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

This is the calm of the Autumnal Eve,
O beautiful and blessed sight
Which lifts the soul to Heaven, and while I grieve
Doth fill me with a holy still delight!
O silence and repose,
Which o'er the passing year, ere yet it goes,
A holy mantle throws!
The Nightingale to other lands hath flown,
The singing birds are still,
The roses have all ceas'd, the lilies gone,
Declining Noon withdraws from vale and hill,
And leaves us all alone.

For these outgoings of the waning Year,
And comings on of silent Night,
Do put more brightly on the Heaven's appareling,
And e'en Decay doth beauty wear;
Blest auguries fill thought and sense and sight:
From purple-clouded strands
A Spirit fair doth spring,
And on the mountain height,
Equipp'd for new and fairer lands,
Like some bright-harness'd Angel doth appear.

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The yellow leaves are trembling,
And pilgrim-birds assembling
And the silver stars are breaking,
And the Moon upon the glorious Heavens all freshly is awaking.
Now Death and Life encountering meet,
And 'tween th' opposing bands
Decay and Beauty have shook hands;
Twilight steals on with dewy feet;
While Earth and Skies are meeting
In mutual benison,
Soft-handed Silence near stands looking calmly on,
And cordial is the greeting.

Brightly looks forth the wand'ring Moon
On rear of the Autumnal noon;
And seems descending from a Heavenly door,
And speaking of a happier shore,
When Death's dim shade shall on us fall,
And Night display her spangled pall.
The day that goes away
Lifts up a glorious curtain in the soul
From things that are more beautiful than Day:
But we, pent up in prison-house of clay,
See them not, though around us still they roll;
Till Darkness shews the peopled Infinite,
And earth-worms tremble at the sight.

Thou aged man that sittest by the sea,
Feeding thy thoughts upon the dark blue Ocean,
And on thy staff with pensive eyes dost lean,
Say from that distant land, which none hath seen,

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What visions come to thee;
From o'er the dark blue caves of ceaseless motion,
Say, what does thy prophetic soul divine,
To fill with happy thoughts thy lustrous eyne?
Sitting alone upon life's evening shore,
Thou hear'st th' eternal billows roar,
Already at the door.
Lift up thy heart, thou aged man,
To where thy face is set—that beauteous dome,—
There thy true birthright scan,
And measure thine own glorious home.

From the cloud-moulded visions of the West
A spirit fair unfolds her glowing vest,
And there, pavilion'd in gold-braided cloud,
Upon the sea descending,
She unto earth, in beauty bow'd,
Her dreadful scale is bending.
Balanc'd upon the Heavenly roof,
One scale springs light as air aloof,—
Sin with her short-liv'd pleasures,
Her poison'd darts, her wounds and chains,
Bought by eternal pains:—
One low descends, all massy proof,
Virtue, with her undying treasures,
Her pains that pass away,
And joys that ever stay.
Mute is the calm autumnal eve profound,
With holy peace diffus'd around,
While all the worth of man, and his pursuit she measures.

And now as in some isle afar,
Beneath the Evening star,

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Brought into nearness in the distant mass,
Bright moon-lit shadows pass;
Catching the rays, as light around them flows,
While mantling night upon their heels is treading,
And Twilight all behind her dewy sails is spreading;
They pass into their bright and calm repose,
Before th' eternal door shall ever close.
Virtue's fair Daughters, born from dying woes
Of Him that walk'd the wave,
They go to Him, and plead His power to save
From the devouring grave.

And who is yonder man?
Himself a fleeting span,
His shadow lengthens as the sun goes down,
So growing Sorrow marks him for her own;
But o'er his head a golden crown
The parting sun hath thrown.
His worldly wealth on earth forsaking,
Wing'd sides he finds, and light-wing'd feet,
And on his way his comrades is o'ertaking,
While Virtue now descends her pilgrim true to meet,
And lead him hand in hand to her enduring seat.

