Page:The spirit of the Hebrew poetry 1861.djvu/49

 mode of immediate spiritual communion. This may well be supposed, and, as we are bound to believe it possible, it may be accepted as a truth, and as a truth that has a deep meaning in Religion.

But the position now assumed is this—that Thought or Feeling, when embodied in language, is, to its whole extent of meaning, necessarily conditioned, as well by the established laws of language, as by all those incidental influences which affect its value and import, in traversing the chasms of Time. Statements of this kind are open to misapprehensions from various sources, and will not fail to awaken debate. So far as such misapprehensions may be precluded, this will best be done in submitting actual instances to the reader's consideration.

Take, as an instance—one among many that are equally pertinent to our purpose,—the Twenty-third Psalm. This is an ode which for beauty of sentiment is not to be matched in the circuit of all literature. In its way down through three thousand years, or more, this Psalm has penetrated to the depths of millions of hearts—it has gladdened homes of destitution and discomfort—it has whispered hope and joy amid tears to the utterly solitary and forsaken, whose only refuge was in Heaven. Beyond all range of probable calculation have these dozen lines imparted a power of endurance under suffering, and strength in feebleness, and have kept alive the flickering flame of religious feeling in hearts that were nigh to despair. The divine element