CARLETON AND YEATS: MYSTICISM AND MYSTICS

New Zealand Tablet, 2 October 1919, Page 21

CARLETON AND YEATS: MYSTICISM AND MYSTICS

-—— _ ■» —• ; (By T. P; Cummins.) .

When one ventures into the domain of literary criticism a grave risk is incurred by the intruder. It is not a free domain by any means, but, privileged critic and ;; observer in the present case meet disarmed, for the atmosphere is congenial to both. Both love Carleton despite his blunders, and they love him because of the peasant that is in him. His foolish errors, due to his unfortunate . perversion, can be condoned for the sake of that truth and love of the Irish sod and people that welled up from his great heart. His heart was sound at the core however much his earlier' work was bartered for mercenary ends. I think, like many others, he lived to regret much of what he had written under stress of actual misery, I have induced myself to venture this paper as a result of the able notes on Carleton that appeared in a recent number of the Tablet; and also because I read him again and again when the world was a flower garden to me, and my portion of it, an Irish hamlet, the fairest corner in that garden. I put Carleton away with a great love in my heart for Ireland, and the men and women of the Irish countryside. Ho opened my eyes to the beauty, sterling worth, and tragic scenes around me, and to-day though lam an exile, and “not so young as I used to be,” j I can still turn with avidity to that most beautiful of Irish romances— Willy Reilly and His Dear Colecn Baivn. Three immortals Carleton, Yeats, and Connolly,— focussed the attention of the Tablet's literary critic. Certain portions of their works were briefly reviewed or criticised. My remarks are complementary, supplementary, and concisely controversial, and I have been encouraged to essay the task as a close student of all three. Otherwise I should not allow myself to linger in a domain that I would. be happier in meekly surveying. \ There is a certain literary relationship—strange as it may seembetween Carleton and Yeats. Between either of them and Connolly there is no affinity. Connolly is a new, strange light, whether ..fixed or meteoric has yet to be discovered. Carleton and Yeats are literary luminaries. My remarks in the present paper are confined to them and their influence on the Celtic Renaissance. With most of the criticism bestowed on Carleton one must agree, though his errors were the result of misery and perversion and cannot be traced to any latent hostility. Priests are not disembodied spirits; they are hu- v mans, and those of us who think and feel at all should be thankful to God many of them are so human. One of the most charming and simple priests it has been my luck to meet was precisely -one such individual that a Carleton or Pat McGill might “fix on,” and hold up to the scorn of mankind, while sacrilegious renegades such as Renan, McCabe, and some others receive the plaudits and laurels of the mob, the so-called intellectuals, and even posterity as well. It seems to me that the reason for this is: one continues in obedience despite his human frailties, and the others, in addition, to their frailties, rebel, become a law unto themselves, and dangerous beacons to lure the evil and foolish of heart toward the rocks of perdition. However, one can forgive Carleton a great deal; his was a splendid personality. He, more than Davis or any of the writers of the Nation, saved the early nineteenthcentury from the sweeping indictment of “stage Irishism.” Because of this, and for that Irish wholesomeness; to ‘ be; found in his pages, he merits a niche in the temple that enshrines the fathers of the Celtic Renaissance. Such a position has not been accorded him regardless of the fact that his inspiration was drawn from the fountainheads of truth soil and the people. At present he stands a neglected champion at the crossings of AngloIrish literature, but a champion nevertheless. . . One . cannot place him in the inner temple with j Standish O’Grady, but ho has earned a place all to himself at, the portal. ■ Has he * not ! in his own just, unique style indicated one way that many moderns, profiting; by his blunders and discoveries, have essayed to tread toward the temple! where Yeats is already crowned in the flesh? ; - '.vv• Carleton was born -in Prillisk, Co.. Tyrone, ,in 1794. ~ He wrote at a difficult period, a period prolific of “stage Irishism” and much commercialism. !He died in 1869. Alfred Perceval Graves, already rewarded with - a little niche in the temple of Anglo-Irish literary pioneers,* says of him: “He is generally regarded as one of the finest exponents -of , Irish character drawing.” ,We all - agree , with Mr. Graves— , . : •! 'i ■ •• M| “And there is trophy, banner, ; and plume, ; - : ' i . : i ikk Killeevy, O Killeevy. 10 , ] ... ‘ -.Uv.v-- , - And the pomp of death with its darkest gloom > i O’ershadows .the Irish chieftain’s ■ tomb 'y * | By the' bonnie £ green woods of Killeevy.” - - 4 iii ' • ■ f Ti ~ . 1 1- , j . ... •'■ •/■ ■■ • • ;• ....

