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Poets and dreamers have enlarged upon the romantic quality of “the sad sea waves.” I once knew a woman who wrote very successful songs about the “shining sea,” though she never saw the ocean in her life. Those who live in the interior, far from the ocean, with never a view of any large body of water, are easily led to believe that the sounds of the sea are delightful companions. I often wish I could share my part of the performance with them! I would gladly exchange my constant sound companion for ten minutes of wind among the trees. Bryant says:

“There is society, where none intrude,

By the deep sea, and music in its roar.”

True; but Bryant was not deaf. No doubt as a child he held a sea shell to his ear and listened to its murmuring with delight. But he could lay it aside when it became tiresome! One speaks from quite another point of view when incased for life within the shell. I think I know just how the Apostle John felt when, looking out from every direction from his weary island, he saw only the blue, rolling water. He wrote as part of his conception of heaven: