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regions consecrate to eldest time ;" her vast wrecks of elemental contests ; her rocks , monumental of an earlier world . And what are the artificial distinctions of men , regarded even as objects 'of the imagination , to those noble attributes m which the loftiest
and the , poorest of the species are equally sharers ? The-splendours of tyrants are dim compared with the gorgeous- visions of childhood . The awe 'which human power can strike into the heart by pomps and august ceremonials , is little to those mysteries
of humanity , life and death , which are -common to ail . The glory of individuals is faint in comparison with that ^ with which man , as man , is encircled . He is in the infancy of a being which rcannot perish . * The stirrings of immortality arfc busy in his soul . Amidst the delicate ornaments and rich
garniture of this his earthly abode , he discerns indications of a beauty more perfect than here he can even imagine . The Divinity bends to listen to his prayers . " A thousand'liveried angels rlacquey him . " From the majestical pillars of earth , the unchanging rocks and forked hills , he looks " to temples hot made with hands , eternal in the
heavens . " There is a depth of affection in his soul which thought cannot fathom , principles which mortal accidents cannot alter , love and hope which he feels that the icy finger of death cannot totally chill . What , then ,
would a poet lose if the symbols of eartfe-i > orn . grandeur were swept away , and man , in his own native majesty , surrounded with all the gorgeous furniture of his terrestial , palace , remained for him to revere and to celebrate •?
Will he mourn the loss * of luxurious trappings who can " live in the rainbow , and play in the plighted clouds' * ? Will he regret the cumbrous processions of a court who can watch the fleecy clouds , in their splendid array , which seem to lie around the portal of heaven ? Will he regret the antiquity of " time-honoured" dungeons who looks freely at the sun which shone over Thermopylae and Marathon ? What are the vanishing baubles of earth to him who lives already in the light of other days ; who feels within Injn self the spirit of immortality ; whd is conscious of joys uliiph he will recogpize in heaven , of hopes whfeh have -their resting-place near the throne of
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the Eternal ! He can shed his own consecration on all the lovelinesses of nature , " a light that never was by sea or land . " His imaginations can throw
a gentle tinge on the evils of life , exhibit our mortal course as rich with indications of immortality , and soften the aspect of death , until it appears €€ a shadow thrown softly and lightly from a passing cloud /* To him the external world is full of sanctities ; its smallest beauties are the remembrancers
of gentle desires , the depositories of little tendernesses , the awakeners of thoughts that " do often lie too deep for tears . " Wiiile the thrones of this world fall , and " the roses and flowers of kings" perish ; the scenes of his joy endure . Amidst the desolations of
ambition , the summer * evening ' s breath is sweet as ever . Stateliest empires have sunk into oblivion , but the tendered dew-drop is lit up as it was in Eden .
Poetry which celebrates only heroes and monarchs must perish with them , but that which appeals -to nature and the heart may share in their stability and duration /
It is also a fallacious opinion that poetry flourishes l > est with a superstitious faith . It is the nature of superstition to controul the -excursions of the imagination as much as the exertions of thought . It may sometimes fill a limited circle with gorgeous
imagery , but it suffers not the mind to stray beyond it . Thus the Greek jnythology created forms of inimitable grandeur and beauty , and peopled with them every rock and grove and stream . But " free nature ' s gra £ e" was lost in these exquisite wonders . The poet
imaged not the brook in its own sweet course , with its gentle cascades and delicate reflectings of beauty , but substituted a fair-hair'diiymph . The mom stood not tip-toe qn the mountain ' s top , but was imagedhyagoddess with roseate fingers . All tfie lonelinesses of
wide prospects , all the pe ^ pective of nature ana of the soul , > were totally hidden . Now we are enabled to enjoy the grace and precwJMm , i 6 f © redan poetry without rerigmngl ^ Ofie more extended views wWchJa J * rt > Wer fwljji
discloses . The * jW < fpn *» ** f . kerofc * and of gods are instinct and breatWw still—there , whe ^ utbey jnijafeter on ly to our elevated 4 ^ K ^ fpi in : the iftia # * nation '® grandest rt £ i < Miis . ^' Hetfvari ; dent dower Olympw Mfe not sold .
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98 The Nonconformist . No . XVL
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 2, 1820, page 98, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2485/page/34/
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