The Christian Scholar :: :: University of Virginia Library

The Christian Scholar

By the Author of "The Cathedral" [i.e. Isaac Williams]

Williams, Isaac (1802-1865)

[section]

[dedication]

CLASSICAL COMPLAINTS AND SCRIPTURAL REMEDIES.

II.

III.

IV.

VI.

VII.

VIII.

IX.

XI.

XII.

XIII.

XIV.

XV.

XVI.

XVII.

XVIII.

XIX.

XX.

XXI.

XXII.

XXIII.

XXIV.

XXV.

XXVI.

XXVII.

HEATHEN ORACLES CONFESSING CHRIST.

II.

III.

IV.

VI.

VII.

VIII.

IX.

XI.

XII.

XIII.

XIV.

XV.

XVI.

XVII.

XVIII.

XIX.

XX.

XXI.

XXII.

XXIII.

XXIV.

XXV.

XXVI.

XXVII.

XXVIII.

XXIX.

XXX.

XXXI.

XXXII.

XXXIII.

XXXIV.

XXXV.

XXXV. COINCIDENCES.

GREEK PHILOSOPHY.

PLATO.

I. THE DEMON OF SOCRATES.

II.

II. SOCRATES ON JUDGMENT AFTER DEATH.

III.

III. SOCRATES REFUSING TO ESCAPE FROM PRISON.

IV.

IV. THE LAST WORDS OF SOCRATES.

V. EGYPT.

VI.

VI. MYTHOLOGY.

VII.

VII. THE GRECIAN JUPITER.

VIII.

VIII. PLATONISM.

IX.

IX. THE PLATONISTS.

X. THE STOICS.

XI.

XI. THE PYTHAGOREANS.

XII.

XIII.

XIII. THE CHANGE.

XIV.

XIV. POETS ADMITTED TO THE CITY OF GOD.

XV.

XV. PLATO'S MUSIC OF THE SOUL.

XVI.

XVI. PLATO EXPELLING POETS.

XVII.

XVII. ON A FUTURE STATE.

XVIII.

XVIII. ON CONSCIENCE.

II.

II. ATE EXPELLED FROM HEAVEN.

III.

III. ULYSSES AND CALYPSO.

IV.

IV. ULYSSES SHIPWRECKED AND NAUSICAA.

V. THE LOTOPHAGI.

IV.

IV. THE ABODE OF CIRCE.

VII.

VII. WARNING AGAINST THE SIRENS.

VIII.

VIII. SCYLLA AND CHARYBDIS.

IX.

IX. THE RECOGNITION OF ULYSSES.

II.

III.

IV.

IV. THE PATH OF VIRTUE.

V. THE RIGHTEOUS KING.

ÆSCHYLUS.

I. THE PROMETHEUS.

II.

II. KNOWLEDGE OF GOD BY SUFFERING.

III.

III. SACRILEGE.

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ON THE FOREGOING.

IV.

IV. THE BESETTING SIN.

V. ATE.

VI.

VI. THE FURIES OVERTAKING ORESTES.

[section]

ORESTES AT THE SHRINE.

SONG OF THE FURIES.

VII.

VII. DIVINE POWER.

SIMONIDES.

II.

II. ELEGIAC FRAGMENT.

III.

III. ON THE LIFE OF MAN.

IV.

IV. MUTABILITY.

V. DANAE AND HER CHILD.

II.

II. THE BIRTH OF HERCULES.

[section]

THE CONTRAST.

III.

III. TRIAL AND REWARD.

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REFLECTION ON THE ABOVE.

IV.

IV. BEGINNING WELL.

V. THE FOUNDLING ON EARTH.

VI.

VI. ASPIRATIONS OF EARTH.

SOPHOCLES.

I. GRECIAN TRAGEDY.

II.

II. THE TRAGIC CHORUS AND THE MORAL LAW.

III.

III. SIGHT OF ATHENS.

EURIPIDES.

I. ALCESTIS RETURNING FROM THE GRAVE.

II.

II. THE GARLAND OF HIPPOLYTUS.

BION.

THE EVENING STAR.

MOSCHUS.

[“When the calm wind upon the dark-blue sea]

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THE CONTRAST.

CALLIMACHUS.

I. FROM THE HYMN TO APOLLO.

II.

II. VANITY OF HUMAN LIFE.

III.

III. EFFECTS OF SIN IRREMEDIABLE.

IV.

IV. BIRTH AND REARING OF MAN.

V. DREAD OF ANNIHILATION.

VI.

VI. OCULAR DECEPTIONS.

VII.

VII. TRUE PHILOSOPHY.

VIII.

VIII. ATHEISM CORRECTED.

CATULLUS.

I. THE PINNACE.

II.

II. HOME.

III.

III. THE FADED FLOWER.

IV.

IV. A BROTHER'S DEATH.

II.

III.

III. ORPHEUS AND EURYDICE.

IV.

VI.

I. LUCRETIUS AND HORACE COMPARED.

II.

II. THE WORLD RENOUNCED.

III.

III. ECCLESIA LABORANS.

IV.

IV. ECCLESIA MIGRATURA.

V. PROTECTING PROVIDENCE.

VI.

VI. THE SICILIAN FEAST.

VII.

I. THE METAMORPHOSIS.

II.

II. OVID'S EPISTLES.

III.

III. OVID'S TRISTIA, OR LAMENTATIONS.

JUVENAL.

I. GUILT THE SELF-AVENGER.

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THE SAME ILLUSTRATED BY REVELATION.

II.

II. RURAL IMAGES IN THE SATIRIST.

PERSIUS.

I. SUFFERINGS OF CONSCIENCE.

II.

II. THE FAITHFUL INSTRUCTOR.

LIVY.

I. THE ROMAN CHARACTER.

II.

II. NUMA POMPILIUS.

III.

III. THE FAITHLESS GUARDIAN.

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iii

J.K. HÆC CUM SUA SINT VERIUS QUAM MEA GRATO ANIMO ATTRIBUUNTUR.

CLASSICAL COMPLAINTS AND SCRIPTURAL REMEDIES.

“THE LEAVES OF THE TREE WERE FOR THE HEALING OF THE NATIONS.”

“IN VALLEM ÆGERIÆ DESCENDIMUS, ET SPELUNCAS DISSIMILES VERIS”

I.

“κακους δε θνητων εξεφην', οταν τυχη,
προσθεις κατοπτρον, ωστε παρθενος νεα,
χρονος .”
Eurip. Hip. 429.

Time holds to me his silent glass,
Wherein myself I view,
As there from sin to sin I pass,
An image sad and true.

And since that now to manhood grown
I bear no goodly sign,
Hath God's displeasure o'er me gone,
I hasten to decline.

“Time, like a youthful maiden, holds his glass,
And shews forth evil men.”

