Myself will to my darling be
Both law and impulse; and with me

The girl, in rock and plain,

In earth and heaven, in glade and bower,
Shall feel an overseeing power

To kindle, or restrain.

The floating clouds their state shall lend
To her, for her the willow bend;

Nor shall she fail to see

Even in the motions of the storm,

Grace that shall mould the maiden's form

By silent sympathy.

And vital feelings of delight

Shall rear her form to stately height,—

Her virgin bosom swell.

Such thoughts to Lucy I will give,

While she and I together live,

Here in this happy dell."

There are deadly

"Vital feelings of delight," observe. feelings of delight; but the natural ones are vital, necessary to very life.

And they must be feelings of delight, if they are to be vital. Do not think you can make a girl lovely, if you do not make her happy. There is not one restraint you put on a good girl's nature - there is not one check you give to her instincts of affection or of effort which will not be indelibly written on her features, with a hardness which is all the more painful because it takes away the brightness from the eyes of innocence, and the charm from the brow of virtue.

This for the means: now note the end. Take from the same poet, in two lines, a perfect description of womanly beauty –

"A countenance in which did meet

Sweet records, promises as sweet."

The perfect loveliness of a woman's countenance can only consist in that majestic peace, which is founded in the memory of happy and useful years, full of sweet records; and from the joining of this with that yet more majestic childishness, which is still full of change and promise; - opening always — modest at once, and bright, with hope of better things to be won, and to be bestowed. There is no old age where there is still that promise — it is eternal youth.

John Ruskin

A Phantom of Delight

HE was a Phantom of delight

SHE

When first she gleamed upon my sight;

A lovely Apparition, sent

To be a moment's ornament;

Her eyes as stars of Twilight fair;
Like Twilight's too, her dusky hair;
But all things else about her drawn
From May-time and the cheerful Dawn;
A dancing Shape, an Image gay,
To haunt, to startle, and waylay.

I saw her upon nearer view,
A Spirit, yet a Woman too!
Her household motions light and free,
And steps of virgin liberty;

A countenance in which did meet
Sweet records, promises as sweet;
A Creature not too bright or good
For human nature's daily food;
For transient sorrows, simple wiles,

Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles.

And now I see with eye serene
The very pulse of the machine;
A Being breathing thoughtful breath,
A Traveller betwixt life and death;
The reason firm, the temperate will,
Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill,
A perfect Woman, nobly planned,
To warn, to comfort, and command;
And yet a Spirit still, and bright
With something of an angel light.

She can flourish staff or pen,
And deal a wound that lingers;
She can talk the talk of men,
And touch with thrilling fingers.

Match her ye across the sea,
Natures fond and fiery ;

Ye who zest the turtle's nest
With the eagle's eyrie.

Soft and loving is her soul,

Swift and lofty soaring;

Mixing with its dove-like dole

Passionate adoring.

Such as she who'll match with me?

In flying or pursuing,

Subtle wiles are in her smiles
To set the world a-wooing.

She is steadfast as a star,

And yet the maddest maiden :
She can wage a gallant war,
And give the peace of Eden.

George Meredith

III

THE POETS AND THE IDEAL

Her faults he knew not, love is always blind,
But every charm revolv'd within his mind:
Her tender age, her form divinely fair,
Her easy motion, her attractive air,
Her sweet behaviour, her enchanting face,
Her moving softness, her majestic grace.

Sweet lips, this way!

A. Pope (after Chaucer)

Matthew Arnold

The Lady of the Sonnets

HALL I compare thee to a summer's day?

SHALL

Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometimes too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,

Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st,

Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st;