Omniana/Volume 1/Poetical Moods and Tenses
48. Poetical Moods and Tenses.
Let us examine the moods and tenses of the poets.
He who plays off the amiable in verse, and writes to display his own fine feelings, is in the sentimental or indicative mood. Didactic poets are in the imperative, satirists in the potential, your amourist in the optative. The classification is defective in the other moods.
The fame of those who write personal satire is in the present tense,..that of most poets in the imperfect. The great ones who are dead, in the perfect,.. the great ones who are living must be content to have theirs in the future.