The Baptistery, or the way of eternal life :: :: University of Virginia Library

“Come on, Aspasio,” good Philander cried,
“Far o'er the hills the Heavenly City lies,”—
Aspasio started, for behind his guide
He listen'd to a lute, in loitering guise,
And fix'd upon a child his thoughtful eyes;
Seeing he sees not, nor in hearing hears,
But deep were mov'd his inward phantasies,
Moulding their converse from his eyes and ears,—
He starts, and with his friend in converse now appears.

“Philander, all things now a voice have found,
And speak as if they hasten'd on to die:
As now I listen'd to that plaintive sound,
It seem'd to me the voice of days gone by;
A child who in his heedless sports stood nigh,
Blowing light bubbles to the empty air,
Attun'd my thoughts to grave philosophy,
Till caught in music's dream I linger'd there,
And from his lightsome sports I drew me thoughts of care.

“From his creative tube each airy ball
Successive pass'd to the bright morning skies,
Taking its colour as the sunbeams fall;
The rainbow lent its own prismatic dyes;
It swells and soars and shines, and then it dies;
Each, gone or going, seems to speak the tale
Of mortal glory, how it instant flies;
If one above another seems to sail,
'Tis but a gleam without, within an empty gale.”

“Strange thoughts which keep the loiterer still behind!”
Philander said, “that on your pensive ear
Come musically as the idle wind
On the Eolian chords: such thoughts should bear
With Heaven-aspiring wings of hope and fear,
And like the full-blown canvas urge the soul,
Not idly flap the pennon; night draws near,
Behold yon trooping clouds that westward roll,
All Heaven seems moving on, and distant is the goal.”

“O thou that still forbearing hold'st my hand,
From the Baptismal waters my sure friend,
Though long I left thy counsels and command,
Till as upon a parent's grave I bend,
Fresh o'er my soul came my remember'd end,
And thou like some good Angel cam'st to sight,
Homeward an orphan pilgrim to attend;
That City then seem'd on a neighbouring height,
E'en as on yonder hill the evening suns alight.

“Still distance mocks me, like a lovely star
Receding from my sight as I advance,
Yea, while advancing, still I seem afar.”
Thus as he spake he sank in pensive trance,
As if those musings served but to enhance
His thoughtful idlesse. Lo, from bound to bound
An antler'd stag before them seen to glance,
Gathering fresh impulse as he touch'd the ground,
Into the thicket pass'd—and stillness reign'd around.

“Mark you,” replied Philander, “on each side
They of that golden City of the sky
Send forth these omens, ever thus to glide
Around our path to train to wisdom high;
Tokens and warnings people all things nigh,
All born of Heaven discern the Heavenly sign,
Stern monitors of life fast hurrying by;
To them that watch this world becomes a shrine,
And every sight they see a messenger divine.

“Swift as yon arrow cleft the vacant air,
Swift as yon bird that sought its woodland nest,
So life shall have gone by, nor passing spare
One trace to speak of all its sad unrest:
Swift as on clouds some vision stands confess'd,
Then vanishes before the shaping wind;
So all on which earth's glory is impress'd,
Pass soon away nor leave a wreck behind,
No vestige of what pleas'd the imperishable mind.

“But to that City we are ever nigh,
Nigh and more nigh on each returning year,
But scenes illusive catch thy wandering eye,
And fill the soul: God has declared it near,

And they who know His mind and learn His fear,
Are taught of God to know that Day at hand;
Then all things speak aloud to eye and ear,
Speak of the Judge Who at the door doth stand,
They tremble lest they fail of that immortal land.

“At every turn of life to list'ning souls
The sounding of the eternal wheels is known;
That Sea of glory ever onward rolls
The clouds and tempests, which precede the throne;
And that celestial City must have thrown
Her garb around thee, ere that face to face
Before the dreadful King thou stand alone;
Hour follows hour, and day fast wears apace,
To warn thee of night's fall that shuts the day of Grace.

“Now round thy Boyhood's path they weave the dance—
Slow intermingling Hours, bright Day, fair Night,
Glad Seasons,—all with measur'd step advance,
Distinct in beauty, slow before thee light,
And toy and tarry with thy lingering sight;
But, as thine age advances, hand in hand
They soon will hurry thee, till in their flight
Scarce are discern'd the features of that band ,
While impulse fresh they gain as they approach the strand.

“Each Hour gleams on thee like an infant's face,
Fresh yet distinct, whose features love may scan,
And Days and Nights and Seasons with a grace
Come forth by turns, in slow-revolving plan,
And linger, while they bear thee on to man;—
Soon all in fourfold shape shall seem to meet,
Like that by Chebar seen, the flying van,
And then shall drop their wings and hurrying feet,
And the dread Voice be heard from the Almighty's seat .

