Ballads for the Times (Now first collected,) Geraldine, A Modern Pyramid, Bartenus, A Thousand Lines, and other poems. By Martin F. Tupper. A new Edition, enlarged and revised |
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A Cabinet of Fossils.
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 | Ballads for the Times |  |
A Cabinet of Fossils.
Come, and behold with curious eye
These records of a world gone by,
These tell-tales of the youth of time,—
When changes, sudden, vast, sublime,
(From Chaos, and fair Order's birth,
To the last flood that drown'd the earth,—)
Shatter'd the crust of this young world,
Into the seas its mountains hurl'd,
And upon boisterous surges strong
Bore the broad ruins far along
To pave old ocean's shingly bed,
While bursting upwards in their stead
The lowest granites towering rose
To pierce the clouds with crested snows,
Where future Apennine or Alp
Bared to high heav'n its icy scalp.
These records of a world gone by,
These tell-tales of the youth of time,—
When changes, sudden, vast, sublime,
(From Chaos, and fair Order's birth,
To the last flood that drown'd the earth,—)
Shatter'd the crust of this young world,
Into the seas its mountains hurl'd,
And upon boisterous surges strong
Bore the broad ruins far along
To pave old ocean's shingly bed,
While bursting upwards in their stead
377
To pierce the clouds with crested snows,
Where future Apennine or Alp
Bared to high heav'n its icy scalp.
Look on these coins of kingdoms old,
These medals of a broken mould:
These corals in the green hill-side,
These fruits and flowers beneath the tide,
These struggling flies in amber found,
These huge pine-forests underground,
These flint sea-eggs, with curious bosses,
These fibred ferns, and fruited mosses
Lying as in water spread,
And stone-struck by some Gorgon's head!
The chambers of this graceful shell,
So delicately form'd,—so well,
None can declare what years have past
Since life hath tenanted it last,
What countless centuries have flown
Since age hath made the shell a stone:
Gaze with me on those jointed stems,
A living plant of starry gems,
And on that sea-flower, light and fair,
Which shoots its leaves in agate there:
Behold these giant ribs in stone
Of mighty monsters, long unknown,
That in some antemundane flood
Wallow'd on continents of mud,
A lizard race, but well for man,
Dead long before his day began,
Monsters, through Providence extinct,
That crocodiles to fishes link'd;
And shreds of other forms beside
That sported in the yeasty tide,
Or, flapping far with dragon-wing,
On the slow tortoise wont to spring,
Or, ambush'd in the rushes rank,
Watch'd the dull mammoth on the bank,
Or loved the green and silent deep,
Or on the coral-reef to sleep,
Where many a rood, in passive strength,
The scaly reptiles lay at length.
These medals of a broken mould:
These corals in the green hill-side,
These fruits and flowers beneath the tide,
These struggling flies in amber found,
These huge pine-forests underground,
These flint sea-eggs, with curious bosses,
These fibred ferns, and fruited mosses
Lying as in water spread,
And stone-struck by some Gorgon's head!
The chambers of this graceful shell,
So delicately form'd,—so well,
None can declare what years have past
Since life hath tenanted it last,
What countless centuries have flown
Since age hath made the shell a stone:
Gaze with me on those jointed stems,
A living plant of starry gems,
And on that sea-flower, light and fair,
Which shoots its leaves in agate there:
Behold these giant ribs in stone
Of mighty monsters, long unknown,
That in some antemundane flood
Wallow'd on continents of mud,
A lizard race, but well for man,
Dead long before his day began,
378
That crocodiles to fishes link'd;
And shreds of other forms beside
That sported in the yeasty tide,
Or, flapping far with dragon-wing,
On the slow tortoise wont to spring,
Or, ambush'd in the rushes rank,
Watch'd the dull mammoth on the bank,
Or loved the green and silent deep,
Or on the coral-reef to sleep,
Where many a rood, in passive strength,
The scaly reptiles lay at length.
For there are wonders, wondrous strange,
To those who will through nature range,
And use the mind, and clear the eye,
And let instruction not pass by:
There are deep thoughts of tranquil joy
For those who thus their hearts employ,
And trace the wise design that lurks
In holy nature's meanest works,
And by the torch of truth discern
The happy lessons good men learn:
O there are pleasures, sweet and new,
To those who thus creation view,
And, as on this wide world they look,
Regard it as one mighty book,
Inscribed within, before, behind,
With workings of the Master-mind;
Ray'd with that Wisdom, which excels
In framing worlds,—or fretting shells,—
Fill'd with that Mercy, which delights
In blessing mammoths, men, or mites,—
With silent deep Benevolence,
With hidden mild Omnipotence,
With order's everlasting laws,
With seen effect, and secret cause,
Justice and truth in all things rife,
Filling the world with love and life,
And teaching from creation round
How good the God of all is found,
His handiwork how vast, how kind,
How prearranged by clearest mind,
How glorious in His own estate,
And in His smallest works how great!
To those who will through nature range,
And use the mind, and clear the eye,
And let instruction not pass by:
There are deep thoughts of tranquil joy
For those who thus their hearts employ,
And trace the wise design that lurks
In holy nature's meanest works,
And by the torch of truth discern
The happy lessons good men learn:
O there are pleasures, sweet and new,
To those who thus creation view,
And, as on this wide world they look,
Regard it as one mighty book,
Inscribed within, before, behind,
With workings of the Master-mind;
Ray'd with that Wisdom, which excels
In framing worlds,—or fretting shells,—
379
In blessing mammoths, men, or mites,—
With silent deep Benevolence,
With hidden mild Omnipotence,
With order's everlasting laws,
With seen effect, and secret cause,
Justice and truth in all things rife,
Filling the world with love and life,
And teaching from creation round
How good the God of all is found,
His handiwork how vast, how kind,
How prearranged by clearest mind,
How glorious in His own estate,
And in His smallest works how great!
| Ballads for the Times | |