his work shocks us; but there are moods when the soul says
it is good, and we rejoice in the strong man that can do it.

The restrictions, denials, and safeguards put upon us by the social order,
and the dictates of worldly prudence, fall only before a still more fervid
humanism, or a still more vehement love.

The vital question is, Where does he leave us? On firmer ground, or in the
mire? Depleted and enervated, or full and joyous? In the gloom of
pessimism, or in the sunlight of its opposite?---

"_So long!_
I announce a man or woman coming--perhaps you are the one;
I announce a great individual, fluid as Nature, chaste, affectionate,
compassionate, fully armed.

"_So long!_
I announce a life that shall be copious, vehement, spiritual, bold,
And I announce an old age that shall lightly and joyfully meet its
translation.

"I announce myriads of youths, beautiful, gigantic, sweet-blooded;
I announce a race of splendid and savage old men."

There is no contradiction here. The poet sounds all the experiences of
life, and he gives out the true note at last.

"No specification is necessary,--all that a male or female does, that is
vigorous, benevolent, clean, is so much profit to him or her, in
the unshakable order of the universe, and through the whole scope
of it forever."

VIII

Nothing but the most uncompromising religious purpose can justify certain
things in the "Leaves;" nothing but the most buoyant and pervasive
spirituality can justify its overwhelming materiality; nothing but the
most creative imagination can offset its tremendous realism; nothing but
the note of universal brotherhood can atone for its vehement Americanism;
nothing but the primal spirit of poesy itself can make amends for this
open flouting of the routine poetic, and this endless procession before us
of the common and the familiar.

IX

Whitman loved the word "unrefined." It was one of the words he would have
us apply to himself. He was unrefined, as the air, the soil, the water,
and all sweet natural things are unrefined (fine but not _re_fined). He
applies the word to himself two or three times in the course of his poems.
He loved the words sun-tan, air-sweetness, brawn, etc. He speaks of his
"savage song," not to call forth the bards of the past, he says, but to
invoke the bards of the future.

"Have I sung so capricious and loud my savage songs?"

The thoug