inst the enchantment. Out of
Nature's mystery, somehow or other, this strange magic suddenly
illuminates the senses of a man; then vanishes again, as noiselessly as it
came. It is a very ghostly thing, and can not be explained by any theory
not of a very ghostly kind. Even Herbert Spencer has devoted his reasoning
to a new theory about it. I need not go further in this particular than to
tell you that in a certain way passion is now thought to have something to
do with other lives than the present; in short, it is a kind of organic
memory of relations that existed in thousands and tens of thousands of
former states of being. Right or wrong though the theories may be, this
mysterious moment of love, the period of this illusion, is properly the
subject of high poetry, simply because it is the most beautiful and the
most wonderful experience of a human life. And why?

Because in the brief time of such passion the very highest and finest
emotions of which human nature is capable are brought into play. In that
time more than at any other hour in life do men become unselfish,
unselfish at least toward one human being. Not only unselfishness but
self-sacrifice is a desire peculiar to the period. The young man in love
is not merely willing to give away everything that he possesses to the
person beloved; he wishes to suffer pain, to meet danger, to risk his life
for her sake. Therefore Tennyson, in speaking of that time, beautifully
said:

Love took up the harp of Life, and smote on all the chords with might,
Smote the chord of Self, that, trembling, pass'd in music out of sight.

Unselfishness is, of course, a very noble feeling, independently of the
cause. But this is only one of the emotions of a higher class when
powerfully aroused. There is pity, tenderness--the same kind of tenderness
that one feels toward a child--the love of the helpless, the desire to
protect. And a third sentiment felt at such a time more strongly than at
any other, is the sentiment of duty; responsibilities moral and social are
then comprehended in a totally new way. Surely none can dispute these
facts nor the beauty of them.

Moral sentiments are the highest of all; but next to them the sentiment of
beauty in itself, the artistic feeling, is also a very high form of
intellectual and even of secondary moral experience. Scientifically there
is a relation between the beautiful and the good, between the physically
perfect and the ethically perfect