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THERE'S A BEAUTY IN THY SMILE, LOVE.

There's a beauty in thy smile, love!
A mild and winning grace,
There's a jewel in thy heart, love,

Which time can ne'er displace;

And not a meteor in the sky,
Or streamlet softly clear,
Whose magic beauty greets the eye,

Can ever be more dear!

There's a sweetness in thy voice, love!

A charm in every sound,
There's a melody of truth, love!

In each expression found;
A mystic joy delights my soul,
A music wild and free,

And heaven, love! the angel's goal,

Is not more dear than thee !

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Delivered at the Wolverton Mechanics' Institute, June 3, 1853,

ON THE

POETRY OF FEELING AND DICTION.

PART I.

WHEN the summer sun robes the creation in luxurious apparel, and the variegated flowers exhale delicious incense to the breeze-while, perchance, ever and anon the lark ascends the aërial passages of Heaven, intermingling its mellow voice with the surrounding atmosphere, and the whole feathered messengers of song make the country resound with strains of melodious music-when every tree bears its fruit and flower its bloom; what rapture thrills the soul of man as he gazes around on such transcendant charms. What electric throbbings of joy vibrate the harpstrings of his heart. He may possess but an illiterate and uncultivated taste-the labyrinths of Science or the refinements of Art may afford no flowers for him-no flowers that are culled only by the intellectual and artistic mind— still he possesses a human heart-a heart as susceptible to love, as capable of loving the beautiful in Nature, as does the most subtle philosopher-the most refined artist.

The Poetry of Feeling, unlike the Poetry of Diction, is universally the property of man. From the peasant, through the intermediate grades of class, up to the king himself, it is felt, although it is oftentimes unnaturally stunted in its influence on some men-altogether unappreciated or unconsciously felt by others. It is Poetry in this sense, that, like an angel of goodness, it calls forth our sympathy for suffering and sorrow. It is the angel side of our existence which dictates to the heart all those generous impulses, unalloyed by mere selfish desire, which spring up in the human breast; those impulses which lead to patriotism and individual exertion, self-denial and suffering endurance, for the good of Humanity.

All men individually admire either some of the works of Nature or of Art. All men have some conceptions of Beauty, however vague and indefinite those conceptions

I

may be. All men can appreciate, in some limited propor tion, the mathematical delineation of life, as pourtrayed by the statuary's chisel; the finely-majestic and noblyreared palace, standing erect, in proud defiance, within the bounds of some delightfully pleasant park-the mental and physical labour of the architect; the rugged or sweetlyenticing landscape, with its trees, hills, meadows, and streams, decked in new and varied colours on the canvas of the painter; the mellifluous harmony of sound, that sweetly fulls the care-worn heart to rest, as produced by the magical touch of the musician, or the metrical composition of the poet, with his immortal thoughts for universal humanity, blended in euphonious harmony with the feelings and aspirations of the age in which he lives.

It would indeed be difficult to imagine a human creature entirely devoid of the finer susceptibilities of life, without the power to appreciate any of the elegancies so profusely strewn over his path, without spontaneous sympathy for suffering sometimes swelling in his breast, without even those holy affections of the heart, which gush up at the name of mother, brother, father, sister, wife, or child; for in all these we behold something of the poetry of the human and the universal heart, something to create the ennobling thought, that all men have within their own souls something of the poetry of feeling, developed in various

ways.

It is indeed a thought that should create within us grateful emotions to that Omniscient Power, whose hand-marks can be traced in all the varied scenes the universe displays. No matter the season, His sceptre wand may change the summer's luscious splendour into the winter's bleak and snow-tipped grandeur. Still that thought, which speaks to us through the aspiration after a nobler and far higher existence, that thought, which contains in itself all that is good, without a mixture of that which is evil, and carries us beyond the iron pressure of unfeeling and sectarian prejudice, springing from political or religious narrowness.-That thought, I repeat, which leads our imagination from the monotony of strife, to bask in the radiance of poetic sunshine, and to drink of the streams of universal humanity, over which it presides, is itself, an incontrovertible evidence of the universal influence of poetry on the feelings of mankind. Do we need to discover the natural influences at work which at all times give excitement to the soul, and roduce poetic impulse, we have but to view our relation to

