to idealize nature and human life, to exhibit the soul in the richness and variety of its sentiments, in the nobleness of its aspirations and in the greatness of its possibilities. To it belong elegance, beauty, harmony, and grandeur, all that can ennoble the fancy and exalt the affections. The end of poetry is refined enjoyment through emotion. In it there is always exultation, a subtle, blooming spirituality. What a treat,' exclaims Dr. Arnold, thinking of the resultant self-improvement, it would be to teach Shakespeare to a good class of young Greeks in regenerate Athens; to dwell upon him line by line and word by word, and so to get all his pictures and thoughts leisurely into one's mind, till I verily think one would, after a time, almost give out light in the dark, after having been steeped, as it were, in such an atmosphere of brilliance!' To what end is our life, if not to soul culture, perpetual ascension in the scale of being? In this the poets help us by seizing and holding up to view the noblest, cleanest, and best, that there is. The finer thoughts, the thrilling sense, The electric blood with which their arteries run, That which should be.' enable them, more powerfully than other authors, to awaken in their readers the states of consciousness that exist in themselves. (5) As a corollary, it is the mission of poetry to sweeten existence, to nourish human sympathies; to fill us with faith, strength, and cheer, when in the desert of life we faint and stagger; to reveal to our duller eyes and colder hearts the beauty and gladness of nature; in short, to furnish the finest and deepest-reaching discipline of which our spiritual being is capable. In order to receive these benefits, it must be studied, that is, read reflectively. To read anything profitably, read it actively. INDEX. Accent, 312. Adams, J. Q., quoted, 168, 169, Esthetics, relation of, to rheto- Akenside, quoted, 237. Arts, classification of, 2, 228. Bacon, Lord, quoted, 40, 84, 117, Alford, Dean, quoted, 39, 71, 90, Baily, Samuel, quoted, 194. 114. Alienisms, 65. Alison, 115, 119, 235. Allegory, 32. Bain, Alexander, quoted, 125, Ballad, the, 330. Alliteration, defined, 26; in poe- Bancroft, quoted, 141. try, 320. Allusion, 35. America, characteristics of, 10. Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, quoted, Anticlimax, 40. Antique, the poetry of, 308. Argument, defined, 194, deduc- Arnold, M., quoted, 68, 90, 91, Arnold, Thomas, quoted, 101, Arnott, Dr., quoted, 192. Barbarisms, 66. Bascom, Dr., quoted, 40, 62, 71, Beautiful, the, chapter on, 231. Bede, quoted, 329. Beecher, H. W., quoted, 9, 83, Benard, quoted, 223. Bible, quoted, 1, 11, 16, 17, 20, Bolingbroke, quoted, 108, 115, Books, power of, 210. Brevity, misplaced, 98. Bruyère, quoted, 75, 89, 95, 121, Bryant, quoted, 7, 60, 133, 313. Comedy, 331. Comma, rules for use of, 132. Conciseness, defined, 84; faulty, Connectives, Coleridge on, 88; ex- Consistency, foolish pride in, 142. Cowper, quoted, 27, 41, 309, 314, Crabbe, quoted, 75. Criticism, true, 271; Pope's ideal Crombie, quoted, 120. Darwin, Charles, quoted, 282. Debater, the, should be true to Definition, logical, 191. Description, defined, 178; object- Dickens, quoted, 115, 261. Discourse, Locke on the construc-| Dixon, Hepworth, quoted, 92. Drama, 331. Essay, exposition and history of, Everett, Edward, quoted, 22, 135. Dryden, quoted, 84, 90, 129, 152, Exaggeration, 78. Eloquence, general principles of, Emerson, quoted, 38, 84, 85, 124, Ends, absolute and relative, Ham- Energy, defined, 94; dependent upon clearness, 95; upon sim- Enough, sufficient, 75. Epic, the, 329. Epigram, 39, 251. Epithets, 309. Equivocal, ambiguous. 76. human nature, 171. Fiction, exposition, 284; histori- Fielding, quoted, 68, 91, 119, 120, Figures, general definition of, 16; Fontenelle, quoted, 9, 24, 85. Fox, quoted, 94, 210. Franklin, Dr., quoted, 135, 178, 252, 303. Free-Trade, in America, 214. Error, benighting effect of on Froude, quoted, 80, 123. Fuller, quoted, 138. Gibbon, quoted, 24, 90, 160. God, Carlyle on the justice of, 8. Goldsmith, quoted, 67, 90, 133, Gough, quoted, 57. Gray, quoted, 309. Greeley, Horace, quoted, 12. Hall, Robert, quoted, 16, 328. gance, 111. Haven, Dr. E. O., quoted, 93, Hazlitt, quoted, 126, 132, 137, 138. Helps, Arthur, quoted, 103, 115. Holland, Dr., quoted, 6, 46, 135. Homer, quoted, 112, 213. Humor, characteristics of, 255; Ideals, influence of, 221, 326; Imagery, perspicuity of, 88; pro- Imagination, chapter on, 215; Induction, in exposition, 190; Interrogation-point, rules for use Invention, discriminated from Interludes, the, 335. Jeffrey, quoted, 92, 231, 239. Jones, Sir W., quoted, 59. Kant, quoted, 6. Kames, Lord, quoted, 109, 230. Kingsley, Charles, quoted, 67, 68, Labor, necessity of, 3. |