Classic Poem

In proud profusion, trying to the eyes,
The varied schools come crowding for a prize:
The Warm and Wilful: and the Chaste and Cool:
The Square-touch: and the Channel squadron school:
The Futile Frantic, charged of woe and crime:
The Wild " Historic," out of space and time:
The " Soulful" school, of sentimental rant:
The " Moral" school, of platitude and cant:
The Fleshly school, of subjects piping hot
That fire the yearning prude, and boil the pot:
The Kiss-mama school, of the nurs'ry cares,
Of bread-and-butter brats and angel airs:
The school Religious — and the school Profane,
That mad distinction of a muddled brain:
The " Christian" school, that libels Christ for pay,

And trades on clap-trap in the formal way —
The school affected by the Pagan crews
That haunt the holy Latin Quarter stews
For virgin subjects suitable to paint —
Supplied the Sinner but denied the Saint:
The Portrait school, that prostitutes for gold
The stately art Velasquez loved of old:
The Academic, lost to fame and shame:
And other schools la-bas that one could name,
Were all this studio jargon of the schools
Aught but the bungler's " bleat" to boggle rules!

Indeed, all schools are met and mangled here,
All schools but one, the simple and sincere;
The school of Genius, glad To-morrow's school,
That shuns the obvious and the easy rule,
To dwell with Beauty in content apart,
And mould the new expression of its art;
Reporting with a vision trained and free
The many-sided moods of sky and sea,
Fused and transfigured of artistic mind
And born again, transcendent and refin'd.

Is all paint sacramental unto men,
And flawless art a fiction of the pen?
Are shirt-sleeve critics Children of the Rope,
Mere sons of Folly, lost to love and hope?
Is Wisdom wholly hidden from their gaze
In Salons reeking of official " bays,"
Where dower'd Dulness flaunts a golden crown,
Swells with pretence and lays his honour down?
Defending daubers with a smirking leer,
And damning Merit with a civil sneer,
As tho' in art there were no central sight,
No fact for which the loyal masters fight,
Only Opinion, colour-blind and bold —
The theory of an int'rest craving gold!
Come! let us raid these " Bleaters," who essay
To rape a dazzled public's praise and pay.