{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_56521/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_56521","id":"gutenberg_56521","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/56521","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Category: Poetry","Poetry"],"text":"Produced by Larry B. Harrison and the Online Distributed\nProofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was\nproduced from images generously made available by The\nInternet Archive)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n POEMS FROM EASTERN SOURCES:\n THE STEADFAST PRINCE;\n AND OTHER POEMS.\n\n BY\n RICHARD CHENEVIX TRENCH.\n\n LONDON:\n EDWARD MOXON, DOVER STREET.\n MDCCCXLII.\n\n\n\n\n LONDON:\n BRADBURY AND EVANS, PRINTERS, WHITEFRIARS.\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS.\n\n\nPOEMS FROM EASTERN SOURCES.\n\n PAGE\n\nALEXANDER AT THE GATES OF PARADISE.\u2014A LEGEND\n FROM THE TALMUD 3\n\nCHIDHER\u2019S WELL 11\n\nTHE BANISHED KINGS 14\n\nTHE BALLADS OF HAROUN AL RASCHID:\n I.\u2014THE SPILT PEARLS 20\n II.\u2014THE BARMECIDES 24\n III.\u2014THE FESTIVAL 35\n\nTHE EASTERN NARCISSUS 41\n\nTHE SEASONS:\n I.\u2014WINTER 43\n II.\u2014SPRING 46\n III.\u2014SUMMER 49\n IV.\u2014AUTUMN 52\n\nMOSES AND JETHRO 55\n\nPROVERBS, TURKISH AND PERSIAN 60\n\n\u201cTHE GOOD THAT ONE MAN FLINGS ASIDE\u201d 64\n\nLOVE 67\n\nTHE FALCON 69\n\nLIFE THROUGH DEATH:\n\n I.\u2014\u201cA PAGAN KING TORMENTED FIERCELY ALL\u201d 71\n\n II.\u2014\u201cA DEW-DROP FALLING ON THE WILD SEA\n WAVE\u201d 73\n\n III.\u2014\u201cTHE SEED MUST DIE, BEFORE THE CORN\n APPEARS\u201d 74\n\nTHE WORLD 75\n\nTHE MONK AND SINNER 78\n\n\u201cWHAT, THOU ASKEST, IS THE HEAVEN, AND THE\n ROUND EARTH AND THE SEA\u201d 81\n\nTHE SUPPLIANT 84\n\nTHE PANTHEIST; OR, THE ORIGIN OF EVIL 87\n\nGHAZEL 90\n\nTHE RIGHTEOUS OF THE WORLD 91\n\nMAXIMS 94\n\nTHE FALCON\u2019S REWARD 96\n\nTHE CONVERSION OF ABRAHAM 101\n\nSONNET 103\n\nTHE DEAD DOG 104\n\n\u201cFAIR VESSEL HAST THOU SEEN WITH HONEY FILLED\u201d 106\n\nFRAGMENTS:\n I.\u2014THE CERTAINTY OF FAITH 108\n II.\u2014MAN\u2019S TWOFOLD NATURE 109\n III.\u2014SCIENCE AND LOVE 110\n IV.\u2014\u201cTHE BUSINESS OF THE WORLD IS CHILD\u2019S\n PLAY MERE\u201d 111\n V.\u2014\u201cSAGE, THAT WOULD\u2019ST MAKER OF THINE OWN\n GOD BE\u201d 112\n VI.\u2014\u201cMAN, THE CAGED BIRD THAT OWNED AN\n HIGHER NEST\u201d 113\n\nNOTES TO THE POEMS FROM EASTERN SOURCES 115\n\n\nTHE STEADFAST PRINCE:\n PART I. 125\n PART II. 152\n\nORPHEUS AND THE SIRENS 173\n\nST. CHRYSOSTOM 184\n\nTHE OIL OF MERCY 185\n\nTHE TREE OF LIFE.\u2014FROM THE GERMAN OF R\u00dcCKERT 192\n\nTHE TREE OF LIFE.\u2014FROM AN OLD LATIN POEM 195\n\nPARADISE.\u2014FROM THE GERMAN OF R\u00dcCKERT 199\n\nTHE LOREY LEY.\u2014FROM THE GERMAN OF HEINE 203\n\n\u201cOH THOU OF DARK FOREBODINGS DREAR\u201d 205\n\nTHE PRODIGAL 206\n\nTHE CORREGAN.\u2014A BALLAD OF BRITTANY 208\n\nSONNET 214\n\nSONNET 215\n\nSONNET 216\n\nTHE ETRURIAN KING 217\n\nTHE FAMINE 219\n\nTHE PRIZE OF SONG 231\n\nNOTES 235\n\n\n\n\nERRATA.\n\n\nPage 39, line 9, for _one_ read _our_.\n\n\u2014 191, \u2014 11, dele comma.\n\n\u2014 215, \u2014 2, for _light_ read _slight_.\n\n\n\n\nPOEMS\nFROM\nEASTERN SOURCES.\n\n\n\n\nNOTE.\n\n\nThe following Poems bear somewhat a vague title, because\nsuch only would describe the nature of Poems which have been\nderived in very different degrees from the sources thus indicated.\nSome are mere translations; others have been modelled anew,\nand only such portions used of the originals as were adapted to\nmy purpose: of others it is only the imagery and thought which\nare Eastern, and these have been put together in new combinations;\nwhile of others it is the story, and nothing more, which has been\nborrowed, it may be from some prose source. On this subject,\nhowever, more information will be given in the Notes.\n\n\n\n\nALEXANDER AT THE GATES OF PARADISE.\n\nA Legend from the Talmud.\n\n\nFierce was the glare of Cashmere\u2019s middle day,\nWhen Alexander for Hydaspes bent,\nThrough trackless wilds urged his impetuous way\n\nYet in that vast and sandy continent\nA little vale he found, so calm, so sweet,\nHe there awhile to tarry was content.\n\nA crystal stream was murmuring at his feet,\nWhereof the Monarch, when his meal was done,\nTook a long draught, to slake his fever heat.\n\nAgain he drank, and yet again, as one\nWho would have drained that river crystalline\nOf all its waves, and left it dry anon:\n\nFor in his veins, ofttimes a-fire with wine,\nAnd in his bosom, throne of sleepless pride,\nThe while he drank, went circling peace divine.\n\nIt seemed as though all evil passions died\nWithin him, slaked was every fire accurst;\nSo that in rapturous joy aloud he cried:\n\n\u201cOh! might I find where these pure waters first\nShoot sparkling from their living fountain-head,\nOh! there to quench my spirit\u2019s inmost thirst.\n\n\u201cSure, if we followed where these waters led,\nWe should at last some fairer region gain\nThan yet has quaked beneath our iron tread,\u2014\n\n\u201cSome land that should in very truth contain\nWhate\u2019er we dream of beautiful and bright,\nAnd idly dreaming of, pursue in vain;\n\n\u201cThat land must stoop beneath our conquering might.\nCompanions dear, this toil remains alone,\nTo win that region of unmatched delight.\n\n\u201cOh faithful in a thousand labours known,\nOne toil remains, the noblest and the last;\nLet us arise\u2014and make that land our own.\u201d\n\n\u2014Through realms of darkness, wildernesses vast,\nAll populous with sights and sounds of fear,\nIn heat and cold, by day and night, he past,\n\nWith trumpet clang, with banner and with spear,\nYearning to drink that river, where it sent\nIts first pure waters forth, serene and clear;\n\nTill boldest captains sank, their courage spent,\nAnd dying cried\u2014\u201cThis stream all search defies,\u201d\u2014\nBut never would he tarry nor repent,\n\nNor pitched his banners, till before his eyes\nRose high as heaven in its secluded state\nThe mighty verdant wall of Paradise.\n\nAnd lo! that stream, which early still and late\nHe had tracked upward, issued bright and clear\nFrom underneath the angel-guarded gate:\n\n\u2014\u201cAnd who art thou that hast adventured here,\nDaring to startle this serene abode\nWith flash of mortal weapons, sword and spear?\u201d\n\nSo the angelic sentinel of God,\nFire flashing, to the bold invader cried,\nWhose feet profane those holy precincts trod.\n\nThe Son of Philip without dread replied,\n\u201cIs Alexander\u2019s fame unknown to thee,\nWhich the world knows\u2014mine, who have victory tied\n\n\u201cTo my sword\u2019s hilt, and who, while stoop to me\nAll other lands, would win what rich or fair\nThis land contains, and have it mine in fee?\u201d\n\n\u2014\u201cThou dost thyself proclaim that part or share\nThou hast not here.\u2014O man of blood and sin,\nGo back\u2014with those blood-stain\u00e8d hands despair\n\n\u201cThis place of love and holy peace to win:\nThis is the gate of righteousness, and they,\nThe righteous, only here may enter in.\u201d\n\nAround, before him, lightnings dart and play:\nHe undismayed\u2014\u201cOf travail long and hard\nAt least some trophy let me bear away.\u201d\n\n\u2014\u201cLo! then this skull\u2014which if thou wilt regard,\nAnd to my question seek for fit reply,\nAll thy long labours shall have full reward.\n\n\u201cOnce in that hollow circle lodged an eye,\nThat was, like thine, for ever coveting,\nWhich worlds on worlds had failed to satisfy.\n\n\u201cNow while thou gazest on that ghastly ring,\nFrom whence of old a greedy eye outspied,\nSay thou what was it,\u2014for there was a thing,\u2014\n\n\u201cWhich filled at last and throughly satisfied\nThe eye that in that hollow circle dwelt,\nSo that, \u2018Enough, I have enough,\u2019 it cried.\u201d\n\n\u2014Blank disappointment at the gift he felt,\nAnd hardly taking, turned in scorn away,\nNor he the riddle of the Angel spelt,\n\nBut cried unto his captains, \u201cWe delay,\nAnd at these portals lose our time in vain,\nBy more than mortal terrors kept at bay:\n\n\u201cCome\u2014other lands as goodly spoils contain,\nCome\u2014all too long untouched the Indian gold,\nThe pearls and spice of Araby remain.\n\n\u201cCome, and who will this riddle may unfold.\u201d\nThen stood before him, careless of his ire,\nAn Indian sage, and rendered answer bold\u2014\n\n\u201cLord of the world, commanded to enquire\nWhat was it that could satisfy an eye,\nThat organ of man\u2019s wandering vast desire,\u2014\n\n\u201cBy deed and word thou plainly dost reply,\nThat its desire can nothing tame or quell,\nThat it can never know sufficiency.\n\n\u201cWhile thou enlargest thy desire as hell,\nFilling thine hand, but filling not thy lust,\nThou dost proclaim man\u2019s eye insatiable:\n\n\u201cSuch answer from thy lips were only just;\nYet \u2019twas not so. One came at last, who threw\nInto yon face an heap of vilest dust,\n\n\u201cWhereof a few small grains did fall into\nAnd filled the orb and hollow of that eye,\nWhen that which suffisance not ever knew,\nWas fain, \u2018Enough, I have enough,\u2019 to cry.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHIDHER\u2019S WELL.\n\n\nI.\n\nThee have thousands sought in vain\nOver land and barren main,\n\n\nII.\n\nChidher\u2019s well,\u2014of which they say\nThat it maketh young again;\n\n\nIII.\n\nFountain of eternal youth,\nWashing free from every stain.\n\n\nIV.\n\nTo its waves the aged moons\nAye betake them, when they wane;\n\n\nV.\n\nAnd the suns their golden light,\nWhile they bathe therein, retain.\n\n\nVI.\n\nFrom that fountain drops are flung,\nMingling with the vernal rain,\n\n\nVII.\n\nAnd the old Earth clothes itself\nIn its young attire again.\n\n\nVIII.\n\nThitherward the freckled trout\nUp the water-courses strain,\n\n\nIX.\n\nAnd the timid wild gazelles\nSeek it through the desert plain.\n\n\nX.\n\nGreat Iskander[A], mighty Lord,\nSought that fountain, but in vain;\n\n\nXI.\n\nThrough the land of darkness went\nIn its quest with fruitless pain,\n\n\nXII.\n\nWhile through wealth of conquered worlds\nDid his thirst unslaked remain.\n\n\nXIII.\n\nMany more with parch\u00e8d lip\nMust lie down, and dizzy brain,\n\n\nXIV.\n\nAnd of that, a fountain sealed\nUnto them, in death complain.\n\n\nXV.\n\nIf its springs to thee are known,\nWeary wanderer, tell me plain.\n\n\nXVI.\n\nFrom beneath the throne of God\nIt must well, a lucid vein.\n\n\nXVII.\n\nTo its sources lead me, Lord,\nThat I do not thirst again,\n\n\nXVIII.\n\nAnd my lips not any more\nShall the earth\u2019s dark waters stain.\n\n[Footnote A: Alexander.]\n\n\n\n\nTHE BANISHED KINGS.\n\n\nOn a fair ship, borne swiftly o\u2019er the deep,\nA man was lying, wrapt in dreamless sleep;\nWhen unawares upon a sunken rock\nThat vessel struck, and shattered with the shock.\nBut strange! the plank where lay the sleeper bore\nHim wrapt in deep sleep ever, to the shore:\nIt bore him safely through the foam and spray,\nHigh up on land, where couched \u2019mid flowers he lay.\nSweet tones first woke him from his sleep, when round\nHis couch observant multitudes he found:\nAll hailed him then, and did before him bow,\nAnd with one voice exclaimed,\u2014\u201cOur King art thou.\u201d\nWith jubilant applause they bore him on,\nAnd set him wondering on a royal throne:\nAnd some his limbs with royal robes arrayed,\nAnd some before him duteous homage paid,\nAnd some brought gifts, all rare and costly things,\nNature\u2019s and Art\u2019s profusest offerings.\nAround him counsellors and servants prest,\nAll eager to accomplish his behest.\nWish unaccomplished of his soul was none;\nThe thing that he commanded, it was done.\n\n Much he rejoiced, and he had well nigh now\nForgotten whence he hither came, and how;\nUntil at eve, of homage weary grown,\nHe craved a season to be left alone.\nAlone in hall magnificent he sate,\nAnd mused upon the wonder of his fate,\nWhen lo! an aged counsellor, a seer\nBefore unnoticed, to the King drew near,\n\u2014\u201cAnd thee would I too gratulate, my son,\nWho hast thy reign in happy hour begun:\nSeen hast thou the beginning, yet attend,\nWhile I shall also shew to thee the end.\nThat this new fortune do not blind thee quite,\nBoth sides observe, its shadowy as its bright:\nHeed what so many who have ruled before,\nFailing to heed, must rue for evermore.\nThough sure thy state and firm thy throne appear,\nKing only art thou for the Present here.\nA time is fixed, albeit unknown to thee,\nWhich when it comes, thou banished hence shalt be.\nRound this fair isle, though hidden from the eye\nBy mist and vapour, many islands lie:\nBare are their coasts, and dreary and forlorn,\nAnd unto them the banished kings are borne;\nOn each of these an exiled king doth mourn.\nFor when a new king comes, they bear away\nThe old, whom now no vassals more obey;\nUnhonoured and unwilling he is sent\nUnto his dreary island banishment,\nWhile all who girt his throne with service true\nNow fall away from him, to serve the new.\n\n \u201cWhat I have told thee lay betimes to heart,\nAnd ere thy rule is ended, take thy part,\nThat thou hereafter on thine isle forlorn\nDo not thy vanished kingdom vainly mourn,\nWhen nothing of its pomp to thee remains,\nOn that bare shore, save only memory\u2019s pains.\n\n \u201cMuch, O my Prince! my words have thee distrest,\nThy head has sunk in sorrow on thy breast;\nYet idle sorrow helps not\u2014I will show\nA nobler way, which shall true help bestow.\nThis counsel take\u2014to others given in vain,\nWhile no belief from them my words might gain.\u2014\nKnow then whilst thou art Monarch here, there stand\nHelps for the future many at command.\nThen, while thou canst, employ them to adorn\nThat island, whither thou must once be borne.\nUnbuilt and waste and barren now that strand,\nThere gush no fountains from the thirsty sand,\nNo groves of palm-trees have been planted there,\nNor plants of odorous scent embalm that air,\nWhile all alike have shunned to contemplate\nThat they should ever change their flattering state.\nBut make thou there provision of delight,\nTill that which now so threatens, may invite;\nBid there thy servants build up royal towers,\nAnd change its barren sands to leafy bowers;\nBid fountains there be hewn, and cause to bloom\nImmortal amaranths, shedding rich perfume.\nSo when the world, which speaks thee now so fair,\nAnd flatters so, again shall strip thee bare,\nAnd sends thee naked forth in harshest wise,\nThou joyfully wilt seek thy Paradise.\n_There_ will not vex thee memories of the past,\nWhile hope will heighten here the joys thou hast.\nThis do, while yet the power is in thine hand,\nWhile thou hast helps so many at command.\u201d\n\n Then raised the Prince his head with courage new,\nAnd what the sage advised, prepared to do.\nHe ruled his realm with meekness, and meanwhile\nHe marvellously decked the chosen isle;\nBade there his servants build up royal towers,\nAnd change its barren sands to leafy bowers;\nBade fountains there be hewn, and caused to bloom\nImmortal amaranths, shedding rich perfume.\nAnd when he long enough had kept his throne,\nTo him sweet odours from that isle were blown:\nThen knew he that its gardens blooming were,\nAnd all the yearnings of his soul were there.\nGrief was it not to him, but joy, when they\nHis crown and sceptre bade him quit one day;\nWhen him his servants rudely did dismiss,\n\u2019Twas not the sentence of his ended bliss,\nBut pomp and power he cheerfully forsook,\nAnd to his isle a willing journey took,\nAnd found diviner pleasure on that shore,\nThan all, his proudest state had known before.\n\n\n\n\nTHE\n\nBALLADS OF HAROUN AL RASCHID.\n\n\nI.\n\nTHE SPILT PEARLS.\n\nI.\n\nHis courtiers of the Caliph crave\u2014\n \u201cOh, say how this may be,\nThat of thy slaves, this Ethiop slave\n Is best beloved by thee?\n\nII.\n\n\u201cFor he is hideous as the Night:\n But when has ever chose\nA nightingale for its delight,\n A hueless, scentless rose?\u201d\n\nIII.\n\nThe Caliph then\u2014\u201cNo features fair\n Nor comely mien are his:\nLove is the beauty he doth wear,\n And Love his glory is.\n\nIV.\n\n\u201cOnce when a camel of my train\n There fell in narrow street,\nFrom broken casket rolled amain\n Rich pearls before my feet.\n\nV.\n\n\u201cI winking to my slaves, that I\n Would freely give them these,\nAt once upon the spoil they fly,\n The costly boon to seize.\n\nVI.\n\n\u201cOne only at my side remained\u2014\n Beside this Ethiop, none:\nHe, moveless as the steed he reined,\n Behind me sat alone.\n\nVII.\n\n\u201c\u2018What will thy gain, good fellow, be,\n Thus lingering at my side?\u2019\u2014\n\u2014\u2018My King, that I shall faithfully\n Have guarded thee,\u2019 he cried.\n\nVIII.\n\n\u201c\u2018True servant\u2019s title he may wear,\n He only who has not,\nFor his Lord\u2019s gifts, how rich soe\u2019er,\n His Lord himself forgot!\u2019\u201d\n\nIX.\n\n\u2014So thou alone dost walk before\n Thy God with perfect aim,\nFrom him desiring nothing more\n Beside himself to claim.\n\nX.\n\nFor if thou not to him aspire,\n But to his gifts alone,\nNot Love, but covetous desire,\n Has brought thee to his throne.\n\nXI.\n\nWhile such thy prayer, it climbs above\n In vain\u2014the golden key\nOf God\u2019s rich treasure-house of love,\n Thine own will never be.\n\n\nII.\n\nTHE BARMECIDES.\n\nHaroun the Just!\u2014yet once that name\nOf Just the ruler ill became,\nBy whose too hasty sentence died\nThe royal-hearted Barmecide.\nO Barmecide, of hand and heart\nSo prompt, so forward to impart,\nOf bounty so unchecked and free,\nThat once a Poet sung, how he\nWould fear thy very hand to touch,\nLest he should learn to give too much,\nLest, catching the contagion thence\nOf thy unmatched munificence,\nA beggar he should soon remain,\nHelpless his bounty to restrain\u2014\nO Barmecide of royal heart,\nMy childhood\u2019s tears again will start\nInto mine eyes, the tears I shed,\nAs I remember, when I read\nOf harsh injustice done to thee,\nAnd all thy princely family.\n\n \u2014What marvel that the Caliph, stung\nWith secret consciousness of wrong,\nOr now desiring every trace\nOf that large bounty to efface,\nWith penalty of death forbade\nThat mourning should for them be made;\nThat any should with grateful song\nTheir memory in men\u2019s hearts prolong?\n\u2014\u201cAnd who art thou, that day by day\nHast dared my mandate disobey?\nWho art thou whom my guards have found,\nNow standing on some grass-grown mound,\nNow wandering \u2019mid the ruined towers,\nFall\u2019n palaces, and wasted bowers\nOf those, at length for traitors known,\nAnd by my justice overthrown\u2014\nSinging a plaintive dirge for them\nWhom my just vengeance did condemn;\nTill ever, as I learn, around\nThy steps a listening crowd is found,\nWho still unto thy sad lament\nDo with their sobs and tears consent;\nWhile in the bosom of that throng\nRise thoughts that do their Monarch wrong?\nWhat doom I did for this assign\nThou knewest, and that doom is thine.\u201d\n\n But then the offender,\u2014\u201cGive me room,\nAnd I will gladly take my doom,\nO King, to spend my latest breath,\nEre I am hurried to my death,\nIn telling for what highest grace\nI was beholden to that race,\nWhose memory my heart hath kept,\nWhose sunken glories I have wept.\nFor then, at least, it will appear\nThat not in disobedience mere\nThy mandate high I overpast.\n\u2014O King, I was the least and last\nOf all the servitors of him,\nWhose glory in thy frown grew dim,\u2014\nThe least and last\u2014yet he one day\nTo me, his meanest slave, did say\nThat he was fain my guest to be,\nAnd the next day would sup with me.