Why are all reflections lovelier than what we call the reality?--not
so grand or so strong, it may be, but always lovelier? Fair as is the
gliding sloop on the shining sea, the wavering, trembling, unresting
sail below is fairer still. Yea, the reflecting ocean itself, reflected
in the mirror, has a wondrousness about its waters that somewhat
vanishes when I turn towards itself. All mirrors are magic mirrors. The
commonest room is a room in a poem when I turn to the glass. (And this
reminds me, while I write, of a strange story which I read in the fairy
palace, and of which I will try to make a feeble memorial in its place.)
In whatever way it may be accounted for, of one thing we may be sure,
that this feeling is no cheat; for there is no cheating in nature and
the simple unsought feelings of the soul. There must be a truth involved
in it, though we may but in part lay hold of the meaning. Even the
memories of past pain are beautiful; and past delights, though beheld
only through clefts in the grey clouds of sorrow, are lovely as Fairy
Land. But how have I wandered into the deeper fairyland of the soul,
while as yet I only float towards the fairy palace of Fairy Land! The
moon, which is the lovelier memory or reflex of the down-gone sun, the
joyous day seen in the faint mirror of the brooding night, had rapt me
away.
I sat up in the boat. Gigantic forest trees were about me; through
which, like a silver snake, twisted and twined the great river. The
little waves, when I moved in the boat, heaved and fell with a plash
as of molten silver, breaking the image of the moon into a thousand
morsels, fusing again into one, as the ripples of laughter die into the
still face of joy. The sleeping woods, in undefined massiveness; the
water that flowed in its sleep; and, above all, the enchantress moon,
which had cast them all, with her pale eye, into the charmed slumber,
sank into my soul, and I felt as if I had died in a dream, and should
never more awake.
From this I was partly aroused by a glimmering of white, that, through
the trees on the left, vaguely crossed my vision, as I gazed upwards.
But the trees again hid the object; and at the moment, some strange
melodious bird took up its song, and sang, not an ordinary bird-song,
with constant repetitions of the same melody, but what sounded like
a continuous strain, in which one thought was expressed, deepening in
intensity as evolved in progress. It sounded like a welcome already
overshadowed with the coming farewell. As in all sweetest music, a tinge
of sadness was in every note. Nor do we know how much of the pleasures
even of life we owe to the intermingled sorrows. Joy cannot unfold
the deepest truths, although deepest truth must be deepest joy. Cometh
white-robed Sorrow, stooping and wan, and flingeth wide the doors she
may not enter. Almost we linger with Sorrow for very love.