As one of the finest exponents of Irish character drawing there is a link that Binds Carleton to the fathers ' of the Celtic re-birth. W. B. Yeats has been acclaimed by some of his friends as the Irish Shelley. He holds a supreme position in Anglo-Irish literature... .With possibly only A.E. to challenge his supremacy in the inner temple, we find immediately within the portal James Clarence Mangan and Sir Samuel Ferguson. William Carleton is at the portal; _ There are only a few critics who ignore his presence . there, I though no one can deny he is one of the precursors of the renaissance. Carleton had seen nine years of existence when poor Mangan was born to his life of "woe and pain, pain and woe," and was 16 when little Samuel Ferguson was set upon the teeming current of life. At this period Yeats's soul was still in the Master's Mind to be launched into being in 1866. Dublin has the honor of being his birthplace. His literary activity commenced with the appearance of Mosada, a work dealing with romantic Spain. The advent of this brochure disclosed Yeats a seeker. Like many dreamers his mind went to the four ends of the world utterly oblivious of the crocks of gold that long lay buried at his feet. In the beginning he wrote more as the result of deep methodical reading and academical discipline than from the dictates of his heart and mind. He frankly admits that his earliest poems were too full of the colors "Shelley gathered in Italy." Nevertheless, one cannot dismiss Mosada without being powerfully impressed by such promise from a boy in his teens. Mosada did not attract general attention, but the literati extended their admiration for it. Rarely has it been the good fortune of any young poet to receive encouragement. Even his most indulgent friends are inclined to look upon the youth as merely an indolent dreamer. Perhaps it is just as well. Such methods may result in the survival of the fittest. Spenser's and Shelley's influence on the mind of Yeats was supplemented later by the mysterious effects of Theosophy and Spiritualism. These movements had a marked influence upon him, as Theosophy had later on A.E. It seems remarkable that shallow influences of the kind should even for a while tend to lead the poet not into the dead ends of Hinduism and other Eastern cults to find a proper expression of himself, but rather back with a plunge into the heroic age of Eirinn. In the Tlieosophical gatherings in Dublin he wandered aimlessly with other minds as much astray as his —minds too that later plunged into the heroic depths of Ireland's history, and gave to the world some splendid work. It was not Theosophy itself, but rather the environment in the movement that tended to turn the spirit of Yeats toward the heroic age, whither other minds reverted as well. It must be remembered that influences more powerful still were just then at work leading men's minds back to the age of Conchobar, Cucullain, Maeve, and Emain Macha. Chief among these influences were the works of Standish o'Grady and Sir Samuel Fe*rguso»n. O'Grady first pierced the depths and disclosed the immensity and richness of the treasure that the bards, story-writers, essayists, and historians of Ireland had blindly overlooked. Mangan and Carleton had surveyed and probed the surface Mangan with considerable success. Ferguson delved deepest. But it remained for O'Grady to vision the depths in his own mind, and then delve fearlessly down. His faith and labor were amply rewarded. Hence, as Ernest A. Boyd establishes clearly, O'Grady was the father of that renaissance which lias given to Ireland a unique literature, "which, although not written in Gaelic, is none the less informed by the spirit of the race." Carleton ranks among the precursors despite the hostility of Mr. Boyd". He cannot be apportioned to English literature with the . ease one can dispose of Goldsmith and Bernard Shaw. It cannot be said that the work of these gifted writers i : "is informed by the spirit of the race." Though Carleton is among the precursors of the renaissance he was not a delver: he was a surface man. He saw the Ireland of i his day through Irish eyes,, and he inhaled the pungency of the soil he stood on. His work is thoroughly "informed by the spirit of the race," and Yeats would.be among the first to acknowledge him in his merited position —near Mangan and Ferguson. Yeats knows his Carleton, and as far back as 1889 .his", Stories From Carleton was published. This work in itself links up the author of Willy Beilly and The Black Prophet with one of the finest poets of : our day. ,-.,. _ ' The author of Mosada quickly became a shareholder in the mine located _.by O'Grady. He contributed four pieces to Poems land Ballads of Young Ireland, and one of the four — The Madness of King Goll —is : among the best he has written. The disciple of? the occultists had : liberated, himself for the time being, and heroic Eirinn claimed him instead. Three years - after Mosada, appeared - what appeals to me, and more; competent critics, as his

