight of the palestra flashed in its but of the human form, male or female, the ampitheatre, dignity of sex. If the dignity
can be estab body as a whole it must needs follow that it is in all its functions tablished, dig to the himself addresses and Whitman nified. proof again again self. The body of the glory of our physical is, verily, not less for? soul the than itself, "
of
the human
concern the main includes and is the meaning, ! the body and includes and is the Soul ; is your body, and how divine Whoever you are ! how superb any part of it." Behold
?
or
a distance
mind travelled from the monkish has Whitman's the a in which was contaminated idea that the body dwelling trans its great before pure soul was imprisoned temporarily of the Middle lation. One of the very few great voices Ages
What
has said, "Praised from whom body,
for our be the Lord no man escapeth."
sister, the death of the of sunshine Far more
Walt
and aModern
Whitman
Problem
89
is in this hymn in almost than can be found literature with its of the refrain sad religious period, there
" Timor
even here
Yet
and
conturbat
is praised
the Lord
its prison body. But Dunbar
Mortis
St.
me"
for unlocking
Francis
any other rather of?
the
soul
from
died
long ago; and perhaps before Whitman have exalted the body as a appears fit tenement of the soul. A test for this supposition is at hand. in a moment In 1844 Thomas Hood wrote, of genuine inspi other men
It is hardly worth while to remind ration, The Bridge of Sighs. is a woman of the street anyone that the subject of this poem see here? has committed does Hood suicide. What He has a broader charity than the priest extended to poor Ophelia. to judge, not for him. Her sins are for her Saviour But domi nant through it all surges his sense of the pity of her fate ?: who
"Alas
! for
the rarity
Of Christian Near
charity,?
a whole
Home
city full, she had none."
she was, young and slender, with auburn tresses, but not dwell upon this cunning mechanism arrested forever. for The worthy part of her is elsewhere, the mercy which suing never in her mad the world, life's history, It is the showed. Beautiful he does
of Hood's ; and after all it is the viewpoint viewpoint generation that some genius of unusually tender nature might have showed as the voice of Chaucer It is perhaps centuries before Hood. to to his that of the prisoner led he likens the face of Constance death.
Turn
now
is the same ? attitude before "
of him
to The City Dead-House of Whitman. The subject one more unfortunate. is the But how different sees in the corpse the two men ! What Whitman is?
Nor
her body? I see the Body? woman, once full of passion and beauty?all so cold, nor running stillness water from
But
impress the house
The
divine
That
house
I look else faucet,
on
it alone, not ; odors morbific
I notice nor
me
; ? alone
that wondrous
house
?
that
delicate
fair,
The
90 That
immortal
more
house,
Or white-domed
high-spired house alone,
little
Fair,
fearful
wreck!
than
all
itself, with cathedrals
Capitol
the old That
Sewanee
more
than
Review the rows majestic
; them
desperate all?poor, " ! itself a Soul !
of a Soul
tenement
ever built of buildings ? surmounted figure
! or
all
!
house
of Life not lesser nor greater than the soul, for exist without of the other ; and in the great scheme With Whitman the universe one is as immortal as the other. a Soul," a worthy "itself tenant of a it is the human body
It is the House one cannot
that is of importance. With Hood and his house, ? is it the all it mortal of the friend homeless, pity generation ever nearer the under the city's glare, descending less wanderer
worthy
a broader With slimy grasp of the clammy river ooze. charity to lament the Whitman passes over this aspect of the tragedy is to him sacred, ruin of this cunning mechanism. The body are immortal, never again will the same and though its elements A love. finger answer brain or eye kindle with long trans are nature?long become plants,
"We We
and
the body
is before
lation
it is only "
A
leaves,
we
been
foliage,
but now we absent, " bark ;
return
;
roots,
that we arrive home
of eras, a few few quadrillions the span or make not hazard
The moral glance that was
after eons
in its dim wanderings:? have
octillions
again:? of
cubic
leagues,
do
it impatient."
receive but a and a patience represents himself as
and the religious sides of the matter His was a large tolerance
from Whitman.