“We all with open face beholding, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image.” 2 Cor. iii. 18.

But in another glass I scan,
Hiding His heavenly rays,
The image of the Son of Man,
And kindle as I gaze.

In deepest sense of my desert
Thus daily let me die,
If so I may but touch the skirt
Of His great charity!

II.

“Quis desiderio sit pudor aut modus
Tam cari capitis ?”
Hor. Od I. xxiv. 1.

If I forget thee for awhile
Then, like some mournful strain,
Thine image seems to chide my smile
And o'er me comes again.

O'er each still hour it comes from far,
With thoughts of childish years,
Reflected, like a heavenly star,
In the deep fount of tears.

“What measure can there be to our laments
For one so dear?”

“Concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope.” I Thess. iv. 13

That fount of tears it hidden lies
Within my Saviour's breast,
And I will leave thee in the skies
And that deep fount to rest.

O Thou, who know'st our secret frame,
And every inmost grief,
In Thee I leave that long-lov'd name,
And find in Thee relief.

III.

“Ουδε παις ευδαιμων εστιν: ουπω γαρ πρακτικος των τοιουτων: οι δε λεγομενοι, δια την ελπιδα μακαριζονται .” Arist. Eth. i. 9.

Still Virtue labours mid the sky
To set her citadel,
Where visitants may come from high,
And Contemplation dwell.

She climbs; hill rises after hill,
The sun seems to alight
Ever before, but distant still
It sinks, and leaves to night.

“Children cannot attain this perfection of virtue and happiness; we call them happy in hope.”

“Suffer the little children to come unto Me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of Heaven.” S. Mark x. 14.

The weary, weak, and leaning child,
Upon a parent's breast
Which lays, o'ercome with wanderings wild,
Its head, and is at rest:

Sole emblem such to young or old
Of all on earth we find,
Which angels may with joy behold,
Faith's meek reposing mind.

IV.

“Quæ caput e cœli regionibus ostendebat,
Horribili super aspectu mortalibus instans .”
Lucret. i. 65.

Religion clad in storms of yore
Unveil'd her awful mien,
And in dread lightnings oped the door
Of the eternal scene.

Sad shades and shapes were there reveal'd
In dismal vision clear,
While conscious Guilt the pencil held,
And dark-portending Fear.

“Religion shewed her head from realms above,
Threatening mankind with visage horrible.”

“Mercy and truth are met together . . . . and Righteousness hath looked down from Heaven.” Ps. lxxxv. 10, 11.

But Abram saw his children throng
Like stars in heaven at night,
Those stars they heard the angelic song,
And from their orbs of light

Came Bethlehem's star, which with us dwells;
Since then they nearer roam,
And seem to walk, like sentinels,
Around our earthly home.

V.

“Immortalia ne speres monet annus et almum
Quæ rapit hora diem .”
Hor., lib. iv. Od. vii. 7.

Yes, years, days, hours, that wave their wing
Through this our mortal span,
With changes on each outward thing,
And in the heart of man,

As with a thousand tongues they preach
No more, so frail and vain,
To build upon a sandy beach,
Where nothing can remain.

“Immortal things are out of reach,
Years, days, and hours this lesson teach.”

“My flesh and my heart faileth; but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion for ever.” Ps. lxxiii. 25.

Yet why do these so fleet appear
And wake the heart's deep sigh,
But that within a spark we bear
Of immortality?

With multitudinous voice they cry
For some more sure abode,
To labour everlastingly,
That we may dwell with God.

VI.

“------Diffugiunt cadis
Cum fæce siccatis amici,
Ferre jugum pariter dolosi .”
Hor., lib. i Od. xxxv. 26.

The darkest cloud that marks below
Misfortune's alter'd scene,
Is in affection's changing brow,
And cold averted mien.

Then friends depart, and by and bye,
All one by one are gone,
Like swallows from a wintry sky,
And we are left alone.

“The cask is empty—friends are gone.”

“Yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee.” Is. xlix. 15.

There is a Friend that draws more near
As other friends depart,
And enters with a warmer cheer
Into a broken heart.

When from a stricken deer they flee,
And leave alone to die,
He opes His bosom unto thee,
In endless bliss to lie.

VII.

“Viâ Lavicanâ ad Fanum Quietis .” Liv., b. iv. ch. 41.

Rest had no place amid that throng,
Where multitudinous rise
Rome's stately temples, which belong
To evil deities.

Her Temple is without the gate,
Beyond the Esquiline;
No Rest but is beyond the state
Wherein the dead recline.

“The Temple of Rest on the Via Lavicana beyond the Esquiline gate.” See Aug. Civ. Dei, iv. xvi.

“Come unto Me, all ye that travail and are heavy laden; and I will give you rest.” S. Matt. xi. 28.

Many the gold-paved streets Divine
By meek obedience trod,
But Rest is as the inmost shrine
In city of our God.

Within—within—yea, further still
By energy of woes,
By prayers, and alms, and bearing ill
We find in Christ repose.

VIII.

“Το δε προπηλακιζομενον ανεχεσθαι, ανδραποδωδες .” Arist. Eth. iv. 5.

Revenge inspires the poet's song,
And decks the warrior's brow,
When Nature's self doth plead the wrong,
And Justice deals the blow.

Retaliation is the plea
Which human judgment arms,
E'en own'd by stern philosophy,
And clothed with awful charms.

“To be reviled and to submit to it is slavish.”

“Who, when He was reviled, reviled not again.” 1 Pet. ii. 23.

There is a fairer righteousness
That cometh from above,
Which the reviler turns to bless,
And overcomes with love.

The soul with self-reproach oppress'd
Seizes that chain from Heaven,
And climbs unto her place of rest,
Forgiving as forgiven.

IX.

“Τον φιλεοντα φιλειν, και τω προσιοντι προσειναι
Και δομεν ος κεν δω, και μη δομεν ος κεν μη δω .”
Hesiod. Works and Days. b. i. 1. 350.

Self is the centre whence around
Such love and bounty flows,—
Self whose horizon there doth bound
This universe of woes.

But all that's built on self alone
With man's own self must fail,
All that to human sense is known,
And fills our vision frail.

“Love him that loves thee, give to one that gives,
Give not to him that gives not.”

“But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again.” S. Luke vi. 35.

God is the centre, on which move
More stable charities,
Founded on that eternal love
Whose orbit is the skies.

Till man's own self is lost within
The everlasting light,
Which swallows up both self and sin
In goodness infinite.

X.

“Ridet argento domus . . . .
Cuncta festinat manus, huc et illuc
Cursitant .”
Hor., lib. iv. Od. xi. 6. 9.

When men unto some honour'd guest
Would open wide their gate,
They bring around and manifest
Their riches, power, and state.

