ng it. He can have no
faith in the previous existence of heroes whom he is purposely
portraying as shadows, and he must constantly be put to shifts, in order
to adapt his story, during its progress, to the circumstances which he
attempts to typify. And, in the second place, he commits the error,
equally palpable, of disenchanting the eyes of his reader. For the very
essence of that pleasure which we all derive from fiction, lies in our
overcoming to a certain extent the idea of its actual falsity, and in
our erecting within ourselves a sort of secondary belief, to which,
accordingly, our sympathies are submitted. Every thing, therefore, which
interferes with this fair and legitimate credulity is directly noxious
to the effect of the poem; it puts us back one stage further from the
point of absolute faith, and materially diminishes the interest which we
take in the progress of the piece. Spenser's Faerie Queen is a notable
example of this. Could we but think that Una was intended, though only
by the poet's fancy, to be the portraiture of a mortal virgin,
unfriended and alone amidst the snares and enchantments of the world,
would we not tremble for her sweet sake, knowing that some as innocent
and as fair as she have fallen victims to jealousy less dark than
Duessa's, and wiles less skilfully prepared than those of the hoary
Archimage? But Una never for one moment appears to us as a woman. From
the first we feel that she is there, not exposed to temptation, but as a
pure and holy spirit, in whose presence hypocrisy is unmasked, and all
sin and iniquity unveiled. Nor fear we for the Red-Cross Knight, even
when he seems to go astray, and turns from the side of her whom he had
sworn to protect and guard; for he bears a talisman upon his shield and
his bosom, expressive of his origin, and able to resist for ever the
fiery darts of the wicked. Never rode knight and lady through earthly
wilderness as these two journey together. For them we have no human
interest--not even such tears as we might shed for the lapse of an
erring angel. They have not put on mortality, nor do they meet or combat
with mortal foes. Truth will do much for us, even in poetry where the
mortal interest is most largely intermingled with the supernatural. Some
belief we have even in the wildest flights of Ariosto. Astolfo does not
cease to be one of ourselves when traversing the regions of air on his
hippogriff, or conversing on the mount of terrestial Paradi