Page 134 of 172 THE COLLOQUY OF MONOS AND UNA - Complete Poetical Works

yet left him half enveloped in dreams--so to me, in the strict embrace

of the _Shadow_, came _that_ light which alone might have had power to

startle--the light of enduring _Love_. Men toiled at the grave in

which I lay darkling. They upthrew the damp earth. Upon my mouldering

bones there descended the coffin of Una. And now again all was void.

That nebulous light had been extinguished. That feeble thrill had

vibrated itself into quiescence. Many _lustra_ had supervened. Dust

had returned to dust. The worm had food no more. The sense of being

had at length utterly departed, and there reigned in its stead--

instead of all things, dominant and perpetual--the autocrats _Place_

and _Time._ For _that_ which _was not_--for that which had no

form--for that which had no thought--for that which had no

sentience--for that which was soundless, yet of which matter formed no

portion--for all this nothingness, yet for all this immortality, the

grave was still a home, and the corrosive hours, co-mates.

[Footnote 1:

"It will be hard to discover a better [method of education] than that

which the experience of so many ages has already discovered; and this

may be summed up as consisting in gymnastics for the body, and

_music_ for the soul."

Repub. lib. 2.

"For this reason is a musical education most essential; since it

causes Rhythm and Harmony to penetrate most intimately into the soul,

taking the strongest hold upon it, filling it with _beauty_ and making

the man _beautiful-minded_. ... He will praise and admire _the

beautiful_, will receive it with joy into his soul, will feed upon it,

and _assimilate his own condition with it_."

Ibid. lib. 3. Music had, however, among the Athenians, a far more comprehensive signification than with us. It included not only the harmonies of time and of tune, but the poetic diction, sentiment and creation, each in its widest sense. The study of _music_ was with them, in fact, the general cultivation of the taste--of that which recognizes the beautiful--in contradistinction from reason, which deals only with the true.]

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		The essence of poetry is will and passion. William Hazlitt