Here is a cottage to be moved, if not a mountain, and a water-fall to be silent, if it is not to hang listening:  but with what different relation to the mind that contemplates them!  Here, in the extremity of its agony, the soul cries out wildly for relief, which at the same moment it partly knows to be impossible, but partly believes possible, in a vague impression that a miracle might be wrought to give relief even to a less sore distress,—­that nature is kind, and God is kind, and that grief is strong; it knows not well what is possible to such grief.  To silence a stream, to move a cottage wall,—­one might think it could do as much as that!

I believe these instances are enough to illustrate the main point I insist upon respecting the pathetic fallacy,—­that so far as it is a fallacy, it is always the sign of a morbid state of mind, and comparatively of a weak one.  Even in the most inspired prophet it is a sign of the incapacity of his human sight or thought to bear what has been revealed to it.  In ordinary poetry, if it is found in the thoughts of the poet himself, it is at once a sign of his belonging to the inferior school; if in the thoughts of the characters imagined by him, it is right or wrong according to the genuineness of the emotion from which it springs; always, however, implying necessarily some degree of weakness in the character.

Take two most exquisite instances from master hands.  The Jessy of Shenstone, and the Ellen of Wordsworth, have both been betrayed and deserted.  Jessy, in the course of her most touching complaint says:—­

    If through the garden’s flowery tribes I stray,
      Where bloom the jasmines that could once allure,
    “Hope not to find delight in us,” they say,
      “For we are spotless, Jessy; we are pure."[71]

Compare with this some of the words of Ellen:—­

    “Ah, why,” said Ellen, sighing to herself,
    “Why do not words, and kiss, and solemn pledge,
    And nature, that is kind in woman’s breast,
    And reason, that in man is wise and good,
    And fear of Him who is a righteous Judge,—­
    Why do not these prevail for human life,
    To keep two hearts together, that began
    Their springtime with one love, and that have need
    Of mutual pity and forgiveness sweet
    To grant, or be received; while that poor bird—­
    O, come and hear him!  Thou who hast to me
    Been faithless, hear him;—­though a lowly creature,
    One of God’s simple children that yet know not
    The Universal Parent, how he sings! 
    As if he wished the firmament of heaven
    Should listen, and give back to him the voice
    Of his triumphant constancy and love;
    The proclamation that he makes, how far
    His darkness doth transcend our fickle light."[72]

The perfection of both these passages, as far as regards truth and tenderness of imagination in the two poets, is quite insuperable.  But of the two characters imagined, Jessy is weaker than Ellen, exactly in so far as something appears to her to be in nature which is not.  The flowers do not really reproach her.  God meant them to comfort her, not to taunt her; they would do so if she saw them rightly.