Not so my friend; he marched up manfully, and putting
his arm over the old woman's shoulder, led her across as carefully as
though she were a princess. Of course, I was ashamed: ashamed! I was
frightened; I expected to see the old woman change into a tall angel
and take him off to heaven, leaving me her original shape to repent
in. On recovering my thoughts, I was inclined to take up my friend
and carry him home in triumph, I felt so strong. Why should not this
thing be as poetical as any in the life of Saint Elizabeth of Hungary
or any one else? for, so we look at it with a pure thought, we shall
see about it the same light the Areopagite saw at Jerusalem surround
the Holy Virgin, and the same angels attending and guarding it.
And there is something else we miss; there is the poetry of the
things about us; our railways, factories, mines, roaring cities,
steam vessels, and the endless novelties and wonders produced every
day; which if they were found only in the Thousand and One Nights, or
in any poem classical or romantic, would be gloried over without end;
for as the majority of us know not a bit more about them, but merely
their names, we keep up the same mystery, the main thing required for
the surprise of the imagination.
Next to Poetry, Painting and Music have most power over the mind; and
how do you apply this influence? In what direction is it forced? Why,
for the last, you sit in your drawing-rooms, and listen to a quantity
of tinkling of brazen marches of going to war; but you never see
before your very eyes, the palpable victory of leading nature by her
own power, to a conquest of blessings; and when the music is over,
you turn to each other, and enthusiastically whisper, "How
fine!"--You point out to others, (as if they had no eyes) the
sentiment of a flowing river with the moon on it, as an emblem of the
after-peace, but you see not this in the long white cloud of steam,
the locomotive pours forth under the same moon, rushing on; the
perfect type of the same, with the presentment of the struggle
beforehand.
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