That such their welcome may discern
As in a mirror bright,
See all things fair at every turn,
And costly to their sight.

Hastes, here and there attendants run.”

“To-day I must abide at thy house.” . . . . “Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor.” S. Luke xix. 5, 8.

Who wish the Lord of earth and skies
Should enter at their door,
Must throw away what most they prize,
And empty all their store.

He loveth most our want to see
Expressive of good will,
That He may so our poverty
With His own fulness fill.

XI.

“Τον φιλεοντ' επι δαιτα καλειν . . .
Τον δε μαλιστα καλειν οστις σεθεν εγγυθι ναιει .”
Hesiod, Works and Days, b. i. 1. 339.

Such is the wisdom of the wise
Their fellow-men above,
Which brings around home-charities,
Delighting in their love.

But self is thus reflected seen,
Of earth in its reward,
Though purest of the joys of sight,
And best it can afford.

But most of all a neighbour dwelling near.”

“When thou makest a dinner or a supper, call not thy friends, nor thy brethren, neither thy kinsmen, nor thy rich neighbours.” S. Luke xiv. 12.

Blest spirit, which with love imbued
And fearing recompense,
Turns to the Giver of all good
From things of sight and sense!

How great is thy reward in store
To whom e'en now 'tis given
Christ to receive in His own poor,
And make thy house a heaven!

XII.

“Ελευθεριου δε εστι σφοδρα και το υπερβαλλειν εν τη δοσει .” Arist. Eth. iv. 1,

To give away and nothing leave
Is like the sun to shine;
For it is human to receive,
But to bestow divine:—

Thus reason'd well the sage; but then
Howe'er can bounty live,
And grow in living progress, when
It nothing hath to give?

“The liberal man is apt to exceed greatly in giving so as to leave but little for himself. For not to look to himself is part of his character.”

“I say unto you, that this poor widow hath cast in more than they all.” S. Luke xxi. 3.

Come, bring the scales wherein are weighed
The actions of the just,
When all things shall be open laid,
And riches turn to dust.

The poor the kingdom have;—their store
By giving larger grows,
Possessing less they have still more,
The poorest most bestows.

XIII.

“Compositum jus, fasque animo, sanctosque recessus
Mentis, et incoctum generoso pectus honesto:
Hæc cedo, ut admoveam templis, et farre litabo .”
Pers. ii. 73.

Thus Reason argued not amiss—
That, in the all-seeing eyes,
The heart itself the altar is
The gift which sanctifies.

Cleanness of hands and the pure heart
Is the best sacrifice,
No treasur'd work of labour'd art
Is of such cherish'd price.

My sacrifice.”

See Ecclus. xxxv. 2.

“Neither will I offer burnt-offerings unto the Lord my God of that which doth cost me nothing.” 2 Sam. xxiv.

But costly was the offering raised
By saintly Magdalene;
And on the gift the Judge hath praised
The eternal seal is seen.

Love stored her precious gift;—and such
The princely-hearted king;
Who loveth much he giveth much,
And hastes the best to bring.

XIV.

“Haud facile emergunt quorum virtutibus obstat
Res angusta domi .”
Juv. iii. 165.

The Satirist in Rome's decline
Made this our world the stage
Of Virtue, there to walk and shine
In glitt'ring pilgrimage.

The world for all of mortal birth
Doth still this judgment hold,
And puts aside as nothing worth
What is not set in gold.

Slow rises worth by poverty depress'd.”

“Blessed be ye poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.” S. Luke vi. 20.

But He who for a holier place
Would cleanse our path from sin,
For habitation of His grace
A kingdom builds within.

His city's gates He hath rehears'd,
The first is poverty,
The Satirist's words hath He revers'd,
And changed the world's decree.

XV.

“Nil habet infelix paupertas durius in se
Quam quod ridiculos homines facit .”
Juv. iii. 152

The bitterest cup in all life's ills
Is poverty and want;—
The bitterest drop that cup that fills
Is the world's jeer and taunt.

The barb most wrankling in the breast
Is scorn and ridicule,
Although to be of one the jest,
Whom God hath deem'd a fool .

Greatest is ridicule.”

Luke xii. 20.

“The Pharisees, who were covetous, heard these things, and they derided Him.” S. Luke xvi. 14.

Such ills on earth the Son of God
Did round Him closely bind;
And they by whom His way is trod
Therein no sting shall find.

On such from Heaven He looketh down;
Such near His Throne shall be;
Lord, of beatitudes the crown
Is to be like to Thee.

XVI.

“Libido pereundi et perdendi .” Liv. Præf.

“Men cannot their own vices bear,
Nor bear their remedies:”
Alas, that we such things should hear
Beneath the pitying skies!

To breathe of Heaven the genial breath,
To walk in Christian light,
And yet to be in love with death,—
O wondrous, awful sight!

“The lust of dying and destroying.”

“Ofttimes it hath cast him into the fire, and into the waters, to destroy him; but, if thou canst do any thing, have compassion on us.” S. Mark ix. 22.

With man—'tis madness, sense-bereft,
Destroying and destroy'd;
With God—the soul which He hath left,
Where Satan fills the void.

Deeper to die man seems to strive,
With his own self at strife;
Lord, teach us in Thy love to live,
And love in Thee our life.

XVII.

“μη φυναι τον απαντα νι-
κα λογον: το δ', επει φανη,
βηναι κειθεν οθεν περ ηκει
πολυ δευτερον ως ταχιστ .”
Soph. Œd. Col. 1225.

Oh yes, if what this world can give
Were all our destiny,
Indeed 'twere better not to live,
Or being born to die.

And I too from the eternal sleep
Woke to this world of strife,
Could like a Thracian mother weep
O'er this poor gift of life.

As soon as born to die.”

“She remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world.” S. John xvi 21.

But on thy face, my little one,
There is a drop of dew,
Which from the everlasting Sun
Hath caught a living hue.

With that may blend a mother's tear
Till both in hope may shine,
To wake in Heaven, and find thee there
To share the life Divine.

XVIII.

“Optima quæque dies miseris mortalibus ævi
Prima fugit; subeunt morbi tristisque senectus .”
Virg. Geor. iii. 66.

The glory of our days is past,
A light which was on things;—
The thousand brilliant hues she cast
As Childhood waved her wings.

The light without—within is o'er—
The bloom—the undefiled—
To be—oh, never, never more,
The happy—happy child!

Disease ensues and sad old age behind.”

“His flesh shall be fresher than a child's; he shall return to the days of his youth.” Job xxxiii. 25.

There is a happier childhood still,
A childhood which is love,
A nobler vision to fulfil,
Whose manhood is above.

Its golden hues may earth invest,
On faith and hope they feed,
And learn upon a Parent's breast
To lay the feebler head.

XIX.

