POEMS.
THE
STORY OF JUSTIN MARTYR,
AND
OTHER POEMS.
BY
RICHARD CHENEVIX TRENCH,
PERPETUAL CURATE OF CURDRIDGE CHAPEL, HANTS.
LONDON:
EDWARD MOXON, DOVER STREET.
MDCCCXXXV.
LONDON:
BRADBURY AND EVANS, PRINTERS,
WHITEFRIARS.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
Dedicatory Lines 1
The Story of Justin Martyr 9
Sonnet 27
To ---- 28
To the same 29
To the same 30
To the same 31
To the same 32
A Legend of Alhambra 33
England 38
The Island of Madeira 39
Gibraltar 40
England 41
Poland 42
To Nicholas, Emperor of Russia, on his reported Conduct
towards the Poles 43
On the Results of the last French Revolution 44
To England 45
Sonnet 46
Sonnet to Silvio Pellico 47
To the Same 48
From the Spanish 49
Lines 52
To a Friend entering the Ministry 53
To a Child Playing 57
The Herring-Fishers of Lochfyne 59
In the Isle of Mull 60
The same 61
At Sea 62
An Evening in France 63
Sonnet. To my Child, a Fellow-traveller 68
The Descent of the Rhone 69
On the Perseus and Medusa of Benvenuto Cellini 80
Lines written at the Village of Passignano, on the Lake of Thrasymene 81
Vesuvius, as seen from Capri 84
Vesuvius 85
The same continued 86
To England. Written after a visit to Sorrento 87
Lines written after hearing some beautiful singing in a
Convent Church at Rome. 88
On a Picture of the Assumption by Murillo 92
An Incident versified 95
Address on leaving Rome to a Friend residing in that City 98
Tasso’s Dungeon, Ferrara 105
Sonnet 106
At Brunecken, in the Tyrol 107
Sonnet 108
Lines written in an Inn 109
To E ---- 114
To ----, on the Morning of her Baptism 119
To a Lady singing 122
The same continued 123
The same continued 124
The same continued 125
The same continued 126
Sonnet 127
Sonnet 128
Sonnet 129
Despondency 130
Ode to Sleep 133
Atlantis 139
Sais 143
Sonnet 144
Recollections of Burgos 145
To a Friend 148
To the Constitutional Exiles of 1823 151
To the same 152
Sonnet 153
On an early Death 154
Sonnet 160
Sonnet 161
New Year’s Eve 162
To my Child 163
Sonnet 164
Sonnet. In a Pass between the Walchen and the Waldensee 165
Sonnet 166
Sonnet 167
To my God-Child, on the Day of his Baptism 168
The Monk and Bird 172
ERRATA.
[Corrected in this etext]
Page 9, line 6, _for_ look _read_ looks.
... 26, ... 3, _for_ flonrish _read_ flourish.
... 137, ... 6, _for_ starerd _read_ starred.
DEDICATORY LINES.
TO ----
If, Lady, at thy bidding, I have strung
As on one thread these few unvalued beads,
I cannot ask the world to count them pearls,
Or to esteem them better than they are:
But thou, I know, wilt prize them, for by thee
Solicited, I have beguiled with these
The enforcèd leisure of the present time,
And dedicate of right my little book
To thee, beloved--sure at least of this
That if my verse has aught of good or true,
It will not lack the answer of one heart--
And if herein it may be thou shalt find
Some notes of jarring discord, some that speak
A spirit ill at ease, unharmonised,
Yet ’twere a wrong unto thyself to deem
These are the utterance of my present heart,
My present mood--but of long years ago,
When neither in the light of thy calm eyes,
Nor in the pure joys of an innocent home,
Nor in the happy laughter of these babes,
Had I as yet found comfort, peace, or joy.
But all is changèd now, and could I weave
A lay of power, it should not now be wrung
From miserable moods of sullen sin,
Chewing the bitter ashes of the fruit
Itself had gathered; rather would I speak
Of light from darkness, good from evil brought
By an almighty power, and how all things,
If we will not refuse the good they bring,
Are messages of an almighty love,
And full of blessings. Oh! be sure of this--
All things are mercies while we count them so;
And this believing, not keen poverty
Nor wasting years of pain or slow disease,
Nor death, which in a moment might lay low
Our pleasant plants,--not these, if they should come,
Shall ever drift our bark of faith ashore,
Whose stedfast anchor is securely cast
Within the veil, the veil of things unseen,
Which now we know not, but shall know hereafter.
Yet wherefore this? for we have not been called
To interpret the dark ways of Providence,
But that unsleeping eye that wakes for us,
Has kept from hurt, and harm, and blind mischance,
Our happy home till now. Yet not for this
Can we escape our share of human fears
And dim forebodings, chiefly when we think
Under what hostile influence malign
They may grow up, for whom their life is cast
Now to begin in this unhappy age,
When all, that by a solemn majesty
And an enduring being once rebuked
And put to shame the sordid thoughts of man,
Must be no more permitted to affront
Him and his littleness, or bid him back
Unto the higher tasks and nobler cares
For which he lives, for which his life is lent.
Yet what though all things must be common now,
And nothing sacred, nothing set apart,
But each enclosure by rude hands laid waste,
That did fence in from the world’s wilderness
Some spot of holy ground, wherein might grow
The tender slips, the planting of the Lord;
Within the precincts of which holy spots,
With awful ordinances fencèd round,
They might grow up in beauty and in peace,
In season due to be transplanted thence
Into the garden of God,--what though all these
May perish, there will yet remain to us
One citadel, one ark, which hands profane
Will scarce invade, or lay unholy touch
Upon the sanctities inviolate,
And pure religion of our sacred homes.
And here the culture may proceed, and here
Heaven may distil its rich and silent dews,
When all around is parched as desert heath.
