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was a truth that illuminated the hidden chambers of the human
psyche, and among his fellows whom he saw on the streets of
Philadelphia and New York, his discovery, as he looked inward
to the sources of his own spirit, was of the darkened, private
aspect of the multitudinous cheerful face that met its clients and
its creditors, its friends at a card table or at a game of draughts.
Within the multitude of faces, hardened by what he called the
"Grin," his personal appearance was obviously singular, and for
a brief time he exerted the full dexterity of his intelligence to take
advantage of what seemed to be a singular position in the world
about him. It is, I believe, useless to speculate upon what he
might have done-or whether or not he would have reached
in
poetry at least the greater heights of Nathaniel Hawthorne's prose
-if the circumstances of his being had been ever so slightly
moderated in his favor. The wonder is not that his personallimi·
lations so nearly destroyed the effectiveness of his literary career,
and undoubtedly clouded his reputation in American criticism,
but that within them he exerted a remarkable energy and a mem–
orable insight.
Perhaps Edgar Poe will always remain an embarrassment
in critical discussions of American literature; and of course a
final word that reilluminates completely the world of his imagina·
tion cannot and will never be written by a hand other than his
own. For my part I would repeat his warning which should
be
remembered as his epitaph: "The terror of which I write is not
of Germany but of the soul."