“The more in man the immortal spirit grows,
The more he feels his fleetness; while the years
Still shorter seem as they approach the close;
See, as this woodland path before us bears,
First full and clear the column'd arch it rears,
From tree to tree the vista mark'd extends,
With narrowing arms in distance it appears,
Till roof with floor, and side with side it blends,
And in one little point th' o'erarching pathway ends.”

Conversing thus they went, and pass'd unseen
Down by a hanging rock, where deep below
The waters gather'd in a still ravine,
Then issued on their course with winding flow;
From 'neath that shady rock appear'd a prow
Moor'd by an Aged man. They wondering note
His wings half hid behind, and wrinkled brow;
Strange visions of the past around them float,
As like some fabled Shade he mov'd his silent boat.

Touch'd by his pole the fast receding bank
Went from them, down the stream with watery bound
They hurried, waves came rippling round the plank,
And parted, with a soft and soothing sound;
Aspasio gaz'd again in thought profound,—
“Thou saidst, Philander, that the earth and air
Are sown with Heaven-sent teachers all around,
Nor are the waters silent,—fleet and fair,
Swift as they journey on the warning voice they bear.

“All speak of life fast hast'ning to its close,
The waters ripple on and downward go,
The bubble breaks, and passes as it glows,
We hurry down with unperceivèd flow;
Shadows are fleeting o'er the mountain brow,
Bright varied scenes recede and are no more,
On either side they flee behind the prow,
And hues of eve come on; clouds, waves, and shore,
All range themselves in words our fleetness to deplore.

“Of man's Mortality one varied tale,
One holy dirge; his generations pass
Like yonder corn-fields, where the woodland vale
Stretches behind, all in one golden mass
Laid low; new fields succeed; yet nature's glass
Still holds ourselves to view: now we discern
A nobler scene expanding, as the pass
Opens, yet left behind at every turn,
And no delaying hand can stay the vision stern.”

Now fruitful glens behind withdrew from sight,
Bosom'd 'mid woodland heights, scenes bright and fair
Nestling in hidden nooks: now on the right
Opens a mountain amphitheatre,
With cots that look out from its verdant stair;
Fit haunts of ancient Time that mountain range;
The exile may return, and lingering there
Find lineaments untouch'd by harmful change,
While to his heart bereav'd all else is new and strange.

That Heaven-sent man of eld moor'd 'neath the shade
Embowering o'er their heads, and farewell took;
While, as beneath the rock his freight was stay'd,
He pointed, “Up yon path and ivy nook,
There is a cell which overhangs the brook,
Which thoughtless men the house of Mourning call—
'Tis call'd the house of Wisdom in the Book.”
Up the ascent they sprang, a winding wall,
And enter'd unperceiv'd in Wisdom's holy hall.

There one was laid upon a dying bed,
A man of God was sitting by his side;
And feebly lifting up his pallid head,
The dying man spake softly, and replied,
“I knew it well, full well, and often sigh'd
In days of blooming youth, to think how soon
The days of man, his pleasure, and his pride,

Nature alike and fortune's richest boon,
Fast hasten on to reach, and pass their waning noon.”

Thus as he spake his sinking frame he rais'd;
“Well I remember in my boyhood's prime,
There was a touching sadness as I gaz'd
Upon the footsteps of transforming Time,
The sweetest music was the evening chime
That spoke of days gone by; in very sighs
Was luxury; poets' tears and thoughts sublime
Would come and blend with tender phantasies,
As they who dress a grave with flowers of vernal skies.

“The passing flower and the Autumnal leaf,
Lov'd animals, and men that died around,
Touch'd oft my soul with thoughts of pitying grief,
And on the ear, responsive to that wound,
Hung poets' words of soft and plaintive sound;
Yet knowing still I knew them not: I tried
To look on all as vanity, nor found
How my poor thoughts the deeper truth belied,
So were those pensive thoughts to vanity allied.”

“Therefore,” replied the priest, “of life's short span
'Tis writ so often in the Sacred Page,
Which, opening immortality to man,
Holds up in mirror life's short pilgrimage,
In every form that may the soul engage,

And then each talent weighs in duty's scale:
Mysterious thought of never-ending age,
At sight of which the strongest heart grows pale,
And dreads ere that be won lest life itself should fail!

“Therefore life's glare which for awhile may play,
And throw a gleam upon the sepulchre,
Beguiles not him, who feels that his short day
Is hurrying on, to leave him standing where
He must meet Judgment on the eternal stair,
That as a mote to Heaven's immensity,
That as a sand upon the desert bare,
That as a drop unto the mighty sea,
E'en such is our short life to vast eternity.

“Each hour is like an Angel, which with wings
Comes from, and goes to Heaven; yet empty ne'er
Comes or returns, but some occasion brings,
And hastens back to Heaven, the tale to bear
Of evil, or fresh store to treasure there.
Wrestle as with an Angel with each Hour,
And hold him; though he seem a child of air,
Yet he will in the struggle give thee power,
And though the flesh grows weak will leave a Heavenly dower.

