creative conception. These men had new senses, and no theories in their heads. Thus, when they took a walk, their emotions were not the same as ours. What is sunrise to an ordinary man? A white smudge on the edge of the sky, between bosses of clouds, amid pieces of land, and bits of road, which he does not see because he has seen them a hundred times. But for them, all things have a soul; I mean that they feel within themselves, indirectly, the uprising and severance of the outlines, the power and contrast of tints, the sad or delicious sentiment, which breathes from this combination and union like a harmony or a cry. How sorrowful is the sun, as he rises in mist above the sad sea-furrows; what an air of resignation in the old trees rustling in the night rain; what a feverish tumult in the mass of waves, whose dishevelled locks are twisted for ever on the surface of the abyss ! But the great torch of heaven, the luminous god, emerges and shines; the tall, soft, pliant herbs, the evergreen meadows, the expanding roof of lofty oaks,the whole English landscape, continually renewed and illumined by the flooding moisture, diffuses an inexhaustible freshness. These meadows, red and white with flowers, ever moist and ever young, slip off their veil of golden mist, and appear suddenly, timidly, like beautiful virgins. Here is the cuckoo-flower, which springs up before the coming of the swallow; there the hare-bell, blue as the veins of a woman; the marigold, which sets with the sun, and, weeping, rises with him. Drayton, in his Polyolbion, sings

"Then from her burnisht gate the goodly glittring East Guilds every lofty top, which late the humorous Night Bespangled had with pearle, to please the Mornings sight;

On which the mirthfull Quires, with their cleere open throats, Unto the joyfull Morne so straine their warbling notes, That Hills and Valleys ring, and even the ecchoing Ayre Seemes all compos'd of sounds, about them everywhere. Thus sing away the Morne, untill the mounting Sunne, Through thick exhaled fogs, his golden head hath runne, And through the twisted tops of our close Covert creeps, To kiss the gentle Shade, this while that sweetly sleeps."1 A step further, and you will find the old gods reappear. They reappear, these living gods—these living gods mingled with things which you cannot help meeting as soon as you meet nature again. Shakspeare, in the Tempest, sings:

66

Ceres, most bounteous lady thy rich leas

Of wheat, rye, barley, vetches, oats, and pease;
Thy turfy mountains, where live nibbling sheep,
And flat meads thatch'd with stover, them to keep;
Thy banks with peonèd and lilied brims,
Which spongy April at thy hest betrims,
To make cold nymphs chaste crowns
Hail, many-colour'd messenger (Iris.) .
Who, with thy saffron wings, upon my flowers
Diffusest honey-drops, refreshing showers,
And with each end of thy blue bow dost crown
My bosky acres and my unshrubb'd down." 2

In Cymbeline he says:

"They are as gentle as zephyrs, blowing below the violet, Not wagging his sweet head." 3

Greene writes:

"When Flora, proud in pomp of all her flowers,
Sat bright and gay,

1 M. Drayton's Polyolbion, ed. 1622, 13th song, p. 214.

And gloried in the dew of Iris' showers,
And did display

Her mantle chequered all with gaudy green.' "1

The same author also says:

"How oft have I descending Titan seen,

His burning locks couch in the sea-queen's lap;
And beauteous Thetis his red body wrap

In watery robes, as he her lord had been!""

So Spenser, in his Faerie Queene, sings:
"The ioyous day gan early to appeare;
And fayre Aurora from the deawy bed
Of aged Tithone gan herselfe to reare
With rosy cheekes, for shame as blushing red:
Her golden locks, for hast, were loosely shed
About her eares, when Una her did marke
Clymbe to her charet, all with flowers spred,

From heven high to chace the chearelesse darke;

With mery note her lowd salutes the mounting larke." 3

All the splendour and sweetness of this moist and well watered land; all the specialties, the opulence of its dissolving tints, of its variable sky, its luxuriant vegetation, assemble thus about the gods, who gave them their beautiful form.

In the life of every man there are moments when, in presence of objects, he experiences a shock. This mass of ideas, of mangled recollections, of mutilated images, which lie hidden in all corners of his mind, are set in motion, organised, suddenly developed like a flower. He is enraptured; he cannot help looking at and admir1 Greene's Poems, ed. Bell, Eurymachus in Laudem Mirimidæ, p. 73. 2 Ibid. Melicertus' description of his Mistress, p. 38.

Spenser's Works, ed. Todd, 1863, The Faerie Queene, i. c. 11, st. 51.

ing the charming creature which has just appeared; he wishes to see it again, and others like it, and dreams of nothing else. There are such moments in the life of nations, and this is one of them. They are happy in contemplating beautiful things, and wish only that they should be the most beautiful possible. They are not preoccupied, as we are, with theories. They do not excite themselves to express moral or philosophical ideas. They wish to enjoy through the imagination, through the eyes, like those Italian nobles, who, at the same time, were so captivated by fine colours and forms, that they covered with paintings not only their rooms and their churches, but the lids of their chests and the saddles of their horses. The rich and green sunny country; young, gaily-attired ladies, blooming with health and love; halfdraped gods and goddesses, masterpieces and models of strength and grace, these are the most lovely objects which man can contemplate, the most capable of satisfying his senses and his heart-of giving rise to smiles and joy; and these are the objects which occur in all the poets in a most wonderful abundance of songs, pastorals, sonnets, little fugitive pieces, so lively, delicate, easily unfolded, that we have never since had their equals. What though Venus and Cupid have lost their altars? Like the contemporary painters of Italy, they willingly imagine a beautiful naked child, drawn on a chariot of gold through the limpid air; or a woman, redolent with youth, standing on the waves, which kiss her snowy feet. Harsh Ben Jonson is ravished with the scene. The disciplined battalion of his sturdy. verses changes into a band of little graceful strophes, which trip as lightly as Raphael's children. He sees his lady approach, sitting on the chariot of Love, drawn

by swans and doves. Love leads the car; she passes calm and smiling, and all hearts, charmed by her divine looks, wish no other joy than to see and serve her for ever. "See the chariot at hand here of Love,

Wherein my lady rideth!

Each that draws is a swan or a dove,

And well the car Love guideth.

As she goes, all hearts do duty
Unto her beauty;

And, enamoured, do wish, so they might

But enjoy such a sight,

That they still were to run by her side,

Through swords, through seas, whither she would ride.

Do but look on her eyes, they do light
All that Love's world compriseth!
Do but look on her hair, it is bright
As Love's star when it riseth! . .
Have you seen but a bright lily grow,

Before rude hands have touched it?
Have you marked but the fall o' the snow,
Before the soil hath smutched it?

Have you felt the wool of beaver?
Or swan's down ever?

Or have smelt o' the bud o' the brier?

Or the nard in the fire?

Or have tasted the bag of the bee?

O so white! O so soft! O so sweet is she!"1

What can be more lively, more unlike measured and artificial mythology? Like Theocritus and Moschus, they play with their smiling gods, and their belief becomes a festival. One day, in an alcove of a wood, Cupid meets a nymph asleep:

1 Ben Jonson's Poems, ed. R. Bell. Celebration of Charis; her Triumph, p. 125.