Page:Wit, humor, and Shakspeare. Twelve essays (IA cu31924013161223).pdf/47

 "The centre-fire heaves underneath the earth, And the earth changes like a human face." "Earth is a wintry clod, But spring-wind, like a dancing psaltress, passes Over its breast to waken it." "The winds Are henceforth voices, in a wail or shout, A querulous mutter, or a quick, gay laugh,— Never a senseless gust now man is born."

The imagination thus proclaiming the banns between spirit and matter reminds us of Wordsworth's dear maiden, of whom he says,—

"She was known to every star in heaven, And every wind that blew."

The impression of surprise which a perfect simile produces is transferred from the understanding back to the imagination before the former can venture to be amused. But sometimes the surprise lingers there long enough to have a narrow escape from smiling; as when Sir Thomas Brown, finding that midnight has overtaken him at his desk, says, "To keep our eyes open longer, were to act the antipodes." His wakefulness is not only like the antipodal day, but dramatizes it; and this is a simile that imparts the shock of wit.

Here is one from Shakspeare that approaches it, but is intercepted by a sense of beauty:—

"These violent delights have violent ends, And in their triumph die; like fire and powder, Which, as they kiss, consume."

And he says that, when the people saw Anne Boleyn at her coronation, such a noise arose "as the shrouds make at sea in a stiff tempest." Mr. Browning makes