The Life of the Spirit in the Modern English Poets

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Houghton, Mifflin, 1895 - 349 pages
 

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Page 8 - The Man of science seeks truth as a remote and unknown benefactor; he cherishes and loves it in his solitude: the Poet, singing a song in which all human beings join with him, rejoices in the presence of truth as our visible friend and hourly companion. Poetry is the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge; it is the impassioned expression which is in the countenance of all Science.
Page 252 - We heard the sweet bells over the bay? In the caverns where we lay, Through the surf and through the swell, The far-off sound of a silver bell? Sand-strewn caverns, cool and deep, Where the winds are all asleep; Where the spent lights quiver and gleam, Where the salt weed sways in the stream...
Page 16 - THERE rolls the deep where grew the tree. O earth, what changes hast thou seen ! There where the long street roars, hath been The stillness of the central sea. The hills are shadows, and they flow From form to form, and nothing stands ; They melt like mist, the solid lands, Like clouds they shape themselves and go.
Page 187 - Not the fruit of experience, but experience itself, is the end. A counted number of pulses only is given to us of a variegated, dramatic life. How may we see in them all that is to be seen in them by the finest senses? How shall we pass most swiftly from point to point, and be present always at the focus where the greatest number of vital forces unite in their purest energy? To burn always with this hard, gem-like flame, to maintain this ecstasy, is success in life.
Page 320 - That each, who seems a separate whole, Should move his rounds, and fusing all The skirts of self again, should fall Remerging in the general Soul, Is faith as vague as all unsweet: Eternal form shall still divide The eternal soul from all beside; And I shall know him when we meet...
Page 9 - ... if the time should ever come when these things shall be familiar to us, and the relations under which they are contemplated by the followers of these respective sciences shall be manifestly and palpably material to us as enjoying and suffering beings.
Page 138 - The loathsome mask has fallen, the man remains Sceptreless, free, uncircumscribed, but man Equal, unclassed, tribeless, and nationless, Exempt from awe, worship, degree, the king Over himself; just, gentle, wise: but man Passionless; no, yet free from guilt or pain, Which were, for his will made or suffered them, Nor yet exempt, tho...
Page 302 - Of aspect more sublime; that blessed mood, In which the burthen of the mystery. In which the heavy and the weary weight Of all this unintelligible world, Is lightened— that serene and blessed mood In which the affections gently lead us on— Until, the breath of this corporeal frame And even the motion of our human blood Almost suspended, we are laid asleep In body, and become a living soul; While with an eye made quiet by the power Of harmony, and...
Page 122 - Life of Life, thy lips enkindle With their love the breath between them; And thy smiles before they dwindle Make the cold air fire; then screen them In those looks, where whoso gazes Faints, entangled in their mazes.
Page 259 - Is it so small a thing To have enjoy'd the sun, To have lived light in the spring, To have loved, to have thought, to have done ; To have advanced true friends, and beat down baffling foes...

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