dled by the Divine Hand shares the immortality of that great source from whence all love descends. The flame cannot expire.
Thus, Love cannot recede, it cannot stand still; it must obey the law of eternal progression, must advance onward and upward, must grow stronger, broader, purer, with every hour of its existence. If it falter, languish, cool, it is not love,—never was love,—never can become love.
The most exquisite illustration which we have ever met, of the affluent love of a high-souled woman, is that given by Mrs. Browning in her Portuguese Sonnets. Surely, a truer, fuller love-utterance never rang out from woman's heart and lips! Yet Mrs. Browning has only painted, with startling force and unsurpassable eloquence, the emotions which thousands of women who love have, either consciously or unconsciously, experienced; though few women, if any, have been gifted with her miraculous power of breathing forth her inmost soul in rythmic concord of sweet sounds. What woman who has loved, or is capable of loving, will find our quotations too ample?
The sonnets are addressed by the (supposed) Portuguese lady to her lover. She portrays to him how entirely by love, "The face of all the world is changed," to the eyes of her who loves; how beautifully she is "taught the whole of life in a new rhythm." How even
