Page:The nature and elements of poetry, Stedman, 1892.djvu/204

174 addressed to the ear in sound; that was its normal Melody, as heard or symbolized. method of conveying its imagery and passion to the human mind, and we have already considered the strange spell of its vocal music. But with the birth of written literature it equally addressed the eye, and since the invention of printing, a thousand times more frequently; so that the epigram is not strained which declares that "It is read with the ear; it is written with the voice; it is heard with the eyes." The mind's ear conceives the beauty of those seen but "unheard melodies" which are "the sweetest." The look of certain words conveys certain ideas to the mind; they seem as entities to display the absolute color, form, expression, associated with their meanings, just as their seen rhythm and melody sound themselves Constructive effects. to the ear. The eye, moreover, finds the architecture of verse effective, realizing a monumental, inscriptionary beauty in stanzaic and ode forms. Shape, arrangement, proportion compose the synthetic beauty of Construction. Thus poetry has its architecture and shares that condition celebrated by Beatrice in the "Paradiso": "All things collectively have an order among themselves, and this is form, which makes the universe resemble God." Beauty of construction is still more potent in the effect of plot and arrangement. Simplicity, above all, characterizes alike the