people that I decided to collect and issue these poems in a small volume
to be called "Poems of Passion." By the word "Passion" I meant the
"grand passion" of love. To those who take exception to the title of the
book I would suggest an early reference to Webster's definitions of the
word.

Since this volume has caused so much agitation throughout the entire
country, and even sent a tremor across the Atlantic into the Old World,
I beg leave to make a few statements concerning some of the poems.

The excitement of mingled horror and amaze seems to center upon four
poems, namely: "Delilah," "Ad Finem," "Conversion," and "Communism."

"Delilah" was written and first published in 1877. I had been reading
history, and became stirred by the power of such women as Aspasia and
Cleopatra over such grand men as Antony, Socrates, and Pericles. Under
the influence of this feeling I dashed off "Delilah," which I meant to
be an expression of the powerful fascination of such a woman upon the
memory of a man, even as he neared the hour of death. If the poem is
immoral, then the history which inspired it is immoral. I consider it my
finest effort.

"Ad Finem" was written in 1878. I think there are few women of strong
character and affections who cannot, from either experience or
observation, understand the violent intensity of regret and despair
which sometimes takes possession of the human heart after the loss by
death, fate, or the force of circumstances, of some one very dear.

In "Ad Finem" I intended to give voice to this very common experience of
almost every heart. Many noble women have since told me that the poem