Dear Archy.--On what subject shall I next address you? Elves, goblins,
ghosts, real and unreal; dreams, witchcraft, second-sight? Bless me! the
field of marvels seems more thronged, as I approach it closer. The
spirits I have evoked begin to scare me with their numbers. How on earth
shall I ever get them fairly laid? But some, I see, can now only limp
along--they are scotched already; I will begin with finishing these. Yet
they deserve gentle treatment. They sprang from our nature, which seems
expressly made to procreate and rear them. Thick, within and around us,
lie the rich veins of illusive suggestion from which they spring.
The thing nearest us is our mental constitution, the world of
consciousness. It is of it we first learn, though it be the last we
understand. It is that through which we perceive and apprehend all other
things; and nothing becomes part of our knowledge but as it has been
shaped and coloured by its magic reflexion. Nay, more, it is not only
our mirror but our archetype for every thing. So we spiritualise the
material universe, and afterwards, by an incongruous consistency,
anthropomorphise spirit.
Reason in vain reclaims against this misuse of analogy. Feeling,
imagination, instinct are too many for her; and any mood, from fun to
earnest, from nonsense to sublimity, may hear a responsive note when
this chord is touched.
Address to that ingenuous young American a remark upon the slightness of
the legs of her work-table,--she blushes--her lively fancy has given
them personality. Were she a wealthier miss, she would give them,
besides, neat cambric trowsers with lace borders. With less refinement,
and with inexcusable warmth, I take shame to myself for having bestowed
a kick upon a similar mahogany limb, which had, however, begun the
contest by breaking my shin.
To the poet's eye, nature is instinct with life. Greece may be "living
Greece no more"--in the soul of her people; but her immortal plains, and
streams, and hills have their own vitality.
"The mountains _look_ on Marathon,
And Marathon _looks_ on the sea."