For this may come, the withering and the drought,
The laying waste of every holy hedge
May come, how soon we know not, but may fear;
Since nations walk, no less than men, by faith,
As seeing that which is invisible
Unto the sealèd eye of sensual men:
And where this vision is not, or the seers
Are lightly counted of, the people perish.
And woe unto our country, if indeed
She has left off this wisdom, or esteems
This for her higher wisdom--to despise
All spiritual purpose, all far-looking aim,
And all that cannot be exchanged for gold--
Woe unto her, and turbulent unrest
Unto ourselves, who cannot hope or wish
In her disquiet to lead quiet lives,
Or to withdraw out of the stormy press
And tumult--to withdraw and keep the latch
Close fastened of our little world apart,
A peaceful island in a stormy sea,
A patch of sunshine amid shadows lying;
This must not be, we were not called to this.
And all the peace we know must be within,
And from within--from that glad river fed,
Whose springs lie deeper than that heat or cold,
Or the vicissitudes earth’s surface knows
Can reach to harm them.
Mayest thou know well
What are these springing waters, wells of life,
By the great Father dug for us at first,
And which, when sin had stopped them, love anew
Has opened, and has given them their old names
And former virtue[1]; and from these refreshed,
Mayest thou pass onward through the wilderness,
And knowing what of ill is imminent,
And may descend upon us, evermore
Strengthen with faith and prayer, with lofty thought
And effort, and it may be in some part
With soul-sustaining verse, the citadel
Of courage and heroic fortitude,
Which in the centre of a woman’s heart
Is stablished, whatsoever outwardly
Of doubt or womanly weak fear prevail.
POEMS, &c.
THE STORY OF JUSTIN MARTYR.
(SEE JUSTIN MARTYR’S FIRST DIALOGUE WITH TRYPHO.)
It seems to me like yesterday,
The morning when I took my way
Upon the shore--in solitude;
For in that miserable mood
It was relief to quit the ken
And the inquiring looks of men--
The looks of love and gentleness,
And pity, that would fain express
Its only purpose was to know,
That, knowing, it might soothe my woe:
But when I felt that I was free
From searching gaze, it was to me
Like ending of a dreary task,
Or putting off a cumbrous mask.
I wandered forth upon the shore,
Wishing this lie of life was o’er;
What was beyond I could not guess,
I thought it might be quietness,
And now I had no dream of bliss,
No thought, no other hope but this--
To be at rest--for all that fed
The dream of my proud youth had fled,
My dream of youth, that I would be
Happy and glorious, wise and free,
In mine own right, and keep my state,
And would repel the heavy weight,
The load that crushed unto the ground
The servile multitude around;
The purpose of my life had failed,
The heavenly heights I would have scaled,
Seemed more than ever out of sight,
Further beyond my feeble flight.
The beauty of the universe
Was lying on me like a curse;
Only the lone surge at my feet
Uttered a soothing murmur sweet,
As every broken weary wave
Sunk gently to a quiet grave,
Dying on the bosom of the sea--
And death grew beautiful to me,
Until it seemed a mother mild,
And I like some too happy child;
A happy child, that tired with play,
Through a long summer holiday,
Runs to his mother’s arms to weep
His little weariness asleep.
Rest--rest--all passion that once stirred
My heart, had ended in one word--
My one desire to be at rest,
To lay my head on any breast,
Where there was hope that I might keep
A dreamless and unbroken sleep;
And the lulled ocean seemed to say,
“With me is quiet,--come away.”
There is a tale that oft has stirred
My bosom deeply: you have heard
How that the treacherous sea-maid’s art
With song inveigles the lost heart
Of some lone fisher, that has stood
For days beside the glimmering flood;
And when has grown upon him there
The mystery of earth and air,
He cannot find with whom to part
The burden lying at his heart;
So when the mermaid bids him come,
And summons to her peaceful home,
He hears--he leaps into the wave,
To find a home, and not a grave.
Anon I said I would not die;
I loathed to live--I feared to die--
So I went forward, till I stood
Amid a marble solitude,
A ruined town of ancient day.
I rested where some steps away
From other work of human hand
Two solitary pillars stand,
Two pillars on a wild hill side,
Like sea-marks of a shrunken tide:
Their shafts were by the sea-breeze worn,
Beneath them waved the verdant corn;
But a few paces from the crown
Of that green summit, farther down,
A fallen pillar on the plain,
Slow sinking in the earth again,
Bedding itself in dark black mould,
Lay moveless, where it first had rolled.
It once had been a pillar high,
And pointing to the starry sky;
But now lay prostrate, its own weight
Now serving but to fix its state,
To sink it in its earthy bed;
I gazed, and to myself I said,
“This pillar lying on the plain
The hand of man might raise again,
And set it as in former days;
But the fall’n spirit who shall raise,
What power on earth? what power in heaven?”
How quickly was an answer given
Unto this voice of my despair!
But now I sat in silence there,
I thought upon the vanished time,
And my irrevocable prime,
My baffled purpose, wasted years,
My sin, my misery--and my tears
Fell thick and fast upon the sands;
I hid my face within my hands,
For tears are strange that find their way
Under the open eye of day,
Under the broad and glorious sun,
Full in the heavens, as mine have done,
And as upon that day they did,
Unnoticed, unrestrained, unchid.
How long I might have felt them flow
Without a check, I do not know,
But presently, while yet I kept
That attitude of woe, and wept,
A mild voice sounded in mine ears--
“You cannot wash your heart with tears!”
I quickly turned--and, vexed to be
Seen in my spirit’s agony,
In anger had almost replied--
An aged man was at my side;
I think that since my life began,
I never saw an older man,
Than he who stood beside me then,
And with mild accents said again:
“You cannot cleanse your heart with tears,
Though you should weep as many years
As our great Father, when he sat
Uncomforted on Ararat--
This would not help you, and the tear
Which does not heal, will scald and sear.
