Life — January 7, 1897 — page 5: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

# "The Heart's Tribunal" This page from *Life* magazine presents a poem by Martha Dickinson (likely related to Emily Dickinson) titled "The Heart's Tribunal," illustrated by Otto Cushing. The illustration depicts three figures: a man in dark clothing at the bottom left, appearing to climb or struggle upward; two figures above (a woman and what appears to be an angelic or allegorical female figure with wings) positioned higher, suggesting judgment or moral authority. The poem's theme concerns love, conscience, and moral judgment—the "heart's tribunal" determining guilt or innocence in matters of the heart. The visual composition uses vertical hierarchy to reinforce this: the struggling man below faces judgment from elevated feminine figures representing love and morality above. This reflects Victorian-era sentimentality about women as moral arbiters of romantic conduct.