“Hæc satis est orare Jovem quæ donat et aufert;
Det vitam, det opes; æquam mi animam ipse parabo .”
Hor. Ep. i. 18.

Alas, what, God give days to live
And soul-debasing wealth;
But hath the best no power to give—
The immortal spirit's health!

Then thou thyself art more than God,
Wrapt in thy Stoic's fur,
And independent of His rod
Thine Heaven within prefer!

Content of mind myself will gain.”

“When I perceived that I could not obtain her, except God gave her me; and that was a point of wisdom to know whose gift she was; I prayed unto the Lord, Give me wisdom.” Wisd. viii. ix.

Oh, no—our best life is to know
In Him we live and move;
We lose ourselves in Him below,
Our very life is love.

To know our weakness is our strength,
Our wealth our want to feel,
Our peace of soul that He at length
This inward want reveal.

XX.

“Αι, αι, ται μαλαχαι μεν επαν κατα καπον ολωνται.”
Mosch. Epit. in Bion. v. 106.

“Ah, mallows in the garden die,
Parsley, and blooming dill,
Yet waken'd by the vernal sky
Again their course fulfil.

While we, the wise, the strong, the brave,
Have no fresh spring in store;
But silent in the hollow grave
Sleep on for evermore.”

“Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust; for thy dew is as the dew of herbs.” Is. xxvi. 19.

O mole-eyed slow philosopher,
Is this thy wisdom's reach,
To read thus wrong each character
Which Nature's self doth teach!

When resurrection is the tale
Writ on the sky and earth,
Creation's lord alone to fail,
And have no second birth!

XXI.

“Οιη περ φυλλων γενεη, τοιηδε και ανδρων.”
Hom. Il. vi. 146.

“Men fade like leaves” that drop away
Beneath the parent shade,
Others again succeed, but they
Are in oblivion laid.

So spake the sire of Grecian song;—
Through each succeeding age
The words are caught and borne along
By poet, saint, and sage.

“Behold the fig-tree and all the trees, when they now shoot forth, ye see and know of your ownselves that summer is now nigh at hand.” S. Luke xxi. 29.

The parable of Autumn's tale
Before us open lies,
We feel, alas, how fast we fail;—
Yet dim our hope to rise—

And it required a Saviour's voice
To read aright the spring;—
That faith with nature might rejoice
When brush'd by Winter's wing.

XXII.

“------Usque ego posterâ
Crescam laude recens.”
Hor, lib iii. Od. xxx.

[_]

Epigram on the grave of Sophocles.

“Gently above the silent grave
Where Sophocles doth sleep,
Soft Ivy, let thy green leaves wave,
Around it gently creep.

There let the blooming Rose arise,
And branching Vine find place,
For honey-sweet, fair-worded, wise,
He blends both Muse and Grace.”

“All the glory of man is as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away: but the word of the Lord endureth for ever.” 1 Pet. i. 24.

A churchyard was all wrapt in gloom
Except one early ray,
Which lit a Cross upon a tomb,
And far Its shadow lay.

I noted long—my heart it fill'd,
Not unmix'd with a tear,
A solemn awe my bosom still'd,—
It was a grave most dear.

XXIII.

“Αθλα δε των κοτινος, μηλα, σελινα, πιτυς .”
Archias. Gr. Epig.

When Greece was all-contending seen
For an Olympic prize,
A little branch of wintry green
Exalted to the skies.

The human breast thus well divin'd
When all mankind shall strive,
That naught can fill the immortal mind
Of all the world can give.

“Their crowns the olive-branch, the apple, parsley, pine.”

“They do it to obtain a corruptible crown, but we an incorruptible.” 1 Cor. ix. 25.

But even while it fades and dies,
That long-enduring leaf
Speaks of an amaranthyne prize
Untouch'd by winter's grief.

And of that blessed company
With victory crown'd, that stands
Beside the glass-illumin'd sea
With palm-branch in their hands.

XXIV.

“Nam veluti Pueri trepidant atque omnia cæcis
In tenebris metuunt, sic nos in luce timemus.”
Lucret. iii. 87.

“As children fear the dark, and feign
All dreadful things therein;
Through life thus empty terrors vain
Still haunt the man within.

Yet not the sun's bright arrows keen
Can chase those fears away,
But in the soul the clear Serene
Of intellectual Day.”

“When I was a child . . . I thought as a child: but when I became a man I put away childish things.” 1 Cor. xiii. 11.

We must in wisdom be as men,
As children now no more,
Nor fear the ills of life again
As heathen men of yore.

How dread—by these mysterious fears
Let Heaven-taught childhood tell,
To be shut out from Him who bears
The keys of Death and Hell!

XXV.

“Nequaquam nobis divinitus esse creatam
Naturam mundi, quæ tantâ est prædita culpâ .”
Lucret ii. 180.

But who of ought can judge aright
Unless ye see the whole;—
Or circumscribe the Infinite
Within the human soul?

Or if in all this worldly show
Such imperfection reigns,
Who gave to man a soul to know
The faults which he disdains?

Divinely made.”

“He hath set the world in their heart, so that no man can find put the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end.” Eccles. iii. 11.

God look'd on all that He had made
And, lo, 'twas very good,
But all is now by sin decay'd,
Of guilt and death the food.

Yet in man live in this his fall
Wrecks of immortal mind,
Which in this varied beauteous ball
Can naught responsive find.

XXVI.

“Βουλοιμην κ' επαρουρος εων θητευεμεν αλλω,
Η πασιν νεκυεσσι καταφθιμενοισιν ανασσειν .”
Hom. Od. xi. 488, 490.

So doth man's sinful nature deem
With ill-foreboding gloom,
And strays as in a fearful dream
In realms beyond the tomb.

For want, disgrace, and servitude
Seem nothing in that hour,
When Death's huge pinions o'er us brood,
We feel his chilling power.

Of some poor hind than king of all the dead.”

“Then He is gracious unto him, and saith, Deliver him from going down to the pit, I have found a ransom.” Job xxxiii. 24.

Like Ocean rocking pole to pole
Eternity draws nigh,
The firm-set anchor of the soul
Quivers all tremblingly.

How blest as then we turn from earth
To touch the absolving key,
Far better than the day of birth
That light beyond the sea.

XXVII.

“Τον δε μετ', εισενοησα βιην Ηρακληειην,
Ειδωλον: αυτος δε μετ' αθανατοισι θεοισι . . .”
Hom. Od xi. 600

Thus even to good Homer then
A better hope was given,
A brighter vision broke again
Of Hercules in Heaven.

But yet that hope was wan and weak,
As moon-beams in the storm;
While from Heaven's face the shadows break
Which clouds again deform.

He was himself among the gods in Heaven.”

“Having a desire to depart and to be with Christ, which is far better.” Phil. i. 23.

