Poetry interprets in two ways: it interprets by expressing, with magical felicity, the physiognomy and movements of the outward world; and it interprets by expressing, with inspired conviction, the ideas and laws of the inward world of man's moral and spiritual nature. In other words, poetry is interpretative both by having natural magic in it, and by having moral profundity.

The Journal of Maurice de Guérin: With an Essay by Matthew Arnold, and a Memoir by Sainte Beuve (ed. 1867)