Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The Sound of the Sea

The Sound of the Sea - meaning Summary

Inner Tides Echoing the Sea

Longfellow’s poem likens the sea’s midnight roar to sudden inner movements of the soul. The natural image of waves rising and a multiplied, mysterious sound becomes a metaphor for inspirations and feelings that arrive from unknown, inaccessible places within us. These impulses are presented not simply as personal creations but as possible divine forewarnings or insights, beyond ordinary reason or control, suggesting humility before deeper sources of knowing.

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The sea awoke at midnight from its sleep, And round the pebbly beaches far and wide I heard the first wave of the rising tide Rush onward with uninterrupted sweep; A voice out of the silence of the deep, A sound mysteriously multiplied As of a cataract from the mountain's side, Or roar of winds upon a wooded steep. So comes to us at times, from the unknown And inaccessible solitudes of being, The rushing of the sea-tides of the soul; And inspirations, that we deem our own, Are some divine foreshadowing and foreseeing Of things beyond our reason or control.

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