Balancing act

After writing the muddled observations about Kant, leave it to Edgar Allan Poe to bring the big issues into sharper focus. In a short essay called “Instinct vs. Reason— A Black Cat” he said what I was thinking far better than I ever could:

Instinct, so far from being an inferior reason, is perhaps the most exacted intellect of them all. It will appear to the true philosopher as the divine mind itself acting immediately upon it’s creatures . . .

The leading distinction between instinct and reason seems to be, that, while one is infinitely more exact, the more certain, and the more far-seeing in its sphere of action— the sphere of action of the other is of the far wider extent.

Intuition and instinct are, to me, allied. Poe tells a charming tale of his cat performing complex actions, without the benefit of reason, which calls into question what intellect really is. The “divine mind” comment closely relates to what I meant by my sense of Kant’s substratum, and Poe's ideas are parallel to my own. The comment that instinct is more pervasive, though under-utilized is sheer genius. I knew it! Literature can make the most complex philosophical propositions much easier to digest.

I think Poe had a pretty good handle on Shelley too: “If ever poet sang— as a bird sings— earnestly — impulsively— with utter abandonment — to himself solely— for the mere joy of his own song...” Of course, like many critics of his time, he felt as if Shelley was a poor craftsman, and his works were not finely worked out. I’d disagree on some poems, but agree on others. However, the intuition that Shelley’s poems were just sketches, notes to himself where “what seems like diffuseness of one idea is a conglomerate concision of many” just seems right on the mark. Maybe that’s my problem: I read too much Shelley.

Poe contrasts Shelley with Tennyson, who was perhaps the finest of craftsmen, though not always the most intuitive of poets and proposes that if by “happy chance” the analytic qualities of Tennyson, and the intuitive exuberance of Shelley should meet in one poet, it would be the greatest poet the world had ever seen. However Poe notes the antagonism between the qualities, and perhaps the impossibility of such a quest.