piring, grateful of recognition. There was a blessing in the elder's encouragement, but bane in the direction of the artistic pressure. At that time Keats cared more for decoration than for profound feeling. The two had, therefore, a natural affinity, a love of pretty things, and they flattered each other's weakness. Hunt opened his home and heart, made a couch for the visitor in his library, stimulated his ambition, recommended his own style of heroic couplet and introduced him to a literary coterie. Keats met, first and last, Reynolds, Haydon, Shelley, Dilke, Brown and Severn.

The occasional verses of these months give glimpses of his life. In Hunt's library a miniature museum of busts and pictures the little clan gathered, wrote competitive sonnets, spent the evenings in animated chat and, like the snowbound Esquimaux in winter, indulged themselves too generously in mutual admirationKeats left reluctantly for the long dark walk to his lodgings in London. But he went oblivious of cold, winds and stars. His mind was full of Milton and Italian poetry. His heart was overflowing with creative impulses. His spirit was on the heights. And he renders these moods of exaltation — the noteworthy feature — in terms

of singing angels, pink robes, wavy hair, silver harps, pearly chariots-all pretty things.

Haydon was something of a counter-influence. If Hunt with his elegant trifles is comparable to a Cellini, Haydon, with his hammering energy, is comparable to the god Thor. A tempestuous soul; of heroic aspirations; egotistic, tireless, almost a conqueror of fame. Keats spent hours in his studio, deeply impressed by the painter's highmindedness. "Consider principle of more value than genius," he advised the young poet. "Collect incident, study character, read Shakespeare and trust in Providence." The divine fire in Haydon, however, was fitful. He professed to find a refuge in God and he found his final refuge in suicide. These two personal influences played upon plastic nature of Keats while he was making the first collection of poems. The Hunt pressure was by far the stronger. The volume of 1817, in substance and technique, shows the predilections of the creator of the new style. It was dedicated to Hunt and when issued it was reviewed and praised in the “Examiner." The début was illstarred. For Keats was thus publicly affiliated with the libeler of the Regent and his poetry was associated with the political radicalism which had made its nest on Hampstead Heath.

the

It is desirable now to examine the poetic personality of Keats. He has attained self-consciousness, chosen his calling and begun his work. What in his equipment is peculiar? From what do the creative impulses proceed?

The Bible is the chief source of our exalted sentiments. A boy, born of English parents, bred in an English community, must come into contact, more or less, with the history, the poetry, the ethics of the Christian traditions. The character of Keats, of course, was affected involuntarily by his environment. But his conscious attitude toward the Christian faith and the church was indifference. Emerson rejected the sacrament of the Lord's Supper because he did n't find it “interesting." Keats turned from the faith and the church because he did n't find them interesting. He admired the splendor, the disinterested service of Jesus; he held blindly, waveringly, to a belief in immortality. Never