Page:Mexico, picturesque, political, progressive.djvu/163

Rh soul is alone capable of comprehending her. Her beauty, her tenderness, her smiles, her tears, have been the inspiration of the names that live through ages. It was she who made immortal Dante and Petrarch, Goethe and Alfred de Musset. It is for want of her inspiration that we doubt the right of Cervantes to be called a poet, in spite of his genius, and deny that of Castelar, in spite of his artistic talent. The latter contracted a civil marriage with History and Politics. From this literary polygamy may spring such daughters as Fame, as Glory, even as Immortality, but never one whose name is Poetry. . . . To sing the praise of that being, as delicate as beautiful, as loving as resigned, as generous as tender, as modest as heroic; of her who is all love and sacrifice, who has come into the world to be the beloved companion of youth, and the sweet consoler of age; who gives wisdom to science, genius to art, and heroes to the native land, — ah, to sing of woman is for the poet to pay the divine debt of inspiration to the highest work of humanity, and to the being who has brought divinity down to earth!"

The verses that follow are in no sense love-songs. There is scarce a tinge of passion or a