of imagination or poetic embodiment generally. Argumentation cannot
of course naturally belong to the region of poetry, however well it may
comport itself when there naturalized; and consequently, although there
are most poetic no less than profound passages in the treatise, a light
scruple arises whether its constituent matter can properly be called
poetry. At all events, however, certain of the more prosaic measures and
stanzas lend themselves readily, and with much favour, to some of the
more complex of logical necessities. And it must be remembered that in
human speech, as in the human mind, there are no absolute divisions:
power shades off into feeling; and the driest logic may find the heroic
couplet render it good service.

Sir John Davies's treatise is not only far more poetic in image and
utterance than that of Lord Brooke, but is far more clear in argument and
firm in expression as well. Here is a fine invocation:

O Light, which mak'st the light which makes the day!
Which sett'st the eye without, and mind within;
Lighten my spirit with one clear heavenly ray,
Which now to view itself doth first begin.

* * * * *

Thou, like the sun, dost, with an equal ray,
Into the palace and the cottage shine;
And show'st the soul both to the clerk and lay, _learned and
By the clear lamp of th' oracle divine. [unlearned_

He is puzzled enough to get the theology of his time into harmony with
his philosophy, and I cannot say that he is always triumphant in the
attempt; but here at least is good argument in justification of the
freedom of man to sin.

If by His word he had the current stayed
Of Adam's will, which was by nature free,
It had been one as if his word had said,
"I will henceforth that Man no Man shall be."

* * * * *

For what is Man without a moving mind,
Which hath a judging wit, and choosing will?
Now, if God's pow'r should her election bind,
Her motions then would cease, and stand all still.

* * * * *

So that if Man would be unvariable,
He must be God, or like a rock or tree;
For ev'n the perfect angels were not stable,
But had a fall more desperate than we.

The poem contains much excellent argument in mental science as well as in
religion and metaphysics; but with that department I have nothing to do.

I