The passages quoted are more fraught with feeling than any of the rest of the prose selections before me; and I will pass over most of them, barely mentioning the subjects. There is a silly and sentimental piece entitled “Mrs. Emily Judson,” in which the demise of the third wife of the famous missionary is noticed. There is a short piece of argumentation in behalf of a regulation requiring attendance on public worship. There is a sophomoric bit of prose entitled “The Spirit Of Song,” wherein we have a glimpse of the Garden of Eden and its happy lovers. There is a piece, without title, in honor of earth’s angels, the noble souls who give their lives to perishing and oppressed humanity. The following, in regard to modern poetry, is both true and well expressed:
The superficial unchristian doctrine of our day is that poetry flourishes most in an uncultivated soil, that the imagination shapes her choicest images from the mists of a superstitious age. The materials of poetry must ever remain the same and inexhaustible. Poetry has its origin in the nature of man, in the deep and mysterious recesses of the human soul. It is not the external only, but the inner life, the mysterious workmanship of man’s heart and the slumbering elements of passion which furnish the materials of poetry.
Finally, because of the subject, I quote the following:
The study of Astronomy gives us the most exalted views of the Creator, and it exalts ourselves also, and binds our souls more closely to the soul of the Infinite. What wonders does it reveal! It teaches that the earth, though it seem so immovable, not only turns on its axis, but goes sweeping round a great circle whose miles are counted by millions; and though it seem so huge, with its wide continents and vast oceans, it is but a speck when compared with the manifold works of God. It teaches the form, weight, and motion of the earth, and then it bids us go up and weigh and measure the sun and planets and solve the mighty problems of their motion. But it stops not here. It bids us press upward beyond the boundary of our little system of worlds up to where the star-gems lie glowing in the great deep of heaven. And then we find that these glittering specks are vast suns, pressing on in their shining courses, sun around sun, and system around system, in harmony, in beauty, in grandeur; and as we view them spread out in their splendour and infinity, we pause to think of Him who has formed them, and we feel his greatness and excellence and majesty, and in contemplating Him, the most sublime object in the universe, our own souls are expanded, and filled with awe and reverence and love. And they long to break through their earthly prison-house that they may go forth on their great mission of knowledge, and rising higher and higher into the heavens they may at last bow in adoration and worship before the throne of the Eternal.
To complete this study of Angeline Stickney’s college writings, it is necessary, though somewhat painful, to quote specimens of her poetry. For example:
There was worship in Heaven. An angel choir,
On many and many a golden lyre
Was hymning its praise. To the strain sublime
With the beat of their wings that choir kept time.
etc., etc., etc.