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The poems posthumous and collected of Thomas Lovell Beddoes

Beddoes, Thomas Lovell (1803-1849)

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VOL. I.
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THE SECOND BROTHER;
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ACT I.
 I. 
Scene I.
 II. 
Scene II.
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ACT II.
 I. 
Scene I.
 II. 
Scene II.
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ACT III.
 I. 
Scene I.
 II. 
Scene II.
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ACT IV.
 I. 
Scene I.
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TORRISMOND;
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ACT I.
 I. 
Scene I.
 II. 
Scene II.
 III. 
Scene III.
 IV. 
Scene IV.
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DRAMATIC SCENES AND FRAGMENTS.
 I. 
I. ERMINIA ABBANDONATA.
 II. 
II. AN APOTHEOSIS.
 III. 
III. The Israelite amid Philistines.
 IV. 
IV. Lovers' Identity.
 V. 
V. Prison Thoughts.
 VI. 
VI. Man's petty Universe contrasted with the True.
 VII. 
VII. Recognition.
 VIII. 
VIII. Reception of Evil Tidings.
 IX. 
IX. A Ruffian.
 X. 
X. Recollection of Early Life.
 XI. 
XI. A Crocodile.
 XII. 
XII. “Bona de Mortuis.”
 XIII. 
XIII. Rosily dying.
 XIV. 
XIV. Speaker's Meaning dimly descried.
 XV. 
XV. Anticipation of Evil Tidings.
 XVI. 
XVI. Midnight Hymn.
 XVII. 
XVII. Concealed Joy.
 XVIII. 
XVIII. Life a Glass Window.
 XIX. 
XIX. A Dream.
 XX. 
XX. Metaphor of Rain.
 XXI. 
XXI. Meditation.
 XXII. 
XXII. Sweet to Die.
 XXIII. 
XXIII. Extreme Acclivity.
 XXIV. 
XXIV. Rain.
 XXV. 
XXV. Life's Uncertainty.
 XXVI. 
XXVI. Kisses.
 XXVII. 
XXVII. Subterranean City.
 XXVIII. 
XXVIII. Dream of Dying.
 XXIX. 
XXIX. Insignificance of the World.
 XXX. 
XXX. Sleeper's Countenance contemplated.
 XXXI. 
XXXI. A beautiful Night.
 XXXII. 
XXXII. Humble Beginnings.
 XXXIII. 
XXXIII. A Countenance foreboding Evil.
 XXXIV. 
XXXIV. A lofty Mind.
 XXXV. 
XXXV. Sorrow.
 XXXVI. 
XXXVI. Sad and cheerful Songs contrasted.
 XXXVII. 
XXXVII. A subterranean City.
 XXXVIII. 
XXXVIII. Man's anxious, but ineffectual, Guard against Death.
 XXXIX. 
XXXIX. A Day of surpassing Beauty.
 XL. 
XL. The slight and degenerate Nature of Man.
 XLI. 
XLI. A Night-Scene.
 XLII. 
XLII. Dirge.
 XLIII. 
XLIII. Mourners consoled.
 XLIV. 
XLIV. A great Sacrifice self-compensated.
 XLV. 
XLV. “Love is wiser than Ambition.”
 XLVI. 
XLVI. The Murderer's haunted Couch.
 XLVII. 
XLVII. Human Life: its value.
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MISCELLANEOUS POEMS.
  
ALFARABI; THE WORLD-MAKER.
  
THE ROMANCE OF THE LILY.
  
PYGMALION.
  
LINES WRITTEN IN A BLANK LEAF OF THE ‘PROMETHEUS UNBOUND.’
  
SONNET:
  
LETTER TO B. W. PROCTER, ESQ.
  
ANOTHER LETTER TO THE SAME.
  
THE BODING DREAMS.
  
LOVE'S LAST MESSAGES.
  
THE GHOSTS' MOONSHINE.
  
