conviction that, unless you are suffused--soul and body, one might say--
with that moral purpose which finds its largest expression in love--that
is, the love of all things in their proper relation--unless you are
suffused with this love, do not dare to meddle with beauty; unless you
are suffused with beauty, do not dare to meddle with truth; unless you
are suffused with truth, do not dare to meddle with goodness. In a word,
unless you are suffused with truth, wisdom, goodness, and love, abandon
the hope that the ages will accept you as an artist."

Through these years of high aspiration and manly endeavor, the poet and
musician was waging a losing fight with consumption. He was finally
driven to tent life in a high, pure atmosphere as his only hope. He first
went to Asheville, North Carolina, and a little later to Lynn. But his
efforts to regain his health proved in vain; and on the 7th of September,
1881, the tragic struggle was brought to a close.

The time has hardly come to give a final judgment as to Lanier's place in
American letters. He certainly deserves a place by the side of the very
best poets of the South, and perhaps, as many believe, by the side of the
greatest masters of American song. His genius had elements of originality
equaled only by Poe. He had the high moral purpose of the artist-
prophets; but his efforts after musical effects, as well as his untimely
death, prevented the full fruitage of his admirable genius. Many of the
poems that he has left us are lacking in spontaneity and artistic finish.
Alliterative effects are sometimes obtrusive. His poetic theories, as
presented in _The Science of English Verse_, often outstripped his
execution. But, after all these abatements are made, it remains true that
in a few pieces he has reached a trembling height of poetic and musical
rapture that is unsurpassed in the whole range of American poetry.