Man seems to climb a mountain side,
And ever as he mounts to leave behind
Green spots and flowers,
And shade of verdant bowers:
Bidding adieu to golden prime,
He flings aside to envious Time
The richer thoughts that were to Hope allied,

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From barren to more barren still to climb.
Then, as he upward mounts, upon the wind
He hears no more the streamlet's melodies,
And Childhood's freshness on his spirit dies.
But now that he hath gain'd the mountain height,
He seems to walk upon the glorious skies:
The Sun, that sets upon the seas beyond,
Flings back the radiance of his golden wand,
And clothes him with a new celestial light;
Anon he seems more large than man's estate,—
A figure seen on Heaven's bright-burnish'd gate.

Another road extends its forward march,
Above the mighty arch
That stretches o'er the tide.
And one is travelling with a tortoise by his side.
How slowly doth he wend,
Making the world his friend!
Nor with her strong league will break
But perish for her sake,
At the celestial gate
Knocking too late!
A road still lower now extends,
Which to that glory dimly tends;
And one in sight of the eternal walls
For ever falls,—
By Sin enthrall'd when near his journey's end,
And Fiends afar in the dark shade rejoice
To see his hapless choice.

And lo, I see on the left hand
The Forms that lead the victim soul
To chambers of the grave, and sorrow's land.

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Catching the rays, they sport awhile,
And on their victim smile.
One blindly tears life's charter'd scroll,
And tramples on the sword;
Another bears th' inebriating bowl,
Or whate'er price they need who sell the Lord.
While Folly laughs to gain the heart and head
Of them who dream of life, while they embrace the dead.

Occasions, standing on each side,
Present themselves to guide,
As pursuivants to either band,
Like sisters twain, or shadows bland;
With head behind all bald and bare,
Before all flowing hair,
Through which is scarce discern'd their visage rare.
They come at every tide,
To convoy each to her own strand.
One grasps the world within her hand,
One tramples 'neath her feet.
One bears the crown of life for ever young,
And endless Heaven upon an hour-glass hung.
The other bears the thong
Which follows on the wrong:
She comes an Angel fair,
With sweet enticing air,
Her hook and scourge conceals,
And feet which turn to talons strong;
But when embrac'd, her twisted thong reveals,

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And her uplifted soundless scourge,
With which her victim blind she on to death shall urge.

Hail, visions strange, which fill the poet's dream,
And shape his flowing theme
With shadows true of mightier things!
While evening skies and earth together teem
With beauteous shades that walk abroad,
Truth peoples fancy's airy road
With her own deep imaginings.
It is a hallow'd and a solemn time,
And o'er the Sea the red-orb'd Sun descends,
Methinks I hear the sound of that eternal chime,
When Judgment shall begin, and Trial ends.

They say what hour through the long year is found
Like this, when summer's glare and daylight fails,
And Contemplation broods around,
To witness those eternal scales
Where life o'er death prevails,—
The scales as seen in Angels' eyes,
Who watch us choose our destinies?
What scene more meet, that where the stars
Stern witnesses appear,
As Darkness lifts her massy bars,
And Ocean sounds his diapason drear
To the fast-waning year?

Then lift thy voice, thou glorious Sea,
In expectation trembling,
And Earth with thousand tongues,
And stars that are assembling
With sweet though silent songs;

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Lift up on high your prison-bars,
That the eternal Year may go forth, free
From all that now his vision mars,
Crown'd with immortal jubilee,
And rescued from his wrongs.

Ye feather'd pilgrims, when the year grows old,
Who on the dim horizon darkly flock,
While pillar'd clouds like smoke the vision mock;—
Or range along the pented roof,
In companies so stiff and cold,—
In flying troops now wheel aloof,
Now huddle 'neath the frosty eaves,
As if in you the spirit grieves
To see the Autumn's waning leaves;
And yet, preparing to depart to-morrow,
Seem reconcil'd to this day's sorrow;
Pictures ye seem of suffering,
As if our climate did you wrong,
Yet suffering still in hope are fresh and strong,
With buoyant wing and twittering song;
Give to my heart your song and wing,
And I with you will fly and sing.