Part 48 (1/2)

You ask me to believe in your civilization; you ask me to believe in your love of light! Let me tell you when I would believe in your civilization and your love of light.

I say that the last and the highest thing in this world is _Genius_.

I say that Religion and Art and Progress and Enlightenment--that all these things are made out of Genius; and that Genius is first and last, highest, and best, and fundamental. And I say that when you recognize that fact--when you believe in Genius--when you prepare the way for it and make smooth the paths for it--I say that then and then alone may you tell me that you are civilized.

The thing shrieks against heaven--your cruelty, your stupidity. Since ever the first poet came into this world it has been the same story of agony, indignity, and shame. _And what do you do?_

It is poverty that I talk about, poverty alone! The poet wants nothing in this world but to be let alone to listen to the voices of his soul. He wants nothing from you in all this world but that you give him food while he does it--while he does it, miserable people--not for himself, but for _you_.

This is the shame upon you--that you expect--that you always have expected--that the poet, besides doing the fearful task his inspiration lays upon him--that he shall go out into the coa.r.s.e, ruthless world and slave for his bread! That is the shame! That is the indignity, that is the brutality, the stupidity, the infamy! Shame upon you, shame upon you, world!

The poet! He comes with a heart trembling with gladness; he comes with tears of rapture in his eyes! He comes with bosom heaving and throat choking and heart breaking. He comes with tenderness and with trust, with joy in the beauty that he beholds. He comes a minstrel, with a harp in his hand--and you set your dogs upon him--you drive him torn and bleeding from your gates!

The poet! You make him go out into the market and chaffer for his bread!

You subject him to the same law to which you subject your loafers and your louts--that he who will not work can not eat! Your drones, and your drunkards--and your poets! Every man must earn for himself, every man must pay his way! No man must ask favors, no man must be helped, no man shall be any different from other men! For shame! For shame!

And you love letters! You love poetry! You are civilized, you are liberal, you are enlightened! You are fools!

I tell you the agony of this thing is in me yet--it has heaped itself up in my soul all my days. It was my life, it was my _life_ that cried out! And now that I can not save my own self--oh, let me at least save the others! O G.o.d, let me not die till I have said one word that reaches their hearts, till I have done something to change this ghastly thing! The voices of the ages cry out to me. Not only the hundreds who have gone before--but the hundreds and the thousands who are to come! What are _we_ to do?

they cry--who shall save _us_? Are we to share the same fate--are we too to struggle and die in vain? And in this world that is civilized! In this world that seeks progress! In this world that wants nothing but light!

Not to the mob I speak, not to those who once mocked me; if none but they lived, I should hold my tongue and go. But you men who are leaders, you men who stand upon the top, you men who see!--can I not find some word to reach _you_? You men who really love books--who have money--who want nothing but to put it to use!--can I not find some word to reach _you_?

O G.o.d! And it is all so simple.

I tell you this land will never be civilized, this land will never lead mankind, it will never be anything but the torture-house that I have found it, until it makes some provision for its men of _Genius_! Until this simple fundamental thing be true--that a man may know that if he have _Genius_--that the day he shows he has _Genius_--he will be honored and protected by society and not trampled and kicked like a dog.

That he will not have to go out into the market-place and vend his wares!

That he will not have to make sick his soul haggling for his bread! That if he turns his strength to higher things, and exposes himself to the world thereby, he will not be trodden down in the struggle for existence! That he will not have to bear indignities and insults; that he will not have to write till he be ripe, or be stunted and deformed by early deprivation.

Genius. And am I not to die now?--And what matters the world?

Therefore let me write it: that I was a man of Genius. And that you have trodden me down in the struggle for existence. That I saw things that no other man has ever seen, I would have written things that no other man can ever write. And that you have trodden me down in the struggle for existence--that you have trodden me down because I could not earn my bread!

This is what I tell you--this is what I cry out to you, that the man of Genius _can not_ earn his bread! That the work by which he develops his power is something absolutely and utterly different from the work by which he earns his bread! And that every hour which he gives to the one, he lessens his power and his capacity for the other! Every hour that he gives to the earning of his bread, he takes from his soul, he weakens his work, he destroys beauty which never again can he know or dream!