FROM THE GERMAN.
  
THE PHANTOM-WOOER.
  
A DIRGE.
  
ANOTHER DIRGE.
  
BRIDAL SERENADE.
  
DIRGE.
  
DIRGE AND HYMENEAL:
  
DIAL-THOUGHTS.
  
DREAM-PEDLARY.
  
BALLAD OF HUMAN LIFE.
  
SONG, ON THE WATER.
  
LOVE-IN-IDLENESS.
  
THE REASON WHY.
  
THE TWO ARCHERS.
  
THE RUNAWAY.
  
SONG ON THE WATER.
  
ALPINE SPIRIT'S SONG.
  
SONG: TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN OF WALTHER VON DER VOGELWEIDE.
  
SONG OF THE STYGIAN NAIADES.
  
THE LILY OF THE VALLEY.
  
A LAMENT.
  
DIRGE.
  
EPITAPH.
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POETIC FRAGMENTS.
  
THE TREE OF LIFE.
  
THE NEW-BORN STAR.
  
THRENODY.
  
LINES, WRITTEN AT GENEVA; JULY, 1824.
  
STANZAS. (FROM THE IVORY GATE.)
  
LINES WRITTEN IN SWITZERLAND.
  
DOOMSDAY.
  
THRENODY.
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VOL. II.
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Death's Jest-book:
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ACT I.
 I. 
Scene I.
 II. 
Scene II.
 III. 
Scene III.
 IV. 
Scene IV.
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ACT II.
 I. 
Scene I.
 II. 
Scene II.
 III. 
Scene III.
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ACT III.
 I. 
Scene I.
 II. 
Scene II.
 III. 
Scene III.
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ACT IV.
 I. 
Scene I.
 II. 
Scene II.
 III. 
Scene III.
 IV. 
Scene IV.
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ACT V.
 I. 
Scene I.
 II. 
Scene II.
 III. 
Scene III.
 IV. 
Scene IV.
  
L'ENVOI.
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THE BRIDES' TRAGEDY
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ACT I.
 I. 
Scene I. A garden.
 II. 
Scene II.
 III. 
Scene III.
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ACT II.
 I. 
Scene I.
 II. 
Scene II.
 III. 
Scene III.
 IV. 
Scene IV.
 V. 
Scene V.
 VI. 
Scene VI.
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ACT III.
 I. 
Scene I.
 II. 
Scene II.
 III. 
Scene III.
 IV. 
Scene IV.
 V. 
Scene V.
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ACT IV.
 I. 
Scene I.
 II. 
Scene II.
 III. 
Scene III.
 IV. 
Scene IV.
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ACT V.
 I. 
Scene I.
 II. 
Scene II.
 III. 
Scene III.
 IV. 
Scene IV.

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207

THE TREE OF LIFE.

There is a mighty, magic tree,
That holds the round earth and the sea
In its branches like a net:
Its immortal trunk is set
Broader than the tide of night
With its star-tipped billows bright:
Human thought doth on it grow,
Like the barren misletoe
On an old oak's forehead-skin.
Ever while the planets spin
Their blue existence, that great plant
Shall nor bud nor blossom want;
Summer, winter, night and day,
It must still its harvest pay;
Ever while the night grows up
Along the wall of the wide sky,
And the thunder-bee sweeps by,
On its brown, wet wing, to dry
Every day-star's crystal cup
208

Of its yellow summer:—still
At the foot of heaven's hill,
With fruit and blossom flush and rife,
Stays that tree of Human Life.
Let us mark yon newest bloom
Heaving through the leafy gloom;
Now a pinkish bud it grows
Scentless, bloomless; slow unclose
Its outer pages to the sun,
Opened, but not yet begun.
Its first leaf is infancy,
Pencilled pale and tenderly,
Smooth its cheek and mild its eye:
Now it swells, and curls its head,—
Little infancy is shed.
Broader childhood is the next— [OMITTED]
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