Night and the soul A dramatic poem. By J. Stanyan Bigg |
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| I. |
| II. |
| III. |
| IV. |
| V. |
| VI. |
| VII. |
| VIII. |
Scene VIII.
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| IX. |
| X. |
| XI. |
| XII. |
 | Night and the soul |  |
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Scene VIII.
As before. Night.Alexis looking on the Passers-by.
Thus they stream on—on through the darken'd world—
Live lightnings rushing through long lanes of night—
Bright meteors dancing on the Infinite,
The heritors of the eternal thrones;
Princes, whose sovereignty shall still endure
When the stars sicken at the name of Night,
And the pale universe, with outstretch'd arms,
Sinks with a death-groan on the breast of God.
Thus they stream on! And still the old world laughs
And calls them pigmies and ephemera.
Cycles of ages had bedeck'd her head
With coronals before their fathers were,
And she will laugh around the grave of all;
But the smile smites herself. For are they not
Her masters, not her slaves? Aye, are they not?
What, though they all go down to night and death,
While she still fans her in the upper air;
What, though whole millions drop into the dark,
While centuries hang round her like idle wreaths,
They are the orphans of Eternity,
And wait the term of their outlawry here,
Coming from out of shadow in a night,
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There to sleep on until the Birthday comes,
And they are call'd unto the courts on high,
Where they shall reign for ever, while the voids
And booming blanks are begging for a world.
Thus they stream on! Each soul a universe;
Each man a microcosm of the whole,
Of all that is, or can be, here below,
Or in the great hereafter. Hell, earth, heaven,
All blended and concentrated in one,
And looking out of eyes that meet me now!
Cherub and Seraph—hierarchies of these
Lay slumbering in the compass of a soul;
Grand possibilities—Aurelias
Destined, perchance, to flash out into heavens!
Thus they stream on; And tramp the world for pence,
With unclaim'd acreage of stars at hand;
With constellations waiting for a lord;
And God Himself, with bounteous eye and hand
Casting the seed into the eternal soil
For them to reap and garner evermore;
Their wealth still growing, like the universe,
From seedlings into suns; from suns to systems.
Thus they stream on! Aye, ever, ever thus.
Witless archangels playing pitch and toss,
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Great lights play round them from their unseen crowns;
Great destinies hang over them like clouds;
And they go scrambling on for halfpence still;
All arms and legs, and scampering eagerness,
And puny, impotent relinquishments;
While round-faced suns break into merriment,
Saying unto each other, “Oh, what fools!”
Thus they stream on! All mantled round by time,
Like god-lings buried to the neck in leaves,
With brows the sun might bless himself to see,
And eyes in which the stars might lose themselves;
Kings, with a beggar's wallet at their back;
Princes and potentates, disporting rags;
Crown'd monarchs, begging at their palace-gate,
And taking crumbs from menials, with a bow!
Thus they stream on! All gasping out for wealth;
For the poor pittance of a niggard world,
While vacant empires cry aloud for lords,
And sceptres are piled up in heaven, star-high,
Waiting for faithful hands to grasp, and wield.
Thus they stream on! On through the darken'd world;
Reeling, mad-drunk; and fill'd with harlotries,
With the great Sisters hanging on each arm,—
Eternity, and the starr'd Infinite,—
Saying unto them, “Brothers, dwell with us.”
On through the darken'd world. Their country house,
Now grown too mighty for their tenancy,
In whose apartments they are lost; and gaze
With eyes of wonder on their stores of wealth—
Strangers unto their own.
Reeling, mad-drunk; and fill'd with harlotries,
With the great Sisters hanging on each arm,—
Eternity, and the starr'd Infinite,—
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On through the darken'd world. Their country house,
Now grown too mighty for their tenancy,
In whose apartments they are lost; and gaze
With eyes of wonder on their stores of wealth—
Strangers unto their own.
Ah! it is sad,
That of all things man only should be poor.
The world is rich in gladness and in smiles;
While he—sad fool—goes mourning all his days.
Daily the sun flings out his laughing light;
And all the clouds catch up the jocund hues,
And dance along the sympathetic heavens,
Like cheeks puff'd out with laughter. And at night,
The moon smiles on the stars; and they on her;
And all the streams on both. Old hoary woods,
And brooks for ever young; and birds, and bees,
And winds, and all the ceaseless hum of time
Give out sweet gratulations unto all—
Outwellings of a joyance overbrimm'd—
Heart-flutters in a boundless hymn of praise.
While Man? Ha! Ha! Well what of him? Aye what?
