“Ay, is it so?
Then wakes the power which in the age of iron
Burst forth to curb the great and raise the low.”
Here the surge of passion began to sweep cumulatively on. The eyes grew wild, the outstretched hands quivered, the tones swelled and rang, the expanded and erected figure looked like a transparent mass of fire, and the climax fell as though the sky had burst with a broadside of thunders.
“Mark where she stands! Around her form I draw
The awful circle of our solemn Church.
Set but a foot within that holy ground,
And on thy head, yea, though it wore a crown,
I launch the curse of Rome!”
The sudden passage of Richelieu from the extreme of tottering feebleness to the extreme of towering strength, under the stimulus of some impersonal passion, illustrated a deep and marvellous principle of human nature. Forrest never forgot how startlingly he had once seen this exemplified by Andrew Jackson when discussing the expediency of the annexation of Texas to the United States. A disinterested and universal sentiment suddenly admitted to the mind, lifting the man out of egotism, sometimes seems to open the valves of the brain, flood the organism with supernatural power, and transform a shrivelled skeleton into a glowing athlete. Richelieu had fainted, and was thought to be dying. The king repents, and restores his office, saying,—