outward world and to trace minutely the associations

that give maturity to our minds. When wonder is excited by the majestic and sublime realities of nature and the reason of man, becomes subservient to feeling, affording the mind no aid, in its vain struggles to fathom the inexplicable in creation. Then, I say, poetic feeling holds commune with the heart; it is the inspiration of nature at work. When the eye wonders over the delightful garden of the world, and the charms of beauty, with a soul-enchanting fascination uprise from everything around, if they should cause but one throb of unselfish pleasure to act upon our hearts-then, I say, poetic feeling is at work. When Love, that divine enchantress of life, waves her magic sceptre, and with its angelic influence creates a heaven of happiness within us, ever fitting us to aid, instruct, and elevate our fellow-creatures, and to feel an ecstacy of joy in whatever is beautiful in nature, as well as whatever is truly great and justly brave in the human character; and we are led by its influence to be more liberal in our opinions of others than we were, more generous in our actions of goodness than we were; and more susceptible of receiving the stimulous of further progress towards universal brotherhood. Then, I say, poetic feeling is at work. When gratitude to God for the boundless benefits he has given to his creatures, is moulded in the souls, and conveyed in the myriad prayers of a people, no matter though they be wanting in the mere outward semblance of scholastic pedantry for the fact that they are the inward workings of the soul, poured forth in thrilling and fervid utterance, is all that is requisite to stamp them with poetic feeling which is therein expressed. And, when gratitude to man for services he may have rendered the world-in giving a greater degree of freedom, politically, religiously or socially, to his kind, becomes the embodiment of an individual's or a people's affection, and he is stimulated thereby to still further and more rigorous endeavours, then, I say, poetic feeling is at work.

Whatever appeals to our imagination of a character advantageous to others, as well as to ourselves; and we feel impulsively its superiority over all that is merely mechanical, whatever becomes the ideal of our lives, that something yet unattained but in our thoughts, for which we look forward hopefully and eagerly, ever shaping our actions so that we may some day realise its promised advantages, contains the very germs of poetry, and although in the progress of our life, we may never attain that high, wealthy position which others may, whose lives are mere

ledgers of calculation, and whose very dreams are but the nightly return of daily pursuits. Yet, the very spontaneous impulse of hope and joy that attends each effort we make, to practically realise the ideal to which our actions tend, gives a bliss to the soul infinitely superior to those selfish considerations which almost entirely influence the minds of many of our fellow-creatures. For, like the rays of the spring-tide sun scattered in radiant pride over the flowery beds of creation, to beautify and enrich the world-do those rays of poetry scattered over the ideal dreams of our lives, cheer and enrich our souls, and whatever of such a character exists within us fascinating and wooing our affections, are the true workings of poetry on the feelings.

The poetry of feeling will for ever hold an exalted position in the drama of life, while the human heart retains its progressive development. Its influence has been strikingly manifested in the revolutions of the past whether social or intellectual. All great schemes ever propounded to mankind, and successfully carried out, needed something more to effect the desired end than mere money and materials, and exerted even in their untried and visionary form and influence, powerfully instrumental in their own accomplishment. Nor was this influence confined merely to the minds of the imaginative, it formed the ideal perfection in the souls of many who were habitually cool, cautious, and calculating men of the world, for even minds such as these, aided in bringing to a successful issue, schemes as grand in their conception, as they were wonderful in their effects on the destiny of mankind. Men become fascinated by the ideal truths contained in them, which truths must have produced the conviction that these schemes of prospective good might become realities, before enthusiasm, perseverance, and faith in the objects in view, could have been acquired sufficiently strong to withstand the depression arising from and produced by accumulated difficulties. Not only were these schemes in their untried form surrounded with poetry, which rested on the hearts of those men that ultimately developed their utility by divesting them of their apparent impracticabilities, but the slow and continual efforts made to bring them to perfection, and show them to be superior to mere utopias, required the influence of poetry also, without which influence they never could have been accomplished.

The imagination must have given existence to these schemes, and have clothed them in ideal attire, before ever the reason could have decided on the probability or the

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