He among mankind. done upon the earth and hearing of oppression in silence. of the oppressed it was given to Perhaps other men to hear that these things were but apparent
remarkable the deeds
seeing the groans him
above
in that great final celestial harmony. At any rate it is we if at realize the to clearly present place of dignity enough has elevated the human body in spite of the which Whitman forces which had been acting through the centuries religious discords
and
are
acting
yet.
the body, and established its place as then, acquitted a worthy one in the great scheme of the universe, and having if we have so shown that it is as immortal as the soul, Whitman, a to in is take another far accepted him, step in advance. position Having,
and aModern
Whitman
Walt
Problem
are few indeed
There
among enlightened in the dignity of the body in it the qualities of strength cultivating to izations on all sides of us bear witness
do not believe
a type
become
admired
by
all.
nations
of to-day who of and the desirability and beauty. Organ
this.
starved
The
91
The
athlete
saint
has
has
disap
peared.
its due place, not if the body as a whole has been given save perhaps all of its most vital functions have been recognized, is most a of Whitman that is here the It few. teaching by But
: he for the?
and most
advanced
the medium
coming
"Voice
of
sets
vital
me
sexes?by
himself
and
clarified
the problem
of be
transfigured."
is nothing indecent, he tells us, connected with the origin a long way from the In that assertion he has advanced Such a thinker as Emer church fathers of the Middle Ages. name His son protests with him, and he loses his position. in a term of reproach with many. becomes Clearly he was
There
life.
of
of his
advance
time.
another
mured
great time, and science science and humanity
his
"But has at
accepted large have
that
declaration
Whitman's
it [the world] had dared
thinker who
sex
has
his view. accepted a right
that anyone "
Sex
contains
Bodies,
Souls,
should
dwell
upon
move," mur in advance of
In like manner, or are accepting to a place
of dig
of the race.
and purest aspirations sex an isolated phenomenon
in the best
nity Were
does to be
there would
be no need
it, but?
all,? meanings,
proofs,
purities,
delicacies,
results,
promulgations,
All
bestowals, benefactions, hopes, of the earth, the passions, delights loves, beauties, of the earth,? follow'd All the governments, persons judges, gods, of itself." in sex, as part of itself and justification are contain'd These
All
he has told us what everyone knows but what few that the race is never separated and that the future will or its curse will rest upon us Its blessings find its past in us. of life? mental, moral, and fullness the we as transmit according ? and transmit to it, or are untrue to our opportunities physical is no There or one of these. all of an existence impoverished Elsewhere
realize ?
The
92
Review
Sewanee
link that we add to the chain of life must strain Every or snap under the stress to which it is to be subjected. life is that in American illuminated One of the most pages evasion.
us Walt
Whitman
of both
the wounded
which
shows
armies
the Civil of Washington in the tragic hospitals during to the rare in superabundance bears witness Testimony He of his soothing presence. easily have been might
War. charm thinking
of himself
when
nursing
in To a Pupil
he says
:?
"Do you not see how it would serve to have such a Body of and Soul, that when you enter the crowd, an atmosphere desire and command enters with you, and every one is im pressed with your personality?" was in part due to an easy this personal magnetism invested. with which he was always of comradery atmosphere of This in turn may be traced largely to the city environment
Doubtless
his youth inherited.
and early manhood. Time and again we
own parentage.
he
He was,
" Well-begotten,
and
in part find Whitman
But
it must
have
returning
been to his
insists,? rais'd
by
a perfect
mother."
he was a good example of the doctrine and mentally Physically ? This ex of being born well. the necessity which he taught to itself a meaning has attached "being born well" pression as we is the last Whitman while worth is it pass, which, noting type, if ever there was one, of the with is brought into the world who and anyone democrat, his environment for and mental conquering physical, capacities, life with a keen zest at the same time is with him and enjoying to the he has a lordly indifference Like Thoreau, well born. the eye sees, that spiritually What fact of property. adventitious one
to admit.
