Poet. By all means. The uselessness of useful knowledge, say. Let there not be wrath between us, let us talk about technical education.
Hist. And you will write your history? It is better than twisting the kaleidoscope of the vocabulary to get new patterns of verbiage. Moreover, you might disarm the hostility with which wise men have often regarded your calling. Plato, you know, would have hunted you out of his Republic.
Poet. If Plato were alive, I would banish him out of this commonwealth of England, or rather it would have been done by the mob the day after he published his Republic. The crowd worships great poets (of whom Plato himself is one), not chiefly because they are poets but because they are dead. When there is no Byron-bait or Shelley-hunt on hand, they wile away the time by professing to admire Milton. He died a believer in polygamy, but at least he died. As for your History of Metaphor, you may write it yourself. But beware how you handle your dangerous material; I never knew any one who could not be trapped by the right metaphor. "The Stream of History," or anything else equally cold and slow, will be quite enough to take you off your feet. But never mind, you will reach the sea. And there all of you that is susceptible of promotion will become vapour, and, who knows, you may drop upon Mount Helicon. I am going there on foot. So, for the present, good-bye.