What is your sorrow?”
Until now
I never had unveiled my woe--
Not that I shunned sweet sympathies,
Man’s words, or woman’s pitying eyes;
But that I felt they were in vain,
And could not help me--for the pain,
The wound which I was doomed to feel,
Man gave not, and he could not heal.
But in this old man’s speech and tone
Was something that allured me on:
I told him all--I did not hide
My sin, my sorrow, or my pride:
I told him how, when I began
First to verge upward to a man,
These thoughts were mine--to dwell alone,
My spirit on its lordly throne,
Hating the vain stir, fierce and loud,
The din of the tumultuous crowd;
And how I thought to arm my soul,
And stablish it in self-controul;
And said I would obey the right,
And would be strong in wisdom’s might,
And bow unto mine own heart’s law,
And keep my heart from speck or flaw,
That in its mirror I might find
A reflex of the Eternal mind,
A glass to give me back the truth--
And how before me from my youth
A phantom ever on the wing,
Appearing now, now vanishing,
Had flitted, looking out from shrine,
From painting, or from work divine
Of poet’s, or of sculptor’s art;
And how I feared it might depart,
That beauty which alone could shed
Light on my life--and then I said,
I would beneath its shadow dwell,
And would all lovely things compel,
All that was beautiful or fair
In art or nature, earth or air,
To be as ministers to me,
To keep me pure, to keep me free
From worldly service, from the chain
Of custom, and from earthly stain;
And how they kept me for a while,
And did my foolish heart beguile;
Yet all at last did faithless prove,
And, late or soon, betrayed my love;
How they had failed me one by one,
Till now, when youth was scarcely done,
My heart, which I had thought to steep
In hues of beauty, and to keep
Its consecrated home and fane,
That heart was soiled with many a stain,
Which from without and from within
Had gathered there, till all was sin,
Till now I only drew my breath,
I lived but in the hope of death.
While my last words were giving place
To my heart’s anguish, o’er his face
A shadow of displeasure past,
But vanished then again as fast
As the breeze-shadow from the brook;
And with mild words and pitying look
He gently said--
“Ah me, my son,
A weary course your life has run;
And yet it need not be in vain,
That you have suffered all this pain;
And, if mine years might make me bold
To speak, methinks I could unfold
Why in such efforts you could meet
But only misery and defeat.
Yet deem not of us as at strife,
Because you set before your life
A purpose and a loftier aim,
Than the blind lives of men may claim
For the most part--or that you sought,
By fixed resolve and solemn thought,
To lift your being’s calm estate
Out of the range of time and fate.
Glad am I that a thing unseen,
A spiritual Presence, this has been
Your worship, this your young heart stirred--
But yet herein you proudly erred,
Here may the source of woe be found,
You thought to fling, yourself around,
The atmosphere of light and love
In which it was your joy to move--
You thought by efforts of your own
To take at last each jarring tone
Out of your life, till all should meet
In one majestic music sweet--
Deeming that in our own heart’s ground
The root of good was to be found,
And that by careful watering
And earnest tendance we might bring
The bud, the blossom, and the fruit
To grow and flourish from that root--
You deemed we needed nothing more
Than skill and courage to explore
Deep down enough in our own heart,
To where the well-head lay apart,
Which must the springs of being feed,
And that these fountains did but need
The soil that choked them moved away,
To bubble in the open day.
But, thanks to heaven, it is not so,
That root a richer soil doth know
Than our poor hearts could e’er supply,
That stream is from a source more high,
From God it came, to God returns,
Not nourished from our scanty urns,
But fed from his unfailing river,
Which runs and will run on for ever.”
When now he came to heavenly things
And spake of them, his spirit had wings,
His words seemed not his own, but given--
I could have deemed one spake from heaven
Of hope and joy, of life and death,
And immortality through faith,
Of that great change commenced within,
The blood that cleanses from all sin,
That can wash out the inward stain,
And consecrate the heart again,
The voice that clearer and more clear
Doth speak unto the purgèd ear,
The gracious influences given
In a continued stream from heaven,
The balm that can the soul’s hurt heal,
The Spirit’s witness and its seal.
I listened, for unto mine ear
The Word, which I had longed to hear,
Was come at last, the lifeful word
Which I had often almost heard
In some deep silence of my breast--
For with a sense of dim unrest
That word unborn had often wrought,
And struggled in the womb of thought,
As from beneath the smothering earth
The seed strives upward to a birth:
And lo! it now was born indeed--
Here was the answer to my need.
But now we parted, never more
To meet upon that lone sea-shore.
We have not met on earth again,
And scarcely shall--there doth remain
A time, a place where we shall meet,
And have the stars beneath our feet.
Since then I many times have sought
Who this might be, and sometimes thought
It must have been an angel sent
To be a special instrument
And minister of grace to me,
Or deemed again it might be He,
Of whom some say he shall not die,
Till he have seen with mortal eye
The glory of his Lord again:
But this is a weak thought and vain.
We parted, each upon our way--
I homeward, where my glad course lay
Beside those ruins where I sate
On the same morning--desolate,--
With scarcely strength enough to grieve:
And now it was a marvellous eve,
The waters at my feet were bright,
And breaking into isles of light:
The misty sunset did enfold
A thousand floating motes of gold;
The red light seemed to penetrate
Through the worn stone, and re-create
The old, to glorify anew;
And steeping all things through and through
A rich dissolving splendour poured
Through rent and fissure, and restored
The fall’n, the falling and decayed,
Filling the rifts which time had made,
Till the rent masses seemed to meet,
The pillar stand upon its feet,
And tower and cornice, roof and stair
Hung self-upheld in the magic air.
