terrible moment everybody is paralysed; but an instant later a man advances from amongst the gathering spectators, vigorously applies himself to the door, and forces it in. Thereupon fierce flames dart out upon him, and he starts back irresolute. A moment's pause, and he is among the flames on a mission as heroic as was ever undertaken by a Knight of the Round Table. He returns no more. When the fire burns out, his ashes are discovered where he fell. Such an event took place in the Cowgate of Edinburgh (if I remember rightly) many years ago. The hero was a man of humble calling—a shoemaker, I think. When the event recurs to our memories it passes not away in a mere mental vision of a burning house, and an excited crowd, and sparks flying, and a man bursting open the door; but with all this we are at the same time filled with a feeling or emotion of the morally sublime. The terror of the scene is softened by the grandeur of it. We thrill with high joy over our shoemaker hero. The feeling of horror over his earthly fate is overwhelmed by that of exultation over his heroism, and out of this again we would argue a great future for him. In short, there is an immortal significance in this moral emotion. I am strongly disposed to think that the universe itself would be all wrong, utterly out of joint, if for him that blazing doorway were nothing more than a tragical entrance to death and eternal oblivion. This, however, is beside the main question under consideration. The present point is that we not only survey the case intellectually, but that we are also deeply thrilled and moved by it. In this soul-thrilling or emotion lies the source of Poetry. The person who might not be deeply moved in the contemplation of such a scene would be for ever incapable of saying or writing anything moving about it, and would, of course, remain for ever unmoved by anything that might be said or written about it. One of the kind is lacking in the noblest elements of Human Nature; he is allied to the Clod, and might say with the pigs : Have we not found out how pleasant which, by the way, would be an excellent motto for the Hedonist. If such a person could get to Heaven, his interests there would probably be exhausted in the Celestial Pantry. 21. In a country Churchyard.—Continuing our investigation into the sources of Poetry, let us stroll into an old country churchyard. Probably it is an ill-kept one, but for our present purposes that does not matter. We see the grey old church, the moss-grown gravestones, the world-old symbols of mortality sculptured upon them, the rank grass growing high round about them. To the philosophic mind those objects suggest thought, meditation, contemplation, out of which grows emotion, tender or sorrowful or solemn as the case may be, all attuned to the strain and character of the thought. In this connection study, for instance, Gray's glorious Elegy, or take just a couplet from Wordsworth. When, looking round the mural tablets in a country church, he speaks of certain of them as commemorative of— "Youth or maiden gone before their time, he is speaking of them with emotion-that is, affectionately and poetically. Let them be spoken of as married women and spinsters merely, and you have heartless and unfeeling prose, although it would be quite intelligible. The heart is the fountain 1 Calderon, 'The Sources of Sin,' p. 183. The Excursion: The Pastor.' of Poetry, and indeed it has no existence but as springing from the heart. "The heart of the wise teacheth his mouth and addeth learning to his lips." 1 22. But this I also apprehend: the greater and nobler the thinking power exercised, the greater and nobler will be the emotions awakened in the situation suggested. Noble thoughts will always be accompanied by emotions of a corresponding kind, whilst small thoughts about small things will be accompanied by meagre emotions, or perhaps by no emotions at all. Small persons dote upon small things, and are almost incapable of emotion; great persons glory in great things, and are in full emotional accordance with them. 23. In a great Cathedral.-Enter now a great Cathedral. We all know that it implies far more than a large building built for ecclesiastical purposes after a certain model, or upon certain architectural principles. The Cathedral, though it be but the work of man, has great esthetical as well as intellectual implications. "Oh, but the building was a grand and overpowering sight," says one in 'Mansie Waugh,' "making man dree the sense of his own insignificance even in the midst of his own handiwork." This strikes the right note. The great Cathedral fills the healthy soul with the emotions of solemnity, awe, worship-with such emotions as in the case of a Milton can scarcely rest in the emotion, but will seek for utterance in sweet Poetry. Notice the same feeling expressed by Shakespeare in viewing a heathen sacrifice : 1 Emotion will correspond to the quality of thinking, and vice Thus also Racine : Tout respire ici, Dieu, la paix, la verité.” 1 24. The Cathedral Music.-Whilst you are in the Cathedral an organist gives voice to the organ, pealing forth some great religious piece. You may be the equal of a Tyndall, competent to discuss and expound the laws of acoustics; but this is of comparatively small account. The music of the organ has far nobler implications than are to be found in those laws. It does not end in making a pleasant noise in your ears merely, but it also thrills you through and through with delightful emotions-perhaps such as those expressed by Milton: "But let my due feet never fail To walk the studious cloisters pale, As may with sweetness through mine ear And bring all Heaven before mine eyes." 25. The Cathedral Bells.-Then listen to the Cathedral Bells on a calm evening. As the sound floats to you over hill and dale and stream, you hear much more, I hope, than the clashing together by human agency of certain pieces of cold metal. It suggests much more than a series of aerial waves breaking upon the drum of your ear and giving rise to certain neural vibrations. Many professors may furnish you with much ingenious information-at least they may give you some ingenious speculations on such vibra 1 Esther,' Prologue. tions and their exciting causes; 1 but these vibrations, though indispensable, are only a comparatively small part of the effect resulting from the ringing of the bells. In its noblest mood the Human Mind will scarcely concern itself at all about the aerial waves or the neural vibrations, or about the bare clashing together of the pieces of cold metal. Far beyond all such effects are the beautiful feelings to which they give risethe emotions, it may be, of solemnity, or of sacred tranquillity, or of worship, raising the thoughts of the listener from Earth to Heaven. It is out of such emotions, so real and splendid are they, that Tennyson and Edgar Allen Poe have created their glorious Poetry of Bells. 26. The Esthetics of Historic Scenes-the Storming of Bezier.-When we turn to the consideration of historic scenes we have analogous results. Take an incident in the Albigensian War, which was kindled by Pope Innocent III. against the Albigeois because they disagreed with his Holiness over certain theological and sacerdotal questions. It began with the storming of Bezier, which was followed by a massacre of the populace of that unhappy place. Some witnesses declare, it appears, that not a person escaped, which I take to be an exaggeration ; but whether so or not, enough must have been done in the way of massacre to make all Hell jubilant. One less superstitious and less savage soul amongst the fanatical horde of murderers who were about to be let loose on the place, inquired very reasonably how the Catholics were to be distinguished from the Heretics; and in answer to this inquiry a Cistercian monk, one of the Popish leaders, is declared to have 1 See, for instance, Véron, Esthetics,' note, p. 91. The materialising philosophers have written infinite quantities of jargon on this and kindred subjects, without knowing it, of course. |