our thought and affection a holy beauty, a divine Sonship, into which we can only slowly grow. And this is a condition which Among the true children of the Highest, free from it? Let the glorious burden How can we be angry at a sorrow which is the birth-pang of a diviner life?

can never cease to be. who would wish to be lie!

From this strife, of infinite capacity with finite conditions, spring all the ideal elements which mingle with the matter of our being. Nor is it our conscience only that betrays the secret of this double life. Our very memory too, though it seems but to photograph the actual, proves to have the artist's true selecting power, and knows how to let the transient fall away, and leave the imperishable undimmed and clear. As time removes us from each immediate experience, some freshening dew, some wave of regeneration, brightens all the colors and washes off the dust; so that often we discover the essence only when the accidents are gone, and the present must die from us ere it can truly live. The work of yesterday, with its place and hour, has but a dull look when we recall it. But the scene of our childish years, the homestead, it may be, with its quaint garden and its orchard grass; the bridge across the brook from which we dropped the pebbles and watched the circling waves; the schoolhouse in the field, whose bell broke up the game and quickened every lingerer's feet; the yew-tree path where we crossed the church-yard, with arm round the neck of a companion now beneath the sod,-how soft the light, how tender the shadows, in which that picture lies! how musical across the silence are the tones it flings! The glare, the heat, the noise, the care, are gone; and the sunshine sleeps, and the waters ripple, and the lawns are green, as if it were in Paradise. But in these minor religions of life, it is the personal images of companions loved and lost that chiefly keep their watch with us, and sweeten and solemnize the hours. The very child that misses the mother's appreciating love is introduced, by his first tears, to that thirst of the heart which is the early movement of piety, ere yet it has got its wings. And I have known the youth who through long years of harsh temptation, and then short years of wasting decline, has, from like memory, never lost the sense as of a guardian angel near, and lived in the enthusiasm, and died into the embrace, of the everlasting holiness. In the heat and struggle of mid-life, it is a severe but often a purifying retreat to be lifted into the

lonely observatory of memory, above the fretful illusions of the moment, and in presence once more of the beauty and the sanctity of life. The voiceless counsels that look through the visionary eyes of our departed steal into us behind our will, and sweep the clouds away, and direct us on a wiser path than we should know to choose. If age ever gains any higher wisdom, it is chiefly that it sits in a longer gallery of the dead, and sees the noble and saintly faces in further perspective and more various throng. The dim abstracted look that often settles on the features of the old,-what means it? Is it a mere fading of the life? an absence, begun already, from the drama of humanity? a deafness to the cry of its woes and the music of its affections? Not always so: the seeming forgetfulness may be but brightened memory; and if the mists lie on the outward present, and make it as a gathering night, the more brilliant is the lamp within that illuminates the figures of the past, and shows again, by their flitting shadows, the plot in which they moved and fell.

It is through such natural experiences - the treasured sanctities of every true life-that God "discovereth to us deep things out of darkness, and turneth into light the shadow of death." They constitute the lesser religions of the soul; and say what you will, they come and go with the greater, and put forth leaf and blossom from the same root. We are so constituted throughout in memory, in affection, in conscience, in intellect - that we cannot rest in the literal aspect of things as they materially come to us. No sooner are they in our possession, than we turn them into some crucible of thought, which saves their essence and precipitates their dross; and their pure idea emerges as our lasting treasure, to be remembered, loved, willed, and believed. What we thus gain, then,- is it a falsification? or a revelation? What we discard, is it the sole constant, which alone we ought to keep? or the truly perishable, which we deservedly let slip? If the vision which remains with us is fictitious, then is there a fatal misadjustment between the actual universe and the powers given us for interpreting it; so that precisely what we recognize as highest in us- the human distinctions of art, of love, of duty, of faith-must be treated as palming off upon us a system of intellectual frauds. But if the idealizing analysis be true, it is only that our faculties have not merely passive receptivity, but discriminative insight, are related to the permanent as well as to the transient, and are at once prophetic and retrospective; and

thus are qualified to report to us, not only what is, but what ought to be and is to be. Did we apply the transforming imagination only to the present, so as to discern in it a better possibility beyond, it might be regarded as simply a provision for the progressive improvement of this world,- an explanation still carrying in itself the thought of a beneficent Provider. But we glorify no less what has been than what now is; and see it in a light in which it never appeared beneath the sun: and this is either an illusion or a prevision.

The problem whether the transfiguring powers of the mind serve upon us an imposture or open to us a divine vision, carries in its answer the whole future of society, the whole peace and nobleness of individual character. High art, high morals, high faith, are impossible among those who do not believe their own inspirations, but only court and copy them for pleasure or profit. And for great lives, and stainless purity, and holy sorrow, and surrendering trust, the souls of men must pass through all vain semblances, and touch the reality of an eternal Righteousness and a never-wearied Love.

ANDREW MARVELL

(1621-1678)

NDREW MARVELL has been described as of medium height, sturdy and thick-set, with bright dark eyes, and pleasing,

rather reserved expression.

He was born in 1621, at Winestead, near Hull, in Yorkshire. His father was master of the grammar school, and there Andrew was prepared for Trinity College, Cambridge. But a boyish escapade led to his expulsion before the completion of his university course, and for several years he lived abroad; visiting France, Holland, Spain, and

ANDREW MARVELL

Italy, and improving his mind "to very good purpose," as his friend John Milton said admiringly. He returned to become tutor to Lord Fairfax's young daughter, and lived at Nun Appleton near Hull. He was an ardent lover of nature, finding rest and refreshment in its color and beauty, noting the lilt of a bird or the texture of a blossom with a happy zest which recalls the songs of the Elizabethans. Much of his pastoral verse was written at this period. But his energetic nature soon tired of country calm. His connection with Lord Fairfax had made him known in Roundhead circles, and he left Nun Appleton, appointed by Cromwell tutor to his young ward Mr. Dutton, and afterwards engaged in politics. His native Hull elected him to Parliament three times; and he is said to have been the last member to receive wages-two shillings a day-for his services. So well did he satisfy his constituents that they continued him a pension until his death in 1678. His public career was distinguished for fearless integrity; and an often quoted instance of this describes Lord Treasurer Danby sent by Charles II. to seek out the poet in his povertystricken lodgings off the Strand, with enticing offers to join the court party. These Marvell stoutly declined; although the story adds that as soon as his flattering visitor had gone he was forced to send out for the loan of a guinea.

Marvell's satiric prose was too bitter and too personal not to arouse great animosity, and he was often forced to circulate it in

9771 manuscript or have it secretly printed. The vigorous style suggests Swift; and mingled with coarse invective and frequent brutalities there is sledge-hammer force of wit,- much of which, however, is lost to the modern reader from the fact that the issues involved are now forgotten.

The great objects of Marvell's veneration were Cromwell and Milton. He knew them personally, was the associate of Milton at the latter's request, and these master minds inspired some of his finest verse. He has been called "the poet of the Protectorate"; and perhaps no one has spoken more eloquently upon Cromwell than he in his 'Horatian Ode' and 'Death of Cromwell.' It is interesting to note that Milton and Cromwell admired and respected Marvell's talents, and that the former suggested in all sincerity that he himself might find matter for envy in the achievement of the lesser poet.

Marvell was eminently afflicted with the gift of wit or ingenuity much prized in his time," says Goldwin Smith. His fanciful artificialities, reflecting the contemporary spirit of Waller and Cowley, are. sometimes tedious to modern taste. But in sincerer moods he could write poems whose genuine feeling, descriptive charm, and artistic skill are still as effective as ever.