\nMore time I willingly had craved,\nBut my excuses all he waved,\nAnd by no train accompanied,\nHis two sons only at his side,\nAt my poor lodging lighted down,\nWhich at the limits of the town\nStood in a close and narrow street.\nHim I and mine did humbly greet,\nStanding before him while he shared\nWhat we meanwhile had best prepared\nOf entertainment, though the best\nWas poor and mean for such a guest.\n\n \u201cBut supper done, with cheerful mien,\n\u2018Thy house,\u2019 he cried, \u2018I have not seen,\nThy gardens;\u2014let me pace awhile\nAlong some cool and shadowy aisle.\u2019\nI thought he mocked me, but replied,\n\u2018Possessions have I not so wide:\nFor house, another room with this\nOur only habitation is;\nAnd garden have I none to show,\nUnless that narrow court below,\nShut in with lofty walls, that name\nIn right of four dwarf shrubs may claim.\u2019\n\u2014\u2018Nay, nay,\u2019 he answered, \u2018there is more,\nIf only we could find the door.\u2019\nAgain I told him, but in vain,\nThat he had seen my whole domain.\n\u2014\u2018Nay, go then quick, a mason call.\u2019\nHim bade he straightway pierce the wall.\n\u2014\u2018But shall we in this wise invade\nA neighbour\u2019s house?\u2019\u2014No heed he paid,\nAnd I stood dumb, and wondering\nWhereto he would the issue bring.\nAnon he through the opening past,\nHe and his sons, and I the last;\nWhen suddenly myself I found\nIn ample space of garden ground,\nOr rather in a Paradise\nOf rare and wonderful device,\nWith stately walks and alleys wide,\nFar stretching upon every side;\nAnd streams, upon whose either bank\nStood lofty platanes, rank by rank,\nAnd marble fountains, scattering high\nIllumined dew-drops in the sky;\nAnd making a low tinkling sound,\nAs sliding down from mound to mound,\nThey did at last their courses take\nDown to a calm and lucid lake,\nBy which, on gently sloping height,\nThere stood a palace of delight;\nAnd many slaves, but all of rare\nAnd perfect beauty, marshalled there,\nDid each to me incline the knee,\nExclaiming all\u2014\u2018Thy servants we.\u2019\n\n \u201cAnd then my Lord cried, laughing\u2014\u2018Nay,\nWhile this is thine, how could\u2019st thou say\nThat thou had\u2019st shown me all before?\nThine is it all.\u2019\u2014He said no more,\nBut at my benefactor\u2019s feet\nI falling, thanks would render meet.\nHe, scarcely listening, turned his head,\nAnd to his eldest son he said:\n\u2018This house, these gardens, \u2019twere in vain,\nUnless enabled to maintain,\nThat he should call them his;\u2014my son,\nLet us not leave this grace half done:\u2019\nWho then replied\u2014\u2018My farms beyond\nThe Tigris I by seal\u00e8d bond\nThis night before we part, will see\nMade over unto him in fee,\u2019\n\u2014\u2018\u2019Tis well; but there will months ensue,\nEre his incomings will be due.\nWhat shall there, the meanwhile, be done?\u2019\nHe turned unto his younger son,\nWho answered\u2014\u2018I will bid that gold,\nTen thousand pieces, shall be told\nUnto his steward presently;\nThese shall his urgent needs supply.\u2019\n\u2019Twas done upon that very eve;\nAnd done, anon they took their leave,\nAnd left me free to contemplate\nThe wonders of my novel state.\n\n \u201cPrince of the faithful, mighty King,\nMy fortunes from this source had spring,\nWhich, if they since that time have grown,\nHim their first author still I own.\nNor when that name, which was the praise\nOf all the world, on evil days\nHad fall\u2019n, was I content to let\nBe quite forgotten the large debt\nI owe to him;\u2014content to die,\nIf such shall be thy pleasure high,\nAnd my offence shall seem to thee\nDeserving of such penalty.\u201d\n\n What marvel that the King who heard\nWas in his inmost bosom stirred?\nWhat marvel that he owned the force\nOf late regret and vain remorse?\nThat spreading palm, whose boughs had made\nFar stretching such an ample shade\nFor many a wanderer through life\u2019s waste,\nHe had hewn down in guilty haste;\nThat fountain free, that springing well\nOf goodness inexhaustible,\nHis hand had stopt it, ne\u2019er again\nTo slake the thirst of weary men.\nThat genial sun, which evermore\nDid on a cold, chill world outpour\nIts rays of love and life and light,\n\u2019Twas he who quenched in darkest night.\nWhat marvel that he owned the force\nOf late regret and vain remorse,\nAnd (all he could) now freely gave\nThe life the other did not crave?\nNay more, the offender did dismiss\nWith gifts and praise\u2014nor only this,\nBut did the unrighteous law reverse\nWhich had forbidden to rehearse,\nAnd in the minds of men prolong,\nBy grateful speech or plaintive song,\nThe bounteous acts and graces wide,\nAnd goodness of the Barmecide.\n\n\nIII.\n\nTHE FESTIVAL.\n\nI.\n\nFive hundred princely guests before\n Haroun Al Raschid sate:\nFive hundred princely guests or more\n Admired his royal state.\n\nII.\n\nFor never had that glory been\n So royally displayed,\nNor ever such a gorgeous scene\n Had eye of man surveyed.\n\nIII.\n\nHe, most times meek of heart, yet now\n Of spirit too elate,\nExclaimed\u2014\u201cBefore me Cesars bow,\n On me two empires wait.\n\nIV.\n\n\u201cYet all our glories something lack,\n We do our triumphs wrong,\nUntil to us reflected back\n In mirrors clear of song.\n\nV.\n\n\u201cCall him then unto whom this power\n Is given, this skill sublime\u2014\nNow win from us some gorgeous dower\n With song that fits the time.\u201d\n\nVI.\n\n\u2014\u201cMy King, as I behold thee now,\n May I behold thee still,\nWhile prostrate worlds before thee bow,\n And wait upon thy will!\n\nVII.\n\n\u201cMay evermore this clear pure heaven,\n Whence every speck and stain\nOf trouble far away is driven,\n Above thy head remain!\u201d\n\nVIII.\n\nThe Caliph cried\u2014\u201cThou wishest well;\n There waits thee golden store\nFor this\u2014but, oh! resume the spell,\n I fain would listen more.\u201d\n\nIX.\n\n\u2014\u201cDrink thou life\u2019s sweetest goblet up,\n O King, and may its wine,\nFor others\u2019 lips a mingled cup,\n Be all unmixed for thine.\n\nX.\n\n\u201cLive long\u2014the shadow of no grief\n Come ever near to thee:\nAs thou in height of place art chief,\n So chief in gladness be.\u201d\n\nXI.\n\nHaroun Al Raschid cried again\u2014\n \u201cI thank thee\u2014but proceed,\nAnd now take up an higher strain,\n And win an higher mead.\u201d\n\nXII.\n\nAround that high magnific hall,\n One glance the poet threw\nOn courtiers, king, and festival,\n And did the strain renew.\n\nXIII.\n\n\u2014\u201cAnd yet, and yet\u2014shalt thou at last\n Lie stretched on bed of death:\nThen, when thou drawest thick and fast\n With sobs thy painful breath\u2014\n\nXIV.\n\n\u201cWhen Azrael glides through guarded gate,\n Through hosts that camp around\nTheir lord in vain\u2014and will not wait,\n When thou art sadly bound\n\nXV.\n\n\u201cUnto thine house of dust alone,\n O King, when thou must die,\u2014\nThis pomp a shadow thou shalt own,\n This glory all a lie.\u201d\n\nXVI.\n\nThen darkness on all faces hung,\n And through the banquet went\nLow sounds the murmuring guests among\n Of angry discontent.\n\nXVII.\n\nAnd him anon they fiercely urge\u2014\n \u201cWhat guerdon shall be thine?\nWhat does it, this untimely dirge,\n \u2019Mid feasts, and flowers, and wine?\n\nXVIII.\n\n\u201cOne lord demanded in his mirth\n A strain to heighten glee;\nBut, lo! at thine his tears come forth\n In current swift and free.\u201d\n\nXIX.\n\n\u2014\u201cPeace\u2014not to him rebukes belong,\n But rather highest grace;\nHe gave me what I asked, a song\n To fit the time and place.\u201d\n\nXX.\n\nAll voices at that voice were stilled;\n Again the Caliph cried,\u2014\n\u201cHe saw our mouths with laughter filled,\n He saw us drunk with pride;\n\nXXI.\n\n\u201cAnd bade us know that every road,\n By monarch trod or slave,\nThick set with thorns, with roses strowed,\n Doth issue in the grave.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nTHE EASTERN NARCISSUS.\n\n\n Thou art the fox, O man, that, maugre all\nHis cunning, did into the water fall.\nThis fox was travelling once o\u2019er hill and dell,\nAnd reached at length the margin of a well;\nHis head he stooped into the well, when, lo!\nAnother fox did in the water show.\nHe winks, he nods\u2014the other fox replies:\n\u201cWhat, ho! we must be better friends,\u201d he cries;\nAnd more acquaintance covetous to win,\nWithout more thought jumped Reynard headlong in.\nHe reached the bottom at a single bound,\nBut there no fox beside himself he found:\nUpward again he now would gladly spring,\nBut to ascend was no such easy thing.\nHe splashes, struggles, and in sad voice cries,\n\u201cFool that I was! I deemed myself more wise.\nAh wretch! will no one come unto my aid?\u201d\u2014\nBut prayer and effort both were vainly made:\nSoon did the water drag him down to death;\nWith a loud cry he sank the waves beneath.\n\n Thou art the fox of which the fable tells\u2014\nThis world of sense the Devil\u2019s well of wells.\nThou saw\u2019st reflected thine own image there,\nAnd didst plunge headlong in without a care.\nOh happy! if thou struggle back to-day,\nEre the strong whirlpool drags thee down for aye.\n\n\n\n\nTHE SEASONS.\n\n\nI.\n\nWINTER.\n\nI.\n\nWhite ermine now the mountains wear,\nTo shield their naked shoulders bare.\n\nII.\n\nThe dark pine wears the snow, as head\nOf Ethiop doth white turban wear.\n\nIII.\n\nThe floods are armed with silver shields,\nThrough which the Sun\u2019s sword cannot fare;\n\nIV.\n\nFor he who trod heaven\u2019s middle road\nIn golden arms, on golden chair,\n\nV.\n\nNow through small corner of the sky\nCreeps low, nor warms the foggy air.\n\nVI.\n\nTo mutter \u2019twixt their teeth the streams,\nIn icy fetters, scarcely dare.\n\nVII.\n\nHushed is the busy hum of life;\n\u2019Tis silence in the earth and air.\n\nVIII.\n\nFrom mountains issues the gaunt wolf,\nAnd from its forest depths the bear.\n\nIX.\n\nWhere is the garden\u2019s beauty now?\nThe thorn is here; the rose, oh! where?\n\nX.\n\nThe trees, like giant skeletons,\nWave high their fleshless arms and bare;\n\nXI.\n\nOr stand like wrestlers, stripped and bold,\nAnd wildest winds to battle dare.\n\nXII.\n\nIt seems a thing impossible\nThat earth its glories should repair;\n\nXIII.\n\nThat ever this bleak world again\nShould bright and beauteous mantle wear,\n\nXIV.\n\nOr sounds of life again be heard\nIn this dull earth and vacant air.\n\n\nII.\n\nSPRING.\n\nI.\n\nWho was it that so lately said,\nAll pulses in thine heart were dead,\n\nII.\n\nOld Earth, that now in festal robes\nAppearest, as a bride new wed?\n\nIII.\n\nOh wrapt so late in winding-sheet,\nThy winding-sheet, oh! where is fled?\n\nIV.\n\nLo! \u2019tis an emerald carpet now\nWhere the young monarch, Spring, may tread.\n\nV.\n\nHe comes,\u2014and, a defeated king,\nOld Winter, to the hills is fled.\n\nVI.\n\nThe warm wind broke his frosty spear,\nAnd loosed the helmet from his head;\n\nVII.\n\nAnd he weak showers of arrowy sleet\nFor his strongholds has vainly sped.\n\nVIII.\n\nAll that was sleeping is awake,\nAnd all is living that was dead.\n\nIX.\n\nWho listens now, can hear the streams\nLeap tinkling down their pebbly bed,\n\nX.\n\nOr see them, from their fetters free,\nLike silver snakes the meadows thread.\n\nXI.\n\nThe joy, the life, the hope of earth,\nThey slept awhile, they were not dead:\n\nXII.\n\nOh thou, who say\u2019st thy sere heart ne\u2019er\nWith verdure can again be spread;\n\nXIII.\n\nOh thou, who mournest them that sleep,\nLow lying in an earthy bed;\n\nXIV.\n\nLook out on this reviving world,\nAnd be new hopes within thee bred.\n\n\nIII.\n\nSUMMER.\n\nI.\n\nNow seems all nature to conspire\nAs to dissolve the world in fire,\n\nII.\n\nWhich dies among its odorous sweets,\nA Ph\u0153nix on its funeral pyre.\n\nIII.\n\nSimoom breathes hotly from the waste,\nThe green earth quits its green attire;\n\nIV.\n\nFloats o\u2019er the plain the liquid heat,\nCheating the traveller\u2019s fond desire\u2014\n\nV.\n\nIllusion fair of lake and stream,\nReceding as he draweth nigher.\n\nVI.\n\nIce is more precious now than gold,\nSnow more than silver men desire.\n\nVII.\n\n\u2019Tis far to seek unfailing wells\nFor tender maid or aged sire;\n\nVIII.\n\nMen know the worth of water now,\nAnd learn to prize God\u2019s blessing higher;\n\nIX.\n\nThe shallow pools have disappeared,\nCaked into iron is the mire.\n\nX.\n\nThrough clouds of dust the crimson sun\nGlares on the earth in lurid ire;\n\nXI.\n\nThe parch\u00e8d earth with thirsty lips\nIs gasping, ready to expire.\n\nXII.\n\nOh happy, who by liquid streams\nIn shady gardens can retire,\n\nXIII.\n\nWhere murmuring falls and whispering trees\nSweet slumber to invite conspire;\n\nXIV.\n\nOr where he may deceive the time\nWith volume sage, or pensive lyre.\n\n\nIV.\n\nAUTUMN.\n\nI.\n\nThine, Autumn, is unwelcome lore\u2014\nTo tell the world its pomp is o\u2019er:\n\nII.\n\nTo whisper in the rose\u2019s ear\nThat all her beauty is no more;\n\nIII.\n\nAnd bid her own the faith how vain,\nWhich Spring to her so lately swore.\n\nIV.\n\nA queen deposed, she quits her state;\nThe nightingales her fall deplore:\n\nV.\n\nThe hundred-voic\u00e8d bird may woo\nThe thousand-leav\u00e8d flower no more.\n\nVI.\n\nThe jasmine sinks its head in shame,\nThe sharp east wind its tresses shore;\n\nVII.\n\nAnd robbed in passing cruelly\nThe tulip of the crown it wore.\n\nVIII.\n\nThe lily\u2019s sword is broken now,\nThat was so bright and keen before;\n\nIX.\n\nAnd not a blast can blow, but strews\nWith leaf of gold the earth\u2019s dank floor.\n\nX.\n\nThe piping winds sing Nature\u2019s dirge\nAs through the forest bleak they roar,\n\nXI.\n\nWhose leafy screen, like locks of eld,\nEach day shows scantier than before.\n\nXII.\n\nThou fadest as a flower, O man!\nOf food for musing here is store.\n\nXIII.\n\nO man! thou fallest as a leaf:\nPace thoughtfully earth\u2019s leaf-strewn floor;\n\nXIV.\n\nWelcome the sadness of the time,\nAnd lay to heart this natural lore.\n\n\n\n\nMOSES AND JETHRO.\n\n\nWhen Moses once on Horeb\u2019s rocky steep,\nA banished man, was keeping Jethro\u2019s sheep,\nWhat time his flocks along the hills and dells\nMade music with their bleatings and their bells,\nHe by the thoughts that stirred within him, drawn\nDeep in the mountain, heard at early dawn\nOne who in prayer did all his soul outpour,\nWith deep heart-earnestness, but nothing more.\nFor strange his words were, savage and uncouth,\nAnd little did he know in very sooth\nOf that great Lord, to whom his vows were made.\nThe other for a moment listening staid,\nUntil, his patience altogether spent\u2014\n\u201cGood friend, for whom are these same noises meant?\nFor him, who dwells on high? this babbling vain,\nWhich vexes even a man\u2019s ear with pain?\nOh, stop thy mouth\u2014thou dost but heap up sin,\nSuch prayer as this can no acceptance win,\nBut were enough to make God\u2019s blessings cease.\u201d\nRebuked, the simple herdsman held his peace,\nAnd only crying\u2014\u201cThou hast rent my heart,\u201d\nHe fled into the desert far apart:\nWhile with himself, and with his zeal content,\nHis steps the Son of Amram homeward bent,\nAnd ever to himself applauses lent\u2014\nMuch wondering that he did not find the same\nFrom his adopted sire, but rather blame,\nWho having heard, replied\u2014\n\n \u201cWas this well done?\nWhat wouldst thou have to answer, O my son,\nIf God should say in anger unto thee\u2014\n\u2018Why hast thou driven my worshipper from me,\nWhy hast thou robbed me of my dues of prayer?\nWell pleasing offering in my sight they were,\nAnd music in mine ears, if not in thine\u2019\u2014\nHe doth its bounds to every soul assign,\nIts voice, its language\u2014using which to tell\nHis praise, he counts that it doth praise him well;\nAnd when there is a knocking at heaven\u2019s gate,\nAnd at its threshold many suppliants wait,\nThen simple Love will often enter in,\nWhile haughty Science may no entrance win.\nThus while his words were rougher husks than thine,\nThey yet might keep a kernel more divine,\u2014\nRude vessel guarding a more precious wine.\n\n \u201c_All_ prayer is childlike\u2014falls as short of HIM\nThe wisdom of the wisest Seraphim,\nAs the child\u2019s small conceit of heavenly things;\nA line to sound his depths no creature brings.\nBefore the Infinite, the One, the All,\nMust every difference disappear and fall,\nThere is no wise nor simple, great nor small.\nFor him the little clod of common earth\nHas to the diamond no inferior worth;\nNor doth the Ocean, world-encompassing,\nUnto his thought more sense of vastness bring\nThan tiny dew-drop\u2014atoms in his eye\nA sun, and a sun-mote, dance equally:\nNot that the great (here understand aright)\nIs worthless as the little in his sight,\nRather the little precious as the great,\nAnd, pondered in his scales, of equal weight:\nSo that herein lies comfort\u2014not despair,\nAs though we were too little for his care.\n\n \u201cGod is so great, there can be nothing small\nTo him\u2014so loving he embraces all,\u2014\nSo wise, the wisdom and simplicity\nOf man for him must on a level be:\nBut while all this, more prompt to feel the wrong,\nAnd to resent it with displeasure strong,\nWhen from him there is rudely, proudly turned\nThe meanest soul that loved him, and that yearned\nAfter his grace\u2014oh, haste then and begone,\nRebuild the altar thou hast overthrown;\nReplace the offering which on that did stand,\nTill rudely scattered by thy hasty hand\u2014\nRemoving, if thou canst, what made it rise\nA faulty and imperfect sacrifice.\nAnd henceforth, in this gloomy world and dark,\nPrize every taper yielding faintest spark,\nAnd if perchance it burn not clear and bright,\nSnuff, if thou canst, but do not quench it quite.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nPROVERBS\n\nTURKISH AND PERSIAN.\n\n\nI.\n\nAll skirts extended of thy mantle hold,\nWhen angel hands from heav\u2019n are scattering gold.\n\n\nII.\n\nSects seventy-two, they say, the world infest,\nAnd each and all lie hidden in thy breast.\n\n\nIII.\n\nOne staff of Moses, slight as it appears,\nAye breaks in shivers Pharaoh\u2019s thousand spears.\n\n\nIV.\n\nForget not Death, O man! for thou mayst be\nOf one thing certain,\u2014he forgets not thee.\n\n\nV.\n\nSpeaks one of good which falls not to thy lot,\nHe also speaks of ill which thou hast not.\n\n\nVI.\n\nBoast not thy service rendered to the King,\n\u2019Tis grace enough he lets thee service bring.\n\n\nVII.\n\nLies once thy cart in quagmire overthrown,\nThy path to thee by thousands will be shown.\n\n\nVIII.\n\nOh square thyself for use\u2014a stone that may\nFit in the wall, is left not in the way.\n\n\nIX.\n\nNever the game has happy issue won,\nWhich with the cotton has the fire begun.\n\n\nX.\n\nThe world\u2019s great wheel in silence circles round,\nAn housewife\u2019s spindle with unceasing sound.\n\n\nXI.\n\nWho doth the raven for a guide invite,\nMust marvel not on carcases to light.\n\n\nXII.\n\nThe king but with one apple maketh free,\nAnd straight his servants have cut down the tree.\n\n\nXIII.\n\nTwo friends will in a needle\u2019s eye repose,\nBut the whole world is narrow for two foes.\n\n\nXIV.\n\nRejoice not when thine enemy doth die,\nThou hast not won immortal life thereby.\n\n\nXV.\n\nBe bold to bring forth fruit\u2014though stick and stone\nAt the fruit-bearing trees are flung alone.\n\n\nXVI.\n\nAll things that live from God their sustenance wait,\nAnd sun and moon are beggars at his gate.\n\n\nXVII.\n\nWhile in thy lips thy words thou dost confine,\nThou art their lord\u2014once uttered, they are thine.\n\n\nXVIII.\n\nBoldly thy bread upon the waters throw,\nAnd if the fishes do not, God will know.\n\n\nXIX.\n\nWhat will not time and toil\u2014? through these a worm\nWill into silk a mulberry leaf transform.