He
is the
riches and social both tell us. To inherit worldly it possesses, to be well not at with birth was, Whitman, necessarily position a were to be such In born. fact, apt handicap. things If Whitman was, as has been said above, of such splendid insist upon that he should it is but natural physical presence, The woman he loves must side of eugenics. the purely physical Her body and "well muscled." and arrogant" be "strong must be perfect ; for only from a perfect body can come the
Walt
and aModem
Whitman
Problem
93
demands for "these States." physical perfection which Whitman to accentuate The habits of his daily life had, it seems, helped in the doctrine of holds the purely physical the place which the measurements of soldiers taken The Whitman. during was to be show what a superb physical manhood Civil War the period tastes and
of
natural
knew his
this more
fully
century. than Whitman. combined
various
occupations contact immediate
travel to bring him into our population which put most side of its nature. it was
But
Few
of the mid-nineteenth
in the American
found men
the healthy Whitman may
emphasis
contact
with
that
upon
the
of natural
man.
have had with men
His
with
his of
class
physical
Whatever
and women
they run at have if time may any they experiences, marked in his most to the attitude of man counter strongly such as nature had they were conventionality, stages of moral What he has to tell us, then, ought to shock us no sanctioned.
experiences were natural
and
to us frankly and directly. if nature had spoken in his words that he speaks about sex there is nothing It is of influences the subtly deteriorating artificiality. conveys saves Whitman that of attitude and naturalness this largeness
more
than
When
of the physical aspect of the innuendo, of the carefully prepared a In many from his pages. is absent of situation, suggestion are these used both of novel of past and of present popularity is deciding more But society, as a whole, with telling effect. insinuation of the novel and for and more against the salacious has IfWhitman of nature which Whitman the message brings. sex is that not yet fully carried all men with him in his "proof" immoral from being The danger of sex.
in his consideration
them that there illustrious, he seems at least to have convinced than that of Boc the question is a better way of approaching later and more caccio and of Balzac, and of other dangerous authors.
and merely
physical really
has
if all that Whitman
But a
great
teacher
non-moral, or
a
to tell us about sex is purely we cannot say that he is either
prophet.
us than the mere thing more to show If he got no further than this he would
He
has,
however,
some
of sex.
dignity physical still be abreast with
the
The
94
Review
Sewanee
time, though his message tardy scientific thought of the present would be largely exhausted. he What His true message, is not yet fully realized. however, us sex to to is also its has has that say spiritual aspect. finally in his poems It was this message upon sex that caused Mrs. in writing one of the gifted women of the last century, Gilchrist, to Rossetti to say of them: [It is not the] "heights brought the lifted up level with but the depths down to the depths, clear and sunlit too." become sunlit heights, that they might Mrs.
has seen
Gilchist
emotion
spiritual failed to find.
The
great
has seen and put into words us in the faces of his Madonnas,? "
face
illuminated
The
the great
to match
of paternity,
chastity
He
of
what
has
Raphael
the mother
of many
of
is an
woman
easily have been
"inimitable
poem." used by a score of poets
a woman
to whom
was
a
of maternity."
arrested
for
children."
feeling which the man of the Middle Ages in his democracy one divine mother, Whitman us than the mother he is tells, greater, Nothing
might
and
of Whitman
chastity
The
and every
love
of supersensual the quality most of the earlier readers
insists upon?
Whitman "
which
of
extends
to only to all.
of men.
Each
extended
This
last phrase
of our language, and
color
form
from
those
alone
the greatness of to the lushly erotic. But with Whitman woman from and the all is a greatness eternity, through Of the female form comes, and can come, this greatness.
man alone he
poem
says,? " A
There
divine
nimbus
exhales
from
it from
head
to foot."
of language spiritual view in the English in life than that which Whitman expresses Life is not passed on merely Paumanok. physic
is no more
the transmission
of
from is largely de of the next generation The spirituality ally. are not our in its creation by this one: termined aspirations ours alone but something?
Starting
"
clandestine, Subtle, transmitted A charge
away beyond, and gift occult,
for
those
being
born."
Whitman
That
and a Modern
Whitman
Walt
in opposition is a brave man and
should with
point obscene
out
to mankind
jests
or, at
95
of the human the dignity to the teaching of centuries shows an advanced thinker. That he
advocate
should
as a whole
body that he
Problem
that subjects which least, with incriminating shows
with
that
it had silence he
treated were
is a great
spiritual significance, was accepted, when his message leader. The days spiritual exist save by indeed a few, were not the days of his physical ence. But he is now coming, and shall come, into the best and fraught
purest
aspirations
of our
life. Earl
University
of Texas.
L.
Bradsher.