had the greatest effect on his own imagination. He looks on nature
neither as a gardener, a geographer, an astronomer, nor a geologist, but
as a man, susceptible of strong impressions, and able to describe clearly
to others the objects which affected himself. This he will do in the style
which the emotion raised within him naturally dictates. His imagery, his
illustrations, his whole language, will take the hue of his own feelings.
It is in describing accurately the effect, not the cause, the emotion, not
the object which produced it, that the poet's fidelity to nature consists.
Let us illustrate our meaning by two or three examples. In Thomson we find
the following description of a thunder-storm:

'A boding silence reigns
Dread through the dun expanse; save the dull sound
That from the mountain, previous to the storm,
Rolls o'er the muttering earth, disturbs the flood,
And shakes the forest leaf without a breath.
Prone to the lowest vale, the aerial tribes
Descend: the tempest-loving raven scarce
Dares wing the dubious dusk. In rueful gaze
The cattle stand, and on the scowling heavens
Cast a deploring eye, by man forsook,
Who to the crowded cottage hies him fast,
Or seeks the shelter of the downward cave.
'Tis listening fear, and dumb amazement all,
When to the startled eye the sudden glance
Appears far south, eruptive through the cloud
And following slower in explosion vast,
The thunder raises his tremendous voice.
At first heard solemn o'er the verge of heaven
The tempest growls; but as it nearer comes
And rolls its awful burthen on the wind,
The lightnings flash a larger curve, and more
The noise astounds; till over head a sheet
Of livid flame discloses wide; then shuts
And opens wider; shuts, and opens still
Expansive, wrapping ether in a blaze.
Follows the loosened, aggravated roar,
Enlarging, deepening, mingling; peal on peal
Crushed horrible, convulsing heaven and earth.'

MR. IRVING describes a similar scene in the following terms: 'It
was the latter part of a calm sultry day, that they floated quietly with
the tide between these stern mountains. There was that perfect quiet which
prevails over nature in the languor of summer heat; the turning of a
plank, or the accidental falling of an oar on deck, was echoed from the
mountain side, and reverberated along the shores. To the left the
Dunderberg reared its woody precipices, hei