le material of thought, volition, or action.
But, mechanic-like, it works by plumb and rule on all the materials
found in the warehouse of memory; and manufactures, out of the same
plank of pine, or bar of iron, or wedge of gold, or precious stone, some
new utensil, ornament, or adornment never found in Nature. In its
present form it is the offspring of the art and contrivance of man.
Hence our invulnerable position against Atheism or Deism. _No one could
have created the idea of a God or of a Christ, without a special
inspiration, any more than he could create a gold watch without the
metal called gold._

The deaf are necessarily dumb. The blind cannot conceive of color. A
Poet cannot work without language, any more than the nightingale could
sing without air. Language and prototypes precede and necessarily
antedate writing and prose. Hence the idea of Poetry is preceded by the
idea of Prose, as speaking by the idea of hearing. There was reason, and
an age of reason, without, and antecedent to, rhyme; and therefore we
sometimes find rhyme without reason, as well as reason without rhyme.

Rhyme, however, facilitates memory and recollection. Memory, indeed, is
but a printed tablet, and recollection the art and mystery of reading
it. Poetry, therefore, is both useful and pleasing. It aids
recollection, and soothes and excites and animates the soul of man. It
makes deeper, more pungent, more stimulating, more exciting, and more
enduring impressions on the mind than prose; and, therefore, greatly
facilitates both the acquisition and retention of ideas and impressions.
Of it Horace says ('Ars Poetica'):

'Ut pictura, poesis; erit, quae, si propius stes,
Te capiet magis, et quaedam, si longius abstes.
Haec amat obscurum; volet haec sub luce videri,
Judicis argutum quae non formidat acumen:
Haec placuit semel, haec decies repetita placebit.'

No one ever attained to what is usually called _good taste_ who has not
devoted a portion of his time and study to the whole science and art of
Poetry. We do not mean good taste in relation to any one manifestation
of it.

There is a general as well as a special good taste, but they are
distinguishable only as genus and species. There is, it may be alleged,
a _native_ as well as an _acquired_ taste. This may also be conceded.
There is in some persons a greater innate susceptibility of deriving
pleasure from the works of Nature and of Art than is discoverable in
others. St