uture, becomes an abundant mine of poetry. The poets who
lived in aristocratic ages have been eminently successful in their
delineations of certain incidents in the life of a people or a man;
but none of them ever ventured to include within his performances the
destinies of mankind--a task which poets writing in democratic ages may
attempt. At that same time at which every man, raising his eyes above
his country, begins at length to discern mankind at large, the Divinity
is more and more manifest to the human mind in full and entire majesty.
If in democratic ages faith in positive religions be often shaken, and
the belief in intermediate agents, by whatever name they are called, be
overcast; on the other hand men are disposed to conceive a far broader
idea of Providence itself, and its interference in human affairs assumes
a new and more imposing appearance to their eyes. Looking at the human
race as one great whole, they easily conceive that its destinies are
regulated by the same design; and in the actions of every individual
they are led to acknowledge a trace of that universal and eternal plan
on which God rules our race. This consideration may be taken as another
prolific source of poetry which is opened in democratic ages. Democratic
poets will always appear trivial and frigid if they seek to invest gods,
demons, or angels, with corporeal forms, and if they attempt to draw
them down from heaven to dispute the supremacy of earth. But if they
strive to connect the great events they commemorate with the general
providential designs which govern the universe, and, without showing the
finger of the Supreme Governor, reveal the thoughts of the Supreme Mind,
their works will be admired and understood, for the imagination of their
contemporaries takes this direction of its own accord.

It may be foreseen in the like manner that poets living in democratic
ages will prefer the delineation of passions and ideas to that of
persons and achievements. The language, the dress, and the daily actions
of men in democracies are repugnant to ideal conceptions. These things
are not poetical in themselves; and, if it were otherwise, they would
cease to be so, because they are too familiar to all those to whom the
poet would speak of them. This forces the poet constantly to search
below the external surface which is palpable to the senses, in order to
read the inner soul: and nothing lends itself more to the delineation
of the ideal than