Synge and the Ireland of his Time: VIII
By William Butler Yeats
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VIII
Not that Synge brought out of the struggle with himself any definite
philosophy, for philosophy in the common meaning of the word is created
out of an anxiety for sympathy or obedience, and he was that rare, that
distinguished, that most noble thing, which of all things still of the
world is nearest to being sufficient to itself, the pure artist. Sir
Philip Sidney complains of those who could hear 'sweet tunes' (by which
he understands could look upon his lady) and not be stirred to 'ravishing
delight.'
'Or if they do delight therein, yet are so closed with wit,
As with sententious lips to set a title vain on it;
Oh let them hear these sacred tunes, and learn in Wonder's schools
To be, in things past bonds of wit, fools if they be not fools!'
Ireland for three generations has been like those churlish logicians.
Everything is argued over, everything has to take its trial before the
dull sense and the hasty judgment, and the character of the nation has so
changed that it hardly keeps but among country people, or where some
family tradition is still stubborn, those lineaments that made Borrow cry
out as he came from among the Irish monks, his friends and entertainers
for all his Spanish Bible scattering, 'Oh, Ireland, mother of the bravest
soldiers and of the most beautiful women!' It was as I believe, to seek
that old Ireland which took its mould from the duellists and scholars of
the 18th century and from generations older still, that Synge returned
again and again to Aran, to Kerry, and to the wild Blaskets.
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