Can he not laugh? Yes! till the houses ring.
An angel lost a lofty throne in heaven,
And came down doubling peal on gusty peal,
Saying that all were mad who dwelt up there!
Cometh the laughter fresh up from the heart,
Or is it but the idiotic smile
Set on a maniac's features, but to say
The soul is not at liberty just now?
Can he laugh? He—great bankrupt of all time,—
Sole dissonance in world-wide choristries:
He who had all, and lost it on a throw;
He to whom day was given as a guide,
And night as friend and teacher,—he who smote
Joy in the face, and would have none of her,—
Great pupil of all times. What does he now?
Sits burly in the sunshine, paring sticks,
And then looks up and laughs!
That of all things man only should be poor.
The world is rich in gladness and in smiles;
While he—sad fool—goes mourning all his days.
Daily the sun flings out his laughing light;
And all the clouds catch up the jocund hues,
And dance along the sympathetic heavens,
Like cheeks puff'd out with laughter. And at night,
The moon smiles on the stars; and they on her;
And all the streams on both. Old hoary woods,
And brooks for ever young; and birds, and bees,
And winds, and all the ceaseless hum of time
Give out sweet gratulations unto all—
Outwellings of a joyance overbrimm'd—
Heart-flutters in a boundless hymn of praise.
While Man? Ha! Ha! Well what of him? Aye what?
Can he not laugh? Yes! till the houses ring.
An angel lost a lofty throne in heaven,
And came down doubling peal on gusty peal,
Saying that all were mad who dwelt up there!
Cometh the laughter fresh up from the heart,
Or is it but the idiotic smile
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The soul is not at liberty just now?
Can he laugh? He—great bankrupt of all time,—
Sole dissonance in world-wide choristries:
He who had all, and lost it on a throw;
He to whom day was given as a guide,
And night as friend and teacher,—he who smote
Joy in the face, and would have none of her,—
Great pupil of all times. What does he now?
Sits burly in the sunshine, paring sticks,
And then looks up and laughs!
Ha! Dreaming still?
And am I doom'd to dream for ever thus;
To fold my arms, and let the world go by
Like a great holiday pageant in the sun,
Till Time begins to stroke me with his wand,
Into a mass of bent decrepitude?
And am I doom'd to dream for ever thus;
To fold my arms, and let the world go by
Like a great holiday pageant in the sun,
Till Time begins to stroke me with his wand,
Into a mass of bent decrepitude?
Has this great clattering workshop nought for me
But the prerogative of looking on?
Was I sent out of old eternities
But to cry “foul play!” to the universe,
And then go puling off into the shades
With a lie rotting on my wither'd lips?
What right have I to mark the earnest brow,
And earth-bent eye of fellow men, and say
“Ye are expending energies for nought,
Tossing your arms in vortexes of winds,
And fronting walls of water?” Are they not
Working for time, and all times with their might,
With heart and soul, and eye, and hand, and brain?
What, though their destinies to them are skies
To those who moil on underground with lamps,
And all high hopes are unseen stars in heaven,
Yet are they working upward towards the sun,
And carving with their hands a fane for God!
Their acts are one with Nature's—one with His.
Their souls, pent-up volcanoes, till they burst,
Gather in elemental fire, and then
Fling out huge legacies of solid rock,
To crumble into soil for future flowers.
What though self underlies their deed,
Like mud the silver surface of a lake,
When heaven itself shines on it day and night,
And sun and moon pass over it in turns,
And a whole sky of stars looks on its deeps
A whole night long in breathless ecstasy,
And then, when daylight comes, goes off to God
To say what mirrors earth holds in her halls?
What, though the tree be rooted in foul slime,
If its great upper branches swing in heaven,
With rainbows for young blossoms, and with suns
For ripen'd fruit?
[A long pause, during which he walks to and fro in a troubled manner.
But the prerogative of looking on?
Was I sent out of old eternities
But to cry “foul play!” to the universe,
And then go puling off into the shades
With a lie rotting on my wither'd lips?
What right have I to mark the earnest brow,
And earth-bent eye of fellow men, and say
“Ye are expending energies for nought,
Tossing your arms in vortexes of winds,
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Working for time, and all times with their might,
With heart and soul, and eye, and hand, and brain?
What, though their destinies to them are skies
To those who moil on underground with lamps,
And all high hopes are unseen stars in heaven,
Yet are they working upward towards the sun,
And carving with their hands a fane for God!
Their acts are one with Nature's—one with His.
