Page:Summer - from the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau.djvu/233

Rh quasi-sanguinem, a certain kind of aerial or ethereal flesh and blood.&quot; This, which Cudworth pronounces &quot;romantical,&quot; is plainly as good doctrine as his own, as if any sincere thought were not the best sort of truth.

There is no doubt but the highest morality in the books is rhymed or measured, is in form, as well as substance, poetry. Such is the scripture of all nations. If I were to compile a volume to contain the condensed wisdom of mankind, I should quote no rhythmless line.

Not all the wit of a college can avail to make one harmonious line. It never happens. It may get so as to jingle. But a jingle is akin to a jar–jars regularly recurring.

So delicious is plain speech to my ears, as if I were to be more delighted by the whistling of the shot than frightened by the flying of the splinters. I am content, I fear, to be quite battered down and made a ruin of. I out general myself when I direct my enemy to my vulnerable points.

Sympathy with what is sound makes sport of what is unsound. The loftiest utterance of love is perhaps sublimely satirical.

Cliffs. Evening. Though the sun set a quarter of an hour ago, his rays are still visible, darting half way to the zenith. That glowing morrow in the west flashes on me like