Transfigured thus those temples stood
Upon the margin of the flood,
All glorious as they rose of yore,
There standing, as not ever more
They could be harmed by touch of time,
But still, as in that perfect prime,
Must flourish unremoved and free,
Or as they then appeared to me,
A newer and more glorious birth,
A city of that other earth,
That Earth which is to be.
SONNET.
What good soever in thy heart or mind
Doth yet no higher source nor fountain own
Than thine own self, nor bow to other throne--
Suspect and fear--although therein thou find
High purpose to go forth and bless thy kind,
Or in the awful temple of thy soul
To worship what is loveliest, and controul
The ill within, and by strong laws to bind.
Good is of God--and none is therefore sure
That has dared wander from its source away:
Laws without sanction will not long endure,
Love will grow faint and fainter day by day,
And Beauty from the straight path will allure,
And weakening first, will afterwards betray.
TO ----
What maiden gathers flowers, who does not love[2]?
And some have said, that none in summer bowers,
Save lovers, wreathe them garlands of fresh flowers:
O lady, of a purpose dost thou move
Through garden walks, as willing to disprove
This gentle faith; who, with uncareful hand,
Hast culled a thousand thus at my command,
Wherewith thou hast this dewy garland wove.
There is no meaning in a thousand flowers--
_One_ lily from its green stalk wouldst thou part,
Or pluck, and to my bosom I will fold,
One rose, selected from these wealthy bowers,
Upgathering closely to its virgin heart
An undivulgèd hoard of central gold.
TO THE SAME.
Look, dearest, what a glory from the sun
Has fringed that cloud with silver edges bright,
And how it seems to drink the golden light
Of evening--you would think that it had won
A splendour of its own: but lo! anon
You shall behold a dark mass float away,
Emptied of light and radiance, from the day,
Its glory faded utterly and gone.
And doubt not we should suffer the same loss
As this weak vapour, which awhile did seem
Translucent and made pure of all its dross,
If, having shared the light, we should misdeem
That light our own, or count we hold in fee
That which we must receive continually.
TO THE SAME.
We live not in our moments or our years--
The Present we fling from us like the rind
Of some sweet Future, which we after find
Bitter to taste, or bind _that_ in with fears,
And water it beforehand with our tears--
Vain tears for that which never may arrive:
Meanwhile the joy whereby we ought to live
Neglected or unheeded disappears.
Wiser it were to welcome and make ours
Whate’er of good, though small, the present brings--
Kind greetings, sunshine, song of birds and flowers,
With a child’s pure delight in little things;
And of the griefs unborn to rest secure,
Knowing that mercy ever will endure.
TO THE SAME.
If sorrow came not near us, and the lore
Which wisdom-working sorrow best imparts,
Found never time of entrance to our hearts,
If we had won already a safe shore,
Or if our changes were already o’er,
Our pilgrim being we might quite forget,
Our hearts but faintly on those mansions set,
Where there shall be no sorrow any more.
Therefore we will not be unwise to ask
This, nor secure exemption from our share
Of mortal suffering, and life’s drearier task--
Not this, but grace our portion so to bear,
That we may rest, when grief and pain are over,
“With the meek Son of our Almighty Lover.”
TO THE SAME.
O dowered with a searching glance to see
Quite through the hollow masks, wherewith the bare
And worthless shows of greatness vizored are,
This lore thou hast, because all things to thee
Are proven by the absolute decree
Of duty, and whatever will not square
With that “prime wisdom,” though of seeming fair
Or stately, thou rejectest faithfully.
Till chidden in thy strength, each random aim
Of good, whose aspect heavenward does not turn,
Shrinks self-rebuked--thou looking kindliest blame
From the calm region of thine eyes, that burn
With tempered but continuous flashes bright,
Like the mild lightnings of a tropic night.
A LEGEND OF ALHAMBRA.
The tradition on which the following Ballad is founded
is an existing one, and exactly as it is here recounted
was narrated to the author during his stay at Granada.
O hymned in many a poet’s strain,
Alhambra, by enchanter’s hand
Exalted on this throne of Spain,
A marvel of the land,
The last of thy imperial race,
Alhambra, when he overstept
Thy portal’s threshold, turned his face--
He turned his face and wept.
In sooth it was a thing to weep,
If then, as now, the level plain
Beneath was spreading like the deep,
The broad unruffled main:
If, like a watch-tower of the sun,
Above the Alpujarras rose,
Streaked, when the dying day was done,
With evening’s roseate snows.
Thy founts yet make a pleasant sound,
And the twelve lions, couchant yet,
Sustain their ponderous burthen, round
The marble basin set.
But never, when the moon is bright
O’er hill and golden-sanded stream,
And thy square turrets in the light
And taper columns gleam,
Will village maiden dare to fill
Her pitcher from that basin wide,
But rather seeks a niggard rill
Far down the steep hill-side!
It was an Andalusian maid,
With rose and pink-enwoven hair,
Who told me what the fear that stayed
Their footsteps from that stair:
How, rising from that watery floor,
A Moorish maiden, in the gleam
Of the wan moonlight, stands before
The stirrer of the stream:
And mournfully she begs the grace,
That they would speak the words divine,
And sprinkling water in her face,
Would make the sacred sign.
And whosoe’er will grant this boon,
Returning with the morrow’s light,
Shall find the fountain pavement strewn
With gold and jewels bright:
A regal gift--for once, they say,
Her father ruled this broad domain,
The last who kept beneath his sway
This pleasant place of Spain.
It surely is a fearful doom,
That one so beautiful should have
No present quiet in her tomb,
No hope beyond the grave.
It must be, that some amulet
Doth make all human pity vain,
Or that upon her brow is set
The silent seal of pain,
Which none can meet--else long ago,
Since many gentle hearts are there,
Some spirit, touched by joy or woe,
Had answered to her prayer.
