Were given me. Mortal speech died
From me: my speech was one spoken before
God bestowed on me human speech.
There is nothing like the moon-night
When I, parted from the voice of the city,
Drink deep of Infinity with peace
From another, a stranger sphere. There is nothing
Like the moon-night when the rich, noble stars
And maiden roses interchange their long looks of love.
When I raise my face from the land of loss
Unto the golden air, and calmly learn
How perfect it is to grow still as a star.
There is nothing like the moon-night
When I walk upon the freshest dews,
And amid the warmest breezes,
With all the thought of God
And all the bliss of man, as Adam
Not yet driven from Eden, and to whom
Eve was not yet born. What a bird
Dreams in the moonlight is my dream:
What a rose sings is my song."

The true poet does not need individual experiences of either sorrow or of
joy. His spirit is so attuned to the song of the universe; so sympathetic
with the moans of earthly trials, that every vibration from the heart of
the universe reaches him; stabs him with its sorrow, or irradiates his
being with joy.

Jesus is fitly portrayed to us as "The Man of Sorrows"; even while we
recognize him as a self-conscious son of God--an immortal being fully aware
of his escape from enchantment, and his heirship to Paradise.

Cosmic consciousness bestows a bliss that is past all words to describe and
it also quickens the sympathies and attunes the soul to the vibrations of
the heart-cries of the struggling evolving ones who are still travailing in
the pains of the new birth. We must be willing to endure the suffering _in
order that we may realize_ the joy; not because joy is the reward for
suffering, but because it is only by losing sight of the personal self that
we become aware of that inner Self which is immortal and blissful; and when
we become aware of the reality of that inner Self, we know that we are
united with _the all_, and must feel with all.

It would be impossible in one volume to enumerate all the poets who have
given evidence of supra-consciousness. As has been previously pointed out,
all true poets are at least temporarily aware of their dual nature--rather,
one should say, the dual phases of their consciousness. Many, perhaps, do
not function beyond the higher planes of the psychic vibrations, but even
these are aware of the reality of the soul, and the illusion of the
sens