\n\n\nXX.\n\nWhen what thou willest has befall\u2019n not, still\nThis help remains, what has befall\u2019n to will.\n\n\nXXI.\n\nThe lily with ten tongues can hold its peace;\nWilt thou with one from babbling never cease?\n\n\nXXII.\n\nHow shall the praise of silence best be told?\nTo speak is silver, to hold peace is gold.\n\n\nXXIII.\n\nThy word unspoken thou canst any day\nSpeak, but thy spoken ne\u2019er again unsay.\n\n\nXXIV.\n\nO babbler, couldst thou but the cause divine\nWhy one tongue only, but two ears are thine!\n\n\nXXV.\n\nWhat mystic roses in thy breast will blow,\nIf on the wind their leaves thou straightway strow!\n\n\n\n\nThe good that one man flings aside\nThat in his discontent and pride\nHe treads on, and rejects no less.\nOut of his count of happiness,\nAnother wiser, even from this\nWould build an edifice of bliss,\nFor whose fair shelter he would pay\nGlad offerings of praise alway.\n\n This truth a Sage had need to learn\u2014\nThis we may by his aid discern\nWho once, reduced to last distress,\nWas culling a few herbs to dress,\nWith these his hunger to allay;\nAnd flinging, as he went his way,\nThe coarse and outer leaves aside,\nWith rising discontent he cried,\n\u201cI marvel if at all there be\nA wretch so destitute as me\nThe wide world over.\u201d\u2014This he said,\nAnd turning (not by chance) his head,\nBehind him saw another sage,\nWhom a like office did engage,\nWho followed with weak steps behind,\nSeeking, like him, a meal to find,\nBut who, with anxious quest and pain,\nTo gather up the leaves was fain,\nBy him rejected with disdain.\n\n Nor other lesson he would teach,\nThe Poet in his Persian speech,\nWho tells how through the desert he\nWas toiling once, how painfully!\nWhile his unsandalled naked feet\nWere scorched and blistered by the heat\nOf fiery sands\u2014and harsh and hard\nHe did his destiny regard;\nAnd evil thoughts did in him stir,\nThat he, a faithful worshipper,\nA pilgrim to God\u2019s holy fane,\nShould such necessities sustain.\nNor did a better mood succeed,\nWith glad endurance of his need,\nNor saw he what of sin was pent\nIn murmuring heart and malcontent,\nTill entering a low chapel, there\nOne prostrate on his face in prayer\nHe marked, and unto him espied\nNot shoes alone, but feet denied.\n\n\n\n\nLOVE.\n\n\nI.\n\nLove is it, Love divine, that hath an impulse lent\nTo man, and beast, and worm, and every element.\n\n\nII.\n\nAll riddles Love can solve, all mysteries unfold;\nAsk what thou wilt, and Love the answer will present.\n\n\nIII.\n\nI asked the circling heavens why they so swiftly moved:\nRound Love\u2019s eternal throne they ever wheeling went.\n\n\nIV.\n\nI asked the waves what made their murmurs never cease:\nShall we in Love\u2019s great hymn with silence be content?\n\n\nV.\n\nI asked the bickering fire when it would climb no more:\nWhen with the fire above in Love\u2019s communion blent.\n\n\nVI.\n\nNight asked I why she hung the world with darkness round:\nTo consecrate the world for Love a bridal tent.\n\n\nVII.\n\nI asked the Westwind why it breathed so soft and warm:\nAll roses to unfold for Love the Westwind meant.\n\n\nVIII.\n\nI sought for some escape from the labyrinth of Love;\nAnd found my bliss was there to be for ever pent.\n\n\nIX.\n\nO soul, that until now hast sullenly refused\nThy portion in Love\u2019s joy, O sullen heart, relent;\n\n\nX.\n\nOh! see Love\u2019s mighty dance, oh! hear its choral hymn;\nStand up\u2014in dance and hymn to take thy part consent.\n\n\n\n\nTHE FALCON.\n\n\nI.\n\nHigh didst thou once in honour stand,\nThe falcon on a Prince\u2019s hand:\n\n\nII.\n\nThine eye, unhooded and unsealed,\nAll depths of being pierced and scanned:\n\n\nIII.\n\nAll worlds of space, from end to end,\nThy never-wearied pinion spanned.\n\n\nIV.\n\nO falcon of the spiritual heaven\u2014\nEntangled in an earthly band,\n\n\nV.\n\nWhile all too eagerly thy prey\nPursuing in a lower land\u2014\n\n\nVI.\n\nIn hope abide;\u2014thy Monarch yet\nFor thy release shall give command,\n\n\nVII.\n\nAnd bid thee to resume again\nThy place upon thy Monarch\u2019s hand.\n\n\n\n\nLIFE THROUGH DEATH.\n\n\nI.\n\nA pagan King tormented fiercely all\nWho would not on his senseless idols call,\nNor worship them:\u2014and him were brought before,\nA mother and her child, with many more.\nThe child, fast bound, was flung into the flame,\nHer faith the mother did in fear disclaim:\nBut when she cried\u2014\u201cO sweetest! live as I,\u201d\nHe answered\u2014\u201cMother dear, I do not die;\nCome, mother, bliss of heaven is here my gain,\nAlthough I seem to you in fiery pain.\nThis fire serves only for your eyes to cheat,\nLike Jesus\u2019 breath of balm \u2019tis cool and sweet.\nCome\u2014learn what riches with our God are stored,\nAnd how he feeds me at the angelic board.\nCome, prove this fire\u2014like water-floods it cools,\nWhile your world\u2019s water burns like sulphur pools.\nCome\u2014Abraham\u2019s secret, when he found alone\nSweet roses in the furnace, here is known.\nInto a world of death thou barest me,\nO mother, death, not life, I owed to thee.\nFair world I deemed it once of glorious pride,\nTill in this furnace I was deified;\nBut now I know it for a dungeon-tomb,\nSince God has brought me into larger room.\nOh! now at length I live\u2014from my pure heaven\nEach cloud, that stained it once, away is driven:\nCome, mother, come, and with thee many bring;\nCry, \u2018Here is spread the banquet of the King;\u2019\nCome, all ye faithful\u2014come, and dare to prove\nThe bitter-sweet, the pain and bliss of love.\u201d\n\n So cried the child unto that crowd of men;\nAll hearts with fiery longings kindled then;\nTow\u00e0rd the pile they headlong rushing came,\nAnd soon their souls fed sweetly on the flame.\n\n\nII.\n\nA dew-drop falling on the wild sea wave,\nExclaimed in fear\u2014\u201cI perish in this grave;\u201d\nBut in a shell received, that drop of dew\nUnto a pearl of marvellous beauty grew;\nAnd, happy now, the grace did magnify\nWhich thrust it forth\u2014as it had feared, to die;\u2014\nUntil again, \u201cI perish quite,\u201d it said,\nTorn by rude diver from its ocean bed:\nO unbelieving!\u2014so it came to gleam\nChief jewel in a Monarch\u2019s diadem.\n\n\nIII.\n\nThe seed must die, before the corn appears\nOut of the ground, in blade and fruitful ears.\nLow must those ears by sickle\u2019s edge be lain,\nEre thou canst treasure up the golden grain.\nThe grain is crushed, before the bread is made,\nAnd the bread broke, ere life to man conveyed.\nOh! be content to die, to be laid low,\nAnd to be crushed, and to be broken so;\nIf thou upon God\u2019s table may\u2019st be bread,\nLife-giving food for souls an-hunger\u00e8d.\n\n\n\n\nTHE WORLD.\n\n\n\u201cO beauteous world! what features fair\nThine needs would show beyond compare,\nIf it were possible to find\nThy glories all in one combined!\nShow me, O Lord, the world\u2014the bright\nFair world reveal unto my sight.\u201d\n\n This prayer the youth had made, whose way\nSoon after through the desert lay,\nWhere he far off a woman spied,\nWandering, by none accompanied.\n\u201cWho art thou?\u201d he exclaimed.\u2014\u201cIn me\nSee her whom thou hast longed to see.\u201d\n\u2014\u201cWhat meanest thou?\u201d More plain reply\nThis time she made\u2014\u201cThe world am I.\u201d\n\u2014\u201cThen let me see thy countenance fair,\nWhich doth so many hearts ensnare.\u201d\nShe from her face the veil withdrew,\nAnd straight the hidden was in view,\nA visage painted all and bleared,\nWhere signs of lust and hate appeared:\nOne bloody hand she raised on high,\nCrooked was the other and awry.\n\u201cHow? what is this?\u201d he shuddering\nExclaimed\u2014\u201cWho art thou, loathsome thing?\u201d\n\u201cI with this bloody hand,\u201d she said,\n\u201cDo ever strike my lovers dead:\nThe other hand its shape has won\nWith beckoning yet more lovers on;\nThose ever hurl I forth with might,\nAnd these with flatteries I invite.\nEven I admire, while thus I show,\nI never lack of lovers know.\u201d\n\u2014\u201cBut tell me yet, how this may be,\nThat when such thousands wait on thee\nAlready, thou dost ever seek\nMore lovers still?\u201d She then did speak:\n\u201cThough these are thousands, never yet\nA man among them have I met;\nWho rightly bear of man the name,\nMy company avoid like shame;\nAnd thus remain I desolate,\nEven while on me such thousands wait.\u201d\n\n My brother, let her answer be\nDeep graven on thy memory:\nA man, my brother, wouldst thou prove,\nFar keep thee from this woman\u2019s love.\n\n\n\n\nTHE MONK AND SINNER.\n\n\nIn days of old, when holy Prophets trod\nThis earth, the living oracles of God,\nWhat time one such his mission did fulfil,\nThere lived a youth, a prodigy of ill:\nSo foul the tablets of his heart and black,\nThat Satan\u2019s self from them had started back.\nHim as the plague sought every soul to shun,\nAt him in horror pointed every one;\nAnd in the city, where this sinful youth\nAll bosoms filled with horror or with ruth,\nIn the same city dwelt a Monk as well,\nRound whom all crowded when he left his cell.\nGreat name for prayer and penance he had gained,\nAnd he one day that Prophet entertained:\nWhen in their sight this sinner did appear,\nWho yet for awe presumed not to draw near,\nBut falling back, like moth from stunning light,\nLay on the ground, as blinded by their sight.\nAnd as in spring relents the frozen ground,\nEven so it seemed as though his heart unbound,\nStreamed from his eyes like loosened floods the tears:\n\u201cWoe\u2019s me,\u201d he cried; \u201cfor thirty guilty years\u2014\nMy life\u2019s best treasure have I spent in vain,\nAnd death and hell are now my only gain.\nI totter on a dark chasm\u2019s dreadful brink,\nHell\u2019s jaws are yawning for me, and I sink:\nYet since none ever thou didst from thee cast,\nI stretch my hands to thee; Lord, hold them fast.\u201d\n\n But here the Monk with lifted eyebrows\u2014\u201cPeace,\nBlasphemer,\u2014from thy useless clamors cease:\nAnd darest thou, thus steeped in sin, make free\nWith him, God\u2019s holy Prophet, and with me?\nMy God, this one thing grant me, that I may\nStand far from this man on the judgment day.\u201d\u2014\nMore he had said, but on the Prophet broke\nSwift inspiration, and he straightway spoke:\n\u201cTwo here have prayed\u2014diverse has been their prayer,\nYet granted both their supplications are.\nHe who in mire of sin now thirty years\nHas rolled, forgiveness asks with many tears:\nNe\u2019er yet his head has contrite sinner lain\nUpon the threshold of God\u2019s throne in vain.\nAll he has sinned to him shall be forgiven,\nWhom God has chose a denizen of heaven.\nThat monk has prayed upon the other hand\nThat he may never near this sinner stand;\nThat this may be so, hell his place must be,\nWhere never more this sinner he shall see.\nWhose robe is white, but heart is black with pride,\nHe for himself hell\u2019s gate has opened wide,\nFor weighed in God the All-sufficient\u2019s scale,\nNot claims nor righteousness of man avail;\nBut these are costly in his sight indeed,\u2014\nRepentance, poverty, and sense of need.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nI.\n\nWhat, thou askest, is the heaven, and the round earth and the sea,\nAnd their dwellers, men and angels,\u2014if with God compared they be?\n\n\nII.\n\nHeaven and earth, and men and angels, all that anywhere is named,\nMatched with him, lose name and being, and to nothing shrink ashamed.\n\n\nIII.\n\nSo \u2019tis seen when this world\u2019s Sultan in his glory forth doth ride,\nHighest, lowest, beggars, Emirs, all alike their faces hide.\n\n\nIV.\n\nIts unnumbered billows rolling, great to thee the Ocean seems;\nGreat the Sun, from golden fountains pouring out a flood of beams:\n\n\nV.\n\nYet the faithful, God-enlightened, know another wonderland,\nWhere the Ocean is a dew-drop, and the Sun a grain of sand.\n\n\nVI.\n\nIn the forest\u2019s dark recesses hast thou marked the glow-worm\u2019s light,\nIn a green dell unbeholden, twinkling through the storm and night?\n\n\nVII.\n\nOnce a pilgrim said\u2014\u201cO gentle star, that shinest nightly, say,\nWhy dost thou appear not ever in the bright and sunny day?\u201d\n\n\nVIII.\n\nHear what then the gentle glow-worm answered from its mouth of fire,\u2014\n\u201cIn the gloomy forest shine I, but before the sun expire.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nTHE SUPPLIANT.\n\n\nAll night the lonely suppliant prayed,\nAll night his earnest crying made,\nTill standing by his side at morn,\nThe Tempter said in bitter scorn,\n\u201cOh! peace:\u2014what profit do you gain\nFrom empty words and babblings vain?\n\u2018Come, Lord\u2014oh, come!\u2019 you cry alway;\nYou pour your heart out night and day;\nYet still no murmur of reply,\u2014\nNo voice that answers, \u2018Here am I.\u2019\u201d\n\nThen sank that stricken heart in dust,\nThat word had withered all its trust;\nNo strength retained it now to pray,\nWhile Faith and Hope had fled away\nAnd ill that mourner now had fared,\nThus by the Tempter\u2019s art ensnared,\nBut that at length beside his bed\nHis sorrowing Angel stood, and said,\u2014\n\u201cDoth it repent thee of thy love,\nThat never now is heard above\nThy prayer, that now not any more\nIt knocks at heaven\u2019s gate as before?\u201d\n\n\u2014\u201cI am cast out\u2014I find no place,\nNo hearing at the throne of grace.\n\u2018Come, Lord\u2014oh, come!\u2019 I cry alway,\nI pour my heart out night and day,\nYet never until now have won\nThe answer,\u2014\u2018Here am I, my son.\u2019\u201d\n\n\u2014\u201cOh, dull of heart! enclosed doth lie,\nIn each \u2018Come, Lord,\u2019 an \u2018Here am I.\u2019\nThy love, thy longing, are not thine\u2014\nReflections of a love divine:\nThy very prayer to thee was given,\nItself a messenger from heaven.\nWhom God rejects, they are not so;\nStrong bands are round them in their woe;\nTheir hearts are bound with bands of brass,\nThat sigh or crying cannot pass.\nAll treasures did the Lord impart\nTo Pharaoh, save a contrite heart:\nAll other gifts unto his foes\nHe freely gives, nor grudging knows;\nBut Love\u2019s sweet smart, and costly pain,\nA treasure for his friends remain.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nTHE PANTHEIST;\n\nOR,\n\nTHE ORIGIN OF EVIL.\n\n\nOne who in subtle questions took delight\nCame running to my lodging late one night,\nAnd straight began:\u2014\u201cWilt thou affirm that sin\nHad in man\u2019s will its root and origin,\nWhen that will did itself from God proceed?\nWhate\u2019er then followed, he must have decreed.\nIf evil, then, be not against God\u2019s will,\n\u2019Tis wrongly named, it is not truly ill.\nRather the world a chess-board we should name,\nAnd God both sides is playing of the game:\nMoses and Pharaoh _seem_ opposed, for they\nDo thus God\u2019s greatness on two sides display;\nThey seem opposed, but at the root are one,\nAnd each his part allotted has well done;\nAnd that which men so blindly evil call,\nAnd hate and fear and shun, is, after all,\nOnly as those discordant notes whereby\nWell-skilled musicians heighten melody;\u2014\nBut as the dark ground cunning painters lay,\nTo bring the bright hues into clearer day:\n\u2019Tis good, as yet imperfect, incomplete\u2014\nFruit that is sour, while passing on to sweet.\u201d\n\n Then I, who knew the world had travelled o\u2019er\nThis line of thought a thousand times before,\nWould all debate have willingly put by,\nYet with this tale at last must make reply:\u2014\n\u201cThe head of Seid his comrade struck one day\u2014\nSeid meant the blow in earnest to repay;\nBut then the striker\u2014\u2018Pardon, friend, the blow\u2014\nI am inquiring, and two things would know:\nSee, when my hand did on your head alight,\nStraight various bruises there appeared in sight.\nNow, prithee, give me a reply to this,\nIf head or hand their ultimate cause is?\nAnd if you really do with them agree\nWho but in pain a lesser pleasure see?\u2019\nSeid then\u2014\u2018O fool! my agony is great,\nAnd think\u2019st thou I can idly speculate?\u2019\u201d\n\u201cThe same I say;\u2014let him display his skill\nOn the world\u2019s woe, who does not feel its ill;\nLet speculate the man who feels no pain,\nTo whom the world is all a pageant vain\u2014\nAn empty show, stretched out that he may sit,\nAnd crying \u2018Fie!\u2019 or \u2018Bravo!\u2019 show his wit.\nMe the deep feeling of its mighty woe\nRobs of all wish herein my skill to show;\nI only know that evil is no dream\u2014\nA thing that is, and does not merely seem:\nNor ask I now who open left the well,\nWhereinto, walking carelessly, I fell;\nNot how I stumbled in the well, but how\nI may get out, is all my question now.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nGHAZEL.\n\n\nI.\n\nWhat is the good man and the wise?\nOfttimes a pearl which none doth prize;\n\n\nII.\n\nOr jewel rare, which men account\nA common pebble, and despise.\n\n\nIII.\n\nSet forth upon the world\u2019s bazaar,\nIt mildly gleams, but no one buys,\n\n\nIV.\n\nTill it in anger Heaven withdraws\nFrom the world\u2019s undiscerning eyes:\n\n\nV.\n\nAnd in its shell the pearl again,\nAnd in its mine the jewel lies.\n\n\n\n\nTHE RIGHTEOUS OF THE WORLD.\n\n\nThe Rabbis, who devise strange dooms of wrath and ill,\nFor them who knew not here God\u2019s perfect law and will,\nYet these have told how they, as many as with true\nAnd faithful heart fulfilled and loved the good they knew,\nThe Righteous of the world shall once delivered be\nFrom darkness, and brought in God\u2019s countenance to see:\nWhich thing they thus recount:\u2014It shall befall one day\nIn those eternal courts where it is day alway,\nBefore him will the Just sit ranged in order meet,\nThe holy Angels all will stand upon their feet,\nAnd while they hymn the praise, the glory and the worth\nOf him who by a word created heaven and earth,\nWill ever high and higher be borne and swept along\nHeaven\u2019s azure-vaulted roofs the full concent of song:\nThen will that mighty voice of jubilee be heard,\nUntil from end to end the spacious world is stirred,\nUntil even those that lie excluded from his face,\nThe Righteous of the world who knew not of his grace\nAnd law, while living\u2014now will triumph in his name,\nAnd with their loud Amen will join the glad acclaim.\n\nThen he who knoweth all, yet purposing to show\nHis goodness, will demand from whence these voices grow.\nThe ministering angels then will answer and will say,\nThe while they veil for awe their faces\u2014\u201cThese are they\nWho did not know thy law while living, and for this\nThey lie in hell remote from glory and from bliss;\nThey cry Amen from thence.\u201d\u2014But he will of his grace\nCompassion take on them and on their mournful case,\nWill give the golden key from heaven\u2019s crystal floors,\nWhich opens with a touch hell\u2019s forty thousand doors,\nTo Michael, mighty prince:\u2014but he will fly amain,\nOn mercy\u2019s errand swift, with all the angelic train.\nHell\u2019s forty thousand gates will open at his word,\nIts narrow chambers deep with expectation stirred.\nAnd as a man draws up his neighbour from a pit,\nWhen he shall have therein through evil hap alit,\nThe prisoners he will draw from dungeons where they lay,\nAnd extricating lift from the deep and miry clay,\u2014\nWill wash and cleanse their wounds where they have plagu\u00e8d been,\nAnd clothe in garments white, and beautiful and clean;\nAnd taking by the hand, will lead them to the gate\nOf Paradise, where they must for a moment wait.