But so it is, that till this hour
That mournful child beneath the moon
Still rises from her watery bower,
To urge this simple boon--
To beg, as all have need of grace,
That they would speak the words divine,
And, sprinkling water in her face,
Would make the sacred sign.
ENGLAND.
Peace, Freedom, Happiness, have loved to wait
On the fair islands, fenced by circling seas,
And ever of such favoured spots as these
Have the wise dreamers dreamed, that would create
That perfect model of a happy state,
Which the world never saw. Oceana,
Utopia such, and Plato’s isle that lay
Westward of Gades and the Great Sea’s gate.
Dreams are they all, which yet have helped to make
That underneath fair polities we dwell,
Though marred in part by envy, faction, hate--
Dreams which are dear, dear England, for thy sake,
Who art indeed that sea-girt citadel,
And nearest image of that perfect state.
THE ISLAND OF MADEIRA.
Though never axe until a later day
Assailed thy forests’ huge antiquity,
Yet elder Fame had many tales of thee--
Whether Phœnician shipman far astray
Had brought uncertain notices away
Of islands dreaming in the middle sea;
Or that man’s heart, which struggles to be free
From the old worn-out world, had never stay
Till, for a place to rest on, it had found
A region out of ken, that happier isle,
Which the mild ocean breezes blow around,
Where they who thrice upon this mortal stage
Had kept their hands from wrong, their hearts from guile,
Should come at length, and live a tearless age.
GIBRALTAR.
England, we love thee better than we know--
And this I learned, when after wanderings long
’Mid people of another stock and tongue,
I heard again thy martial music blow,
And saw thy gallant children to and fro
Pace, keeping ward at one of those huge gates,
Which like twin giants watch the Herculean straits:
When first I came in sight of that brave show,
It made my very heart within me dance,
To think that thou thy proud foot shouldst advance
Forward so far into the mighty sea;
Joy was it and exultation to behold
Thine ancient standard’s rich emblazonry,
A glorious picture by the wind unrolled.
ENGLAND.
We look for, and have promise to behold
A better country, such as earth has none--
Yet, England, am I still thy duteous son,
And never will this heart be dead or cold
At the relation of thy glories old,
Or of what newer triumphs thou hast won,
Where thou as with a mighty arm hast done
The work of God, quelling the tyrants bold.
Elect of nations, for the whole world’s good
Thou wert exalted to a doom so high--
To outbrave Rome’s “triple tyrant,” to confound
Every oppressor, that with impious flood
Would drown the landmarks of humanity,
The limits God hath set to nations and their bound[3].
POLAND, 1831.
The nations may not be trod out, and quite
Obliterated from the world’s great page--
The nations, that have filled from age to age
Their place in story. They who in despite
Of this, a people’s first and holiest right,
In lust of unchecked power or brutal rage,
Against a people’s life such warfare wage,
With man no more, but with the Eternal fight.
They who break down the barriers He hath set,
Break down what would another time defend
And shelter their own selves: they who forget
(For the indulgence of the present will)
The lasting ordinances, in the end
Will rue their work, when ill shall sanction ill.
TO NICHOLAS, EMPEROR OF RUSSIA.
ON HIS REPORTED CONDUCT TOWARDS THE POLES.
What would it help to call thee what thou art?
When all is spoken, thou remainest still
With the same power and the same evil will
To crush a nation’s life out, to dispart
All holiest ties, to turn awry and thwart
All courses that kind nature keeps, to spill
The blood of noblest veins, to maim, or kill
With torture of slow pain the aching heart.
When our weak hands hang useless, and we feel
Deeds cannot be, who then would ease his breast
With the impotence of words? But our appeal
Is unto Him, who counts a nation’s tears,
With whom are the oppressor and opprest,
And vengeance, and the recompensing years.
ON THE RESULTS OF THE LAST FRENCH REVOLUTION.
How long shall weary nations toil in blood,
How often roll the still returning stone
Up the sharp painful height, ere they will own
That on the base of individual good,
Of virtue, manners, and pure homes endued
With household graces--that on this alone
Shall social freedom stand--where these are gone,
There is a nation doomed to servitude?
O suffering, toiling France, thy toil is vain!
The irreversible decree stands sure,
Where men are selfish, covetous of gain,
Heady and fierce, unholy and impure,
Their toil is lost, and fruitless all their pain;
They cannot build a work which shall endure.
TO ENGLAND.
A SEQUEL TO THE FOREGOING.
Thy duteous loving children fear for thee
In one thing chiefly--for thy pure abodes
And thy undesecrated household Gods,
Thou most religious, and for this most free,
Of all the nations. Oh! look out and see
The injuries which she, who in the name
Of liberty thy fellowship would claim,
Has done to virtue and to liberty;
Whose philtres have corrupted everywhere
The living springs men drink of, all save thine.
Oh! then of her and of her love beware!
Better again eight hundred years of strife,
Than give her leave to sap and undermine
The deep foundations of thy moral life.
SONNET.
You say we love not freedom, honoured friend;
Yea, doubtless, we can lend to scheme like yours
Small love. Yet not for this--that it assures
Too much to man--this would not me offend:
But for I know that all such schemes will end
With leaving him too little,--will deprive
Of that free energy by which we live:
For of such plots the final act attend--
See them who loathed the very name of king,
Emulous in slavery, bow their souls before
The new-coined title of some meaner thing
Than ever crown of king or emperor wore;
For such in God’s and Nature’s righteousness,
The weakness which avenges all excess.
SONNET TO SILVIO PELLICO,
ON READING THE ACCOUNT OF HIS IMPRISONMENT.
Ah! who may guess, who yet was never tried
How fearful the temptation to reply
With wrong for wrong, yea fiercely to defy
In spirit, even when action is denied?
