much as the didactic poet from the doctrinal part of his theme.

From this attempt to rectify the idea of didactic poetry, it will be
seen at once why Pope failed utterly and inevitably in the 'Essay on
Man.' The subject was too directly and commandingly interesting to
furnish any opening to that secondary and playful interest which arises
from the management by art and the subjugation of an intractable theme.
The ordinary interest of didactic poetry is derived from the _repellent_
qualities of the subject, and consequently from the dexterities of the
conflict with what is doubtful, indifferent, unpromising. Not only was
there no _resistance_ in the subject to the grandeur of poetry, but, on
the contrary, this subject offered so much grandeur, was so pathetic and
the amplitude of range so vast as to overwhelm the powers of any poet
and any audience, by its exactions. That was a fault in one direction.
But a different fault was--that the subject allowed no power of
selection. In ordinary didactic poetry, as we have just been insisting,
you sustain the interest by ignoring all the parts which will not bear a
steady gaze. Whatever fascinates the eye, or agitates the heart by
mimicry of life is selected and emphasized, and what is felt to be
intractable or repellent is authoritatively set aside. The poet has an
unlimited discretion. But on a theme so great as man he has no
discretion at all. This resource is denied. You _can_ give the truth
only by giving the whole truth. In treating a common didactic theme you
may neglect merely transitional parts with as much ease as benefit,
because they are familiar enough to be pre-supposed, and are besides
essential only in the real process, but not at all in the mimic process
of description; since A and C, that in the _reality_ could reach one
another only through B, may yet be intelligible as regards their beauty
without any intermediation of B. The ellipsis withdraws a deformity, and
does not generally create an obscurity: either the obscurity is none at
all, or is irrelevant to the real purpose of beauty, or may be treated
sufficiently by a line or two of adroit explanation. But in a poem
treating so vast a theme as man's relations to his own race, to his
habitation the world, to God his maker, and to all the commands of the
conscience, to the hopes of the believing heart, and to the eternal
self-conflicts of the intellect, it is clear that the purely
transitional parts, essential