\nTill there with leave brought in, they fall upon their face,\nAnd worship God, and praise and magnify his grace:\nWhile all that had before their places round the throne,\nWill give new thanks for this new mercy he has shown,\nAnd by new voices swelled, and higher and more strong,\nRing through the vaults of heaven the full concent of song.\n\n\n\n\nMAXIMS.\n\n\nI.\n\n\u201cWho truly strives?\u201d they asked.\u2014Then one replied,\n\u201cThe man who owns no other goal, beside\nThe throne of God, and till he there arrives\nAllows himself no rest, he truly strives.\u201d\n\n\nII.\n\nHonour each thing for that it once may be,\nIn bud the rose, in egg the chicken see:\nBright butterfly behold in hideous worm,\nAnd trust that man enfolds an angel form.\n\n\nIII.\n\nAye let humility thy garment be,\nWhich never suffer to be drawn from thee,\nAlthough a Chosroes\u2019 mantle in its stead\nBy Fortune\u2019s hand to thee were offer\u00e8d.\n\n\nIV.\n\nA pebble thrown into the mighty sea\nSinks and disturbs not its tranquillity\u2014\nNo ocean, but a shallow pool, the man,\nWhom every little wrong disquiet can.\n\n\nV.\n\nTHE TRUE FRIEND.\n\nHe is a friend who, treated as a foe,\nNow even more friendly than before doth show:\nWho to his brother still remains a shield,\nAlthough a sword for him his brother wield;\nWho of the very stones against him cast,\nBuilds friendship\u2019s altar higher and more fast.\n\n\nVI.\n\nPRIDE.\n\nWith needle\u2019s point more easily you will\nUproot and quite unfasten a huge hill,\nThan from the bosom you will dig up pride;\nAnd the ant\u2019s footfall sooner is descried,\nOn black earth moving in the darkest night,\nThan are pride\u2019s secret movements brought to light.\n\n\n\n\nTHE FALCON\u2019S REWARD.\n\n\nI.\n\nBeneath the fiery cope of middle day\n The youthful Prince, his train left all behind\nWith eager ken gazed round him every way,\n If springing well he anywhere might find.\n\n\nII.\n\nHis favourite falcon, from long a\u00ebry flight\n Returning, and from quarry struck at last,\nTold of the chase, which with its keen delight\n Had thus allured him on so far and fast,\u2014\n\n\nIII.\n\nTill gladly he had welcomed in his drought\n The dullest pool that gathered in the rain\u2014\nBut such, or fount of clearer wave, he sought\n Long through that land of barrenness in vain.\n\n\nIV.\n\nWhat pleasure when, slow stealing o\u2019er a rock,\n He spied the glittering of a little rill,\nWhich yet, as if his burning thirst to mock,\n Did its rare treasures drop by drop distil.\n\n\nV.\n\nA golden goblet from his saddle-bow\n He loosed, and from his steed alighted down,\nTo wait until that fountain, trickling slow,\n Shall in the end his golden goblet crown.\n\n\nVI.\n\nWhen set beside the promise of that draught,\n How poor had seemed to him the costliest wine,\nThat ever with its beaded bubbles laughed,\u2014\n When set beside that nectar more divine.\n\n\nVII.\n\nThe brimming vessel to his lips at last\n He raised, when, lo! the falcon on his hand,\nWith beak\u2019s and pinion\u2019s sudden impulse, cast\n That cup\u2019s rare treasure all upon the sand.\n\n\nVIII.\n\nLong was it ere that fountain, pulsing slow,\n Caused once again that chalice to run o\u2019er;\nWhen, thinking no like hindrance now to know,\n He raised it to his parch\u00e8d lips once more:\n\n\nIX.\n\nOnce more, as if to cross his purpose bent,\n The watchful bird,\u2014as if on this one thing,\nThat drink he should not of that stream, intent,\u2014\n Struck from his hand the cup with eager wing.\n\n\nX.\n\nBut when this new defeat his purpose found,\n Swift penalty this time the bird must pay;\nHurled down with angry force upon the ground,\n Before her master\u2019s feet in death she lay:\n\n\nXI.\n\nAnd he, twice baffled, did meanwhile again\n From that scant rill to slake his thirst prepare;\nWhen, down the crags descending, of his train\n One cried, \u201cO Monarch, for thy life forbear!\n\n\nXII.\n\n\u201cCoiled in these waters at their fountain head,\n And causing them so feebly to distil,\nA poisonous snake of hugest growth lies dead,\n And doth with venom all the streamlet fill.\u201d\n\n\nXIII.\n\nDropped from his hand the cup;\u2014one look he cast\n Upon the faithful bird before his feet,\nWhose dying struggles now were almost past,\n For whom a better guerdon had been meet;\n\n\nXIV.\n\nThen homeward rode in silence many a mile:\u2014\n But if such thoughts did in his bosom grow,\nAs did in mine the painfulness beguile\n Of that his falcon\u2019s end, what man can know?\n\n\nXV.\n\nI said, \u201cSuch chalices the world fills up\n For us, and bright and without bale they seem\u2014\nA sparkling potion in a jewelled cup,\n Nor know we drawn from what infected stream.\n\n\nXVI.\n\n\u201cOur spirit\u2019s thirst they promise to assuage,\n And we those cups unto our death had quaffed,\nIf Heaven did not in dearest love engage\n To dash the chalice down, and mar the draught.\n\n\nXVII.\n\n\u201cAlas for us, if we that love are fain\n With wrath and blind impatience to repay,\nWhich nothing but our weakness doth restrain,\u2014\n As he repaid his faithful bird that day;\n\n\nXVIII.\n\n\u201cIf an indignant eye we lift above,\n To lose some sparkling goblet ill content,\nWhich, but for that keen watchfulness of love,\n Swift certain poison through our veins had sent.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nTHE CONVERSION OF ABRAHAM.\n\n\nFond heart, when learnest thou to say,\nI love not pomps that fade away,\nNor glories that decay and wane,\nNor lights that rise to set again?\nWhen wilt thou turn where Abraham turned,\nAnd learn the lesson Abraham learned?\nBeyond the river while he dwelt,\nHe with his kin to idols knelt,\nAnd nightly gazing on the sky,\nWorshipped the starry host on high.\nBut when he saw their splendours fail,\nAnd that bright multitude grow pale,\nHe left them, and adored the moon;\nBut she too wanly wan\u00e8d soon.\nBaffled, he knelt unto the sun;\nBut when _his_ race of light was done,\nHe cried, \u201cTo such no vows I bring\u2014\nI worship not the perishing!\u201d\nAnd turned him to the God, whose hand\nMade sun, and moon, and starry band\u2014\nAn everlasting Light, in whom\nDecrease and shadow find no room.\n\n\n\n\nSONNET.\n\n\nWhat child of dust with glory was arrayed\nLike Solomon?\u2014his bidding, while he stood\nIn his obedience and first state of good,\nThe upper and the under worlds obeyed\u2014\nAll spirits, good and evil; yea, he made\nHell\u2019s concourse and involuntary brood\nDo drudging work for him\u2014hew stones, bring wood,\nAnd in the rearing of God\u2019s temple aid.\nBut when he fell from God, the self-same hour\nThey fell from him\u2014against him dared to turn,\nDefied his might, his ring, his seal of power;\nMade him the subject of their mock and scorn;\nWhile before them he now must crouch and cower,\nOf strength and wisdom, as of goodness, shorn.\n\n\n\n\nTHE DEAD DOG.\n\n\nFor the man whose heart and eye\nAre made wise by charity,\nSomething will appear always\nThat may have his honest praise;\nThere will glimmer points of light\nIn the darkest, saddest night.\nThus a crowd once gathered round\nThe dead carcase of an hound;\nFlung upon the open way,\nIn the market-place it lay;\nAnd the idle multitude,\nVulture-like, around it stood,\nOne exclaiming, \u201cI declare\nThat he poisons quite the air:\u201d\nBut the next, \u201cHe is not worth\nPains of putting under earth;\u201d\nAnd against the poor dead thing\nEach in turn his stone must fling:\nTill one wiser passing by,\nJust exclaimed, while eagerly\nThey were venting each his spite,\u2014\n\u201cSee his teeth, how pearly white!\u201d\nStraight the others, with self-blame,\nShrunk away in silent shame.\n\n\n\n\nI.\n\nFair vessel hast thou seen with honey filled,\n Which is no sooner opened, than descend\nUpon the clammy sweets by bees distilled\n A troop of flies, quick swarming without end?\n\n\nII.\n\nYet these when one doth fan away and beat,\n Such as had lighted with a fearful care\nOn the jar\u2019s edge, nor cumbered wings and feet,\n Lightly they mount into the upper air.\n\n\nIII.\n\nBut all that headlong plunged those sweets among,\n No flight is theirs, in cloying sweetness bound;\nThe heavy toils have all around them clung,\n In woful surfeiting their lives are drowned.\n\n\nIV.\n\nSuch vessel is this world\u2014fanned evermore\n By death\u2019s dark Angel with his mighty wing;\nThen all that had in pleasure\u2019s honied store\n Their spirits sunk, they upward cannot spring.\n\n\nV.\n\nOnly they mount who, on this vessel\u2019s side\n With heed alighting, had with extreme lip\nJust ventured, there while suffered to abide,\n Its sweets in measure and with fear to sip.\n\n\n\n\nFRAGMENTS.\n\n\nI.\n\nTHE CERTAINTY OF FAITH.\n\nWhat thou of God and of thyself dost know,\nSo know that none can force thee to forego;\nFor oh! his knowledge is a worthless art,\nWhich, while it forms not of himself a part,\nThe foremost man he meets with readier skill\nIn sleight of words, can rob him of at will.\nFaith feels not of _her_ lore more sure nor less,\nIf all the world deny it or confess:\nDid the whole world exclaim, \u201cLike Solomon,\nThou sittest high on Wisdom\u2019s noblest throne,\u201d\nShe would not, than before, be surer then,\nNor draw more courage from the assent of men.\nOr did the whole world cry, \u201cOh, fond and vain!\nWhat idle dream is this which haunts thy brain?\u201d\nTo the whole world Faith boldly would reply,\n\u201cThe whole world can, but I can never, lie.\u201d\n\n\nII.\n\nMAN\u2019S TWOFOLD NATURE.\n\nAn hen, though such tame creatures mostly are,\nYet once received a water-bird in care;\nIts mother-instinct drew the fledgling still\nTo the wide ocean floods to roam at will;\nIts timid nurse, upon the other hand,\nSought evermore to lead it back to land.\nO Man! thy mother, Heaven, thy nurse is Earth,\nAnd thou of both wert nurtured from thy birth;\nFrom thy true mother comes thine impulse free\nTo launch forth boldly upon being\u2019s sea;\nWhile aye thy nurse fears for thee, and would fain\nThee to a narrow slip of dry restrain.\n\n\nIII.\n\nSCIENCE AND LOVE.\n\nWho that might watch the moon in heaven, would look\nAt its weak image in the water-brook?\nWho were content, that might in presence stand\nOf one beloved, with letters from his hand?\nWhen thou hast learned the name, hast thou the thing?\nWhat life to thee will definitions bring?\nWill the four letters, R, O, S, and E,\nThe rose\u2019s hues and fragrance bring to thee?\nFeed not on husks, but these strip off and feed\nOn the rich kernel, which is food indeed.\nSay, who of choice would wash in arid sand,\nWhile limpid streams were bubbling close at hand?\nBare Science is dry sand;\u2014thy spirit\u2019s wings\nBathe thou in Love\u2019s delicious water-springs.\nBe thou the bee, which ever to its cell\nNot wax alone, but honey brings as well:\nGood is the wax for light, but better still\nWhat will thine hive with stor\u00e8d sweetness fill.\n\n\nIV.\n\nThe business of the world is child\u2019s play mere;\nToo many, ah! the children playing here:\nTheir pleasure and their woe, their loss and gain,\nAlike mean nothing, and alike are vain;\nAs children\u2019s, who, to pass the time away,\nBuild up their booths, and buy and sell in play;\nBut homeward hungering must at eve repair,\nAnd standing leave their booths with all their ware:\nSo the world\u2019s children, when _their_ night is come,\nWith empty satchels turn them sadly home.\n\n\nV.\n\nSage, that would\u2019st maker of thine own God be,\nWhen made, alas! what will he profit thee?\nMost like art thou to children that astride\nOn reeds or wooden horses proudly ride;\nAnd as they trail them on the ground, they cry,\n\u201cThis is the lightning, and its Lord am I!\u201d\nYet, while they deem their horses them upbear,\nThemselves the bearers of their horses are;\nAnd when they grow aweary of their course,\nThey find no strength in them, no help, no force.\nHow otherwise they fare\u2014how fresh, how strong,\nNot of themselves, but borne of God along!\nHow jubilant to him they lift their head,\nTill the ninth heaven shakes underneath their tread!\n\n\nVI.\n\nMan, the caged bird that owned an higher nest,\nIs here awhile detained, reluctant guest,\nWho beak and plumage shatters in his rage,\nAnd with his prison doth vain war engage:\nFor him the falcon watches, and his snare\nThe bloody fowler doth for him prepare.\nExiled from home, he here doth sadly sing,\nIn spring lacks autumn, and in autumn spring.\nFar from his nest, he shivers on a wall,\nWhere blows on him of rude misfortune fall\u2014\nHis head with weight of misery sore bowed down,\nHis pinion clogged with dust, his courage gone.\nThen from his nest in heaven is heard a cry,\nAnd straight he spreads his wings divine on high:\nLift him, O Lord, unto the Lotus tree,\nNo meaner pitch may with his birth agree;\nGrant him a pinion of such lofty flight,\nThat he may on the Lotus tree alight:\nIn thy bright palaces his nest prepare;\u2014\nOh, happy, happy bird that nesteth there!\n\n\n\n\nNOTES\n\nTO\n\nTHE POEMS FROM EASTERN SOURCES.\n\n\nPage 3.\n\nALEXANDER AT THE GATES OF PARADISE.\n\nSee Eisenmenger\u2019s \u201cEntdecktes Judenthum,\u201d v. ii. p. 321,\nwith whom I trust that my readers will not agree, for he has scarcely\npatience to finish this \u201cnarrische Talmudische Fabel,\u201d as he styles\nit. It reappears, slightly modified, in the Persian tradition, according\nto which Alexander, having conquered the world, determined\nto seek out the fountain of life. See the following note. In\nlike manner, in the Christian poems of the middle ages, Alexander\nis made to recognise at last the vanity and emptiness of all the\nglory which he has won, and is hardly turned from his purpose of\ngoing forth at last in search of the lost Paradise. See Rosenkranz\n\u201cGesch. d. Deutschen Poesie in Mittelalter,\u201d p. 367. Very\nnotable is this making of Alexander, and no other\u2014the man from\nwhom the confession comes, that the world has not that which\ncan truly satisfy man\u2019s spirit, but that he still yearns for something\nbeyond. It is like, in the Scripture, the same confession\ncoming from the lips of Solomon; for in each case the experiment\nhas been made under the most favourable circumstances: so that\nin one case, as in the other, it may be asked, \u201cWhat can the\nman do that cometh after the king?\u201d\n\n\nP. 11.\n\nCHIDHER\u2019S WELL.\n\nOf Chidher\u2019s Well, the Eastern \u03bb\u03bf\u03c5\u03c4\u03c1\u03bf\u03bd \u03c0\u03b1\u03bb\u03b9\u03b3\u03b3\u03b5\u03bd\u03b5\u03c3\u03b9\u03b1\u03c2, Von\nHammer, in his very interesting introduction to his \u201cHistory of\nPersian Poetry,\u201d gives a good account. Among other things\nhe says, \u201cCotemporary with Moses lived the Prophet Chiser, of\nwhom some hold that he is the same with Elias, while others\naltogether distinguish them. He is one of the chief personages of\nEastern Mythology, the ever-ready helper of the oppressed, the\nGenius of spring, the deliverer in peril, the admonisher of princes,\nthe avenger of unrighteousness, the guide through the wilderness\nof the world, and, finally, the ever-youthful guardian of the fountain\nof life. As such he revives the youth of men, and beasts,\nand plants, gives back lost beauty, and in spring arrays the dead\nearth with its fresh garments of green. His fountain bestows on\nwhosoever drinks it eternal beauty, youth, and wisdom. What\nwonder then that all mortals with burning desire seek it, though\nas yet not one, not even Alexander, the conqueror of the world,\nwho, in quest of it, undertook an expedition into the land of darkness,\nhas found it!\u201d Probably this, his journey through the land\nof darkness, is but a mythic form of his expedition through the\nLibyan desert to the temple of Jupiter Ammon.\n\nOn this poem I may observe, that it is the first of several in\nthe volume written with an arrangement of rhyme hardly familiar\nto the English reader, which yet is that of a great part, as I\nbelieve, of the lyric poetry of the East, and which may not, perhaps,\nbe unworthy of a place among us. According to the laws\nof the Ghazel,\u2014for poems in this metre are so entitled,\u2014the two\nfirst lines must rhyme, and then this rhyme repeats itself in the\nsecond line of each succeeding couplet, which is, in fact, a new\nstanza, till the end of the poem,\u2014the termination of the first line\nin each of these following couplets being left free. This single\nrule of the one repeated rhyme being observed, the Ghazel admits\notherwise of the greatest possible variety; it may be composed, as\nis this present, in short trochaics, in longer or shorter iambics, or,\nin fact, in lines of whatsoever length or arrangement of syllables\nthe poet will. In Germany, the Ghazel has been perfectly\ndomesticated. R\u00fcckert and Count Platen are, I believe, considered\nto have cultivated it with the greatest success.\n\n\nP. 14.\n\nTHE BANISHED KINGS.\n\nSee R\u00fckert\u2019s \u201cBrahmanische Erz\u00e4hlungen,\u201d p. 5. I am not\naware whether the Parable is of his own constructing, or whether\nit be, as the name of the volume would intimate, derived from an\nIndian source.\n\n\nP. 20.\n\nTHE SPILT PEARLS.\n\nThis story is from the Bustan of Saadi. See Tholuck\u2019s\n\u201cBl\u00fcthensammlung aus der Morgenl\u00e4ndischen Mystik,\u201d p. 239.\nWith the moral of this story we may compare the memorable\nwords of St. Bernard, when of God he says, \u201cIpse retributor, ipse\nretributio nostra, nec jam aliud quam ipsum expectamus ab ipso.\u201d\n\n\nP. 24.\n\nTHE BARMECIDES.\n\nThe anecdote on which this poem is founded is related by Sylvestre\nde Sacy in his \u201cChrestomathie Arabe,\u201d v. ii. See also\nD\u2019Herbelot\u2019s \u201cBibliotheque Orientale,\u201d s. v. Barmekian. For\nthe sake of those who are as ignorant as myself of the Eastern\nlanguages I would remark, that \u201cAl Raschid\u201d is a title signifying\nThe Just.\n\n\nP. 35.\n\nTHE FESTIVAL.\n\nThis story also is to be found in the \u201cChrestomathie Arabe\u201d\n(v. ii. p. 3) of Sylvestre de Sacy.\n\n\nP. 41.\n\nTHE EASTERN NARCISSUS.\n\nIn the attempt made by the Neo-Platonists to put a new life\ninto the old Grecian Mythology, Narcissus falling in love with his\nown image in the water-brook was made the symbol of man casting\nhimself forth into the world of shows and appearances, and expecting\nto find the good that would answer to his nature there, but indeed\nfinding nothing but disappointment and death.\u2014The fable is\nFeridoddin Attar\u2019s, who, born in 1216, perished in the invasion\nof Dschengischan at the beginning of the next century. The\naccount of the manner in which he was converted to the life of\ncontemplative piety is remarkable. He was originally a rich merchant\nof spices. A pious dervisch entered his warehouse and craved\nan alms. Ferid bade him to be gone. The dervisch answered,\n\u201cThat can I do easily, for I possess nothing save my hood; but\nthou, with so many heavy sacks, how wilt thou contrive to be gone\nwhen the hour of thy departure has arrived?\u201d These words made\nso deep an impression on Ferid, that, from that moment, he gave\nup his worldly strivings, and dedicated himself to the spiritual\nlife.\n\n\nP. 55.\n\nMOSES AND JETHRO.\n\nThis story is one among the many remarkable extracts which\nTholuck, in his \u201cBl\u00fcthensammlung aus d. Morg. Myst.,\u201d has\ngiven (p. 128) from the poems of the chief of the mystical writers\nof Persia, Dschelaleddin Rumi. In his treating of the subject,\nhowever, that indifference to all positive religion, and all fixed\nforms and outlines of truth, which is the very essence of the\nMystic, comes so strongly out, that I have been obliged to write\nthe story anew, seeking to bring out that which is really its valuable\npart\u2014that truth which a great Christian writer expressed when\nhe said, \u201cS\u00e6pe amor intrat, ubi scientia foris stat.