I now have the Lehrer. Before I address that book, I first should express disdain for my last posting where I wrote: " I've known individuals with an extraordinary sensibility that I usually admired immensely, and which I discerned to be distinct from what I'll call the "mere consciousness" which every lout has."
The trouble with that is, it compares a "faculty" -- sensibility -- with the PRODUCT of a faculty -- consciousness. This is roughly like comparing John's sense of humor to Jim's joke. Bad. In the same posting I wrote: "Well done, Mike. To me, it sounds like Whitman (sometimes) thought of "soul" the way others might think of "sensibility", or perhaps, as "sensitivity" in the nineteenth-century sense of an ability to react to exquisitely suggestive elements of "nature". Now that I've begun to look at the Lehrer, and pondered more steadily what Mike Mallory cited, I believe I was unjustifiably and dim-wittedly giving Whitman more credit than he deserves. But more about my disdain for him in a subsequent posting. This one is simply to say mea culpa for my last, where I tried to go too far on too little reading. I should have napped. ************** Life should be easier. So should your homepage. Try the NEW AOL.com. (http://www.aol.com/?optin=new-dp&icid=aolcom40vanity& ncid=emlcntaolcom00000002)
