OR THE COURSE OF A SOUL; AND OTHER POEMS
BY WALTER R. CASSELS



EIDOLON,
OR THE COURSE OF A SOUL;
AND OTHER POEMS,

BY WALTER R. CASSELS


LONDON
WILLIAM PICKERING
1850


TO
CHARLES PEEL,

THIS VOLUME IS INSCRIBED BY
HIS FRIEND,

W. R. CASSELS.




CONTENTS.


Page
Eidolon 1
Alcestй 93
Pygmalion 136

MISCELLANEOUS POEMS.
Ode to Fancy 159
What is a sigh? 165
Ione 167
Reality 169
Retrospection 172
The Stormy Petrel 181
To ---- 183
The Mermaid 185
The Spirit of the Air 190
Why do I love thee? 195
Lady Annabel 196
To Jenny Lind 201
The Gold Seekers 204
To Woman 209
The Poet 212
Evening 224
Life 226
Sorrow 229

SONNETS.
I. Written at Ulleswater 233
II. "There is a spell by which the panting soul" 234
III. "We wander on through life as pilgrims do" 235
IV. "Sweet spirits of the Beautiful! where'er ye dwell," 236
V. "We are ambitious overmuch in life," 237
VI. "Mountains! and huge hills! wrap your mighty forms" 238
VII. To Ella 239
VIII. "I traverse oft in thought the battle-plain" 240




INTRODUCTION TO EIDOLON.


Hazlitt says, one cannot "make an allegory go on all fours," it must
to a certain degree be obscure and shadowy, like the images which the
traveller in the desert sees mirrored on the heavens, wherein he can
trace but a dreamy resemblance to the reality beneath. It therefore
seems to me advisable to give a solution of the "Eidolon," the symbol,
which follows, that the purpose of the poem may at once be evident.

In "Eidolon" I have attempted to symbol the course of a Poet's mind
from a state wherein thought is disordered, barren and uncultivated,
to that which is ordered and swayed by the true Spirit of Poetry, and
holds its perfect creed.

I have therefore laid the scene on a desert island, whence, as from
the isolation of his own mind, he reflects upon the concerns of life.
At first he is a poet only by birthright '_Poeta nascitur_.' He has
the poet's inherent love for the Beautiful, his keen susceptibility of
all that is lovely in outward nature, but these are only the blossoms
which have fallen upon him from the Tree of Life, the fruit is yet
untasted. He has looked at the evil of the world alone, and seeing how
much "the time is out of joint" has become misanthropic, and turns his
back alike on the evil and the good.

Then comes Night, the stillness of the soul, with starlight breaking
through the gloom. He gazes on other worlds, and pictures there the
perfection he sighs