\u201d\n\n\nP. 64.\n\n_The good that one man flings aside._\n\nI must acknowledge that I have only assumed from internal\nevidence, that this story of the Sage gathering herbs is of Eastern\norigin, owing it myself to Calderon, who introduces it in his famous\ndrama, \u201cLa Vida es Sue\u00f1o.\u201d The second incident of the rebuke\nwhich the pilgrim through the desert met with for his unthankfulness\nand discontent is related by Saadi in his \u201cRosarium,\u201d and\nhe tells it as having come upon himself.\n\n\nP. 71.\n\nLIFE THROUGH DEATH.\n\nSee Tholuck\u2019s \u201cBl\u00fcthensammlung &c.\u201d p. 69. There can be no\ndoubt that the poet has a deeper meaning than lies on the surface:\nthe furnace is that of self-denial, which the natural man thinks will\nbe death, but which, if he dares to prove, he finds to be life. Being\nwilling to lose his life, he finds it.\n\nIn relation to v. 12, it may be needful to observe, that the\nMahomedans believe it was in the breath of Christ that the\nhealing virtue lay, by which his miraculous cures were effected.\nIt is a tradition alike Jewish and Mahomedan, that Abraham was\nflung into the furnace by Nimrod, for refusing to worship his\nfalse gods; whereupon the flames, instead of scorching and consuming,\nwere turned for him into a bed of jasmine and roses.\n\n\nP. 74.\n\n_The seed must die, before the corn appears._\n\nCompare John xii. 24, \u201cExcept a corn of wheat fall into the\nground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth\nmuch fruit.\u201d\n\n\nP. 75.\n\nTHE WORLD.\n\nSee Von Hammer\u2019s \u201cGesch. d. sch\u00f6nen Redekunst Persiens,\u201d\np. 236.\n\n\nP. 78.\n\nTHE MONK AND SINNER.\n\nIt is difficult not to be struck with the deep moral resemblance\nwhich this story of Saadi\u2019s bears to that related by St. Luke,\nch. vii. 36-50. We have here reproduced to us the Pharisee\nand the woman that was a sinner, and all the deep relations of law\nand grace; and a reference to the original, or at least _my_ original,\nin Tholuck\u2019s \u201cBl\u00fcthensammlung &c.,\u201d p. 251, will prove that\nI have not sought to throw upon it any colouring which it did\nnot in itself already possess.\n\n\nP. 81.\n\n_What, thou askest, is the heaven_, &c.\n\nSee Tholuck\u2019s \u201cBl\u00fcthensammlung &c.,\u201d p. 243.\n\n\nP. 84.\n\nTHE SUPPLIANT.\n\nSee the same, p. 84. Even in the same spirit Augustine gives\nthe reason why no true prayer can be unheard by God:\u2014\u201cquoniam\nad ipsum redit, quod ab ipso processit.\u201d\n\n\nP. 87.\n\nTHE PANTHEIST.\n\nThe doctrine of evil as not indeed evil, but only an inferior\nkind of good, to which the Pantheist is of necessity driven, is\nwrought out with great skill and frequency by the Eastern Mystics\u2014often\ncomes out in their writings in its most offensive shapes.\nIt is curious to notice how completely they have anticipated this\nview, which continually reappears in the philosophical systems of\nour own day, and is in them brought forward as some mighty discovery,\nas a key to all the perplexities of the actual world. See\nTholuck\u2019s \u201cSaufismus,\u201d p. 255, seq., and \u201cBl\u00fcthensammlung\n&c.,\u201d pp. 133, 145.\n\n\nP. 91.\n\nTHE RIGHTEOUS OF THE WORLD.\n\nSee Eisenmenger\u2019s \u201cEntdeckt. Judenthum,\u201d v. ii. p. 362.\n\n\nP. 96.\n\nTHE FALCON\u2019S REWARD.\n\nThis story, at its root so similar to that of Beth Gellert, is told\nin the \u201cCalila and Dimna,\u201d and I believe is to be found in many\nother quarters.\n\n\nP. 101.\n\nTHE CONVERSION OF ABRAHAM.\n\nSee D\u2019Herbelot\u2019s \u201cBiblioth. Orient.\u201d s. v. Abraham.\n\n\nP. 103.\n\nSONNET.\n\nSee Eisenmenger\u2019s \u201cEntdeckt. Judenthum,\u201d v. i. p. 355.\n\n\nP. 104.\n\nTHE DEAD DOG.\n\nSee Von Hammer\u2019s \u201cGesch. d. sch\u00f6n. Redek. Persiens,\u201d p. 108.\n\n\nP. 106.\n\n_Fair vessel hast thou seen with honey filled._\n\nThis poem is also from the \u201cCalila and Dimna.\u201d With the\nmain thought of it we may compare the beautiful lines of Prudentius:\u2014\n\n\u201cHaud secus ac si olim per sudum lactea forte\nLapsa columbarum nubes descendat in arvum\nRuris frugiferi, laqueos ubi callidus auceps\nPr\u00e6tendit, lentoque illevit vimina visco;\nSparsit et insidias siliquis vel farre doloso.\nIlliciunt alias fallentia grana, gulamque\nInnectunt avidam tort\u00e6 retinacula set\u00e6,\nMolle vel implicitas gluten circumligat alas:\nAst ali\u00e6, quas nullus amor pr\u00e6lectat edendi,\nGressibus innocuis sterili spatiantur in herba,\nSuspectamque cavent oculos convertere ad escam.\nMox ubi jam c\u0153lo revolandum, pars petit \u00e6thram\nLibera sideream, plaudens super a\u00ebra pennis;\nPars captiva jacet, laceris et saucia plumis\nPugnat humi, et volucres nequicquam suspicit auras,\nSic animas,\u201d &c.\n\n\nP. 113.\n\n_Man, the caged bird that owned an higher nest._\n\nSee Von Hammer\u2019s \u201cGesch. d. sch\u00f6n. Redek. Persiens,\u201d p. 389.\n\n\n\n\nTHE STEADFAST PRINCE.\n\n\n\n\nNOTE.\n\n\nThe subject of the following Poem was first suggested to me by\nCalderon\u2019s noble drama, \u201cEl Principe Constante,\u201d accessible not\nonly to the Spanish, but, through Schlegel\u2019s admirable translation,\nto the German scholar also: from it also I have derived the\nname. I am, however, much more indebted to a Life of the\nPrince, published at Berlin, 1827, which gives many original\ndocuments connected with the unfortunate expedition to Africa,\nand actual details of the captivity, and sufferings, and death of the\nPrince;\u2014a little volume which strikingly exemplifies how far\nricher and deeper will oftentimes be the simple truth than any\nfiction, since all that even so great a poet as Calderon has imagined\nfor the casting a glory round his Christian hero is weak and\npoor compared with the simple reality;\u2014which, however, I may\nadd, I have not so strictly followed but that I have felt myself at\nliberty to alter and modify the details as best suited my purpose.\n\nIt may be of interest to the English reader to know how much\nof English blood was in the veins of the Prince:\u2014his mother,\nPhilippa, who married John the First of Portugal, was sister to\nour fourth Henry.\n\n\n\n\nTHE STEADFAST PRINCE.\n\nOnly the best composed and worthiest hearts\nGod sets to act the hard\u2019st and constant\u2019st parts.\u2014DANIEL.\n\n\nPART I.\n\nI.\n\nOf all the princes that in lofty place\nWith lowly virtues did adorn\u00e8d stand,\nWhom better did these lowly virtues grace\nThan all their worldly state, might none demand\nA nobler mead of praise than Ferdinand,\nBrother of him, whose sceptre ruled of old\nWhere Tagus pours its waves o\u2019er sands of gold.\n\nII.\n\nHis was no higher gladness than to tend\nThe poor, the needy, whom uncomforted\nNot ever from his portals he would send,\nWhom sick he watched beside contagious bed,\nAnd whom an-hungered his large bounty fed;\nWhile loving words made ever doubly prized\nThe gracious acts which he for all devised.\n\nIII.\n\nAnd only was he rigid and severe\nWith his own self, his weak frame chastening still\nWith long-drawn fasts and discipline austere,\nWith vigils which the long night-watches fill:\nYet leaving not to seek all knightly skill\nIn lists of arms, arrayed in knightly weeds,\nAgainst some coming day of martial deeds.\n\nIV.\n\nFor like a clear flame in his bosom burned,\nAs on an holy altar, fiery zeal,\nThough not for meeds of earthly fame he yearned,\nNor willingly for these had bared his steel;\nBut greatly longed some land that now did feel\nThe yoke of misbelieving men, once more\nTo his Redeemer\u2019s kingdoms to restore.\n\nV.\n\nHe, long confined unto unwelcome ease,\nTo see renewed his Father\u2019s glories yearned,\nWho with two hundred vessels crossed the seas,\nAnd for himself a noble title earned,\nAs first, who to the infidels returned\nThe wrongs they wrought on Spain, and with high hand\nMade Ceuta his, the key of all their land.\n\nVI.\n\nOh day, when many a heart beat high and fast,\nWhen his exultingly did bound and leap,\nFor that despaired of long was come at last,\u2014\nOnce more a gallant host was on the deep,\nAnd every vessel did its due course keep\nFor Afric, and at each prow unconfined\nA Red-cross banner floated on the wind.\n\nVII.\n\nFar off, that fleet might seem a wandering troop\nOf huge sea-monsters gambolling at will\nUpon the topmost surge\u2014or clouds that stoop\nAnd lean on Ocean\u2019s breast, themselves to fill\nWith water, which they back in rain distil,\nOr flock of snow-white sea-birds, that expand\nHuge never-wearied pinions, far from land.\n\nVIII.\n\nOr now he might that goodly sight compare,\nWho saw it from afar, to forest vast\nIn motion, that did all its pines upbear\u2014\nThey tossing their tall heads, as every mast\nNow rose, now yielded to the unsteady blast;\nOr now had deemed them, proudly thus advancing,\nA city on the inconstant billows dancing.\n\nIX.\n\nOh joy, when they by tempests unassailed\nSet their firm feet upon the Libyan shore,\nWhile loud and clear the holy hymn prevailed,\nWhich ofttimes heard in Palestine before,\u2014\n\u201cThe standards of the King advance,\u201d\u2014once more\nFilled now the air, and seemed the prelude high\nOf near success and certain victory.\n\nX.\n\n\u2014Long were it and a mournful task to tell\nHow this fair dawn of triumph was defaced\nWith wrack of envious clouds, and how befell,\nAnd by whose fault that with untimely haste\nThey were entangled in the desert waste;\nWherein they deeper day by day were led,\nStill thinking that the foe before them fled:\n\nXI.\n\nTill when the scorching heat of Afric\u2019s sun,\nWith alternating dews of chilly night,\nAnd pain and travail had their office done,\nAnd theirs already was an evil plight,\nA dawning morning showed them every height\nCrowned with innumerous hosts, that hemmed their way,\nThen rushed to seize an unresisting prey.\n\nXII.\n\nYet did not then that instant peril tame\nThe courage of that high heroic band:\nThe bold Crusaders, worthy that high name,\nWith dauntless front from morn to evening stand;\nAlthough when darkness did at length command\nBrief truce from arms, the boldest needs must own\nThat to retrace their steps remained alone.\n\nXIII.\n\nBack to their ships they wound in sad retreat,\nEnveloped ever in a fiery cloud\nOf dust and burning sand, which by their feet\nStirred, hung around them like a dismal shroud:\nAnd choked by agony of thirst, they crowd\nRound scanty desert wells, and thence in vain\nStrive to assuage their fierce and torturing pain.\n\nXIV.\n\nThe hopes of triumph now had quite departed,\nBut an austerer glory still remained,\u2014\nStill to abide mid failing hearts high-hearted;\nAnd though the light that lit their path had waned,\nAnd by no hope of victory sustained,\nStill to do well, what still was to be done;\u2014\nThe Prince amid defeat this glory won.\n\nXV.\n\nBut ever as they drew the shore more near,\nAnd as each ship received its willing freight,\nThe Moorish squadrons on their feeble rear\nAnd their diminishing ranks with added weight,\nWith louder cries and more tumultuous hate\nThronged, pressing on more fiercely and more fast:\nHe who had been the first, was now the last.\n\nXVI.\n\nHe fain the last would quit the hostile shore,\nWho leaped the foremost on its fatal strand:\nAround him throng the Moors, behind, before:\nOf those true-hearted that beside him stand\nSome fall in death\u2014the noble Ferdinand,\n(Skill courage and despair alike in vain,)\nIn the foe\u2019s hands a captive must remain.\n\nXVII.\n\n\u2014\u201cNot in ignoble bondage, nor for long,\nIf Christian hearts can worth or valour prize,\nO gallant Prince, shalt thou endure this wrong,\nThis unbeseeming yoke, which on thee lies;\u201d\nWith such well-sounding gentle courtesies\nThe Mauritanian king him greeted fair,\nWhen of his prisoner\u2019s high estate aware.\n\nXVIII.\n\n\u201cTo-morrow a swift ship shall cleave the main,\nBearing this message to the Tagus\u2019 shore,\nThat freedom shall to thee be given again,\nIf Ceuta will thy brother hold no more,\nBut unto us its rightful lords restore;\nThis for a brother will not be denied;\nMeanwhile with me, my guest thou shalt abide.\u201d\n\nXIX.\n\nFrank recognition of his grace the Prince\nRendered again\u2014yet did not, when he heard\nOf that so near deliverance, joy evince,\nNor of that ransom answered he a word:\nOnly it seemed some thought within him stirred,\nThat some large thought was stirring in his breast,\nWhich he had well-nigh spoke and then represt.\n\nXX.\n\nBut now there waned not many moons, before\nBy favouring breezes wafted o\u2019er the sea\nThey came, the prompt embassadors that bore\nLarge powers to set the princely captive free;\nWhom at this cost did ransom willingly\nHis loving brother, and did only yearn\nThat he should hasten his desired return.\n\nXXI.\n\nAnd all seemed finished now, when \u201cHear me,\u201d cried\nThe Prince\u2014\u201cHear _me_, although a captive thrall;\nYe know that if my brother childless died,\nMine would be then the throne of Portugal:\nWhile this is so, no power has he at all\nAught of its state to alienate or lose,\nUnless with my consent, which I refuse.\n\nXXII.\n\n\u201cShall that fair city, on whose walls my Sire\nWith his own hands first planted the five shields\nOf Portugal\u2014shall Ceuta, glorious hire\nOf labours long on stormy battle-fields,\nWhich o\u2019er this land such broad dominion wields,\nBe in a moment bartered for one poor\nAnd worthless life? who would such thought endure?\n\nXXIII.\n\n\u201cIts golden crosses glittering in the air,\nShall they give place to crescents foul and pale?\nAnd for glad bells that call to Christian prayer,\nThe muezzin\u2019s melancholy voice prevail,\nBidding to impious rites? and at the tail\nOf horses shall our images divine\nBe dragged?\u2014to stables turned each sacred shrine?\n\nXXIV.\n\n\u201cNo\u2014rather if just ransom thou for me,\nSuch as a faithful man can pay, refuse,\nAnd for my partners in captivity,\u2014\nFor I not any liberty will use,\nIn which they share not,\u2014then I rather choose\nOf this poor life whatever may remain,\nTill death release, to spend in captive pain.\u201d\n\nXXV.\n\nMore he had said, but him the Moorish king\nNot suffered to proceed\u2014\u201cAnd dost thou ween\nTo find captivity that easy thing,\nWhich by my grace it hitherto has been?\nWhile thou in me this grace hast only seen,\nWithout thine harm thou thinkest to despoil\nUs of the just reward of all our toil.\n\nXXVI.\n\n\u201cOh fool, to think I have no power nor will\nTo make thy bondage bitter unto thee\u2014\nThat I with gall and wormwood cannot fill\nBrimming the cup of thy captivity!\nThou art my slave\u2014a slave\u2019s lot thine shall be,\nLabour and pains\u2014and harder to be borne,\nInsult and ignominy, stripes and scorn.\n\nXXVII.\n\n\u201cBut when sore laden with thy shameful task,\nOf thy long bondage thou shalt weary be,\nAnd when mid basest labours thou shalt ask\nFor pity, ask it of thyself\u2014not me:\nFor thou dost in thine own hands hold the key\nOf thine own prison\u2014yield to me that place,\nElse shalt thou vainly crave the poorest grace.\n\nXXVIII.\n\n\u201cAnd ye, that did your bootless message bring,\nGo back and say what sight these lands afford\u2014\nA Christian prince, the brother of your king,\nTending the horses of his Moorish lord.\nCome and redeem him with the spear and sword,\nIf ye are willing once again to try\nThe welcome of our Moslem chivalry.\u201d\n\nXXIX.\n\nBy this from off his shoulders rudest men\nHad torn his decent robes, and garmented\nIn prison-dress of coarsest serge, and then\nHim to his task dishonourable led,\nHe nought resisting\u2014only this he said,\n\u201cIf that herein there be dishonour, thine\nIs the dishonour and the shame, not mine.\u201d\n\nXXX.\n\nAnd his companions each and all were borne\nOne way or other to some servile toil,\nMid blows and curses and tumultuous scorn,\u2014\nWhom all were free to buffet and to spoil,\nUntil they wet that cruel Afric soil\nWith mingled blood and tears, and scarcely thought\nThey would with life to that day\u2019s end be brought:\n\nXXXI.\n\nSo that when they were thrust in harshest wise\nInto a noisome vault at that day\u2019s close,\nThat noisome vault appeared a paradise,\nBecause it gave some shelter from the blows,\nThe taunts and insults of their cruel foes\u2014\nBecause its bars and iron-strengthened gate\nRose strong between them and that clamorous hate.\n\nXXXII.\n\nBut when there lacked not of their number one,\nThe Prince so joyed, as though he found reward\nFor all the suffering he that day had known:\nYet when a light permitted to regard\nTheir garments rent, swoln hands, and faces marred,\nHe, strong before all weakness to restrain,\nNot any longer might from tears refrain.\n\nXXXIII.\n\n\u2014\u201cDear friends, that I have dragged you down with me\nInto this gulf of woe, this makes my smart,\nThat of this suffering and captivity\nI may not for myself claim every part:\nOh this it is that causes my weak heart\nTo die within me;\u2014tell me you forgive\nOnly this wrong, and I again shall live.\u201d\n\nXXXIV.\n\nNothing they spake\u2014but of that faithful band\nOne after other rising from his place\nDrew near, and knelt and kissed the Prince\u2019s hand,\nAs though that hand dispersed all gifts and grace:\nHe raised and wound them in a strict embrace\nOne after other\u2014\u201cBrothers of my heart,\nHenceforth for good or ill we never part.\u201d\n\nXXXV.\n\n\u2014\u201cOh wish us not then any more away,\nOur dear, dear Lord\u2014nor grudge to us our share\nIn this high suffering\u201d\u2014so they all did say\u2014\n\u201cWhat could we wish more goodly or more fair,\nThan that when men hereafter shall declare\nThy noble acts, that they should then as well\nOf us thy servants and true comrades tell?\u201d\n\nXXXVI.\n\nBut he to them\u2014\u201cWe know not what shall be,\nNor whither these things tend\u2014if that we bore\nTo-day of outrage and indignity\nBe but the first and least, and far, far more\u2014\nYea, mortal suffering be for us in store;\nOr if, when God awhile our faith has proved,\nAll suffering shall from us be then removed.\n\nXXXVII.\n\n\u201cBut He who knoweth that we hither came\nNot in the lust of spoil, nor heat of pride,\nNor with the hope to win ourselves a name,\nBut the dear faith of Christ to spread more wide,\nCan give us strength in patience to abide,\nTill one way or another grief has end;\nThen let us unto him our cause commend.\u201d\n\nXXXVIII.\n\nWhat of the night remained, when thus the smart\nOf their new bleeding wounds had been allayed\nWith the sweet balm of loving words, in part\nWas spent in holy prayer; they knelt and made\nTheir supplications unto God for aid;\nAnd then they did their weary eyelids close\nIn blest oblivion of all earthly woes.\n\nXXXIX.\n\nIn dreams they wandered by familiar places\nIn their own land, unto their childhood dear;\nAnd some were locked in loving, fond embraces,\nAnd sweet the voices of their home and clear\nCame to them;\u2014pain was gone, and doubt and fear;\nAnd all the dreary and the dread Between\nWas gone, like aught which had not ever been.\n\nXL.\n\nWhat happy dreams, blest visions without number\nWere scattered by their rude tormentors\u2019 tone,\nSnapping in twain the golden links of slumber!\nThen each poor captive staggering rose, as one\nFrom off whose heart there had been rolled a stone\nA little moment\u2014to return again\nWith added weight, a sense of hopeless pain.