Source identified
Read & copy the quotation
“The noblest poem cannot be elaborated, and send down its undying strains into the future, without steady and painstaking labour.”
- Source
- Thrift
- Date
- 1875
Meaning of “The noblest poem cannot be elaborated, and send…”
Poetic achievement is used as an example of creative work requiring patient elaboration rather than appearing complete in a single burst.
Where does it come from?
Thrift, Chapter I, “Industry,” Project Gutenberg #14418. The sentence follows Smiles’s claim that useful and beautiful thoughts arise from sustained intellectual work and uses poetry as one example of painstaking creative labour.