Therefore praise waits on thee, not drawn aside
By this strong lure of hell--on thee whose eye
Being formed by love, could every where descry
Love, or some workings unto love allied--
And benediction on the grace that dealt
So with thy soul--and prayer, more earnest prayer,
Intenser longing than before we felt
For all that in dark places lying are,
For captives in strange lands, for them who pine
In depth of dungeon, or in sunless mine[4].
TO THE SAME.
Songs of deliverance compassed thee about,
Long ere thy prison doors were backward flung:
When first thy heart to gentle thoughts was strung,
A song arose in heaven, an angel shout
For one delivered from the hideous rout,
That with defiance and fierce mutual hate
Do each the other’s griefs exasperate.
Thou, loving, from thy grief hadst taken out
Its worst--for who is captive or a slave
But He, who from that dungeon and foul grave,
His own dark soul, refuses to come forth
Into the light and liberty above?
Or whom may we call wretched on this earth
Save only him who has left off to love?
FROM THE SPANISH.
Who ever such adventure yet,
Or a like delight has known,
To that which Count Arnaldo met
On the morning of St. John?
He had gone forth beside the sea,
With his falcon on his hand,
And saw a pinnace fast and free,
That was making to the land.
And he that by the rudder stood
As he went was singing still,
“My galley, oh my galley good,
Heaven protect thee from all ill;
“From all the dangers and the woe
That on ocean’s waters wait,
Almeria’s reefs and shallows low,
And Gibraltar’s stormy strait.
“From Venice and its shallow way,
From the shoals of Flanders’ coast,
And from the gulf of broad Biscay,
Where the dangers are the most.”
Then Count Arnaldo spoke aloud,
You might hear his accents well--
“Those words, thou mariner, I would
Unto me that thou wouldst tell.”
To him that mariner replied
In a courteous tone, but free--
“I never sing that song,” he cried,
“Save to one who sails with me.”
LINES.
Not thou from us, O Lord, but we
Withdraw ourselves from thee.
When we are dark and dead,
And Thou art covered with a cloud,
Hanging before Thee, like a shroud,
So that our prayer can find no way,
Oh! teach us that we do not say,
“Where is _thy_ brightness fled?”
But that we search and try
What in ourselves has wrought this blame;
For thou remainest still the same;
But earth’s own vapours earth may fill
With darkness and thick clouds, while still
The sun is in the sky.
TO A FRIEND ENTERING THE MINISTRY.
I.
High thoughts at first, and visions high
Are ours of easy victory;
The word we bear seems so divine,
So framed for Adam’s guilty line,
That none, unto ourselves we say,
Of all his sinning suffering race,
Will hear that word, so full of grace,
And coldly turn away.
II.
But soon a sadder mood comes round--
High hopes have fallen to the ground,
And the ambassadors of peace
Go weeping, that men will not cease
To strive with heaven--they weep and mourn,
That suffering men will not be blest,
That weary men refuse to rest,
And wanderers to return.
III.
Well is it, if has not ensued
Another and a worser mood,
When all unfaithful thoughts have way,
When we hang down our hands, and say,
Alas! it is a weary pain,
To seek with toil and fruitless strife
To chafe the numbed limbs into life,
That will not live again.
IV.
Then if Spring odours on the wind
Float by, they bring into our mind
That it were wiser done, to give
Our hearts to Nature, and to live
For her--or in the student’s bower
To search into her hidden things,
And seek in books the wondrous springs
Of knowledge and of power.
V.
Or if we dare not thus draw back,
Yet oh! to shun the crowded track
And the rude throng of men! to dwell
In hermitage or lonely cell,
Feeding all longings that aspire
Like incense heavenward, and with care
And lonely vigil nursing there
Faith’s solitary pyre.
VI.
Oh! let not us this thought allow--
The heat, the dust upon our brow,
Signs of the contest, we may wear:
Yet thus we shall appear more fair
In our Almighty Master’s eye,
Than if in fear to lose the bloom,
Or ruffle the soul’s lightest plume,
We from the strife should fly.
VII.
And for the rest, in weariness,
In disappointment, or distress,
When strength decays, or hope grows dim,
We ever may recur to Him,
Who has the golden oil divine,
Wherewith to feed our failing urns,
Who watches every lamp that burns
Before his sacred shrine.
TO A CHILD, PLAYING.
Dear boy, thy momentary laughter rings
Sincerely out, and that spontaneous glee,
Seeming to need no hint from outward things,
Breaks forth in sudden shoutings, loud and free.
From what hid fountains doth thy joyance flow,
That borrows nothing from the world around?
Its springs must deeper lie than we can know,
A well whose springs lie safely underground.
So be it ever--and thou happy boy,
When Time, that takes these wild delights away,
Gives thee a measure of sedater joy,
Which, unlike this, shall ever with thee stay;--
Then may that joy, like this, to outward things
Owe nothing--but lie safe beneath the sod,
A hidden fountain fed from unseen springs,
From the glad-making river of our God.
THE HERRING-FISHERS OF LOCHFYNE.
Deem not these fishers idle, though by day
You hear the snatches of their lazy song,
And see them listlessly the sunlight long
Strew the curved beach of this indented bay:
So deemed I, till I viewed their trim array
Of boats last night,--a busy armament,
With sails as dark as ever Theseus bent
Upon his fatal rigging, take their way.
Rising betimes, I could not choose but look
For their return, and when along the lake
The morning mists were curling, saw them make
Homeward, returning toward their quiet nook,
With draggled nets down hanging to the tide,
Weary, and leaning o’er their vessels’ side.
IN THE ISLE OF MULL.
The clouds are gathering in their western dome,
Deep-drenched with sunlight, as a fleece with dew,
While I with baffled effort still pursue
And track these waters toward their mountain home,
In vain--though cataract, and mimic foam,
And island-spots, round which the streamlet threw
Its sister arms, which joyed to meet anew,
Have lured me on, and won me still to roam;
Till now, coy nymph, unseen thy waters pass,
Or faintly struggle through the twinkling grass--
And I, thy founts unvisited, return.