\n\nXLI.\n\nAnd this their mournful life continued long\nWithout a change, unless when some new day\nBrought with it some new insult or new wrong,\nSharp taunt or scorn, which they might not gainsay\nNor seem to feel; which, if one did repay\nWith but an angry look, he then would find\nThat there was worse and keener wrong behind.\n\nXLII.\n\nBut, oh! what gladness was it when they met,\nThe long day\u2019s miserable task-work o\u2019er,\nIn their dank vault, and shared the black bread set,\nWith water from the pools drawn, them before!\nThen made they of that coarse and scanty store\nA glorious meal, while love makes all things sweet,\nAnd it is always joy, when brethren meet.\n\nXLIII.\n\nYet oft the wantonness of fell despite\nWould grudge them this poor respite of their woes;\nAnd then harsh voices in the middle night,\nJust as their leaden eyelids \u2019gan to close,\nAnd their tired limbs were sinking to repose,\nWould bid them forth, and task them to renew\nThe past day\u2019s work, or merely to undo.\n\nXLIV.\n\nYet amid all still kept his constant mind,\nNot to be wearied out by toil or pain,\nOr all which malice could of outrage find,\nThe steadfast Prince; on him were spent in vain\nAll shafts of malice\u2014able to sustain\nNot his own heart alone, but aye to speak\nStrength to the fainting, courage to the weak.\n\nXLV.\n\nYet if they cursed their foes, or wished them dead,\nWith gentle words, but firm, he would put down\nSuch evil thoughts:\u2014\u201cShall we be anger\u00e8d\nWith them that help us to a martyr\u2019s crown?\nShall we not rather our tormentors own\nAs scourges with which God doth scourge our sin,\nAnd far unhappier than are we therein?\n\nXLVI.\n\n\u201cYour curses cannot harm them, but can make\nOf your own hearts a hell instead of heaven;\nIts healing virtue from affliction take,\nAnd mar all gracious ends for which \u2019twas given.\nWith mortal men ye gloriously have striven;\nAn harder task remains you\u2014to oppose\nRevenge, and scorn, and hate, far deadlier foes.\u201d\n\nXLVII.\n\nYet once, what time the others sleeping lay,\nTo one, an aged and faithful servant true,\nWho, though he \u2019scaped that last disastrous day,\nYet when his lord\u2019s captivity he knew,\nTo share his bondage and his sufferings flew,\u2014\nHe once unto this faithful servant old\nMore of his inmost bosom did unfold:\n\nXLVIII.\n\n\u201cTo these, my poor companions, seem I strong,\nAnd at some times such am I, as a rock\nThat has upstood in middle ocean long,\nAnd braved the winds\u2019 and waters\u2019 angriest shock,\nCounting their fury but an idle mock;\nYet sometimes weaker than the weakest wave\nThat dies about its base, when storms forget to rave.\n\nXLIX.\n\n\u201cI from my God such strength have sometimes won,\nThat all the dark, dark future I am bold\nTo face;\u2014but, oh! far otherwise anon,\nWhen my heart sinks and sinks to depths untold,\nTill Being seems no deeper depth to hold,\nUnfathomed by the line of my despair;\nAnd with my spirit so it now doth fare.\n\nL.\n\n\u201cO God, that I had fall\u2019n with them who fell\nIn that disastrous conflict by Tangiers!\nOh happy you, my brethren, ending well!\nOh, not to be lamented with such tears\nAs we, condemned to waste inglorious years\nIn this captivity, which shall extend,\nWithout release, unto life\u2019s utmost end!\n\nLI.\n\n\u201cYet is not here the answer to my prayer?\nFor I remember when upon my nod\nMen waited, and the world did speak me fair,\nThen thinking on my Saviour and my God,\nAnd on the thorny path of life he trod\nWith bleeding feet, deep shame possessed my heart,\nThat I should in his sufferings bear no part.\n\nLII.\n\n\u201cAnd then in secret prayed I earnestly\nThat I might to some likeness with my Lord\nBe brought\u2014not courted, praised, and honoured be,\nWhile he was scorned, and buffeted, and gored\nWith cruel wounds:\u2014I knew my prayer was heard,\nThough on what side affliction would appear,\nI strove in vain to guess;\u2014now all is clear.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nTHE STEADFAST PRINCE.\n\n\nPART II.\n\nI.\n\nWhat man shall say that he the deepest deep\nHas reached, whereto misfortune may him bring?\nThat never from her fatal urn may leap\nA lot inscribed with heavier suffering\nThan that he knows? that now of everything\nWhich sweetens life, his life is stript so bare,\nThat worse with him henceforth it cannot fare?\n\nII.\n\nNot he, who had been hurled with impulse rude\nDown from the honourable high estate\nWherein observed and reverenced once he stood;\nHe yet must be misfortune\u2019s trustier mate\u2014\nMust lie exposed to keener shafts of fate:\nHe, knowing much of ill, must find that more,\nBitterer and sharper, is for him in store.\n\nIII.\n\nFor now his foes, by malice partly moved,\nBecause they saw it solaced him to share\nAll griefs and labours which the others proved;\nAnd how that all, though oft they threatened were,\nAnd punished for their deed, yet still would bear\nTo him all reverence and respect, and bring\nHomage to him as to a crown\u00e8d king;\u2014\n\nIV.\n\nAnd partly, for they dreaded lest his frame,\nWhich had been ever tender, weak, and frail,\nAnd evidently weaker now became\nWith each succeeding day, should wholly fail,\nNor longer to sustain itself avail;\u2014\nLest it should sink beneath its cruel toil,\nAnd them of all their promised gain despoil,\u2014\n\nV.\n\nThey now denied him the sad liberty\nTo share whatever pains the others knew:\nShut in a narrow dungeon must he lie,\nShut from their fellowship and service true;\nThere he his resolution high may rue,\nIf ever ruth on high and noble deeds,\nWhatever consequence they bring, succeeds.\n\nVI.\n\nOh dreary months! months growing into years,\nWhich o\u2019er their heads, bringing no respite, past;\nAnd they must mingle still their drink with tears,\nWhile fell upon them thicker and more fast\nThe shafts of anguish;\u2014yet for him at last,\nThe noblest sufferer of this suffering band,\nThe hour of his deliverance was at hand.\n\nVII.\n\nFor once, when they as usual passed before\nHis vault, and softly called him, no reply\nMight they obtain;\u2014but listening at the door,\nThey only heard him breathing heavily,\nAnd caught at intervals a long-drawn sigh;\nTill, more times called, he faintly did desire\nWho called to know, and what they might require.\n\nVIII.\n\n\u2014\u201cOh! fares it, dearest lord, so ill with thee,\nThat now thou dost no more our voices know,\nWho once could\u2019st tell us each from each, if we\nDid but so much as near thy dungeon go,\nBound on our weary errands to and fro?\u201d\n\u2014\u201cOh, pardon me, my friends,\u2014my extreme pain\nHath robbed me of all sense and dulled my brain.\n\nIX.\n\n\u201cBut go and say in what an evil case\nI find me now;\u2014perchance they will relent\nSo far that I may in this noisome place,\nFor my short time remaining, not be pent;\nOr at my prayer they will at least consent\nThat one of you may now continue nigh,\nAnd watch beside me\u2014for, dear friends, I die.\u201d\n\nX.\n\nTo the king\u2019s presence straight they forced their way,\nRegardless of what dangers they might meet:\nBefore him prone upon the earth they lay;\nThey kissed the very ground beneath his feet,\nLaying the dust with tears, and did entreat\nIn anguish that their lord might not be left\nUnhelped to perish, of all aid bereft.\n\nXI.\n\nBut little might they find of pity there;\nNew insults and new taunts were all they won;\nThese, with rude blows, their only answer were:\n\u2014\u201cBack to your tasks, ye Christian dogs\u2014begone\u2014\nAway! from me compassion finds he none:\nLet him upon himself compassion show;\nI swear, by Heaven, he shall no other know!\n\nXII.\n\n\u201cWhat! shall ye come in arms to waste our land,\nGod\u2019s people to extirpate shall ye come,\nAnd then, when it fares ill with you, demand\nOur pity?\u2014no; accept your righteous doom,\nO fools! that in your own land had not room\nTo dwell\u2014that had not strength to conquer ours;\nFools, whose desires so far outstrip your powers!\n\nXIII.\n\n\u201cWhere are they now, that with the fire and sword\nOur land to harry were so free of old?\nCan they no pity to your Prince afford?\nWhere is your King, and where your captains bold?\nOr has it not in Portugal been told\nWhat here is done, and what by him is borne\nOf shame and outrage, and of extreme scorn?\u201d\n\nXIV.\n\nIt seemed that for those votaries of Mahound\nAll love, all mercy quite had fled away;\nYet in one heart this much of grace they found,\nThat when their tasks were ended of the day,\nHe who the dungeon where the sufferer lay\nKept, unto them consented to afford\nA brief communion with their dying lord.\n\nXV.\n\nAdmitted there, from cries and loud lament,\nUntimely now, they scarcely could refrain:\nFain would they with their shrieks the vault have rent;\nThey knelt beside him,\u2014kissed his hands, the chain\nThat on his wasted limbs did still remain;\nThey cast themselves the dungeon-floor along,\nAnd tore their beards, and did their faces wrong.\n\nXVI.\n\nSobs choked their utterance wholly, to behold\nThe lineaments so marred and so defaced,\nWhich they had loved and reverenced so of old.\nHe too was deeply moved, but sooner chased\nThe weakness from him, and with calm replaced:\nThen from the strawen pallet where he lay\nHimself a little raising, thus did say:\u2014\n\nXVII.\n\n\u201cIf I sometimes an earnest hope have fed,\nThat I might breathe again my native air,\nAnd tread my natal soil\u2014this wish was bred\nBy the desire I cherished to prepare\nFor you such honourable shelter there,\nAs could none other do, who did not know\nHow truly you have served me in my woe.\n\nXVIII.\n\n\u201cFor had I sate a king upon my throne,\nAll wealth, all honour waiting on mine eye,\nYou never could have truer service shown\nThan you _have_ shown me in my misery\u2014\nNor I from any found more loyalty,\nThan that which I _have_ found upon your parts,\nOh children dear! oh true and faithful hearts!\n\nXIX.\n\n\u201cAnd now that I am hastening to my rest,\nOne only thought of trouble doth employ\nMy soul, that I am leaving you opprest\nWith this huge weight of woe;\u2014the perfect joy\nMy bosom feels, knows only this alloy,\nThat many, when my lips are closed in death,\nWill seek to draw you from your holy faith.\n\nXX.\n\n\u201cBut oh! whatever of worst ill betide,\nSeek not this manner to evade your woe.\nBe true to God\u2014on him in faith abide,\nAnd sure deliverance you at length shall know;\nIt may be that some path his hand will show\nTo your dear earthly homes\u2014or he will shape\nFor you at length my way of glad escape.\n\nXXI.\n\n\u201cBe true to God\u2014forsake not him, and you\nIn all your griefs forsake he never will;\nThe true of heart have found him ever true:\nAnd this I say, who having known much ill,\nDo now affirm him faithful to fulfil\nAll promises\u2014and boldly say that he\nIn all my griefs hath not forsaken me.\u201d\n\nXXII.\n\nNo more he spake\u2014but speechless sank, oppressed\nWith the fierce fever that within him burned;\nBut oh! what anguish then the hearts possessed\nOf that poor captive band, who weeping turned,\nAnd their dear lord, as now departed, mourned,\u2014\nForth filing from that vault, a weeping train\nWho had beheld him now, and should not see again.\n\nXXIII.\n\nNow seemed they desolate\u2014for he, although\nHelpless his dearest to defend with power\nFrom the least insult of the meanest foe,\nHad seemed to them a shelter and a tower\nOf refuge in affliction\u2019s fiercest hour,\nFrom his lone dungeon spreading broad above\nTheir heads the buckler of his faith and love.\n\nXXIV.\n\nAnd still the tears flowed faster from their eyes,\nAs each his fellow weeping did remind\nOf all his loving gentle courtesies,\nAnd gracious acts\u2014how oft, as one that pined,\nE\u2019en ere that sickness took him, he declined\nHis scanty portion of the food prepared,\nWhich among them with this pretext he shared.\n\nXXV.\n\n\u2014\u201cHe knew our fetters\u2019 clank, and with quick ear\nOne from another by that mournful sound\nHe could discern, nor ever passed we near\nHis dungeon, on our weary labour bound,\nBut he for us some words of comfort found,\nAnd still he begged us pardon him, as though\nHimself he owned the cause of all our woe.\n\nXXVI.\n\n\u201cAnd what most grieved him, more than all he bore\nIn his own person of injurious wrong,\nPiercing his very bosom\u2019s inmost core,\nWas, if the tale was brought him that among\nUs, his dear children, there had strife upsprung,\nAs sometimes did\u2014for grief is quick and wild,\u2014\nThen left he not, till we were reconciled.\u201d\n\nXXVII.\n\n\u2014Beside the Prince might only one remain\nIn that unlighted vault the livelong night:\nIts earlier watches seemed of restless pain,\nNothing he spake\u2014but tossed from left to right,\nLike one who vainly did some ease invite;\nTill when it verged toward morning, he that kept\nThat anxious vigil deemed the sufferer slept:\n\nXXVIII.\n\nOr sometimes feared he was already dead,\nSo noiseless now that chamber\u2019s silence deep;\nYet ventured not to speak or stir, for dread\nLest he should chase away that sweetest sleep\nOf morning, which comes over them that keep\nPained watches through the night;\u2014till tardily\nThe morning broke, and he drew gently nigh.\n\nXXIX.\n\nWhen lo! with folded palms the Martyr lay,\nHis eyes unclosed\u2014and stood in each a tear,\nAnd round his mouth a sweeter smile did play\nThan ever might on mortal lips appear:\nNo mortal joy could ever have come near\nThe joy that bred that smile\u2014with waking eye\nHe seemed to mark some vision streaming by.\n\nXXX.\n\nThen feared to rouse him from that bless\u00e8d trance,\nAnd back again with noiseless step retired\nThat good old man\u2014nor nearer would advance,\nThough of his weal he gladly had required.\nHe waited, and a long long hour expired,\nAnd it was silence still\u2014when to his bed\nHim beckoning soft, the princely sufferer said\u2014\n\nXXXI.\n\n\u201cWhat I shall speak, now promise that to none\nOf all my fellow captives shall be told,\nThat not till this poor body shall have gone\nThe way of all the earth, thou wilt unfold\nMy words, yea evermore in silence hold,\nUnless hereafter should a time betide,\nWhen by the telling God were glorified.\n\nXXXII.\n\n\u201cTwo hours or more before the spring of day,\nAs I within me mused how poor and leer\nThis world, and as in pain I waking lay,\nThought upon all the happy souls, that here\nOnce suffered, but are now exempt from fear\nAnd pain and wrong, there woke within my breast\nA speechless longing for that heavenly rest.\n\nXXXIII.\n\n\u201cMine eyes were steadfastly tow\u00e0rd the wall\nTurned, when I saw a wondrous vision there;\nI saw a vision bright, majestical,\nOne seated on a throne\u2014and many fair\nAnd dazzling shapes before him gathered were,\nWith palms in hand\u2014such glory from his face\nWas shed, as lightened all this dismal place.\n\nXXXIV.\n\n\u201cThis dismal vault, this dungeon of deep gloom,\nThis sunless dwelling of eternal night,\nWhich I have felt so long my living tomb,\nShowed like the court of heaven\u2014so clear, so bright,\nSo full of odours, harmonies and light\u2014\nAnd music filled the air\u2014an heavenly strain,\nThat rose awhile, and then was hushed again.\n\nXXXV.\n\n\u201cThen one came forward from that blessed throng,\nAnd kneeled to him, and said\u2014\u2018Compassion take\nOn this thy servant, who has suffered long\nSuch great and heavy troubles for thy sake,\nWe thank thee, Lord, that thou so soon wilt make\nThy servant\u2019s many woes to end, that he\nInto our choir admitted now will be.\u2019\n\nXXXVI.\n\n\u201cWhen thus I heard him speak, I marked him well,\nAnd by his banner and his scales, I knew\nIt was the great Archangel Micha\u00ebl:\nAnd by his side there knelt another too,\nWho in one hand a chalice held in view,\nThe other clasped a book, and there was writ,\n\u2018In the beginning was the Word,\u2019 in it.\n\nXXXVII.\n\n\u201cBut then my Lord, my Saviour turned to me,\nAnd with sweet smile ineffable he said,\n\u2018To-day thou comest hence and shalt be free!\u2019\u2014\nWith music, as it came, then vanish\u00e8d\nThe vision\u2014but within me it has bred\nSweet comfort that remains, and now I know\nTo-day I leave the world, and end my woe.\n\nXXXVIII.\n\n\u201cMy Lord, my God, what wondrous grace is this\nThat thou hast not disdained to visit me,\nAnd give me tidings of my coming bliss\u2014\nWho am I, sinful man, so graced to be?\nOh gladly will I bear whate\u2019er by thee\nMay be appointed, ere my race be run,\nOf pain or travail\u2014Lord, thy will be done.\u201d\n\nXXXIX.\n\nIn calmest quiet waiting his release,\nWhen he had finished thus his prayer, he lay:\n\u201cLord, now thou lettest me depart in peace,\u201d\nWere the last words which he was heard to say,\nUpon his left side turning, as the day\nSlow sinking now with more than usual pride\nStreamed through the prison bars, a glory deep and wide.\n\nXL.\n\nWhen the last flush had faded from the west,\nWhen the last streak of golden light was gone,\nThey looked, but he had entered on his rest\u2014\nHe too his haven of repose had won,\nLeaving this truth to be gainsaid by none,\nThat what the scroll upon his shield did say,\nThat well his life had proved\u2014_Le bien me pla\u00eet_.\n\n\n\n\nORPHEUS AND THE SIRENS.\n\n\nI.\n\nHigh on the poop, with many a godlike peer,\n With heroes and with kings, the flower of Greece,\nThat gathered at his word from far and near,\n To snatch the guarded fleece,\n\n\nII.\n\nGreat Jason stood; nor ever from the soil\n The anchor\u2019s brazen tooth unfasten\u00e8d,\nTill, auspicating so his glorious toil,\n From golden cup he shed\n\n\nIII.\n\nLibations to the Gods\u2014to highest Jove\u2014\n To Waves and prospering Winds\u2014to Night and Day\u2014\nTo all, by whom befriended, they might prove\n A favourable way.\n\n\nIV.\n\nWith him the twins\u2014one mortal, one divine\u2014\n Of Leda, and the Strength of Hercules;\nAnd Tiphys, steersman through the perilous brine,\n And many more with these:\u2014\n\n\nV.\n\nGreat father, Peleus, of a greater son,\n And Atalanta, martial queen, was here;\nAnd that supreme Athenian, nobler none,\n And Idmon, holy seer.\n\n\nVI.\n\nNor Orpheus pass unnamed, though from the rest\n Apart, he leaned upon that lyre divine,\nWhich once in heaven his glory should attest,\n Set there a sacred sign.\n\n\nVII.\n\nBut when auspicious thunders rolled on high,\n Unto its chords and to his chant sublime\nThe joyful heroes, toiling manfully,\n With measured strokes kept time.\n\n\nVIII.\n\nThen when that keel divided first the waves,\n Them Chiron cheered from Pelion\u2019s piny crown,\nAnd wondering Sea-nymphs rose from ocean caves,\n And all the Gods looked down.\n\n\nIX.\n\nThe bark divine, itself instinct with life,\n Went forth, and baffled Ocean\u2019s rudest shocks,\nEscaping, though with pain and arduous strife,\n The huge encountering rocks;\n\n\nX.\n\nAnd force and fraud o\u2019ercome, and peril past,\n Its hard-won trophy raised in open view,\nThrough prosperous floods was bringing home at last\n Its high heroic crew;\n\n\nXI.\n\nTill now they cried, (\u00c6\u00e6a left behind,\n And the dead waters of the Cronian main,)\n\u201cNo peril more upon our path we find,\n Safe haven soon we gain.\u201d\n\n\nXII.\n\nWhen, as they spake, sweet sounds upon the breeze\n Came to them, melodies till now unknown,\nAnd blended into one delight with these,\n Sweet odours sweetly blown,\u2014\n\n\nXIII.