Their souls, pent-up volcanoes, till they burst,
Gather in elemental fire, and then
Fling out huge legacies of solid rock,
To crumble into soil for future flowers.
What though self underlies their deed,
Like mud the silver surface of a lake,
When heaven itself shines on it day and night,
And sun and moon pass over it in turns,
And a whole sky of stars looks on its deeps
A whole night long in breathless ecstasy,
And then, when daylight comes, goes off to God
To say what mirrors earth holds in her halls?
What, though the tree be rooted in foul slime,
If its great upper branches swing in heaven,
With rainbows for young blossoms, and with suns
For ripen'd fruit?
Is there no help for this?
And am I doom'd to hear the hinges grate,
Stirr'd by the ghostly hand of mighty winds,
While the door opens not, but grinds, and grinds,
As if to tell me I am prisoner here,
Beyond the reach of hope, or solacement?
Soul! Soul! Fling thyself out of this! Dash through
The window-panes, out, out into the light,—
Into the breathing world of shapes and deeds,
And leave thy cell self-dungeon'd here behind!
Out, out at once, and look not back again,
Lest thou, like Lot's wife, art transform'd to stone,
And stand upon the waste-world of the plain,
Like a lank finger pointing at the moon!
Flee from the doomèd city—from the homes
Of pale idolatries, and self-sick night;
Flee from thyself, and from the poison'd air
Of o'erwrought thought into the world of deeds!
Strike up the arm that smites thee on the mouth,
And flings thee panting on the jagged rocks!
Off with thy thinkings, and go out to work—
Out to the solid world.
[Another pause.
And am I doom'd to hear the hinges grate,
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While the door opens not, but grinds, and grinds,
As if to tell me I am prisoner here,
Beyond the reach of hope, or solacement?
Soul! Soul! Fling thyself out of this! Dash through
The window-panes, out, out into the light,—
Into the breathing world of shapes and deeds,
And leave thy cell self-dungeon'd here behind!
Out, out at once, and look not back again,
Lest thou, like Lot's wife, art transform'd to stone,
And stand upon the waste-world of the plain,
Like a lank finger pointing at the moon!
Flee from the doomèd city—from the homes
Of pale idolatries, and self-sick night;
Flee from thyself, and from the poison'd air
Of o'erwrought thought into the world of deeds!
Strike up the arm that smites thee on the mouth,
And flings thee panting on the jagged rocks!
Off with thy thinkings, and go out to work—
Out to the solid world.
And what means this?
Am I to leave my soul behind, and go
Stripp'd for the task, a bundle of strong bones,
Of rounded muscles, and of well-strung nerves?
Wherefore call ye this thing that toils thus—Man?
Is it in bitter mockery, or sport?
This grave spade-wielder, this food-grinding churl,
Whose mechanism morning sets to work,
And evening finds stretch'd in a snoring sleep?
Is this to live? And were we sent from heaven,
Like Winter snow-flakes through the fields of air,
But to alight on dung-hills, and expire?
Shall I join Donkeydom, and learn to bray
At all things greater, nobler than myself,
And be a beast of burden,—not a soul
Endow'd with eyes and hands?
[Another pause.
Am I to leave my soul behind, and go
Stripp'd for the task, a bundle of strong bones,
Of rounded muscles, and of well-strung nerves?
Wherefore call ye this thing that toils thus—Man?
Is it in bitter mockery, or sport?
This grave spade-wielder, this food-grinding churl,
Whose mechanism morning sets to work,
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Is this to live? And were we sent from heaven,
Like Winter snow-flakes through the fields of air,
But to alight on dung-hills, and expire?
Shall I join Donkeydom, and learn to bray
At all things greater, nobler than myself,
And be a beast of burden,—not a soul
Endow'd with eyes and hands?
Nay! Nay! What then?
Live as I have lived, scooping water up,
To see it trickle through my fingers, thus:— [Pours water into his hand.
And be a shrivell'd weed to cling around
A cog of the great world's revolving wheel?
Or is it possible to wed great thought
Live as I have lived, scooping water up,
To see it trickle through my fingers, thus:— [Pours water into his hand.
And be a shrivell'd weed to cling around
A cog of the great world's revolving wheel?
To noble action, and to make them one?
And if it were, what purpose would it serve
To a mad world that clings unto the past,
Like a young starveling to his mother's rags,
And is drawn forward unto nobler aims
As willingly as Hector was, behind
The chariot wheels of his great Grecian foe?
Wed thought to action? Make them one? Ha! Ha!
Cork thunder in a bottle; and go round
With phials labell'd Lightning in your hand!
| Night and the soul | |