Is it that thou art revelling with thy peers?
Or dost thou feed a solitary urn,
Else unreplenished, with thine own sad tears?
THE SAME.
Sweet Water-nymph, more shy than Arethuse,
Why wilt thou hide from me thy green retreat,
Where duly Thou with silver-sandalled feet,
And every Naiad, her green locks profuse,
Welcome with dance sad evening, or unloose,
To share your revel, an oak-cinctured throng,
Oread and Dryad, who the daylight long
By rock, or cave, or antique forest, use
To shun the Wood-god and his rabble bold?
Such comes not now, or who with impious strife
Would seek to untenant meadow stream and plain
Of that indwelling power, which is the life
And which sustaineth each, which poets old
As god and goddess thus have loved to feign.
AT SEA.
The sea is like a mirror far and near,
And ours a prosperous voyage, safe from harms;
And yet the sense that everlasting arms
Are round us and about us, is as dear
Now when no sight of danger doth appear,
As though our vessel did its blind way urge
’Mid the long weltering of the dreariest surge,
Through which a perishing bark did ever steer.
Lord of the calm and tempest, be it ours,
Poor mariners! to pay due vows to thee,
Though not a cloud on all the horizon lowers
Of all our life--for even so shall we
Have greater boldness towards thee, when indeed
The storm is up, and there is earnest need.
AN EVENING IN FRANCE.
One star is shining in the crimson eve,
And the thin texture of the faint blue sky
Above is like a veil intensely drawn;
Upon the spirit with a solemn weight
The marvel and the mystery of eve
Is lying, as all holy thoughts and calm,
By the vain stir and tumult of the day
Chased far away, come back on tranquil wing,
Like doves returning to their noted haunts.
It is the solemn even-tide--the hour
Of holy musings, and to us no less
Of sweet refreshment for the bodily frame
Than for the spirit, harassed both and worn
With a long day of travel; and methinks
It must have been an evening such as this,
After a day of toilsome journeyings o’er,
When looking out on Tiber, as we now
Look out on this fair river flowing by,
Together sat the saintly Monica[5],
And with her, given unto her prayers, that son,
The turbid stream of whose tumultuous youth
Now first was running clear and bright and smooth,
And solitary sitting in the niche
Of a deep window held delightful talk--
Such as they never could have known before,
While a deep chasm, deeper than natural love
Could e’er bridge over, lay betwixt their souls--
Of what must be the glorious life in heaven.
And looking forth on meadow, stream, and sky,
And on the golden west, that richest glow
Of sunset to the uncreated light,
Which must invest for ever those bright worlds,
Seemed darkness, and the best that earth can give,
Its noblest pleasures, they with one consent
Counted as vile, nor once to be compared--
Oh! rather say not worthy to be named
With what is to be looked for there; and thus
Leaving behind them all things which are seen,
By many a stately stair they did ascend
Above the earth and all created things,
The sun and starry heavens--yea, and above
The mind of man, until they did attain
Where light no shadow has, and life no death,
Where past or future are not, nor can be,
But an eternal present, and the Lamb
His people feeds from indeficient streams.
Then pausing for a moment, as to taste
That river of delights, at length they cried,
Oh! to be thus for ever, and to hear
Thus in the silence of the lower world,
And in the silence of all thoughts that keep
Vain stir within, unutterable words,
And with the splendour of His majesty,
Whose seat is in the middle of the throne,
Thus to be fed for ever--this must be
The beatific vision, the third heaven.
What we have for these passing moments known,
To know the same for ever--this would be
That life whereof even now we held debate.
When will it be? oh when?
These things they said,
And for a season breathed immortal air,
But then perforce returned to earth again:
For the air on those first summits is too fine
For our long breathing, while we yet have on
Our gross investiture of mortal weeds.
Yet not for nothing had their spirits flown
To those high regions, bringing back at once
A reconcilement with the mean things here,
And a more earnest longing for what there
Of nobler was by partial glimpses thus
Seen through the crannies of the prison house.
And she, that mother--such entire content
Possessed her bosom, and her Lord had filled
The orb of her desires so round and full,
Had answered all her prayers for her lost son
With such an overmeasure of his grace,
She had no more to ask, and did not know
Why she should tarry any longer here,
Nor what she did on earth. Thus then she felt,
And to these thoughts which overflowed her heart
Gave thankful utterance meet; nor many days
After this vision and foretaste of joy,
Inherited the substance of the things
Which she had seen, and entered into peace.
SONNET.
TO MY CHILD--A FELLOW-TRAVELLER.
How of a sudden Sleep has laid on thee
His heavy hand--on thee, for ever blest,
Sleeping or waking, stirring or at rest:
But now thou wert exulting merrily,
And in the very middle of thy glee
Thy head thou layedst on thy father’s breast,
There seeming to have found a peacefuller nest
Than one would think might in this loud world be.
There were no need to fear thy worser mood,
Striving in years to come against the good
He would impart, if thou couldst keep in mind
How many times, the while with anxious care
He sought to screen thee from the chilling air,
Upon his bosom thou hast slept reclined.
THE DESCENT OF THE RHONE.
Often when my thought has been
Pondering on what solemn scene,
Which of all the glorious shows
Nature can at will disclose,
Once beholden by the eye,
Ever after would supply
Most unto the musing heart
Of memories which should not depart--
It has seemed no ampler dower
Of her beauty or her power
We could win, than night and day,
An illimitable way,
To sail down some mighty river,
Sailing as we would sail for ever.
