those choice forms of verbal combination in which concentrated passion
and sentiment may be fitly presented."

And the language which Spencer regards as the "most effective" is
tersely set forth by that poetic and spiritual preacher, Frederick
W. Robertson, in his idea of poetry: "The natural language of excited
feeling, and a work of imagination wrought into form by art."

Another point in connection with the language of poetry is that,
compelled by their limitations of rhythm, rhyme, and the compression
of much thought and feeling into brief space, the poets have become
the finest artists in the use of words. The examples of word-use in
the dictionaries are largely drawn from the poets. Joseph Joubert, the
French epigrammatist, says:

"Like the nectar of the bee, which turns to honey the dust of flowers,
or like that liquor which converts lead into gold, the poet has a
breath that fills out words, gives them light and color. He knows
wherein consists their charm, and by what art enchanted structures may
be built with them."

Familiarity with poetry thus becomes to the attentive reader an
insensible training in language, as well as an elevation of mind and
spirit. Superiority of spirit and of form, then, offers good
reasons why the intelligent--whether for stimulation, consolation,
self-culture, or mere amusement in idle hours--should avail of a due
proportion of this finest expression of the sweetest, the highest, and
the deepest emotional experiences of life, in the realms of nature, of
art, and of humanity itself.