“Pity looks down from Heaven's o'erarching roof,
Awe-struck to see how swift our hour is sped;
To see while day and night weave the thin woof,
Eternity is hanging on the thread;
And then that hour that numbers 'mong the dead,

Numbers us among those that die no more:
Time marks not Death with unperceivèd tread
Steal on behind: but while he numbers o'er
His many days to come, Death shuts the eternal door.

“Death puts on every shape and varied dress,
Looks in at every door, hides in each scene,
Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter's silver tress,
Childhood, Youth, Manhood, Age: in verdant green
Or pallid sere he lurks alike unseen;
At funerals or feasts a shadowy guest,
Thrusts his unwelcome head their mirth between:
And there marks for his own the unheeding breast,
Yea, every day we live, we are by him undress'd.

“Death speaks to us in all things, drawing near,
Through all we love Death speaks to us, to move
The more by their lov'd accents: on whate'er
Flower, bird, or beast, we build and lean our love,
He takes it to himself, that we might prove
Stay'd list'ners to his story: every night
He sends his image, wraps us in his cove
Of unavoided sleep, shuts out the light,
Puts life and friends away, and hides us from their sight.”

The dying man was mov'd, with thoughts too deep,
For utterance too big, too big for tears:
Then spake at length; “I wake as from a sleep

100

From visions which have haunted my past years,
The dread reality at length appears!
Such thoughts familiar from my childhood seem'd,
But when they mov'd my sorrow and my fears,
In fancy's fond irradiance fair they gleam'd,
Like gloomy clouds of night on which the moonlight stream'd.

“Scripture oft call'd aloud; in Nature's glass
Mortality's strong picture stood to view,
Where human things as fleeting shadows pass,
And all within me own'd the likeness true:
Truth beckon'd, yet I ne'er did Truth pursue
With eager hands and to my bosom press'd,
But sported with her shadow as it flew,
And now she visits me with sad unrest,
When I would lay me down in calmness on her breast.

“It needs a faith long school'd in hourly life
To feel the everlasting arms beneath,
When in the bosom wakes an Ocean's strife,
And face to face looks on approaching Death.
O Thou before Whom with our fleeting breath
The shades of Being pass, the All in All,
Whose lowest whisper Wisdom cherisheth,
Morn, eve, month, year, and Fast and Festival,
How hast Thou call'd to me, when I heard not Thy call!”

The Priest spake calm and comfort, and his Book
Unclasping, on whose bright and burnish'd page

101

Bright Angels seem'd as if they radiance shook
From wings bedropp'd with gold:—“Each passing stage,”
He said, “of this life's sacred pilgrimage
Hath its own task assign'd, its duty given;
Each hour, in joy or grief, in youth or age,
Should like the wave bear impress of the Heaven,
Whether the blush of Morn, or the calm star of Even.

“Thy work this hour is patience: if the past
Hath set its image there where nought decays,
Deny not its own work to this thy last:
Strong yearnings ever mark'd thy vanish'd days,
And outstretch'd longings after absent ways:
That all is past, and now thy heart incline
To seize the present good as by it strays,
To Heaven's all-gracious will thyself resign;
The Heavenly kingdom this; and this is life Divine.

“As strangers and as sojourners we stand
Before Him, in our sadness and our mirth:
He knows our fleetness, we are in His hand;
Before the sea and mountains had their birth,
Before were laid the pillars of the earth,
Thou art from everlasting: Thine ear hears,
Thy heart doth pity us, and knows our worth;
With Thee there are the everlasting years;
Thou weighest all our sighs, and countest all our tears.”

102

He paus'd—for Death around in silence trod,—
On all the unutterable stillness lies
Of that dread hour when man must meet his God,
And spirits stand around: Aspasio's sighs
Philander heard, and saw his tearful eyes,
And led him forth without. One twinkling star
Look'd through the trees, silence was on the skies,
Save waters and a dog that bay'd afar;—
Stillness kept watch, with nought soft Nature's calm to mar.

“'Tis not life's fleeting things that move my tears,
But that they move me thus and do no more,”
Aspasio cried—“'tis this that wakes my fears:
I stretch my hands in vain unto the shore,
And still in vain my empty hands deplore.”
“Remember,” said Philander's voice serene,
“That now 'tis the last time!” nor added more,—
The youth with lifted hands and fallen mien
Kneel'd down, where the broad moon broke on the woodland scene.

Then good Philander secretly was glad,—
Philander was his angel, and full long
Watch'd o'er him: now he saw him Heavenly-clad,
And pass'd on wings which to wild dreams belong.—
Aspasio woke, and felt himself made strong

103

With eagles' plumes and feet on high to climb.
Heaven seem'd all starry eyes,—like some sweet song
Linger'd those words with solemn under-chime;
“Remember, little child, that now 'tis the last time!”

See Lyra Apostolica, p. 48. edit. 1st.

Ezekiel i. 25.