Dann zur Blumenflor der Sterne
Aufgeschauet liebewarm,
Fass’ ihn freundlich Arm in Arm
Trag’ ihn in die blaue Ferne.
--Uhland, “An den Tod.”
Then towards the Garden of the Star
Lift up thine aspect warm with love,
And, friendlike link’d through space afar,
Mount with him, arm in arm, above.
--Uhland, “Poem to Death.”
He stood upon the lofty balcony that overlooked the quiet city. Though
afar, the fiercest passions of men were at work on the web of strife and
doom, all that gave itself to his view was calm and still in the rays
of the summer moon, for his soul was wrapped from man and man’s narrow
sphere, and only the serener glories of creation were present to the
vision of the seer. There he stood, alone and thoughtful, to take the
last farewell of the wondrous life that he had known.
Coursing through the fields of space, he beheld the gossamer shapes,
whose choral joys his spirit had so often shared. There, group upon
group, they circled in the starry silence multiform in the unimaginable
beauty of a being fed by ambrosial dews and serenest light. In his
trance, all the universe stretched visible beyond; in the green valleys
afar, he saw the dances of the fairies; in the bowels of the mountains,
he beheld the race that breathe the lurid air of the volcanoes, and hide
from the light of heaven; on every leaf in the numberless forests, in
every drop of the unmeasured seas, he surveyed its separate and swarming
world; far up, in the farthest blue, he saw orb upon orb ripening into
shape, and planets starting from the central fire, to run their day
of ten thousand years. For everywhere in creation is the breath of the
Creator, and in every spot where the breath breathes is life! And alone,
in the distance, the lonely man beheld his Magian brother. There,
at work with his numbers and his Cabala, amidst the wrecks of Rome,
passionless and calm, sat in his cell the mystic Mejnour,--living on,
living ever while the world lasts, indifferent whether his knowledge
produces weal or woe; a mechanical agent of a more tender and a wiser
will, that guides every spring to its inscrutable designs. Living
on,--living ever,--as science that cares alone for knowledge, and halts
not to consider how knowledge advances happiness; how Human Improvement,
rushing through civilisation, crushes in its march all who cannot
grapple to its wheels (“You colonise the lands of the savage with the
Anglo-Saxon,--you civilise that portion of THE EARTH; but is the SAVAGE
civilised? He is exterminated! You accumulate machinery,--you increase
the total of wealth; but what becomes of the labour you displace? One
generation is sacrificed to the next. You diffuse knowledge,--and
the world seems to grow brighter; but Discontent at Poverty replaces
Ignorance, happy with its crust. Every improvement, every advancement in
civilisation, injures some, to benefit others, and either cherishes
the want of to-day, or prepares the revolution of to-morrow.”--Stephen
Montague.); ever, with its Cabala and its number, lives on to change, in
its bloodless movements, the face of the habitable world!
And, “Oh, farewell to life!” murmured the glorious dreamer. “Sweet, O
life! hast thou been to me. How fathomless thy joys,--how rapturously
has my soul bounded forth upon the upward paths! To him who forever
renews his youth in the clear fount of Nature, how exquisite is the mere
happiness TO BE! Farewell, ye lamps of heaven, and ye million tribes,
the Populace of Air. Not a mote in the beam, not an herb on the
mountain, not a pebble on the shore, not a seed far-blown into the
wilderness, but contributed to the lore that sought in all the true
principle of life, the Beautiful, the Joyous, the Immortal. To others,
a land, a city, a hearth, has been a home; MY home has been wherever the
intellect could pierce, or the spirit could breathe the air.”
He paused, and through the immeasurable space his eyes and his
heart, penetrating the dismal dungeon, rested on his child. He saw it
slumbering in the arms of the pale mother, and HIS soul spoke to the
sleeping soul. “Forgive me, if my desire was sin; I dreamed to have
reared and nurtured thee to the divinest destinies my visions could
foresee. Betimes, as the mortal part was strengthened against disease,
to have purified the spiritual from every sin; to have led thee, heaven
upon heaven, through the holy ecstasies which make up the existence
of the orders that dwell on high; to have formed, from thy sublime
affections, the pure and ever-living communication between thy mother
and myself. The dream was but a dream--it is no more! In sight myself of
the grave, I feel, at last, that through the portals of the grave lies
the true initiation into the holy and the wise. Beyond those portals I
await ye both, beloved pilgrims!”
From his numbers and his Cabala, in his cell, amidst the wrecks of Rome,
Mejnour, startled, looked up, and through the spirit, felt that the
spirit of his distant friend addressed him.
“Fare thee well forever upon this earth! Thy last companion forsakes thy
side. Thine age survives the youth of all; and the Final Day shall find
thee still the contemplator of our tombs. I go with my free will into
the land of darkness; but new suns and systems blaze around us from the
grave. I go where the souls of those for whom I resign the clay shall be
my co-mates through eternal youth. At last I recognise the true ordeal
and the real victory. Mejnour, cast down thy elixir; lay by thy load
of years! Wherever the soul can wander, the Eternal Soul of all things
protects it still!”