serving, it is a lofty soul and a noble mind possessed by a great purpose, which control and triumph. The magical arts are simply the means by which a great end is served; when the work is accomplished, the staff will be broken and the book sunk beneath the sea, lower than any sounding of plummet." "Yes," said Rosalind impulsively, carrying the thought another step forward, "Prospero deals with natural, substantial things for great, real ends, not with magical powers for fantastic purposes. When it falls in his way, he evokes forces so unusual that they seem supernatural to those who do not understand his power, but the end which lies before him is always real, enduring, and noble; something which belongs to the eternal order of things." "For that matter," I interrupted, "it grows more and more difficult to distinguish between the forces and the achievements that we have thought real and possible, and those which have seemed only dreams and visions. Men are doing things every day by mechanical agencies which the most famous of the old magicians failed to accomplish. The visions of great minds are realities discovered a little in advance of their universal recognition." "As I was saying," continued the Poet, "most men hold Prospero to be a mere wonder-worker, a magician who puts his arts on and off with his robe; they do not know that he stands for the greatest force in the world. For the Imagination is not only the inspiring leader of men in their strange journey through life, but their nearest, most constant, and most practical helper and sustainer. That our souls would have starved without the Imagination we are all, I think, agreed; without Imagination we should have seen and remembered nothing on our long journey but the path at our feet. The heavens above us, the great, mysterious world about us, would have meant no more to us than to the birds and the beasts that have perished without thought or memory of the beauty which has encompassed them. All this the Imagination has interpreted for us. It has fashioned life for us, and the dullest mind that plods and counts and dies is ministered to and enriched by it. It does magical things. It puts on its robe and opens its book, and straightway the heavens rain melody and drop riches upon us. But this is its play. In these displays of its art it hints at the resources at its command, at the marvels it will yet bring to pass. Meanwhile it has made the earth hospitable for us and taught men how to live above the brutes." The Poet stopped abruptly, as if he had been caught in the act of preaching, and Rosalind gave the sermon a delightful ending.