THE VALUE OF SOCIAL CONSERVATISM ACCORDING TO ROBERT FROST RICHARD DILLINGHAM Berry College A writer seldom deals frequently with a subject unless he feels that it has some value. Robert Frost is no exception. His poetry expresses social conservatism. At the same time his poetry displays his belief that this social conservatism has value. Frost feels that "... life is often lived at a point where power- ful forces meet. Either of these forces taken alone will warp or sometimes even destroy life. Holding these forces in equilibrium gives the most satisfactory life which this world can offer. . 1. ."1 Frost seems to say that this indispensable equilibrium is achieved with social conservatism. Throughout his poetry Frost demonstrates his belief that dis- asters result when a balance between opposing forces is not main- tained. Social reformers, he says, often become so concerned with new things that they forget the potentiality of anything that is old. The effect of this type of procedure is that there is a large amount of waste. "The Wood-Pile" illustrates this point. In this poem a pile of cut wood has been left unused by "Someone who lived in turning to fresh tasks."2 This wood could be used to provide warmth for some family during the cold days of winter, but it has been left "To warm the frozen swamp as best it could/With the slow smokeless burning of decay."3 Frost also contends that too much concern for newness can cause the destruction of things (individualism, self-reliance, and personal creativeness) that are needed in any age. He expresses this idea in a letter to Louis Untermeyer: "In the general rush of change with almost everything going, I should think there would be danger that some things would be carried away that even the wildest revolutionary would be sorry to see carried away."4 In the same letter Frost states explicitly the value of social conservatism by contrasting his position concerning social affairs to Untermeyer's position: "You want to blow the candle to see if it won't give more light. All right, let me hold the candle so you can give all your attention to blowing it carefully so as not to blow it out. And let me hold the matches too so that if you should blow it out we could form a society to relight it."5 The danger of allowing the process of reform to get out of hand and sweep away things which no one wants to destroy is This content downloaded from 128.255.58.141 on Thu, 03 Jan 2019 20:44:52 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 62 Frost actually similar to the situation found in "Rose Pogonias." The speaker of the poem and his companion have found a meadow of flowers and tall grass. They hope That in the general mowing That place might be forgot; Or if not all so favored, Obtain such grace of hours, That none should mow the grass there While so confused with flowers.6 Beautiful flowers, like individualism, self-reliance, and personal creativeness, are things that make any age more pleasant; tall grass is a nuisance. If one were to rush into the meadow to cut the tall grass without first observing where the flowers were, he could destroy these flowers in the process of indiscriminately mowing. Frost does not like socialism, scientific progress, and educa- tional specialization. One major reason for his dislike is his belief that in each of these areas the balance between two extremes has been lost. Reformers offer socialism as a way of improving man's condition, but Frost maintains that socialism destroys the equili- brium between man's self-reliance and his reliance on other human beings by making it less disastrous to abandon self-reliance and by actually encouraging this abandonment. Scientists give the world the destructive power of nuclear weapons, but they do not have the ability to control the use of these weapons. Consequently, life itself is in danger. The world "Will find relief in one burst. You shall see. / That's what a certain bomb was sent to be."7 The area of education offers, I think, the best example of Frost's belief that allowing one of two extremes to get the upper hand warps or even destroys life. In "The Ax-Helve" one finds objects which are comparable to the product of educational spe- cialization and the creative, thoughtful individual. Magoon of "A Hundred Collars" and the ant of "Departmental" cannot stand up to any test that is outside their specialties. They are like the ax-helve which the speaker of the poem was using when Baptiste came upon him: "You give her one good crack, she's snap raght off."8 But an ax-helve that was made by Baptiste was different: He liked to have it slender as a whipstock, Free from the least knot, equal to the strain Of bending like a sword across the knee. He showed me that the lines of a good helve Were native to the grain before the knife Expressed them, and its curves were no false curves Put on it from without. And there its strength lay.9 This content downloaded from 128.255.58.141 on Thu, 03 Jan 2019 20:44:52 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms South Atlantic Bulletin The individual who is creative enough to think for himself is like one of Baptiste's ax-helves: he is capable of bending, of dealing with various aspects of life. His life is not warped by being con- fined to one narrow section of life. Social conservatism has value, Frost says, as a force which serves to balance the recklessness of the social reformers. Reformers want to improve the age in which they live, just as the speaker of "The Grindstone" wanted to assist his companion in improving the sharpness of a cutting tool. But reformers must remember what the speaker of "The Grindstone" has remembered: The thing that made me more and more afraid Was that we'd ground it sharp and hadn't known. And now were only wasting precious blade. And when he raised it dripping once and tried The creepy edge of it with wary touch, And viewed it over his glasses funny-eyed, Only disinterestedly to decide It needed a turn more, I could have cried Wasn't there danger of a turn too much? Mightn't we make it worse instead of better?'0 The importance which Frost attaches to holding opposing forces in equilibrium, whatever these forces may be, is maintained with remarkable consistency throughout his poetry. In "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening," two contending forces, duty and desire, are held in balance. The woods represent that which could divert one from performing his duty. The man in the poem stops to watch these woods fill with snow, to obey a desire to be im- practical for a moment, as Pike of "From Plane to Plane" was when he hoed only one way. Yet the man in the poem does not allow desire to dominate his outlook on life: The woods are lovely, dark and deep, But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep." This man is able to take life as a whole, to live with desire (im- practicality) on the one hand and duty (work) on the other. Because he is capable of holding these two forces in equilibrium, he can enjoy both of them. He is like the husband of "Home Burial," who does not allow grief to destroy life. In contrast to this man and the husband of "Home Burial" is the wife of "Home Burial," who does not maintain a balance between the joy which life offers and the grief which life offers. This content downloaded from 128.255.58.141 on Thu, 03 Jan 2019 20:44:52 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 64 Frost Another example of Frost's sense of balance is the view which he takes concerning the relationship between some divine power and man. One can only describe it as a "... middle-ground position of skepticism without relinquishing faith, on the one hand, and denial, on the other hand."12 In "Sitting by a Bush in Broad Sun- light," Frost says that We must not be too ready to scoff. God once declared he was true And then took the veil and withdrew.13 And in "Accidentally on Purpse," even though evolutionists explain man as an accident, as the modification of a former generation, even though such explanations make life appear purposeless, Never believe it. At the very worst It must have had the purpose from the very first To produce purpose as the fitter bred: We were just purpose coming to a head. Whose purpose was it? His or Hers or Its? Let's leave that to the scientific wits. Grant me intention, purpose, and design- That's near enough for me to the Divine.14 At the same time that one finds these expressions of faith in a divine power, skeptical as they are, he also discovers poems, like "Design" and "The Strong Are Saying Nothing," in which Frost expresses some doubt that there is something in man that endures after death: "There may be little or much beyond the grave, / But the strong are saying nothing until they see."'5 Frost's poetry is concerned with social conservatism, and Frost assigns a specific value to it. Frost himself provides the brief de- scription that one needs to summarize what kind of poetry he offers: I could give all to Time except-except What I myself have held. But why declare The things forbidden that while the Customs slept I have crossed to Safety with? For I am There, And what I would not part with I have kept.'6 NOTES 1. John Doyle, Jr., The Poetry of Robert Frost: An Analysis (New York, 1962), p. 238. 2. Robert Frost, "The Wood-Pile," in Complete Poems of Robert Frost (New York, 1949), p. 127. Hereafter cited as Complete Poems. 3. Ibid. This content downloaded from 128.255.58.141 on Thu, 03 Jan 2019 20:44:52 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms South Atlantic Bulletin 65 4. Robert Frost, The Letters of Robert Frost to Louis Untermeyer, ed. Louis Untermeyer (New York, 1963), p. 97. 5. Ibid., p. 99. 6. Robert Frost, "Rose Pogonias," in Complete Poems, p. 19. 7. Robert Frost, "Bursting Rapture," in Complete Poems, p. 568. 8. Robert Frost, "The Ax-Helve," in Complete Poems, p. 228. 9. Ibid., p. 230. 10. Robert Frost, "The Grindstone," in Complete Poems, p. 234. 11. Robert Frost, "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening," in Complete Poems, p. 275. 12. Lawrance Thompson, Fire and Ice: The Art and Thought of Robert Frost (New York, 1942), p. 182. 13. Robert Frost, "Sitting by a Bush in Broad Daylight," in Complete Poems, p. 342. 14. Robert Frost, "Accidentally on Purpose," in In the Clearing (New York, 1962), p. 34. 15. Robert Frost, "The Strong Are Saying Nothing," in Complete Poems, p. 791. 16. Robert Frost, "I Could Give All to Time," in Complete Poems, p. 447. The Index Committee of the Modern Language Association announces the publication of Volume I of the Second Edition of Donald G. Wing's Short-Title Catalogue of Books Printed in England, Scotland, Wales, and British America and of English Books Printed in Other Countries, 1641-1700. The three volumes of the First Edition were published between 1945 and 1951, with the goal of listing every book, pamphlet, and broadside published in the last sixty years of the seventeenth century. These volumes included 90,000 listings and proved to be an indispensable tool of scholarship and a stimulus to research in the seventeenth century. The Second .Edition is a complete revision and updating of the First Edition with information acquired in the past twenty-seven years. It has been estimated that under the A's alone there are more than 1,000 new facts, mostly listings of additional copies of already cited titles that Mr. Wing has located. Volume I contains 644 pages and sells for $60.00. Volumes II and III are forthcoming. Donald G. Wing is Associate Librarian, Emeritus, of the Yale University Library. For further information, please write Mrs. Judith Lapidus, MLA Advertising and Promotion Coordinator, 62 Fifth Avenue, New York 10011. This content downloaded from 128.255.58.141 on Thu, 03 Jan 2019 20:44:52 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms South Atlantic Modern Language Association The Value of Social Conservatism according to Robert Frost Author(s): Richard Dillingham Source: South Atlantic Bulletin, Vol. 37, No. 4 (Nov., 1972), pp. 61-65 Published by: South Atlantic Modern Language Association Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/3197367 Accessed: 03-01-2019 20:44 UTC JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at https://about.jstor.org/terms South Atlantic Modern Language Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to South Atlantic Bulletin This content downloaded from 128.255.58.141 on Thu, 03 Jan 2019 20:44:52 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms