It is only by a long and elaborate process of literary effort
that you have made them prosaic.
Now, the first and fairest thing to say about Rudyard Kipling
is that he has borne a brilliant part in thus recovering the lost
provinces of poetry. He has not been frightened by that brutal
materialistic air which clings only to words; he has pierced through
to the romantic, imaginative matter of the things themselves.
He has perceived the significance and philosophy of steam and of slang.
Steam may be, if you like, a dirty by-product of science.
Slang may be, if you like, a dirty by-product of language.
But at least he has been among the few who saw the divine parentage of
these things, and knew that where there is smoke there is fire--that is,
that wherever there is the foulest of things, there also is the purest.
Above all, he has had something to say, a definite view of things to utter,
and that always means that a man is fearless and faces everything.
For the moment we have a view of the universe, we possess it.
Now, the message of Rudyard Kipling, that upon which he has
really concentrated, is the only thing worth worrying about
in him or in any other man. He has often written bad poetry,
like Wordsworth.
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