When Death our sins hath open laid,
And Light makes manifest,
Then, Rock of Ages, in Thy shade
Thy chosen ones find rest.

Until Thy Presence for our shame
The robe of light hath wove;
And Thy redeem'd releas'd from blame
Shall mirror all Thy love.

HEATHEN ORACLES CONFESSING CHRIST.

“MAGNA CURIOSITATE ET MAJORE LONGE MEMORIA OPUS EST AD STUDENDUM, SI QUIS VELIT EX LITERIS REOEPTISSIMIS QUIBUBQUE PHILOSOPHORUM, VEL POETARUM, VEL QUORUMLIBET DOCTRINÆ AC SAPIRNTI(AB) SEOULARIS MAOISTRORUM TESTIMONIA EXCERPERE CHRISTIANÆ VERITATIS.” Tertullian, De Test. Animæ.

“AMISSA DRACHMA REGIO
RECONDITA EST ÆRARIO;
ET GEMMA, DETERSO LUTO,
NITORE VINCIT SIDERA.”
Rom. Brev. Mar. Mag.

“PRIMUS SAPIENTIÆ GRADUS EST. FALSA INTELLIGERE
SEOUNDUS, VERA REOOGNOSOERE.”
Lactantius, De fals. Rel., lib. i. cap. xxiii.

I.

“------της αγαν γαρ εστι που σιγης βαρος .”
Soph. Antig. 1256.

When human words are found too weak
Some dreadful weight of woe to speak,
The poet drops his oar and sail,
And Silence bids to tell the tale.

Dido, Jocasta, Creon's wife
Entangled in a mortal strife,
In silence hide the desperate will,
And in a thunder-cloud are still.

“Something momentous in great silence lies.”

“I held my tongue, and spake nothing: I kept silence.”
Ps. xxxix. 3.

The loudest thunder hath no tongue
More dread than is this stillness long,
Which seems to wrap all nature round,
Awaiting the last Trumpet's sound.

Such noiseless foot-falls, stillness-shod,
Which seem to mark the ways of God,
Sound deeper than the outward sense,
With a strange awful eloquence.

II.

“Ποθος και κακων αρ' ην τις.
και γαρ ο μηδαμα δη φιλον, ην φιλον:
οποτε γε και τον εν χεροιν κατειχον .”
Œd. Col. 1693.

Antigone, that gentle guide
By her blind father's aged side,
Guiding his feeble steps aright,
Like morning star with sable night.

That tragic page, affection's child,
Her Presence lights, serene and mild;
In duteous love she found repose,
And thus spoke sweetly at its close.

Were dear and welcome.”

“Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities. . . .in distresses for Christ's sake.” 2 Cor. xii 10.

For them who on the steps of time
Shall with the “Man of Sorrows” climb,
Affection's light the cloud shall line,
And paint its edge with hues divine.

Thus they who walk this vale of woe
With Christ, nor duty's hand let go,
Safe on their Father's breast erewhile
Shall on the past look back, and smile.

III.

“Πολιτειας δε εστιν ειδη τρια. Τουτων δε βελτιστη μεν η βασιλεια .” Arist. Eth. lib. viii. c. x.

The powers of Father, Patriarch, King,
Are shadows of the Eternal's wing,
Fostering in her obedient ways,
Where Piety gives length of days.

Such is the school of love divine,
In varied forms of discipline,
God teaches thus His hand to see,
Whose service is true liberty.

“Of forms of government, the kingly is the best.” And Hom. Il. ii. 205.

“The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ.” Rev. xi. 15.

What men call freedom here on earth
I ever thought of little worth;
The Angels with their King above
Know of no liberty but love.

Kings' rule is nature's own behest,
God's own vicegerence manifest;
Which all around a people brings
The anointing of the King of kings.

IV.

“Diis te minorem quod geris, imperas .” Hor. Od iii. 6.

Why in the shades of ancient Rome
Did Empire make her wondrous home,
So deep her strong foundations cast,
With power that lingers to the last?

It is that to the Roman tongue
A mystic word there did belong,
Which changeful Greece could ne'er supply,
That word of power is “Piety.”

“'Tis piety to Heaven gives sway on earth.”

“Length of days is in her right hand; and in her left hand riches and honour.” Prov. iii. 16.

The kingdom of the imperial Czar
Now seems to issue from afar,
And o'er the ages yet to be
To rise in tranquil majesty.

Her strength she builds o'er sea and land
Upon Mount Sinai's fifth command,
Which casts its shadow long before,
And hath the length of days in store.

V.

“------ο μεγας δε κινδ-
νος αναλκιν ου φω-
τα λαμβανει. ”
Pind. Ol. i. 129

How is it that stern fortitude,
A mailèd form of heathen mood,
Hath power mad multitudes to stay,
And hold the upheaving world at bay?

It is that such of iron nerve,
That takes its post and will not swerve,
Shadows that Faith whose fearless form
Walks on the waves and treads the storm.

Admits not of a craven soul.”

“Only be thou strong and very courageous, that thou mayest observe to do according to all the Law.” Josh i 7.

Give me the spirit brave and bold
The stormy kingdom's helm to hold,
The praise of man behind him cast
Who looks right onward to the last.

Who, train'd by Christ in Wisdom's school,
Is by the world esteem'd a fool:
Set at the helm this statesman true,
And I the storm would brave with you.

VI.

“Εχθρος γαρ μοι κεινος ομως Αιδαο πυλησιν,
Ος χ' ετερον μεν κευθη ενι φρεσιν, αλλο δε ειπη .”
Hom. Il. ix. 312.

So spake Achilles,—'twas a gem
The brightest in his diadem,
To whom the Poet had assign'd
Noble divinity of mind.

Falsehood is mark of his disguise
Who is the father of all lies,
Though oft its craven wing may brood
Beneath a warlike attitude.

Who one thing thinks, another dares to tell.”

“All liars shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone.” Rev. xxi. 8.

The mirror of all youthful grace
Is seen in the transparent face,
Ere sin hath touch'd the open breast,
And hid therein its viper nest.

And 'twas a wisdom deep and true,
More than that ancient Poet knew,
When thus he made the liar dwell
Beside the very gates of hell.

VII.

“Nil dictu fœdum visuve hæc limina tangat
Intra quæ puer est .”
Juv. Sat. xiv. 44.

O unseen Angels guard around,—
For nothing earthly can be found
To keep and shelter undefil'd
'Mid toils of youth a guileless child.

'Mid heathen haunts O keep his soul
From every vision dark and foul;—
Thou only canst, all-saving Name,
Walk with Thy children in the flame.

E'er touch the threshold where there is a boy.”

“Whosoever shall offend one of these little ones which believe in Me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.” S. Mat. xviii. 6.

