University of Virginia Library

MONODY,

TO THE MEMORY OF THE REV. J. W. EASTBURN.

Vail, Zion, vail thy mourning head,
Let sacred clouds descending weep;
Mourn, holy hill, thy shepherd dead,
Whose voice no more shall charm thy sheep!
Thou, city of the Lord, deplore
A watchman vanish'd from thy walls!
While nightly tempests round thee roar,
No more thy faithful servant calls.
Temple of God! let chants of wo
Through all thy hallowed courts be borne;
A polished shaft in dust lies low,
And round the sister columns mourn.
Departed saint! how sweet the strain
The spirit taught thy lips to pour!
How dear the echoes which remain
When now the music breathes no more!
Around those lips, as in the shade
Where infant Plato lay reclin'd,
Hymettian bees prophetic play'd,
And left their choicest store behind:
But than their treasures far more sweet,
Though with them inspiration clung,
With unction of the Paraclete,
Descending seraphs tipp'd thy tongue!
“Proclaim,” the Eternal Spirit said,
“Glad tidings to the meek in heart,
Bind up the wounds that earth has made,
And bid the enfranchis'd slave depart.
Tell the poor captive, chain'd by sin,
‘Thy bars are burst, and thou art free!
The year of glory shall begin,
The spring of beauty dawns for thee!’
Bid those who mourn on Zion's steep,
Swathed in such garb as grief should be,
As o'er the sins of men they weep,
Look through their tears to Calvary.
For them the oil of joy shall flow,
Immortal beauty shall be theirs,
And, for the livery sad of wo,
The spotless robe that angel wears.
In ancient wastes, where moss o'erspreads
The temples once devote to God,
And weeds, luxuriant, wave their heads
Above the consecrated sod;
Where ruin, scowling o'er the gloom,
For years has marked the scene her own,
Rebuild the crumbling walls, relume
The fire upon the altar stone!”
He heard the summons and obeyed;
And desolation bloom'd again,
Like nature, as old bards have said,
Obedient to the minstrel strain.
How soon his strain exultant swells
The hymn that mortals may not share!
Like music borne on summer gales,
That melts upon the distant air.
So soars the lark in early morn,
Her note heard fainter as she flies;
Upward, still upward, she is borne,
Until in heaven her warbling dies.
But now, that cherished voice was near;
And all around yet breathes of him;—
We look, and we can only hear
“The parting wings of cherubim!”
Mourn ye, whom haply nature taught
To share the bard's communion high;
To scan the ideal world of thought,
That floats before the poet's eye;—
Ye, who with ears o'ersated long,
From native bards disgusted fly,
Expecting only, in their song,
The ribald strains of calumny;—
Mourn ye a minstrel chaste as sweet,
Who caught from heaven no doubtful fire,
But chose immortal themes as meet
Alone, for an immortal lyre.
O silent shell! thy chords are riven!
That heart lies cold before its prime!
Mute are those lips, that might have given
One deathless descant to our clime!
No laurel chaplet twines he now;
He sweeps a harp of heavenly tone,
And plucks the amaranth for his brow
That springs beside the eternal throne.
Mourn ye, whom friendship's silver chain
Link'd with his soul in bonds refin'd;
That earth had striv'n to burst in vain,—
The sacred sympathy of mind.
Still long that sympathy shall last:
Still shall each object like a spell,
Recall from fate the buried past,
Present the mind belov'd so well.
That pure intelligence—O where
Now is its onward progress won?
Through what new regions does it dare
Push the bold quest on earth begun?
In realms with boundless glory fraught,
Where fancy can no trophies raise—
In blissful vision, where the thought
Is whelm'd in wonder and in praise!
Till life's last pulse, O triply dear,
A loftier strain is due to thee;
But constant memory's votive tear
Thy sacred epitaph must be.