Lo! my wish is almost won,
Broadly flows the stately Rhone,
And we loosen from the shore
Our light pinnace, long before
The young East in gorgeous state
Has unlocked his ruby gate,
And our voyage is not done
At the sinking of the sun;
But for us the azure Night
Feeds her golden flocks with light:
Ours are all the hues of heaven,
Sights and sounds of morn and even;
In our view the day is born;
First the stars of lustre shorn,
Until Hesper, he who last
Kept his splendour, now fades fast;
A faint bloom over heaven is spread,
And the clouds blush deeper red,
Till from them the stream below
Catches the same roseate glow;
The pale east lightens into gold,
And the west is with the fold
Of the mantle of dim night
Scarcely darkened or less bright--
Till, his way prepared, at length
Rising up in golden strength,
Tramples the victorious sun
The dying stars out, one by one.
Fairer scene the opening eye
Of the day can scarce descry--
Fairer sight he looks not on
Than the pleasant banks of Rhone;
Where in terraces and ranks,
On those undulating banks,
Rise by many a hilly stair
Sloping tiers of vines, where’er
From the steep and stony soil
Has been won by careful toil,
And with long laborious pains
Fenced against the washing rains,
Fenced and anxiously walled round,
A little patch of garden ground.
Higher still some place of power,
Or a solitary tower,
Ruined now, is looking down
On some quiet little town
In a sheltered glen beneath,
Where the smoke’s unbroken wreath,
Mounting in the windless air,
Rests, dissolving slowly there,
O’er the housetops like a cloud,
Or a thinnest vapourous shroud.
Morn has been, and lo! how soon
Has arrived the middle noon,
And the broad sun’s rays do rest
On some naked mountain’s breast,
Where alone relieve the eye
Massive shadows, as they lie
In the hollows motionless;
Still our boat doth onward press.
Now a peaceful current wide
Bears it on an ample tide,
Now the hills retire, and then
Their broad fronts advance again,
Till the rocks have closed us round,
And would seem our course to bound,
But anon a way appears,
And our vessel onward steers,
Darting swiftly as between
Narrow walls of a ravine.
Morn has been and noon--and now
Evening falls about our prow:
But the sunken sunset still
Burns behind the western hill;
Lo! the starry troop again
Gather on the ethereal plain;
Even now and there were none,
And a moment since but one;
And anon we lift our head,
And all heaven is overspread
With a still assembling crowd,
With a silent multitude--
Venus, first and brightest set
In the night’s pale coronet,
Armed Orion’s belted pride,
And the Seven that by the side
Of the Titan nightly weave
Dances in the mystic eve,
Sisters linked in love and light;
’Twere in truth a solemn sight,
Were we sailing now as they,
Who upon their western way
To the isles of spice and gold,
Nightly watching, might behold
These our constellations dip,
And the great sign of the Ship
Rise upon the other hand,
With the Cross that seems to stand
In the vault of heaven upright,
Marking the middle hour of night--
Or with them whose keels first prest
The mighty rivers of the west,
Who the first with bold intent
Down the Orellana went,[6]
Or a dangerous progress won
On the mighty Amazon,
By whose ocean-streams they tell
How yet the warrior-maidens dwell.
But the Fancy may not roam;
Thou wilt keep it nearer home,
Friend, of earthly friends the best,
Who on this fair river’s breast
Sailest with me fleet and fast,
As the unremitting blast
With a steady breath and strong
Urges our light boat along.
We this day have found delight
In each pleasant sound and sight
Of this river bright and fair,
And in things which flowing are
Like a stream, yet without blame
These my passing song may claim,
Or thy hearing may beguile,
If we not forget the while,
That we are from childhood’s morn
On a mightier river borne,
Which is rolling evermore
To a sea without a shore,
Life the river, and the sea
That we seek--eternity.
We may sometimes sport and play,
And in thought keep holiday,
So we ever own a law,
Living in habitual awe,
And beneath the constant stress
Of a solemn thoughtfulness,
Weighing whither this life tends,
For what high and holy ends
It was lent us, whence it flows,
And its current whither goes.
There is ample matter here
For as much of thought and fear,
As will solemnize our souls--
Thought of how this river rolls
Over millions wrecked before
They could reach that happy shore,
Where we have not anchored yet;
Of the dangers which beset
Our own way, of hidden shoal,
Waters smoothest where they roll
Over point of sunken rock,
Treacherous calm, and sudden shock
Of the storm, which can assail
No boat than ours more weak or frail--
Matter not alone of sadness,
But no less of thankful gladness,
That, whichever way we turn,
There are steady lights that burn
On the shore, and lamps of love
In the gloomiest sky above,
Which will guide our bark aright
Through the darkness of our night--
Many a fixed unblinking star
Unto them that wandering are
Through this blindly-weltering sea.
Themes of high and thoughtful glee,
When we think we are not left,
Of all solaces bereft,
Each to hold, companionless,
Through a watery wilderness,
Unaccompanied our way,
As we can--this I may say,
Whatsoever else betide,
With thee sitting at my side,
And this happy cherub sweet,
Playing, laughing at my feet.
ON THE PERSEUS AND MEDUSA OF BENVENUTO CELLINI.
In what fierce spasms upgathered, on the plain
Medusa’s headless corpse has quivering sunk,
While all the limbs of that undying trunk
To their extremest joint with torture strain;
But the calm visage has resumed again
Its beauty,--the orbed eyelids are let down,
As though a living sleep might once more crown
Their placid circlets, guiltless of all pain.
And Thou--is thine the spirit’s swift recoil,
Which follows every deed of acted wrath,
That holding in thine hand this lovely spoil,
Thou dost not triumph, feeling that the breath
Of life is sacred, whether it inform,
Loathly or beauteous, man or beast or worm?
LINES.
WRITTEN AT THE VILLAGE OF PASSIGNANO, ON THE LAKE OF THRASYMENE.