finest work, — The Wanderings of Oisin and Other Poems, —which underwent careful revision in 1895. This work places him in the front rank of the* bards o"f Ireland, and on iw higher plane than contemporary '"poets of England and France. /■' Mr.ni'd*-. W|Ml : : ,-y- iuyv-i;>i:> <?->_ -■'■'-■•-■■ | Surveying Yeats's brilliant output in poetry''and prose one should say that tho u most « popular, invaluable, and Irish-Irish of those that will live are— Madness of King Goll, The Wanderings' of Oisin,> The Countess Kathleen, and various legends and lyrics, Fergus and the Druid, ■The Hosting of the, Sidhe, and that incomparable little dream-play, Kathleen ,ni Houlihan. Much of his later work does not appeal to many of his race. The creator of Jnnisfree and Kathleen 7ii Houlihan would seem inclined to end as he essayed to beginin the dead ends of occultism. His maturer ] work is highly mysterious. This obscurity has served to earn for Yeats the title of mystic! But he is more astray in his "mystical" verse than when he penned Mosada. Ho was a seeker then, and in his search for something everlastingly beautiful he paused, and was, lured into the mysterious nowhere of Indian lights and perfumes. A mystic must have a creed and a mission: there is a jumble of creeds in Yeats, and his mission cannot exactly be discerned. Attracted to Ireland's heroic age whence inspiration was exkaustless, and where he found the best expression of himself and his race, he seems to have surrendered the quest at the promptings of the evil spirits of occultism. Kathleen ni Houlihan won him for a while with brilliant and imperishable results: let us hope she may yet- save his soul. • To' me it seems very extraordinary to class Yeats and certain other Irish, French, and Russian poets and writers as mystics. One might with safety probably class the author of The Hound of Heaven among the mystics; but in this case the poet bad a creed and a mission, and his life conformed to both. In regard to Yeats and others their "mysticism" would appear to be established by the obscurity of their doctrine. Indeed, obscurity of doctrine is one of the definitions of mysticism! 'William Ailingham's advice to a young poet is very apposite in its significance for our modern "mystics": "You're a true poet; but, my dear, If you would hold the public ear, Remember to be, —not too clear I Be strange, be verbally intense; Words matter ten times more than sense. In clear streams, under sunny skies, The fish you angle for won't rise. In turbid water, cloudy weather, They'll rush to you by shoals together. Ignotum pro mirifico. The least part of your meaning show; Your readers must not understand Too well; the mist-wrapt hill looks grand, The placid noonday mountain small. Speak plainly: folk say—'ls that all?' Speak riddles — What is here ?' They read And re-read, many times, indeed; How fine, how strange! how deep ! how new! Here's my opinion; what say you? It may be this, it might be that; Who can be certain what he's at, This necromancer!'" While they talk, You swing your solemn cloak and stalk Or else look on with smile urbane: 'Well done,. my children, —guess again 0 let me not advise in vain, Be what you will, but don't be plain!" But there is such a thing as mysticism, and there are such exalted beings as mystics. Therefore, it will be appropriate as bearing upon -my subject to define mystu-s and mysticism. I cannot, of course, presume to do so, but I bring to my aid no less an authority than Doin S. Louismet, 0.5.8., author of The Mystical Knowledge of God, and The, Mystical Life. In the course of his introduction to The Mystical Life he writes: "Modern writers have a great deal to say about what they call the mystical faculty.' Truth to tell, there are two mystical faculties; and they are no other than the intellect and the free-will -of the Christian, informed by faith, hope, and charity and the infused moral virtues, and strengthened moreover by the Seven Gifts of the Holy Ghost. These are tho mystical faculties: there are no others. •.".. r"'•,-.•.• .v;i .;"- : .'' '. ;■ . '■: "Genius, coupled with . a reverent turn of mind, in the arts of romance, music, poetry, painting, command our admiration, but I would not assign them to any extra faculty. They, too, proceed: from the intellect and free will, helped on by a vivid imagination and by a skill of hand which is the fruit of hard work and well disciplined sensibility. Unless the element of i sincere, supernatural

religion be r added to these, nothing mystical is there, only a proof of what might call modifying slightly a celebrated sentence of ' Tertullian, '' ' testimonium animae naturaliter mysticae? The Saints are the great artists. Their masterpiece, their great work of art, is their own beau-. tiful, pure life, the active share they take;: in the secret of their own heart, in the sanctity and the joy of God." "There- are two kinds of mystics: the dumb ones and tho eloquent ones;; eloquent, these last, with "tongue or the pen, or with both.'" My heart' hath uttered a good word, sings the Psalmist; my tongue is the pen of a scrivener that ivritcth swiftly.' (Ps. xliv., 2.) These are the only true .'.mystical writers.' The appellation must. not bo given indiscriminately to all who take upon themselves the task of informing the world at large of what they understand by Mysticism. Oh, no! Otherwise a deist, like the philosopher Boutroux, would have to bo considered a. mystical writer, and many others even less deserving of the title. Thus, to preclude the possibility of hopeless confusion and misunderstanding, we shall reserve the name of 'mystical writers for those only who speak of the soul-experience of Mystical Theology, and who are qualified to do so because they have themselves enjoyed it and are familiar with its manifestations. Such are, for instance, . . . St. Gertrude, Ruysbrocck, Blessed Suzo, St. Catherine of Siena, St. Angela of Fobgno, St. Teresa. From the writings of these there goes forth a virtue entirely lacking in the 'writings of other men, bo they ever so talented. These give us glimpses, as it were;; of; Mystical Theology, make us understand its meaning and long for its enjoyment; they even dispose the soul for it and give her a foretaste of its ineffable delights. The others are mystical even when, perchance, they do write about genuine Mysticism; which is seldom the case. Even then, their Writings have a blighting influence, because they lack the' unction of the Holy Spirit, and are the outcome of mere human effort and mere external study of the subject matter of Mysticism too philosophical, too much of the brain and appealing only to/the brain, too dry-as-dust. But, I repeat, it is seldom indeed that they confine themselves to genuine Mysticism and do not stray into blind alleys leading nowhere, or into bypaths that lose themselves in a tangled wilderness of metaphysical nonsense. These writers have done an enormous amount of mischief. It has been said that in paganism everything was God except God Himself; it may be said that in our days everything is called Mysticism except Mysticism itself." Yeats, great thinker and poet though he be, and even A.E., "the greatest of the Dublin mystics," have lost themselves "in a tangled wilderness of metaphysical nonsense."