A father would his son should be
Swallowed in the unfathom'd sea
Rather than harbour thoughts unclean,
As they who walk this worldly scene.

Or, if by passing from this sphere
He might to Christ be brought more near,
Then would he die to keep him pure,
If father's love might that secure.

VIII.

“------Μελαντειχεα νυν δομον
Φερσεφονας ιθι, Αχοι.”
Pind. Ol. xiv. 28.

Thus spake the Theban bard divine,—
“To black-wall'd house of Proserpine,
Sweet nymph that dwell'st in airy cell,
Echo, go forth, the tidings tell.

“There Cleodamus shalt thou meet,
And bid him know, in Pisa's seat
His son is crown'd, and stands on high,
Clad with the wings of victory.”

“Joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth.” S. Luke xv. 7.

It is an Echo now no more
That passes to the eternal shore,
But in the ever-living Word
The Truth itself is stilly heard.

Such deep communion in their Head
Combines the living with the dead;
They know and feel the better choice,
And o'er the quick the dead rejoice.

IX.

“------πλειων χρονος
ον δει μ' αρεσκειν τοις κατω, των ενθαδε.
εκει γαρ αει κεισομαι.”
Soph. Antig. 74

“'Tis more avail to please the dead
Than those 'mong whom this life is led;
'Tis better far to keep a friend
Where there is life that hath no end.”

When death on friendship sets his seal,
Past good and ill we trembling feel,
They come forth and before us stand
As written by an Angel's hand.

“They shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven.” S. Matt viii. 11

When we have hence departed, then
We shall be with our fellow-men,
Which now conceal'd behind the veil
Watch this our life and being frail.

No better wisdom can we learn
Than their unfailing love to earn,
And look on all things with the eyes
Of those unearthly companies.

X.

“Trophonius and Agamedes, having built a shrine at Delphi, requested of Apollo their reward, and he said he would give it them on the seventh day; and on that day they died.” Plutarch apud Stob.

The Epitaph of Biton and Cleobis.

“Their mother's car themselves they drew
To this her shrine in all men's view;
The people bless'd her thus convey'd,
And she for them her Goddess prayed,—

“On these her sons that there might rest
Some gift the highest and the best;
She prayed—they died;—the God thus shews
Death is the best which Heaven bestows.”

Ibid.

“I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, From henceforth blessed are the dead which die in the Lord; for they rest from their labours, and their works do follow them.”

Rev. xiv. 13

So death, our nature's worst distress,
Itself is highest blessedness,
If it be register'd on high
In deeds of duteous piety.

To that state nearest they draw nigh
In self-denying deeds who die;
Of earthly pleasures dispossess'd
When mortified they are at rest.

XI.

“Τις δ' οιδεν ει ζην τουθ', ο κεκληται θανειν,
Το ζην δε θνησκειν εστι .”
Eurip. apud Stob

When stars were thronging heaven's blue arch
On their serene majestic march,
Then gazing on Night's face severe
The heathen heard this voice of fear,—

If all those beauteous orbs of light
Are brought to view by silent Night,
The light of life may from our eyes
Hide greater things that fill the skies.

And this our life be death.”

“When I was a child . . I understood as a child . . . For now we see through a glass darkly; but then face to face.” 1 Cor. xiii. 11, 12.

Mysterious Childhood, on thy ways
With wonder and with awe we gaze,
So small the horizon which around
Doth all thy little knowledge bound.

Thou art a mirror here below,
Compar'd with what the wisest know,
Of what this scene of night and day
Shall be to those that leave this clay.

XII.

“Οσσα δε μη πεφιληκε
Ζευς, ατυζονται βοαν
Πιεριδων αιοντα.”
Pind. Pyth. 1. 24,

Sweet and entrancing was that song
Which Pindar paints the heavens among;
Which held the gods in ecstasy,
And clos'd in sleep the eagle's eye.

“That melody whose sound to hear
Fills every guilty soul with fear,
Whom the great Father doth not love,
Through earth, sea, hell, or skies above.”

“And I heard the voice of harpers harping with their harps: and they sung as it were a new song before the throne.” Rev xiv 2. 3.

Oh, that with me the blissful spell,
That soul of music, might indwell,
Which sets all strife and sin afar,
And in its orbit holds each star!

For what is music but, to sense
Express'd in wondrous eloquence,
That peace no heart can tell below,
And which the wicked ne'er shall know.

XIII.

“Η δε μεθωδηγησεν, απο στερνων προφερουσα
Μαζον, τον λιμου ρυτορα και θανατου.”
Epigr. Leon. Alex.

As on the cliff her infant steals
No sound a mother's heart reveals;
He on the verge that looks from high
Creeps in unconscious infancy.

Yet still no voice, no sound is heard,
She utters not one warning word,
But drawing near, and watching there,
She leans, and lays her bosom bare.

“Can a woman forget her sucking child?. . . .Yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee.” Is. xlix. 15.

How tender, Lord, Thy ways of love!
Thy very Silence doth reprove,
And to Thy breast Thy child recall
Trembling o'er an eternal fall.

What long forbearance hath been Thine,
More than maternal, love divine,
Whose gifts Thy very heart disclose,
And there invite him to repose!

XIV.

“Τα λεγομενα αγαθα παντα φθειρει και αποσπα, καλλος, και πλουτος, και ισχυς σωματος, και ξυγγενεια ερρωμενη εν πολει, και παντα τα τουτων οικεια .” Plato. De Rep. lib. vi.

Such sayings come from East and West,
And in Christ's kingdom find their rest;
Such wisdom speaks in Gentile lands,
And to Christ's truth a witness stands;—

Like that Centurion's voice they come,—
While mid the darkness and the gloom
Beneath the Cross his watch he trod,—
“This is indeed the Son of God.”

“Those things which are commonly called goods, such as beauty, riches, strength of body, powerful state-connections, and the like, deprave the soul.”

“All that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father.” 1 John ii. 16.

For well we know whatever shines
Where the Sun rises and declines,
Is like the bower of Paradise,
Wherein a painted serpent lies.

When Christ to death His head bowed low,
The sweat of Blood upon His brow
With good men's suffering blends, to bless
Their sweat in this the wilderness.

XV.

“Ταγαθον δε οικειον τι και δυσαφαιρετον ειναι μαντευομεθα .” Arist. Eth. lib. i. ch. v.

That great, essential, only Good,
For ever sought, ne'er understood,
For which man's nature ever pines,
Of which within his heart divines;—

Divines aright, howe'er possess'd,
That it must be our perfect rest,
True and intrinsic, which alone
Can ne'er be lost, our very own.

“The soul within us divines that the Chief Good must be something quite our own, and which cannot be taken from us.”

“There be many that say, Who will shew us any good? Lord, lift Thou up the light of Thy countenance upon us.” Ps iv. 6

We know not where that Good may dwell;
Where it doth not we know full well:
We know not, for we know not God,
Who is Himself the soul's abode.

