108 SUGGESTIVENESS 



but in the hands of an imaginative man like Maeter- 

 linck a certain order of facts in natural history 

 becomes fraught with deepest meaning, as may 

 be witnessed in his wonderful " Life of the Bee," 

 one of the most enchanting and poetic contribu- 

 tions to natural history ever made. Darwin's work 

 upon the earthworm, and upon the cross fertiliza- 

 tion of flowers, in the same way seems to convey 

 more truth to the reader than is warranted by the 

 subject. 



The writer who can touch the imagination has 

 the key, at least one key, to suggestiveness. This 

 power often goes with a certain vagueness and in^ 

 definiteness, as in the oft-quoted lines from one of 

 Shakespeare's sonnets : 



"the prophetic soul 

 Of the wide world dreaming on things to come ; " 



a very suggestive, but not a clearly intelligible pas- 

 sage. 



Truth at the centre, straightly put, excites the 

 mind in one way, and truth at the surface, or at the 

 periphery of the circle, indirectly put, excites it in 

 another way and for other reasons; just as a light 

 in a dark place, which illuminates, appeals to the 

 eye in a different way from the light of day falling 

 through vapors or colored glass, wherein objects 

 become softened and illusory. 



A common word may be so used as to have an 