\n\nSweet odours wafted from the flowery isle,\n Sweet music breath\u00e8d by the Sirens three,\nWho there lie wait, all passers to beguile,\n Fair monsters of the sea\u2014\n\n\nXIV.\n\nFair monsters foul, that with their magic song\n And beauty to the shipman wandering,\nWorse peril than disastrous whirlpools strong,\n Or fierce sea-robbers bring.\n\n\nXV.\n\nSometimes upon the diamond rocks they leant,\n Sometimes they sate upon the flowery lea\nThat sloped tow\u00e0rd the wave, and ever sent\n Shrill music o\u2019er the sea.\n\n\nXVI.\n\nOne piped, one sang, one struck the golden lyre;\n And thus to forge and fling a threefold chain\nOf link\u00e8d harmony the three conspire,\n O\u2019er land and hoary main.\n\n\nXVII.\n\nThe winds, suspended by the charm\u00e8d song,\n Shed treacherous calm about that fatal isle;\nThe waves, as though the halcyon o\u2019er its young\n Were brooding, always smile;\n\n\nXVIII.\n\nAnd every one that listens, presently\n Forgetteth home, and wife, and children dear,\nAll noble enterprise and purpose high,\n And turns his pinnace here,\u2014\n\n\nXIX.\n\nHe turns his pinnace, warning taking none\n From the plain doom of all who went before,\nWhose bones lie bleaching in the wind and sun,\n And whiten all the shore.\n\n\nXX.\n\nHe cannot heed,\u2014so sweet unto him seems\n To reap the harvest of the promised joy;\nThe wave-worn man of such secure rest dreams,\n So guiltless of annoy.\n\n\nXXI.\n\nThe heroes and the kings, the wise, the strong,\n That won the fleece with cunning and with might,\n_Their_ souls were taken in the net of song,\n Entangled in delight;\n\n\nXXII.\n\nTill ever loathlier seemed all toil to be,\n And that small space they yet must travel o\u2019er,\nStretched an immeasurable breadth of sea\n Their fainting hearts before.\n\n\nXXIII.\n\n\u201cLet us turn hitherward our bark,\u201d they cried,\n \u201cAnd, \u2019mid the blisses of this happy isle,\nPast toil forgetting and to come, abide\n In joyfulness awhile;\n\n\nXXIV.\n\n\u201cAnd then, refreshed, our tasks resume again,\n If other tasks we yet are bound unto,\nCombing the hoary tresses of the main\n With sharp swift keel anew.\u201d\n\n\nXXV.\n\nO heroes, that had once a nobler aim,\n O heroes, sprung from many a godlike line,\nWhat will ye do, unmindful of your fame,\n And of your race divine?\n\n\nXXVI.\n\nBut they, by these prevailing voices now\n Lured, evermore draw nearer to the land,\nNor saw the wrecks of many a goodly prow,\n That strewed that fatal strand;\n\n\nXXVII.\n\nOr seeing, feared not\u2014warning taking none\n From the plain doom of all who went before,\nWhose bones lay bleaching in the wind and sun,\n And whitened all the shore.\n\n\nXXVIII.\n\nAnd some impel through foaming billows now\n The hissing keel, and some tumultuous stand\nUpon the deck, or crowd about the prow,\n Waiting to leap to land.\n\n\nXXIX.\n\nAnd them had thus this lodestar of delight\n Drawn to their ruin wholly, but for one\nOf their own selves, who struck his lyre with might,\n Calliope\u2019s great son.\n\n\nXXX.\n\nHe singing, (for mere words were now in vain,\n That melody so led all souls at will,)\nSinging he played, and matched that earth-born strain\n With music sweeter still.\n\n\nXXXI.\n\nOf holier joy he sang, more true delight,\n In other happier isles for them reserved,\nWho, faithful here, from constancy, and right,\n And truth have never swerved;\n\n\nXXXII.\n\nHow evermore the tempered ocean gales\n Breathe round those hidden islands of the blest,\nSteeped in the glory spread when daylight fails\n Far in the sacred West;\n\n\nXXXIII.\n\nHow unto them, beyond our mortal night,\n Shines evermore in strength the golden day;\nAnd meadows with purpureal roses bright\n Bloom round their feet alway;\n\n\nXXXIV.\n\nAnd plants of gold\u2014some burn beneath the sea,\n And some, for garlands apt, the land doth bear,\nAnd lacks not many an incense-breathing tree,\n Enriching all that air.\n\n\nXXXV.\n\nNor need is more, with sullen strength of hand\n To vex the stubborn earth, or plough the main;\nThey dwell apart, a calm heroic band,\n Not tasting toil or pain.\n\n\nXXXVI.\n\nNor sang he only of unfading bowers,\n Where they a tearless, painless age fulfil,\nIn fields Elysian spending blissful hours,\n Remote from every ill;\n\n\nXXXVII.\n\nBut of pure gladness found in temperance high,\n In duty owned, and reverenced in awe,\nOf man\u2019s true freedom, that may only lie\n In servitude to law;\n\n\nXXXVIII.\n\nAnd how \u2019twas given through virtue to aspire\n To golden seats in ever-calm abodes;\nOf mortal men, admitted to the quire\n Of high immortal Gods.\n\n\nXXXIX.\n\nHe sang\u2014a mighty melody divine,\n That woke deep echoes in the heart of each\u2014\nReminded whence they drew their royal line,\n And to what heights might reach.\n\n\nXL.\n\nAnd all the while they listened, them the speed\n Bore forward still of favouring wind and tide,\nThat, when their ears were open to give heed\n To any sound beside,\n\n\nXLI.\n\nThe feeble echoes of that other lay,\n Which held awhile their senses thralled and bound,\nWere in the distance fading quite away,\n A dull, unheeded sound.\n\n\n\n\nST. CHRYSOSTOM.\n\n\n\u2019Tis not by action only, not by deed,\nThough that be just and holy, pure and wise,\nThat man may to his last perfection rise;\nOf suffering as of doing he has need:\nThus prospers with due change the heavenly seed,\nWhile stormy night succeeds to sunny day;\nThus the good metal, proven every way,\nFrom the last dross that clung to it is freed.\nAnd thus for thee, O glorious man, on whom\nLove well deserved, and honour waited long,\nIn thy last years in place of timely ease\nThere did remain another loftier doom,\nPain, travail, exile, peril, scorn and wrong\u2014\nGlorious before, but glorified through these.\n\n\n\n\nTHE OIL OF MERCY.\n\n\nMany beauteous spots the earth\nKeepeth yet,\u2014but brighter, fairer\nDid that long-lost Eden show\nThan the loveliest that remaineth:\nSo what marvel, when our Sire\nWas from thence expelled, he waited\nLingering with a fond regret\nRound those bless\u00e8d happy places\nOnce his home, while innocence\nWas his bright sufficient raiment?\nLong he lingered there, and saw\nUp from dark abysmal spaces\nFour strong rivers rushing ever;\nSaw the mighty wall exalted\nHigh as heaven, and on its heights\nGlimpses of the fiery Angel.\n\n Long he lingered near, with hope\nWhich had never quite abated,\nThat one day the righteous sentence,\nDooming him to stern disgraces,\nShould be disannulled, and he\nIn his first bliss reinstated.\n\n But when mortal pangs surprised him,\nBy an unseen foe assail\u00e8d,\nSeth he called, his dearest son,\nCalled him to his side, and faintly\nHim addressed\u2014\u201cMy son, thou knowest\nOf what sufferings partaker,\nOf what weariness and toil,\nOf what sickness, pain and danger\nI have been, since that sad hour\nThat from Eden\u2019s precincts drave me.\nBut thou dost not know that God,\nWhen to exile forth I far\u00e8d,\nHouseless wanderer through the world,\nThus with gracious speech bespake me:\n\u2014\u2018Though thou mayst not here continue,\nIn these bless\u00e8d happy places,\nAs before from pain exempt,\nSuffering, toil, and mortal ailment,\nThink not thou shalt therefore be\nOf my loving care forsaken:\nRather shall that tree of life,\nIn the middle garden planted,\nOnce a precious balm distil,\nWhich to thee applied, thine ailments\nShall be all removed, and thou\nMade of endless life partaker.\u2019\u2014\nWith these words he cheered me then,\nWords that have remained engraven\nOn my bosom\u2019s tablets since.\nGo then, dear my son, oh hasten\nUnto Eden\u2019s guarded gate,\nTell thine errand to the Angel;\nAnd that fiery sentinel\nTo the tree will guide thee safely,\nWhere it stands, aloft, alone,\nIn the garden\u2019s middle spaces:\nThence bring back that oil of mercy,\nEre my lamp of life be wasted.\u201d\n\n When his father\u2019s feeble words\nSeth had heard, at once he hastened,\nHoping to bring back that oil,\nEre the light had wholly faded\nFrom his father\u2019s eyes, the lamp\nOf his life had wholly wasted.\nO\u2019er the plain besprent with flowers,\nWith ten thousand colours painted\nIn that spring-time of the year,\nBy Thelassar on he hastened,\nMade no pause, till Eden\u2019s wall\nRose an ever verdant barrier,\nHigh as heaven\u2019s great roof, that shines\nWith its bright carbuncles paven.\nThere the son of Adam paused,\nFor above him hung the Angel\nIn the middle air suspense,\nWith his swift sword glancing naked.\nDown upon his face he fell\nBy the sun-bright vision daz\u00e8d.\n\u201cChild of man\u201d\u2014these words he heard,\n\u201cRise, and say what thing thou cravest?\u201d\n\nAll his father\u2019s need he told,\nAnd how now his father waited,\nIn his mighty agony\nFor that medicine yearning greatly.\n\u201cBut thou seekest\u201d (this reply\nThen he heard) \u201cthou seekest vainly\nFor that oil of mercy yet,\nNor will tears nor prayers avail thee.\nGo then quickly back, and bring\nThese my words to him, _thy_ parent,\nParent of the race of men.\nHe and they in faith and patience\nMust abide, long years must be\nEre the precious fruit be gathered,\nEre the oil of mercy flow\nFrom the bless\u00e8d tree and sacred\nIn the Paradise of God:\nNor till then will be obtain\u00e8d\nThe strong medicine of life,\nHealing every mortal ailment,\nNor thy sire till then be made\nOf immortal life a sharer.\nFear not that his heart will sink\nWhen these tidings back thou bearest,\nRather thou shalt straightway see\nAll his fears and pangs abated,\nAnd by faith allayed to meekness\nEvery wish and thought impatient.\nHasten back then\u2014thy return,\nStrongly yearning, he awaiteth:\nHasten back then.\u201d\u2014On the word\nTo his father back he hastened,\nFound him waiting his return\nIn his agony, his latest:\nTold him of what grace to come,\nOf what sure hope he was bearer\u2014\nSaw him, when that word was spoke,\nEvery fear and pang assuag\u00e8d,\nAnd by faith allayed to meekness,\nEvery wish and thought impatient,\nLike a child resign himself\nUnto sweet sleep, calm and painless.\n\n\n\n\nTHE TREE OF LIFE.\n\nFROM THE GERMAN OF R\u00dcCKERT.\n\n\nI.\n\nWhen Adam\u2019s latest breath was nearly gone,\nTo Paradise the Patriarch sent his son,\n\n\nII.\n\nA branch to fetch him from the tree of life,\nHoping to taste of it ere life was done.\n\n\nIII.\n\nSeth brought the branch, but ere he had arrived,\nHis father\u2019s spirit was already flown.\n\n\nIV.\n\nThen planted they the twig on Adam\u2019s grave,\nAnd it was tended still from son to son.\n\n\nV.\n\nIt grew while Joseph in the dungeon lay,\nIt grew while Israel did in Egypt groan.\n\n\nVI.\n\nSweet odours gave the blossoms of the tree,\nWhen David harping sat upon his throne.\n\n\nVII.\n\nDry was the tree, when from the ways of God\nWent erring in his wisdom Solomon:\n\n\nVIII.\n\nYet the world hoped it would revive anew,\nWhen David\u2019s stock should give another Son.\n\n\nIX.\n\nFaith saw in spirit this, the while she sat\nMourning beside the floods of Babylon.\n\n\nX.\n\nAnd when the eternal lightning flashed from heaven,\nThe tree asunder burst with jubilant tone.\n\n\nXI.\n\nTo the dry trunk this grace from God was given,\nThe W\u00f2od of Passion should from thence be won.\n\n\nXII.\n\nThe blind world fashioned out of it the cross,\nAnd its Salvation nailed with scorn thereon.\n\n\nXIII.\n\nThen bore the tree of life ensanguined fruit,\nWhich whoso tasteth life shall be his loan.\n\n\nXIV.\n\nOh look, oh look, how grows the tree of life,\nBy storms established more, not overthrown.\n\n\nXV.\n\nMay the _whole_ world beneath its shadow rest:\n_Half_ has its shelter there already won.\n\n\n\n\nTHE TREE OF LIFE\n\nFROM AN OLD LATIN POEM.\n\n\nI.\n\nThere is a spot, by men believed to be\nEarth\u2019s centre, and the place of Adam\u2019s grave,\nAnd here a slip that from a barren tree\nWas cut, fruit sweet and salutary gave\u2014\nYet not unto the tillers of the land;\nThat bless\u00e8d fruit was culled by other hand.\n\n\nII.\n\nThe shape and fashion of the tree attend:\nFrom undivided stem at first it sprung;\nThence in two arms its branches did outsend,\nLike sail-yards whence the flowing sheet is hung,\nOr as a yoke that in the furrow stands,\nWhen the tired steers are loosened from their bands.\n\n\nIII.\n\nThree days the slip from which this tree should spring\nAppeared as dead\u2014then suddenly it bore\n(While earth and heaven stood awed and wondering)\nHarvest of vital fruit;\u2014the fortieth more\nBeheld it touch heaven\u2019s summit with its height,\nAnd shroud its sacred head in clouds of light.\n\n\nIV.\n\nYet the same while it did put forth below\nBranches twice six, these too with fruit endued,\nWhich stretching to all quarters might bestow\nUpon all nations medicine and food,\nWhich mortal men might eat, and eating be\nSharers henceforth of immortality.\n\n\nV.\n\nBut when another fifty days were gone,\nA breath divine, a mighty storm of heaven\nOn all the branches swiftly lighted down,\nTo which a rich nectareous taste was given,\nAnd all the heavy leaves that on them grew\nDistilled henceforth a sweet and heavenly dew.\n\n\nVI.\n\nBeneath that tree\u2019s great shadow on the plain\nA fountain bubbled up, whose lymph serene\nNothing of earthly mixture might distain:\nFountain so pure not anywhere was seen\nIn all the world, nor on whose marge the earth\nPut flowers of such unfading beauty forth.\n\n\nVII.\n\nAnd thither did all people, young and old,\nMatrons and virgins, rich and poor, a crowd\nStream ever, who, whenas they did behold\nThose branches with their golden burden bowed,\nStretched forth their hands, and eager glances threw\nTow\u00e0rd the fruit distilling that sweet dew.\n\n\nVIII.\n\nBut touch they might not these, much less allay\nTheir hunger, howsoe\u2019er they might desire,\nTill the foul tokens of their former way\nThey had washed off, the dust and sordid mire,\nAnd cleansed their bodies in that holy wave,\nAble from every spot and stain to save.\n\n\nIX.\n\nBut when within their mouths they had received\nOf that immortal fruit the gust divine,\nStraight of all sickness were their souls relieved,\nThe weak grew strong;\u2014and tasks they did decline\nAs overgreat for them, they shunned no more,\nAnd things they deemed they could not bear, they bore.\n\n\nX.\n\nBut woe, alas! some daring to draw near\nThat sacred stream, did presently retire,\nDrew wholly back again, and did not fear\nTo stain themselves in all their former mire,\nThat fruit rejecting from their mouths again,\nNot any more their medicine, but their bane.\n\n\nXI.\n\nOh bless\u00e8d they, who not retreating so,\nFirst in that fountain make them pure and fair,\nAnd do from thence unto the branches go,\nWith power upon the fruitage hanging there:\nThence by the branches of the lofty tree\nAscend to heaven\u2014The Tree of Life oh! see.\n\n\n\n\nPARADISE.\n\nFROM THE GERMAN OF R\u00dcCKERT.\n\n\nI.\n\nOh! Paradise must show more fair\n Than any earthly ground,\nAnd therefore longs my spirit there\n Right quickly to be found.\n\n\nII.\n\nIn Paradise a stream must flow\n Of everlasting love:\nEach tear of longing shed below\n Therein a pearl will prove.\n\n\nIII.\n\nIn Paradise a breath of balm\n All anguish must allay,\nTill every anguish growing calm,\n Even mine shall flee away.\n\n\nIV.\n\nAnd there the tree of stillest peace\n In verdant spaces grows:\nBeneath it one can never cease\n To dream of blest repose.\n\n\nV.\n\nA cherub at the gate must be,\n Far off the world to fray,\nThat its rude noises reach not me,\n To fright my dream away.\n\n\nVI.\n\nMy heart, that weary ship, at last\n Safe haven there will gain,\nAnd on the breast will slumber fast\n The wakeful infant, Pain.\n\n\nVII.\n\nFor every thorn that pierced me here\n The rose will there be found,\nWith joy, earth\u2019s roses brought not near,\n My head will there be crowned.\n\n\nVIII.\n\nThere all delights will blossom forth,\n That here in bud expire,\nAnd from all mourning weeds of earth\n Be wove a bright attire.\n\n\nIX.\n\nAll here I sought in vain pursuit,\n Will freely meet me there,\nAs from green branches golden fruit,\n Fair flowers from gardens fair.\n\n\nX.\n\nMy youth, that by me swept amain,\n On swift wing borne away,\nAnd Love that suffered me to drain\n Its nectar for a day,\u2014\n\n\nXI.\n\nThese, never wishing to depart,\n Will me for ever bless,\nTheir darling fold unto the heart,\n And comfort and caress.\n\n\nXII.\n\nAnd there the Loveliness, whose glance\n From far did on me gleam,\nBut whose unveil\u00e8d countenance\n Was only seen in dream,\n\n\nXIII.\n\nWill, meeting all my soul\u2019s desires,\n Unveil itself to me,\nWhen to the choir of starry lyres\n Shall mine united be.\n\n\n\n\nTHE LOREY LEY.\n\nFROM THE GERMAN OF HEINE.\n\n\nI.\n\nWhat makes me so heavy-hearted,\n I ask of my heart in vain:\nBut a tale of the times departed\n Haunts ever my heart and brain.\n\n\nII.\n\nIn the cool air it waxes dimmer,\n And quietly flows the Rhine:\nAnd the mountain summits glimmer\n In the sunny evening shine.\n\n\nIII.\n\nThere sits on the rocks a maiden\n In marvellous beauty there.\nWith gold her apparel is laden,\n And she combs her golden hair:\n\n\nIV.\n\nAnd the comb is of gold and glistens,\n And thereto she sings a song,\nWhich for every soul that listens\n Has a potent spell and strong.\n\n\nV.\n\nThe boatman in light boat speeding,\n When he hears it, utters a cry,\nNo longer the rapids heeding,\n But only gazing on high.\n\n\nVI.\n\nThe stream is its wild waves flinging\n O\u2019er boat and boatman anon,\nAnd \u2019tis this with her lovely singing\n Which the Lorey Ley has done.\n\n\n\n\nI.\n\nOh thou of dark forebodings drear,\n Oh thou of such a faithless heart,\n Hast thou forgotten what thou art,\nThat thou hast ventured so to fear?\n\n\nII.\n\nNo weed on Ocean\u2019s bosom cast,\n Borne by its never-resting foam\n This way and that, without an home,\nTill flung on some bleak shore at last\u2014\n\n\nIII.\n\nBut thou the Lotus, which above\n Swayed here and there by wind and tide,\n Yet still below doth fixed abide\nFast rooted in the eternal Love.\n\n\n\n\nTHE PRODIGAL.\n\n\nI.\n\nWhy feedest thou on husks so coarse and rude?\nI could not be content with angels\u2019 food.\n\n\nII.\n\nHow camest thou companion for the swine?\nI loathed the courts of heaven, the choir divine.\n\n\nIII.\n\nWho bade thee crouch in hovel dark and drear?\nI left a palace wide to sojourn here.\n\n\nIV.\n\nHarsh tyrant\u2019s slave who made thee, once so free?\nA father\u2019s rule too heavy seemed to me.\n\n\nV.\n\nWhat sordid rags hang round thee on the breeze?\nI laid immortal robes aside for these.\n\n\nVI.\n\nAn exile through the world who bade thee roam?\nNone, but I wearied of an happy home.\n\n\nVII.\n\nWhy must thou dweller in a desert be?\nA garden seemed not fair enough to me.\n\n\nVIII.\n\nWhy sue a beggar at the mean world\u2019s door?\nTo live on God\u2019s large bounty seemed so poor.\n\n\nIX.\n\nWhat has thy forehead so to earthward brought?\nTo lift it higher than the stars I thought.\n\n\n\n\nTHE CORREGAN.\n\nA BALLAD OF BRITTANY.\n\n\nI.\n\nThey were affianced, a youthful pair;\nIn youth, alas! they divided were.\n\n\nII.\n\nLovely twins she has brought to light,\nA boy and a girl, both snowy white.\n\n\nIII.\n\n\u2014\u201cWhat shall now for thee be done,\nWho hast brought me this longed-for son?\n\n\nIV.\n\n\u201cShall I fetch thee fowl from the sedgy mere?\nOr strike in the greenwood the flying deer?\u201d\n\n\nV.\n\n\u2014\u201cWild deer\u2019s flesh would please me best,\nYet wherefore go to the far for\u00e8st?\u201d\n\n\nVI.\n\nHe snatched his spear, he mounted his steed;\nHe to the greenwood is gone with speed.\n\n\nVII.