Not all the
writers just named are equally sure that they, rather than the world,
are right. The women are thoroughly optimistic. Mr. Woodberry, though he
leaves the question, whether the poet's beauty is a delusion, unanswered
in the poem where he broaches it, has betrayed his faith in the ideal
realms everywhere in his writings. James Thomson, on the contrary, is
not at all sure that the world is wrong in its doubt of ideal truth. The
tone of his poem, _Tasso and Leonora_, is very gloomy. The Italian
poet is shown in prison, reflecting upon his faith in the ideal realms
where eternal beauty dwells. He muses,
Yes--as Love is truer far
Than all other things; so are
Life and Death, the World and Time
Mere false shows in some great Mime
By dreadful mystery sublime.
But at the end Tasso's faith is troubled, and he ponders,
For were life no flitting dream,
Were things truly what they seem,
Were not all this world-scene vast
But a shade in Time's stream glassed;
Were the moods we now display
Less phantasmal than the clay
In which our poor spirits clad
Act this vision, wild and sad,
I must be mad, mad,--how mad!
However, this is aside from the point.
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