Page:The nature and elements of poetry, Stedman, 1892.djvu/262

232 conceiving these, but of holding one's conceptions so well in mind as to express them,—to copy them,—in actual language or form.

The strength of the imagination is proportioned, How to gauge its strength. in fact, to its definiteness, and also to the stress of its continuance,—of the memory which prolongs its utilization. Every one has more or less of this ideal faculty. The naturalness of children enables us to judge of their respective allotments. A mother knows which of her brood is the imaginative one. She realizes that it has a rare endowment, yet one as perilous as "the fatal gift of beauty." Her pride, her solicitude, are equally centred in that child. Now the clearer and more self-retentive this faculty, the more decided the ability of one in whom it reaches the grade at which he may be a designer, an artist, or a poet.

Let us see. Most of us have a sense of music. Clearness and retention. Tunes of our own "beat time to nothing" in the head. We can retain the theme, or opening phrase, at least, of a new composition that pleases us. But the musician, the man of genius, is haunted with unbidden harmonies; besides, after hearing a difficult and prolonged piece, he holds it in memory, perhaps can repeat it,—as when a Von Bülow repeats offhand an entire composition by Liszt. Moreover, his mind definitely hears its own imaginings; otherwise the sonata, the opera, will be confused and inferior. Again: most of us, especially when nervous or half asleep, find the "eyes make