O sinner, see your dangerous state,
And think of hell ere 'tis too late;
When worldly cares would drown each thought,
Pray call to mind that hell is hot.
Still to increase your godly fears,
Let this be sounding in your ears,
Still bear in mind that hell is hot,
Remember and forget it not.
There was another poem about a congregation of the dead in the region of
the damned:
I found a reverend parson there,
A congregation too,
Bowed on their bended knees at prayer,
As they were wont to do.
But soon my heart was struck with pain,
I thought it truly odd,
The parson's prayer did not contain
A word concerning God.
You will remember the Danish book called "Letters from Hell," containing
exactly the same idea, and conclude that the Manx bard was poking fun at
some fashionable yet worldly-minded preacher. But no; he was too much a
child of Nature for that.
There is not much satire in the Manx character, and next to no cynicism
at all. The true Manxman is white-hot. I have heard of one, John Gale,
called the Manx Burns, who lampooned the upstarts about him, and also of
one, Tom the Dipper, an itinerant Manx bard, who sang at fairs; but in a
general way the Manx bard has been a deadly earnest person, most at home
in churchyards. There was one such, akin in character to my old friend
Billy of Maughold, but of more universal popularity, a quite privileged
pet of everybody, a sort of sacred being, though as crazy as man may be,
called Chalse-a-Killey. Chaise was scarcely a bard, but a singer of
the songs of bards. He was a religious monomaniac, who lived before his
time, poor fellow; his madness would not be seen in him now. The idol
of his crazed heart was Bishop Wilson. He called him _dear_ and _sweet_,
vowed he longed to die, just that he might meet him in heaven; then
Wilson would take him by the hand, and he would tell him all his mind,
and together they would set up a printing press, with the types of
diamonds, and print hymns, and send them back to the Isle of Man. Poor,
'wildered brain, haunted by "half-born thoughts," not all delusions, but
quaint and grotesque. Full of valiant fury, Chaise was always ready to
fight for his distorted phantom of the right. When an uncle of my
own died, whose name I bear, Chaise shocked all the proprieties by
announcing his intention of walking in front of the funeral procession
through the streets and singing his terrible hymns. He would yield to
no persuasion, no appeals, and no threats. He had promised the dead man
that he would do this, and he would not break his oath to save his life.
It was agony to the mourners, but they had to submit. Chaise fulfilled
his vow, walked ten yards in front, sang his fierce music with the tears
streaming from his wild eyes down his quivering face. But the spectacle
let loose no unseemly mirth. Nobody laughed, and surely if the heaven
that Chaise feared was listening and looking down, his crazy voice was
not the last to pierce the dome of it. My friend the Rev. T. E. Brown
has written a touching and beautiful poem, "To Chaise in Heaven":
So you are gone, dear Chaise!
Ah well; it was enough--
The ways were cold, the ways were rough,
O Heaven! O home!
No more to roam,
Chaise, poor Chaise!
And now it's all so plain, dear Chaise!
So plain--
The 'wildered brain,
The joy, the pain
The phantom shapes that haunted,
The half-born thoughts that daunted:
All, all is plain,
Dear Chaise!
All is plain.
*****
Ah now, dear Chaise! of all the radiant host,
Who loves you most?
I think I know him, kneeling on his knees;
Is it Saint Francis of Assise?
Chaise, poor Chaise.