Yet deem'd that Grecian school aright
It is from that heart-gladdening light
Which in all virtue on the soul
Breaks from the everlasting goal.

XVI.

“Οστις ουν μη διδωσι δικην, αδικων, τουτω προσηκειν αθλιω ειναι διαφεροντως των αλλων ανθρωπων .” Socrates in Plato's Gorgias.

So spake the Sage, whose eagle ken
Was cleans'd beyond all heathen men;
Who laid his hand upon the key
Which opes divine philosophy.

He saw that while an Ocean strife
Coils and embroils this nether life,
A golden net upon each hand
Was drawing to a heavenly strand.

“I say that those who commit wrong are of all men the most miserable: but less so if they suffer for it.”

“He that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin.” 1 Pet. iv. 1.

Yet knew he not that mystic Sign
Which suffering clothes with strength divine;—
That Sign which through all nature reigns,
In all things great and small remains.

That Tree puts forth its healing leaves,
While 'neath its shade all nature grieves,
Till by its hallow'd touch restor'd
United to a suffering Lord.

XVII.

“Οιμαι δε και τους πολλους ειναι τουτων των παραδειγματων τους εκ τυραννων και βασιλεων και δυναστων.” Plato, Gorgias.

When classic sage or bard are led
To paint the places of the dead,
They make the rich and great to be
Chief sufferers in eternity.

Nor is this mere the impress given
From that old democratic leaven,
To which unquict Greece gave birth
Against the princes of the earth.

“Thou in thy life receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things; but now he is comforted, and thou art tormented.” S. Luke xvi 25.

No; in Christ's kingdom, where alone
Freedom and envy are unknown,
On mighty men of earth there lie
Dark shadows of futurity.

For wealth and power and ampler space
Tempt all too much our fallen race;
But amid want and shame and pains
The healing Cross its power sustains.

XVIII.

“Delirant reges, plectuntur Achivi .” Hor.

The sins of kings their people bear,
As the primeval curse we share:
And haply God through evil kings
His judgments on a people brings.

By one another's sins around
Mysteriously we are thus bound;
And there descends throughout all time
A chain of penalty and crime.

“When kings are mad, their subjects feel the scourge.”

“As by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.” Rom. v. 19.

Such complication on us lies
Of endless sympathetic ties,
All are in Adam dead on earth,
All are in Christ of heavenly birth.

Thus Adam's sin below we bear
To make us one in mutual care;
Christ's righteousness we share above
To make us one in mutual love.

XIX.

“Tum Africanus . . Si tibi parva (ut est) ita videtur, hæc cœlestia semper spectato .” The Dream of Scipio.

Thus Roman conquerors could climb
Above the things of earth and time,
Forgetting human hopes and fears
Amid the music of the spheres:—

Advancing into converse high
Of goodness, truth, and piety,
And of a place to spirits given
In Plato's tranquil seats of heaven.

“If earth, the abode of mankind, now appears to thee so small, as indeed it is, ever look thou to these heavenly things.”

“Not many mighty, not many noble are called.” 1 Cor i. 26

How is it now the worldly great,
Men of renown and high estate,
Turn from the soul-ennobling theme
Of which e'en heathens loved to dream?

Is it that truth appears so mean
Where Christ the only door is seen?
Or that we to the dregs descend
As the world verges to its end?

XX.

“------Pauci quos æquus amavit
Jupiter, aut ardens evexit ad æthera virtus .”
Virg. Æn. vi. 129

The sparks ascend, and one by one
Extinguish'd are in smoke and gone:
In stedfast course a few arise
Borne upward to congenial skies.

Mid paynim nations some were seen,
With strong presentiment serene,
Heavenward to hold a tranquil light,
Till they had pass'd from human sight.

Whom glowing virtue raised to skies above.”

“Knowledge shall be increased. . . . But none of the wicked shall understand.” Dan. xii. 4, 10.

Christ's shadow now on us remains,
And covers o'er the Gentile's stains,
The world His fourfold Robes divides,
And 'neath their shelt'ring skirt abides.

With one alone of all the four
The inner Raiment is in store,
When by the lot of heaven's decree
The heart is clothed with charity.

XXI.

“Rari quippe boni, numero vix sunt totidem quot
Thebarum portæ, vel divitis ostia Nili .”
Juv. xiii. 27.

When mid those friends we cherish'd long
We find the world at heart is strong,
With heavy sickness at the soul
We doubt if aught attains the goal.

A remnant in all times and few
Are they who walk with heaven in view;
In the dark vale few gleams appear,
Thus hope is purified by fear.

Gates of Cadmean Thebes, or mouths of Nile.”

“Many are called, but few are chosen.” S. Matt. xxii. 14

'Tis dark, and stars like living eyes
Look from their houses with surprise,
While rippling of unnumber'd waves
Bears us all onward to our graves.

One only point—one polar star—
One point of safety from afar;
Who to that haven would prevail
Must use untir'd both oar and sail.

XXII.

“Θεος, επιτροπος ε-
ων, τεαισι μηδεται,
Εχων τουτο κηδος, Ιερων
Μεριμναισιν.”
Pind Ol. i 173

“A God keeps watch o'er thee alone,
And makes thy cares to be His own,
As kindred watch o'er kindred dear;”—
Thus Pindar spake in kingly ear.

“Carior est illis homo quam sibi.” Juv. x. 350.

Still brighter did this golden theme
Upon Rome's later poet gleam,
That “dearer to the gods is he
Than man unto himself can be.”

“Casting all your care upon Him; for He careth for you.” 1 Pet v 7.

Thus mid the ruin sin hath wrought
In things without and inward thought,
Through this dark world of sin and pain
Some shiver'd fragments still remain—

Some fragments which to heathen sight
Present that vision of true light,
Which in the Christian's sky above
Shines like the Sun, that—“God is Love.”

XXIII.

“Δοξειε δ' αν ο τοιουτος ειναι φιλαυτος: απονεμει γαρ εαυτω τα καλλιστα και μαλιστα αγαθα, και χαριζεται εαυτου τω κυριωτατω .” Arist Eth. ix. 8.

Who going forth from his own door
Opes wide his hand unto the poor,
He mercy shews to his own soul,
He loves true life—his being whole.

He who his lower self denies
His higher life doth mostly prize;
And no one to himself is kind
Who harbours an unfeeling mind.

“The good man is properly a lover of self; for to himself he affords what is truly good, and gratifles the highest part of his nature.

“Whosoever will save his life, shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for My sake shall find it.” S. Matt. xvi. 25.

Thus he himself doth mostly love
Who mostly loveth God above;
At home begins that charity
Which reaches to the boundless sky.

