Page:Poems Blagden.djvu/19

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memoir.
xv

in her life. If she had written only those seven exquisite sonnets, to be found at pages 93-97 of this volume, and which she entitled the "Seven Chords of the Lyre," such would have been equally the case, and I should equally have been able to claim for her the character and dignity of a true poet. Mark with what subtlety yet distinctness of touch she strikes the first chord! What is it? Aspiration: aspiration for a beneficent activity which shall have its guerdon on earth and in heaven, by spanning both with the arch of Fame. What is the second? Love: love that is described as transfiguring the whole being, making the arid to bloom, the dark places to shine, even as the moon does, when it arises, on the earth. What is the third? Joy: joy that treads the shore of the blest isles, and that holds love's lilies in its clasp. Can the notes of delight and exultation ascend higher? Alas! they have touched the topmost height; and here for a moment they pause, ere the decrescendo movement begins. The fourth sonnet—the fourth of the Seven Chords of the Lyre—is Doubt; doubt described as

"Malignant asp, more envious than the cloud
That sears the glories of the summer sky,
And brings foul tempests where was golden calm!"

doubt that defeatureth the beauty of that soft domain, and "wars with love, till love itself depart." And now note with what exquisite accuracy of touch and estimation, with what penetration into the finer facts of life, with what fulfilment of the Pagan creed of delight by the