The Eighth Sin
THE EIGHTH SIN
THE EIGHTH SIN.
"There is no greater Sin after the seven deadly than to flatter oneself into an idea of being a great Poet." Letters of John Keats.
OXFORD
B. H. BLACKWELL, BROAD STREET
LONDON
SIMPKIN, MARSHALL & CO. LIMITED
MCMXII
One must have an excuse. The only one I can offer is that many of these verses have already been refused (with charming tact) by reputable journals. According to the canons of one whose opinion I much value in these matters, that makes them all the more worthy of publication.
I wish I might include a poem by Lord Byron, which I passed off on this same critic as one of my own. He was gracious enough to remark, "Not bad for a beginner!" May he be as lenient towards these!
The publishers of the Isis and the Vanity have kindly allowed me to reprint some verses which they chaperoned in the first instance.
New College,
November, 1912.
TO you I sing. To you alone
These rhymes in no uncertain tone
A message bring. Let others hint
They are not worth the ink to print—
Of others I am heedless grown.
Chilled by the bookshop's frigid zone
These rhymes in haste to you have flown,
Fleeing the critic's heart of flint
To you they sing.
I have no fear lest you postpone
Your gentle judgement. I have known
Your gracious favour has no stint,
You'll say (your cheek a rosier tint),
"I like them, for they are his own"—
To you I sing.
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1929.
The longest-living author of this work died in 1957, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 66 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
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