The Sun.
London, England, 1846-10-27 00:00:00

TIIE POETRY OF RAILROADS.

" have heard many say, that on a railway all the
poetry of travelling is lost, and that we lose sight of the
beautiful and interesting. As to the last part of this
remark, I em only say that every one is free to stay at
whatever station he chooses, and look about him until
the next train arrives ; and as to all the poetry of tra-
velling being lost, I am quite of the contrary opinion.
ft is in the narrow, close-packed diligences that poetry
vanishes : we become dull, we are plagued with belt and
lust in the best season of the year, and in winter by
bad, heavy roads ; we do not see nature itself in a wider
exte:lt, but in longer draughts than in a railway carriage.
- " Oh, what a noble and great achievement of the mind
is this production ! We feel ourselves as powerful as the
sorcerers of old ! We put our magic horse to the car-
riage, and space disappears ; we fly like the clouds in a
storm—as the bird of passage flies ! Our wild horse
snorts and snuffs, and the dark steam issues out of his
nostrils. Mephistopheles could not fly quicker with
Faust on his cloak ! We are, with natural means, equally
As • potent in the present age. as those in the middle ages
thought that only the Devil Himself could be ! With our
cunning we are at his side, and, before ha knows it him-
self, we are past him.
" I can remember hut a few times in my life that I
ever felt myself so affected as I was on this railroad
journey : it was thus with all my thoughts—that I be-
held God face to face. I felt a devotion such as, when a
child, I have felt in the church alone ; and when older,
in the sun-illumined forest, or on the sea in a dead calm
and star-light Light. Feeling and Imagination are not the
only ones that reign in the realm of poetry : they have
a brother equally powerful ;—he is callect Intellect : he
proclaims the eternal truth, and in that, greatness and
poetry reside."
ST. PETER'S CITURCU.

" We ought to see St. Peter's Church during the
Easter week, to see it in the evening, and in bright sun-
shine ! It is perfectly like enchantment to witness what
they call the lighting of the dome ; yet it is not alone
the dome and the cross high above it that stream with
lights, but it is the whole immense building with the
colonnades around the place ! We see everything in a
,hue of fire ; the lamps are so richly diversified, and
placed in such situations, that the whole architectural
design stands forth confessed. It has a great effect, on
such an evening, to go from the illuminated place into
the church itself, where all is night and stillness ; but
directly under the dome, by the high altar, beams a
glory of several hundred silver lamps, placed on the
parapet around St. Peter's grave. We climb up to it,
and look down into the chapel shining with gold and
silver, where the marble figure of a kneeling Pope prays
in silence. There is such a peace, such a devotion in
the quiet of the church and in this venerable man's
figure, that we ourselves era filled with both, and, like
the Catholic, feel a desire to bend in adoration to the
Invisible Almighty.
" We must wander through this divine temple by sun-
light, when it is solitary, and the beautiful voices stream
from the side-chapel : we must come here during the
great festivals : the music vibrates, the incense per-
fumes, thousands kneel down and receive an old man's
blessing. Everything beams with light, everything
glows with gold and colours !"
THE ACROPOLIS.

"During my stay in Athens, I visited daily the Acro-
polis, whether it were sunshine or rain ! I celebrated
my birthday by a visit here ; here I read my letters from
home. The Acropolis was the last place I visited at
Athens when I was about to leave ; my thoughts dwell
longest on the Acropolis when they visit Greece. It was
as if nature and art reposed on my breast in this place ;
here I felt no want, except that all my dear friends could
not participate with me in this spectacle.
" A sunset, seen from this place, is one of the most
elevated sights I know. I have seen such a one. I sat
on the steps of the Parthenon ; everything was void and
dead towards llymettus ; black birds flew over the valley
where a single white column stands. An ass brayed
down there, and it sounded like the screams of a jackal ;
the sun sank behind the Bay of Salamis, and the moun-
tains shone with the most powerful colours. .lEgina was
as ble as the eshst violets. The same colrs, the
same fornis offr thee mountains were seen byou Plato,
Socrates, and the great men of that world, from the same
spot as that from which I myself saw them. It was the
same earth they had trodden. I felt, for a moment, that
I was living in those times. The sun went down, and
the glittering stars streamed forth over the dilapidated
temples ! I felt that God's work is eternal, man's
perishable ; but I drank life's poetry from both, which (if
God allows it to flourish and expand) shall refresh the
heart of man."