\n\nWhen he there arrived, a milk-white hind\nStarted before him as swift as wind.\n\n\nVIII.\n\nHe pursued it with foot so fleet,\nOn his forehead stood the heat,\n\n\nIX.\n\nAnd down his courser\u2019s flanks it ran;\n\u2014Evening now to close began;\n\n\nX.\n\nWhen he espied a stream that flowed\nNear the Corregan\u2019s abode.\n\n\nXI.\n\nSmoothest turf encircled its brink;\nDown from his steed he alit to drink.\n\n\nXII.\n\nBy its margin was seated there\nThe Corregan, combing her golden hair,\n\n\nXIII.\n\nCombing it with a comb of gold;\u2014\nRichly clad, and bright to behold.\n\n\nXIV.\n\n\u2014\u201cThou art bolder than thou dost know,\nDaring to trouble my waters so.\n\n\nXV.\n\n\u201cMe shalt thou on the instant wed,\nOr in three days shalt be dead.\u201d\n\n\nXVI.\n\n\u2014\u201cI will not wed on the instant thee,\nNor yet in three days dead will be.\n\n\nXVII.\n\n\u201cWhen God pleases I will die,\nAnd already wedded am I;\n\n\nXVIII.\n\n\u201cAnd besides I had rather died\nThan to make a fairy my bride.\u201d\n\n\nXIX.\n\n\u2014\u201cSick am I, mother, at heart; oh spread,\nIf thou lovest me, my death-bed!\n\n\nXX.\n\n\u201cMe the fairy has looked to death:\nIn three days shall I yield my breath.\n\n\nXXI.\n\n\u201cYet though my body in earth they lay,\nTo her I love, oh! nothing say.\u201d\n\n\nXXII.\n\n\u2014Three days after, \u201cO mother, tell,\u201d\nShe exclaimed, \u201cwhy tolls the bell?\n\n\nXXIII.\n\n\u201cWhy do the Priests so mournfully go,\nClad in white, and chanting low?\u201d\n\n\nXXIV.\n\n\u2014\u201cA beggar we lodged died yesternight;\nThey bury him with the morning light.\u201d\n\n\nXXV.\n\n\u2014\u201cO mother, where is my husband gone?\u201d\n\u2014\u201cHe from the town will return anon.\u201d\n\n\nXXVI.\n\n\u2014\u201cO mother, I would to church repair;\nTell me what were meetest to wear:\n\n\nXXVII.\n\n\u201cShall it be my robe of blue,\nOr my vest of scarlet hue?\u201d\n\n\nXXVIII.\n\n\u2014\u201cIt is now the manner to wear\nGarments of black, my daughter, there.\u201d\n\n\nXXIX.\n\nWhen she came to the churchyard ground,\nHer husband\u2019s grave was the first she found.\n\n\nXXX.\n\n\u2014\u201cDeath of kin I have not heard,\nYet this earth has been newly stirred.\u201d\n\n\nXXXI.\n\n\u2014\u201cMy daughter, the truth I needs must show;\n\u2019Tis thy husband that lies below.\u201d\n\n\nXXXII.\n\nDown she fell upon that floor;\nThence she rose not any more.\n\n\nXXXIII.\n\nBut the night next after the day,\nWhen by his her body lay,\n\n\nXXXIV.\n\nTwo tall oaks, both stately and fair,\nMarvel to see! arose in air;\n\nXXXV.\n\nAnd upon their uppermost spray,\nTwo white doves, delightsome and gay:\n\n\nXXXVI.\n\nAt dawn of morn they did sweetly sing;\nAt noon toward heaven they lightly spring.\n\n\n\n\nSONNET.\n\n\nUlysses, sailing by the Sirens\u2019 isle,\nSealed first his comrades\u2019 ears, then bade them fast\nBind him with many a fetter to the mast,\nLest those sweet voices should their souls beguile,\nAnd to their ruin flatter them, the while\nTheir homeward bark was sailing swiftly past;\nAnd thus the peril they behind them cast,\nThough chased by those weird voices many a mile.\nBut yet a nobler cunning Orpheus used:\nNo fetter he put on, nor stopped his ear,\nBut ever, as he passed, sang high and clear\nThe blisses of the Gods, their holy joys,\nAnd with diviner melody confused\nAnd marred earth\u2019s sweetest music to a noise.\n\n\n\n\nSONNET.\n\n\nWere the sad tablets of our hearts alone\nA dreary blank, for Thee the task were light,\nTo draw fair letters there and lines of light:\nBut while far other spectacle is shown\nBy them, with dismal traceries overdrawn,\nOh! task it seems, transcending highest might,\nEver again to make them clean and white,\nEffacing the sad secrets they have known.\nAnd then what heaven were better than a name,\nIf there must haunt and cling unto us there\nAbiding memories of our sin and shame?\nDread doubt! which finds no answer anywhere\nExcept in him, who with him power did bring\nTo make us feel our sin an alien thing.\n\n\n\n\nSONNET.\n\n\nIn the mid garden doth a fountain stand;\nFrom font to font its waters fall alway,\nFreshening the leaves by their continual play:\u2014\nSuch often have I seen in southern land,\nWhile every leaf, as though by light winds fanned,\nHas quivered underneath the dazzling spray,\nKeeping its greenness all the sultry day,\nWhile others pine aloof, a parch\u00e8d band.\nAnd in the mystic garden of the soul\nA fountain, nourished from the upper springs,\nSends ever its clear waters up on high,\nWhich, while a dewy freshness round it flings,\nAll plants which there acknowledge its control\nShow fair and green, else drooping, pale, and dry.\n\n\n\n\nTHE ETRURIAN KING.\n\n[See Mrs. Hamilton Gray\u2019s \u201cVisit to the Sepulchres of Etruria.\u201d]\n\n\nI.\n\nOne only eye beheld him in his pride,\nThe old Etrurian monarch, as he, died;\n\n\nII.\n\nAnd as they laid him on his bier of stone,\nShield, spear, and arrows laying at his side;\n\n\nIII.\n\nIn golden armour with his crown of gold,\nOne only eye the kingly warrior spied;\n\n\nIV.\n\nNor that eye long\u2014for in the common air\nThe wondrous pageant might not now abide,\n\n\nV.\n\nWhich had in seal\u00e8d sepulchre the wrongs\nOf time for thirty centuries defied.\n\n\nVI.\n\nThat eye beheld it melt and disappear,\nAs down an hour-glass the last sand-drops glide.\n\n\nVII.\n\nA few short moments,\u2014and a shrunken heap\nOf common dust survived, of all that pride:\n\n\nVIII.\n\nAnd so that gorgeous vision has remained\nFor evermore to other eye denied:\n\n\nIX.\n\nAnd he who saw must oftentimes believe\nThat him his waking senses had belied,\n\n\nX.\n\nSince what if all the pageants of the earth\nMelt soon away, and may not long abide,\n\n\nXI.\n\nYet when did ever doom _so_ swift before\nEven to the glories of the earth betide?\n\n\n\n\nTHE FAMINE.\n\n\nI.\n\nOh, time it was of famine sore,\n That ever sorer grew;\nAnd many hungered that before\n Rich plenty only knew!\n\n\nII.\n\nFor year by year the labouring hind\n Bewailed his fruitless toil,\nAnd ever seemed some spell to bind\n The hard, unthankful soil.\n\n\nIII.\n\nHis seed-corn rotted in the ground,\n And did no more appear;\nOr if in blade and stalk was found,\n It withered in the ear.\n\n\nIV.\n\nAnd now unseasonable rains,\n And now untimely drought,\nWith blight and mildew, all his pains\n And hopes to nothing brought.\n\n\nV.\n\nAnd ever did that keen distress\n In wider circles spread;\nWho once with alms did others bless,\n Now lacked their daily bread,\n\n\nVI.\n\n\u2014One only, who was never known\n To bless another\u2019s board\u2014\nIn all that Suabian land alone\n This cruel, impious lord,\n\n\nVII.\n\nDid all the while exempt appear\n From this wide-reaching ill;\nWith largest bounties of the year,\n His broad fields laughing still.\n\n\nVIII.\n\nThe Autumn duly had outpoured\n For him its plenteous horn,\nAnd safe in ample granaries stored\n He saw his golden corn;\n\n\nIX.\n\nAnd high he reared new granaries vast,\n Of hewn stone builded strong,\nAnd made with bars of iron fast,\n And fenced from every wrong.\n\n\nX.\n\nTill safe, as seemed, from every foe,\n He now, as if the sight\nOf others\u2019 want, and others\u2019 woe\n Enhanced his own delight,\n\n\nXI.\n\nSate high, and with his minions still\n Did keep continual feast;\nLong nights with waste and wassail fill\n Which not with morning ceased;\n\n\nXII.\n\nTill ofttimes they who wandered near\n Those halls at early day,\nCulling wild herbs and roots in fear,\n Their hunger to allay,\n\n\nXIII.\n\nHeard sounds of fierce and reckless mirth\n Borne from those halls of pride,\nWhile famine\u2019s feeble wail went forth\n From all the land beside;\n\n\nXIV.\n\nAnd strange thoughts rose in many a breast,\n Why God\u2019s true servants pined,\nAnd largest means this man unblest\n Did still for riot find;\n\n\nXV.\n\nWhich stranger grew, as more and more\n He did his coffers fill\nWith gold and every precious store,\n Wrung from men\u2019s cruel ill;\n\n\nXVI.\n\nAs he each poor man\u2019s field was fain\n To add unto his own\u2014\nTo the wide space of his domain,\n Now daily wider grown.\n\n\nXVII.\n\nFor some, their lives awhile to save,\n Had sold him house and lands;\nAnd some to bonds their children gave,\n As grew his stern demands:\n\n\nXVIII.\n\nYet not a whit for poor man\u2019s curse\n This evil churl did care;\nHe said,\u2014it passed, nor left him worse\u2014\n That words were only air.\n\n\nXIX.\n\nHe, if they cried \u201cFor Jesu\u2019s sake,\n That so may light on thee\nGod\u2019s blessing!\u201d answer proud would make,\n \u201cWhat will that profit me?\u201d\n\n\nXX.\n\n\u201cI ask no blessing\u2014yet my fields\n Have store of spiky grain:\nThe earth to me its fatness yields,\n The sky its sun and rain.\n\n\nXXI.\n\n\u201cAnd high my granaries stand, and strong,\n Huge-vaulted, ribbed with stone:\nWhat need I fear? from any wrong\n I can defend mine own.\u201d\u2014\n\n\nXXII.\n\nThus ever fierce, and fiercer rose\n His words of scorn and pride;\nAnd more he mocked at mortal woes,\n And earth and heaven defied.\n\n\nXXIII.\n\nAnd thus it chanced upon a day,\n As oft had been before,\nThat from his gates he spurned away\n A widow, old and poor;\n\n\nXXIV.\n\nWhen to his presence entered in\n A servant, pale with fear,\nAnd did with trembling words begin:\u2014\n \u201cOh, dread my Lord, give ear!\n\n\nXXV.\n\n\u201cAs me perchance my business drew\n Thy storehouse vast beside,\nI heard unwonted sounds, and through\n The iron grating spied.\n\n\nXXVI.\n\n\u201cThe thing I saw, if like it seemed\n To any thing on earth,\nI might some huge black bull have deemed\n That hellish monstrous birth.\n\n\nXXVII.\n\n\u201cYet how should beast have entrance found\n Into that guarded place,\nWhich strangely now it wandered round,\n With wild, unresting pace?\n\n\nXXVIII.\n\n\u201cOh, here must be some warning meant,\n Which do not now deride:\nOh, yet have pity, and relent,\n Nor speak such words of pride!\u201d\n\n\nXXIX.\n\nSlight heed his tale of fear might find,\n Slight heed his counsel true;\nThat utterance of his faithful mind\n He now had learned to rue,\n\n\nXXX.\n\nBut that, even then, another came,\n Worse terror in his mien:\n\u2014\u201cThree monstrous creatures, breathing flame,\n These eyes but now have seen;\n\n\nXXXI.\n\n\u201cThey toss about the hoarded store,\n And greedily they eat,\nConsuming thus a part, but more\n They stamp beneath their feet.\n\n\nXXXII.\n\n\u201cOh, Sir! full often God doth take\n What we refuse to give;\nBut yet to him large offering make,\n And all our souls may live.\u201d\n\n\nXXXIII.\n\n\u2014\u201cFool!\u2014Let another hasten now,\n But if he shall not see\nThe self-same vision, fellow, thou\n Shalt hang on yonder tree.\u201d\n\n\nXXXIV.\n\nHe said\u2014when, lo! inrushed a third\n Within the briefest space:\u2014\n\u2014\u201cOf horses wild and bulls an herd\n Is filling all the place.\n\n\nXXXV.\n\n\u201cThe numbers of that furious rout\n Wax ever high and higher;\nAnd from their mouths smoke issues out,\n And from their nostrils fire.\n\n\nXXXVI.\n\n\u201cFrom side to side they leap and bound,\n The hoarded corn they eat,\nThey toss and scatter on the ground,\n And stamp beneath their feet.\n\n\nXXXVII.\n\n\u201cMy Lord, these portents do not scorn;\n Thy granary doors throw wide,\nAnd poor men\u2019s prayers even yet may turn\n The threatened wrath aside.\u201d\n\n\nXXXVIII.\n\n\u2014\u201cWhat, all conspiring in one tale!\n Or fooled by one deceit!\nYet think not ye shall so prevail,\n Or me so lightly cheat.\n\n\nXXXIX.\n\n\u201cCome with me;\u2014fling the portals back;\u2014\n I too this sight would see:\nWhat! one and all this courage lack?\n Give _me_ the ponderous key.\u201d\n\n\nXL.\n\nIn fear the vassal multitude\n Fell back on either side:\nBefore the doors he singly stood\u2014\n He singly\u2014in his pride.\n\n\nXLI.\n\nBut them, or ere he touched, asunder\n Some hand unbidden threw;\nWith lightning flash, with sound like thunder\n The gates wide open flew.\n\n\nXLII.\n\nHow shook then underneath the tread\n Of thousand feet the earth!\nDay darkened into night with dread!\n So wild a troop rushed forth.\n\n\nXLIII.\n\nAnd all who saw like dead men stood,\n As swept that wild troop by,\nTill lost within a neighbouring wood\n For aye from mortal eye.\n\n\nXLIV.\n\nBut when that hurricane was past\n Of hideous sight and sound,\nAnd when they breathed anew, they cast\n Their fearful glances round:\n\n\nXLV.\n\nThey lifted up a blackened corse,\n Where scorched and crushed it lay,\nAnd scarred with hooves of fiery force,\u2014\n Then bore in awe away;\n\n\nXLVI.\n\nThey bore away, but not to hide\n In any holy ground;\nWho in his height of sin had died\n No hallowed burial found.\n\n\n\n\nTHE PRIZE OF SONG.\n\n\nI.\n\nChallenged by the haughty daughters\n Of the old Emathian king,\nStrove the Muses at the waters\n Of that Heliconian spring\u2014\nProved beside those hallowed fountains\n Unto whom the prize of song,\nUnto whom those streams and mountains\n Did of truest right belong.\n\n\nII.\n\nFirst those others in vexed numbers\n Mourned the rebel giant brood,\nWhom the earth\u2019s huge mass encumbers,\n Or who writhe, the vulture\u2019s food;\nMourned for earth-born power, which faileth\n Heaven to win by might and main;\nThen, thrust back, for ever waileth,\n Gnawing its own heart in pain.\n\n\nIII.\n\nNature shuddered while she hearkened,\n Through her veins swift horror ran:\nSun and stars, perturbed and darkened,\n To forsake their orbs began.\nBack the rivers fled; the Ocean\n Howled upon a thousand shores,\nAs it would with wild commotion\n Burst its everlasting doors.\n\n\nIV.\n\nHushed was not that stormy riot\n Till were heard the sacred Nine,\nSinging of the blissful quiet\n In the happy seats divine;\nSinging of those thrones immortal,\n Whither struggling men attain,\nPassing humbly through the portal\n Of obedience, toil, and pain.\n\n\nV.\n\nAt that melody symphonious\n Joy to Nature\u2019s heart was sent,\nAnd the spheres, again harmonious,\n Made sweet thunder as they went:\nLightly moved, with pleasure dancing,\n Little hills and mountains high,\u2014\nHelicon his head advancing,\n Till it almost touched the sky.\n\n\nVI.\n\n\u2014Thou whom once those Sisters holy\n On thy lonely path hath met,\nAnd, thy front thou stooping lowly,\n There their sacred laurel set,\nOh be thine, their mandate owning,\n Aye with them to win the prize,\nReconciling and atoning\n With thy magic harmonies\u2014\n\n\nVII.\n\nAn Arion thou, whose singing\n Rouses not a furious sea,\nRather the sea-monsters bringing\n Servants to its melody;\u2014\nAn Amphion, not with passion\n To set wild the builders\u2019 mind,\nBut the mystic walls to fashion,\n And the stones in one to bind.\n\n\n\n\nNOTES.\n\n\nTHE STEADFAST PRINCE.\n\n\nPage 128, stanzas 7, 8.\n\nIn these stanzas I had before me Calderon\u2019s magnificent description\nof the advance of the Portuguese fleet, which he puts into\nthe mouth of one of the Moors. These are a few lines:\u2014\n\nPrimero nos pareci\u00f3\nViendo que sus puntas tocan\nCon el cielo, que eran nubes\nDe los que \u00e1 la mar se arrojan\nA concebir en zafir\nLluvias, que en cristal abortan.\nLuego de marinos monstruos\nNos pareci\u00f3 errante copia,\nQue \u00e1 acompa\u00f1ar \u00e1 Neptuno\nSalian de sus alcobas:\nPues sacudiendo las velas\nQue son del viento lisonja\nPensamos que sacudian\nLas alas sobre las olas.\nYa parecia mas cerca\nUna inmensa Babilonia,\nDe quien los p\u00e9nsiles fueron\nFl\u00e1mulas, que el viento azotan.\n\n\nP. 129, s. 9, l. 5.\n\n\u201cVexilla Regis prodeunt,\u201d the great Crusaders\u2019 hymn.\n\n\nP. 173.\n\nORPHEUS AND THE SIRENS.\n\nThis poem was first suggested by some words in the \u201cSirenes,\nsive Voluptas,\u201d in Lord Bacon\u2019s \u201cSapientia Veterum.\u201d [Orpheus]\n\u201claudes Deorum cantans et reboans, Sirenum voces confudit\net summovit: meditationes enim rerum divinarum voluptates\nsens\u00fbs non tantum potestate, sed etiam suavitate superant.\u201d\nAccording to the author of the \u201cOrphic Argonautics,\u201d the song\nof Orpheus ended the enchantment of the Sirens, and caused\nthem to fling themselves into the sea, where they were changed\ninto rocks. Lord Bacon gives finely the meaning of the shore\nwhite with bones (stanza xix.), which yet were unable to deter\nothers from approaching;\u2014how it teaches us \u201cexempla calamitatum,\nlicet clara et conspicua, contra voluptatum corruptelas non\nmultum proficere.\u201d\n\nThe classical reader will at once recognise, in more than one\npassage, my obligations to Pindar.\n\n\nP. 185.\n\nTHE OIL OF MERCY.\n\nThe traditions concerning the relations between the Tree of\nlife which was set in Paradise, and the Cross on which hung\nthe Saviour of the world, are almost infinite; or, rather, the one\ndeep idea of their identity has clothed itself in innumerable forms.\nThey constitute indeed one of the richest portions of what may\nwithout offence be termed the Mythology of the Christian Church.\nThat which I have followed here is given in the \u201cEvangelium\nNicodemi,\u201d c. 19. See Thilo\u2019s \u201cCodex Apocryphus,\u201d v. i. p. 684.\nIn the \u201cRecognitions\u201d of Clement, l. 1, c. 45, an Ebionite book,\nand therefore only acknowledging the humanity of Christ, he is,\nconsistently with this view, said, not himself to anoint, but to\nhave been anointed with the oil from the Tree of Life. The\nconnexion between the Tree of Life and the Cross of Christ has\nbeen twice wrought up into sublime dramatic poems by Calderon;\nonce in his Auto, entitled \u201cEl Arbor del mejor Fruto;\u201d and\nagain in that which is indeed only the same poem in a later and\nmore perfect form, \u201cLa Sibila del Oriente.\u201d We have the same\ntradition of Seth going to the gates of Paradise in the fine old\nCornish Mystery of \u201cThe Creation of the World,\u201d which was\nlately published with an English translation; and allusions to it\nare frequent in all the popular literature of the Middle Ages;\nsee, for instance, G\u00f6the\u2019s recension of the \u201cReineke Fuchs,\u201d\nnear the beginning of the tenth book; and I remember a curious\npassage about it in Mandeville\u2019s \u201cTravels.\u201d R\u00fcckert, in the\nfollowing poem, has given the tradition in somewhat a different\nshape.\n\nI may just observe that this poem is an attempt\u2014I will confess\na most unsuccessful one\u2014to write English verse in the Spanish\nassonant rhyme, of which the principle is, that words are considered\nto rhyme which have the same vowel-sounds, though the\nconsonants are different: thus, _angel_ and _raiment_ having the\nsame vowel-sounds, _a\u2014e_, are perfect assonant rhymes. As in\nthe Persian Ghazel, there is but one rhyme running through the\nwhole poem, and in this all the alternate lines, beginning with\nthe second, terminate: and of course the rhythmical effect of the\npoem is to be judged, not by any half-dozen lines apart, but by\nthe total impression which the whole Poem continuously read\nleaves on the ear.\n\n\nTHE END.\n\n\n\n\nLONDON:\nBRADBURY AND EVANS, PRINTERS,\nWHITEFRIARS.\n\n\n\n\nTranscriber\u2019s Note\n\n\nObvious typographical errors have been silently corrected. Variations\nin hyphenation have been standardized but all other spelling and\npunctuation remains unchanged.\n\nFootnote has been placed at end of respective poem.\n\nPoems with and without titles within the book were left as printed.","title":"Poems from Eastern Sources: The Steadfast Prince; and Other Poems","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":25683}