of life. From this interval of religious contemplation
she returned to her labours with the feeling of a new
power. In opening the first meeting of this second
series, on November 22, 1840, Margaret spoke of
great changes which had taken place in her way of
thinking. These were of so deep and sacred a character that she could only give them a partial expression,
which, however, sufficed to touch her hearers deeply.
“They all, with glistening eyes, seemed melted into
one love." Hearts were kindled by her utterance to
one enthusiasm of sympathy which set out of sight the
possibility of future estrangement.
In the conversations of this winter (1840–41) the fine arts held a prominent place.
Margaret stated, at the beginning, that the poetry of life would be found in the advance" from objects to law, from the circumference of being, where we found ourselves at our birth, to the centre. This poetry was "the only path of the true soul," life's prose being the deviation from this ideal way. The fine arts she considered a compensation for this prose, which appeared to her inevitable. The beauties which life could not embody might be expressed in stone, upon canvas, or in music and verse. She did not permit the search for the beautiful to transcend the limits of our social and personal duties. The pursuit of æsthetic pleasure might, lead us to fail in attaining the higher beauty. A poetic life was not the life of a dilettante.
Of sculpture and music she had much to say, placing them above all other arts. Painting appeared to her inferior to sculpture, because it represented a greater variety of objects, and thus involved more prose. Several conversations were, nevertheless, devoted to
