 | Ranolf and Amohia |  |
IV.
Surprise a moment held him dumb;And why set down the words he spoke—
Disjoined and crowded as the sum
Of mingled feelings that within him woke?—
What speech has Passion's mastering moods? what speech
Is possible to any Ecstasy?
Can finite words an infinite feeling reach,
Or the mere bounded Intellect express
The Soul's emotions in their boundlessness?
No! as the sky-drawn moisture that distils
Down from the sky-aspiring hills,
A sea-side valley slowly fills;
But, if some milder earthquake's pant
Have slightly changed its downward slant,
Suddenly bursts the marsh below
And seaward rushes in mad overflow,
Bearing before it to the mighty Main
The wrecked and flowery richness of the plain,
Till all the calm eternal blue,
About the outlet of the river new,
283
Where still the clinging flax-flower smiles,
Minute azolla-stains of ruddiest hue,
And many a water-loving bloom that grew
Luxuriant while the swamp its moisture could sustain:—
So Speech and all the forms of Thought,
Yea, every medium Intellect supplies,
Are shattered and distraught,
Whene'er the o'er-informing Soul doth rise
And swell and sweep in native might
On to its kindred Infinite;
And broken words and images essay
In vain the abounding current to convey,
In vain to express the inexpressible;
While blissful moans and happy murmurs tell,—
And only they,—
How the Eternal that within us sleeps,
Stirred to its inmost mystic deeps,
Is welling forth its own imperial way;
Bursting the crust where Custom's weeds are growing,
And its material marge triumphantly o'erflowing!
| Ranolf and Amohia | |