there is a wisdom against which poetry wars - the wisdom of the senses, which makes physical comfort and gratification the supreme good, and wealth the chief interest of life—we do not deny; nor do we deem it the least service which poetry renders to mankind, that it redeems them from the thraldom of this earthborn prudence. But, passing over this topic, we would observe that the complaint against poetry, as abounding in illusion and deception, is, in the main, groundless. In many poems there is more of truth than in many histories and philosophic theories. The fictions of genius are often the vehicles of the sublimest verities, and its flasbes often open new regions of thought, and throw new light on the mysteries of our being. In poetry, the letter is falsehood, but the spirit is often profoundest wisdom. And if truth thus dwells in the boldest fictions of the poet, much more may it be expected in his delineations of life; for the present life, which is the first stage of the immortal mind, abounds in the materials of poetry, and it is the highest office of the bard to detect this divine element among the grosser pleasures and labours of our earthly being. The present life is not wholly prosaic, precise, tame. and finite. To the gifted eye it abounds in the poetic. The affections which spread beyond ourselves, and stretch far into futurity; the workings of mighty passions, which seem to arm the soul with an almost superhuman energy; the innocent and irrepressible joy of infancy; the bloom, and buoyancy, and dazzling

hopes of youth; the throbbings of the heart when it first wakes to love, and dreams of a happiness too vast for earth; woman, with her beauty, and grace, and gentleness, and fulness of feeling, and depth of affection, and her blushes of purity, and the tones and looks which only a mother's heart can inspire,-these are all poetical. It is not true that the poet paints a life which does not exist. He only extracts and concentrates, as it were, life's ethereal essence, arrests and condenses its volatile fragrance, brings together its scattered beauties, and prolongs its more refined but evanescent joys; and in this he does well; for it is good to feel that life is not wholly usurped by cares for subsistence and physical gratifications, but admits, in measures which may be indefinitely enlarged, sentiments and delights worthy of a higher being. This power of poetry to refine our views of life and happiness is more and more needed as society advances. It is needed to withstand the encroachments of heartless and artificial manners, which make civilization so tame and uninteresting. It is needed to counteract the tendency of physical science, which-being now sought, not, as formerly, for intellectual gratification, but for multiplying bodily comforts-requires a new development of imagination, taste, and poetry, to preserve men from sinking into an earthly, material, epicurean life.

THE CHURCH OF BROU.

BY MATTHEW ARNOLD.

I.

THE CASTLE.

OWN the Savoy valleys sounding,
Echoing round this castle old,

'Mid the distant mountain chalets,
Hark! what bell for church is toll'd?

In the bright October morning, Savoy's Duke had left his bride; From the Castle, past the drawbridge, Flow'd the hunter's merry tide.

Steeds are neighing, gallants glittering; Gay, her smiling lord to greet,

From her mullion'd chamber casement Smiles the Duchess Marguerite.

From Vienna by the Danube

Here she came, a bride, in spring; Now the autumn crisps the forest, Hunters gather, bugles ring.

Hounds are pulling, prickers swearing,
Horses fret, and boar-spears glance:

Off! They sweep the marshy forests,

Westward, on the side of France.

Hark! the game's on foot; they scatter:Down the forest ridings lone,

Furious, single horsemen gallop;

Hark! a shout

a crash a groan!

Pale and breathless, came the hunters,
On the turf dead lies the boar;

God! the Duke lies stretch'd beside him-
Senseless, weltering in his gore.

In the dull October evening,

Down the leaf-strewn forest road, To the Castle, past the drawbridge, Came the hunters with their load.

In the hall, with sconces blazing,
Ladies waiting round her seat,
Cloth'd in smiles, beneath the dais,
Sate the Duchess Marguerite.

Hark! below the gates unbarring!

Tramp of men and quick commands!

"Tis my lord come back from hunting," And the Duchess claps her hands.

Slow and tired came the hunters!

Stopp'd in darkness in the court;

-Ho, this way, ye laggard hunters!

To the hall! What sport, what sport?"

Slow they enter'd with their Master,
In the hall they laid him down;
On his coat were leaves and blood-stains,
On his brow an angry frown.

Dead her princely youthful husband
Lay before his youthful wife;
Bloody, 'neath the flaring sconces,
And the sight froze all her life.

In Vienna, by the Danube,

Kings hold revel, gallants meet;
Gay of old amid the gayest
Was the Duchess Marguerite.

In Vienna, by the Danube,

Feast and dance her youth beguil'd;

Till that hour she never sorrow'd
But from then she never smil'd.

'Mid the Savoy mountain valleys,
Far from town or haunt of man,
Stands a lonely church, unfinish'd,
Which the Duchess Maud began.