Matthew Arnold somewhere tells us that all great poetry has one or both of two attributes: "Natural Magic" and "Moral Profundity." Whatever these two phrases may mean upon first sight, after examining their true import it will be appreciated that the greatest English critic did not consider poetry a thing for the closet, or sentimental matter only to be read by the melancholy lovelorn to his sentimental maid. The effect of the natural magic of a summer’s night, of the sea breaking upon the wind-swept coast, of the sea gull’s flight, is apparent and valued by everyone. What are most holidays other than periods during which we absorb appearances and sensations, that enter our personalities and remain part of ourselves during the succeeding year of work? "Natural Magic" is that which acts upon us as a holiday influence, compounded perhaps of beauty, mystery, fear or sentiment, which for the moment or for eternity gives our minds entrance into a realm of new and pleasurable things. Read Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s "Kubla Khan" and you will find the essence of natural magic. You enter a realm, indeed, of magic and witchery, for In Xanadu did Kubla Khan A stately pleasure-dome decree: Where Alph, the sacred river, ran Through caverns measureless to man Down to a sunless sea. Do those lines charm you? They charm most of us and the cadence of the words, the confused picture of Xanadu, have become our own,—riches with which we would not care to part. Every time I read them the blunt edge of life is worn off, living regains its sharpness, I have to an extent experienced an ecstasy, taken a holiday. It is hard to define the exhilaration of a canter across the meadows upon a crisp October day, or the impulse that surges through you as you look to the ocean breathing the sea breeze, or the sense of religious comradeship that grips you when in the midst of a crowd, great with a single purpose,—but this is all of the true stuff of Natural Magic. Your sensations are not of the minute, but of all time, as they have vivified your soul and become part and parcel of your personality.