in more precious habit--
More moving delicate, and full of life,
Into the eye and prospect of his soul,
Than when she lived indeed."

We have here expressed in plain language the imaginative
memory of the beloved dead, rising upon the past, like
moonlight upon midnight,--

"The gleam, the shadow, and the peace supreme."

This is its simple meaning--the statement of a truth, the
utterance of personal feeling. But observe its hidden
abstract significance--it is the revelation of what goes on
in the depths of the soul, when the dead elements of what
once was, are laid before the imagination, and so breathed
upon as to be quickened into a new and higher life. We have
first the _Idea of her Life_--all he remembered and felt of
her, gathered into one vague shadowy image, not any one
look, or action, or time--then the idea of her life
_creeps_--is in before he is aware, and SWEETLY
creeps,--it might have been softly or gently, but it is the
addition of affection to all this, and bringing in another
sense--and now it is in his _study of imagination_--what a
place! fit for such a visitor. Then out comes the _Idea_,
more particular, more questionable, but still ideal,
spiritual--_every lovely organ of her life_--then the
clothing upon, the mortal putting on its immortal, spiritual
body--_shall come apparelled in more precious habit, more
moving delicate_--this is the transfiguring, the putting on
strength, the _poco piu_--the little more which makes
immortal,--_more full of life_, and all this submitted
to--_the eye and prospect of the soul_.

"Break, break, break,
On thy cold gray stones, O sea!
And I would that my tongue could utter
The thoughts that arise in me.

"O well for the fisherman's boy
That he shouts with his sister at play!
O well for the sailor lad
That he sings in his boat on the bay!

"And the stately ships go on
To their haven under the hill!
But O for the touch of a vanish'd hand,
And the sound of a voice that is still!

"Break, break, break,
At the foot of thy crags, O sea!
But the tender grace of a day that is dead
Will never come back to me."

Out of these few simple words, deep and melancholy, and sounding a