If men really had new sentiments, poetry could not deal with them.

If, let us say, a man did not feel a bitter craving to eat bread; but did, by way of substitute, feel a fresh, original craving to eat brass fenders or mahogany tables, poetry could not express him.
If a man, instead of falling in love with a woman, fell in love with a fossil or a sea anemone, poetry could not express him.

Poetry can only express what is original in one sense--the sense in which we speak of original sin.

It is original, not in the paltry sense of being new, but in the deeper sense of being old; it is original in the sense that it deals with origins.
All artists, who have any experience of the arts, will agree so far, that a poet is bound to be conventional with regard to matters of art.
Unfortunately, however, they are the very people who cannot, as a general rule, see that a poet is also bound to be conventional in matters of conduct.

It is only the smaller poet who sees the poetry of revolt, of isolation, of disagreement; the larger poet sees the poetry of those great agreements which constitute the romantic achievement of civilisation.