Port Tobacco times, and Charles County advertiser. (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1845-1898, 1852-01-07
MISC ELL n E 0 u S.
From the.Lady's Book.
THE ENCHANTED WORLD.
BY L. w. MECH.

THE ENCHANTED WORLD.
BY L. W. MECH.
The benign watchcare of guardian spirits
seems to be inculcated by the Sacred Scrip
lures. Thus the page of inspiration bears
the record: ..The Ssducees say there is no
resurrection, neither angel nor spirit; but
the Pharisees confess both" Nothing more
would seem to be the purport OF this pas
sage than simply to express the historic fact,
that part of the Hebrew nation believed in
the existence Of angels and invisible spirits.
10 other places, however, there are more
direc, in,ima,ions, and passages which un-
doub,edly sanction this belief with the au-
shorty Of Revelation.
care they no. oil ministering spirits :''-
"Take heed ,ha, We despise no, one Of these
lille ones for ] say unto you their angels
do always behold the face Of my father which
is in heaven" The companionship Of at
tendsn, angels to The saints here seems ex-
plicitIy iDcucsted. The heart of humanity
is glsddened. and takes courage at The reci-
tai, so beautifully paraphrased by the poet
ssHow cheering the thought that the spirits of bliss
Will bow their bright wings to world such as
this,
Will leave their sweet home in the mansions above
To breathe FER our bosoms some message of love.
"They come, on the wings of the morning they
come,
Impatient to lead some poor wanderer home,
Some pilgrim to snatch from this stormy abode,
And lay him to rest in the arms of his God"
In ,hi. sketch the Scriptursl view is first
introduced 10 show in wha, manner ,Ife be-
4
element Of Christianity. And thus far we
faithfully and implicitly believe; bu, further
the mystic seduces us in vain. The beau
,iful dreams Of PLATO and the imaginative
poets delight Us in common with mankind;
but il is in the sense Of dreams.
How strange is the incident related Of the
poe, Shelley! Visiting a rural scene in the
vicinity ofLond"n, accompanied bv friend.
sfler gazing upon its beauties for time, she
stopped suddenly in the midst Of his rsplu-
rous praises, and, looking into the eyes Of
his friend, burst into flood Of tears. II
was long time before he could speak
and, when bis friend insisted upon knowing
the cause Of such an expression of feeling,
he replied that, somewhere in his previous
existence, he had gazed at that identical
landscape; and yet he knew that, in body,
he had never stood where they then STOOD.
He was sure that, at some previous time, he
had done so; for It came upon hlm as an
old familiar spot, and 1t must be that in
spirit he had seen it," Such. a declaration
is accounted venlal, while under The 'sfne
frenzy" of CaslaIa bu, in sober moment,
when the poe, resumes the man, il can only
In,1 foal # Il
pity. 1t appears the more serious, since j,
leads one 10 overlook the distinction of
righ, and wrong, as we'll as of the real and
the imaginary.
But, in their own proper sphere, the ex-
quisi. images Of poetry and philosophy, as
sources Of the sublime and beautiful, as
springs Of high and lofty emotion, have
always been valued and admired as the
very poetry Of life. Nor is their use re-
stric,ed TO pleasing hints and illusions,
''to paint moral or adorn tale" They
have beguiled the tedious hour, and charm
ed away life's SORROWS, adornng and beau
have aided and illustrated the expression of
thought, and cultivated a sense of the pure
end beautiful in nature. And, so far as they
conduce to these ends, so far is it salu,ary
at times to yield TO the illusion of their
charmed spell.
The gracious presence Of invisible angels
has already been shown-a well-known al
lusion to which is attributed, by the poet
Milton, to Adam, "the comeliest man Of
men," in conversation with Eve
"Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth,
Unseen, both when wake and when we sleep
All these, with ceaseless praise, his works behold
Both day and night
s'How often from the steep
OF echoing hill or thicket have we heard
Celestial voices to the midnight air,
Sole, or responsive each to others note,
Singing their great Creator!"
Kindred to these spirited lines, though j,
be not original, is the sublime vision Of j.
saiah, where the seraphim cry one to an
other, and proclaim the supreme holiness Of
@,he Lord of hosts the whole earth is full
Of His glory" But the doctrine of invisi-
BILE spirits has pervaded literature from its
very infancy. How naturally does it enter