Then he whoe'er would find true rest
Above the clouds must build his nest;
True love is only understood
Which rests in everlasting good.

XXIV.

“Οι δ' ευεργεται τους ευεργετηθεντας δοκουσι μαλλον φιλειν, η οι ευ παθοντες τους δρασαντας.” Arist Eth. ix. 7.

The Sage of that Socratic school
Who laid out Wisdom's chart by rule,
Said, by its deeds Love forms and grows;
Thus Love back to its fountain flows.

“Proprium odisse quem læseris.” Tac. Agric. 42.

The Historian stern of Rome's decay
Survey'd the dregs of that dark day,
And reason'd well—that deeds of ill
Their parent breast with hatred fill.

“You, that were enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath He reconciled.” Col. i. 21.

To sin 'gainst God and then to hate,
O death of deaths most desolate,—
That in ourselves by evil deeds
We quench the source whence Love proceeds!

But how dost Thou in Thy dear Son
Make evil deeds to be undone?
Obedience is Love's mystery,
Which lives by learning first to die.

XXV.

“Novissimâ in luce desideravere aliquid oculi tui .” Tac. Agric. 45.

More than he meant his sorrows spoke,—
Of one 'neath death's bereaving stroke
Whose eyes in love's last longings stray
To seek those dearer far away.

From all it sees the mind will turn
For something unbeheld to yearn,
Familiar objects all explore,
Then seem to ask for something more.

“Thine eyes in death were for some object looking in vain.”

“The eye is not satisfied with seeing.” Eccl. i. 8.

The infant's and the old man's gaze,
And eyes death's shadow overlays,
Seem looking into vacancy,
As seeking those man cannot see.

Each human heart, each human sense
Search all they can embrace, and thence
Turns to its God the aching breast,
In Whom Alone the soul can rest.

XXVI.

“Εμοι δε αι σαι μεγαλαι ευτυχιαι ουκ αρεσκουσι, το θειον επισταμενω ως εστι φθονερον .” Herod b iii. 40.

From age to age the Heathen saw
One ever fix'd unvaried law,
'Mid change and chance to man allow'd,
That God doth overthrow the proud.

They saw the effect, knew not the cause,
For God from sight His hand withdraws,
Assigning love's unfathom'd plan
To envy as of sinful man.

“Thy great prosperities please me not, knowing as I do the envy of the deity.”

“God resisteth the proud.” 1 Pet. v. 5.

The Cross mysterious unlocks all,—
That God, Who loves both great and small,
Yet nearer brings unto His throne
In Christ each favour'd little one.

But when in men grown high and bold
Christ's Image He doth not behold,
In Christ no more He hears their call,
He turns His countenance, and they fall.

XXVII.

“Ο Κροισος πεμπων τας πεδας επι του νηου τον ουδον .” Herod. b. i. ch 90.

“If Crœsus pass the Halys, know
He shall an empire overthrow.”
He pass'd the Halys, lost his throne,
And found that empire was his own.

Sought with much gold at Delphi's cell
So spake the guileful oracle;—
Thus fiends will truth with falschood blend
To lead men to some evil end.

“Crœsus,” now a prisoner, “sent Lydians to Delphi, and commanded them to lay his chains on the threshold of the shrine.”

“For this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie.” 2 Thess. ii. 11.

Those shrines are silent, yet again
They thus deceive 'mid ways of men,
With harmful truth they prophesy,
The promise keep, but hope belie.

Pleasure or power or wealth they give
To those who sacrifice and strive,
But giving blend the curse of sin,
Blooming without but death within.

XXVIII.

“Ηλυθε, και πιεν αιμα κελαινεφες: αυτικα δ' εγνω .”
Hom Od xi, 152.

The dead in Hades' dark domain
Flock'd round the hero, but in vain,
Weak, senseless shadows, dead in soul,
Without all power, or life's controul:—

Till there was given mysterious food
The taste of sacrifice and blood,
The wandering shade was then made strong,
Restor'd to thought, and sight, and tongue.

And all the mother in her soul awakes.”

“As for thee also, by the blood of thy covenant I have sent forth thy prisoners out of the pit wherein is no water.” Zech. ix 11.

“Would I,” said Job, “could find His place,
That I might meet Him face to face,
He strength would give me in that need,
That I with Him my cause might plead.”

The soul thus in her solitude
Augurs of that life-giving Blood,
That it may drink, and not in vain,
But in that hour may life sustain.

XXIX.

“Και Τιτυον ειδον, Γαιης ερικυδεος υιον,
κειμενον εν δαπεδω. ο δ' επ' εννεα κειτο πελεθρα .”
Hom. Od. xi. 575.

Plato in realms beyond the tomb
Speaks of a dread Tartarean gloom,
And bodies of the suffering dead
Together bound, hands, feet and head.

And Homer paints in Stygian chains
Tantalian and Sisyphian pains;
And Tityus on nine acres laid,
While vultures on his liver prey'd.

“Αδυνατον γαρ τους μη προτερον παρα των ειδοτων μεμαθηκοτας τα ουτω μεγαλα και θεια πρηγματα γινωσκειν.” Just. Mar Ad. Græc 3.

“Send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue.” S. Luke xvi. 24.

Bodies surviving with the dead!
Was it from some primeval creed
In their Egyptian pilgrimage
Glean'd by the poet and the sage?

Or that, 'mid wreck and waste of sin,
The yearnings of the heart within
Somehow, as from a living shrine,
Unconsciously of truth divine?

XXX.

“Ζευς παντων αυτος φαρμακα μουνος εχει .”
Simonides

Such was the rest, Simonides,
Wherein thy tender heart found ease;
A heart which most feels human woes,
Mostly beneath them finds repose:—

That 'mid the ways by sorrow trod
Healing of all ills is with God;—
And haply by some power to save,
A remedy beyond the grave.

He setteth right whate'er is wrong below.”

Curse of Kehama. xix 13

“Thou hast destroyed thyself, but in Me is thine help.” Hos xiii. 9.

For all the pains the body shake,
For all the woes the spirit break,
For all the lesser ills of life,—
The loss—the sorrow—and the strife,—

For worst of all the deep heart-aches,
When to itself the Conscience wakes,
Man's sole self-refuge still must prove
His rest upon mysterious love.

XXXI.

“Ελπεσθαι χρη παντ', επει ουκ εστ' ουδεν αελπτον.
Π(αδια παντα θεω τελεσαι, και ανηνυτον ουδεν.”
Linus.

“All things 'tis right for man to hope,
“Nothing beyond hope's boundless scope,
“For all the God can do full well,
“Nothing to Him impossible.”

Linus, to whom such words were given,
Well might they feign thee born of Heaven;
Son of Urania, Goddess bright,
Or of Apollo, God of light.

“If ye have faith..... nothing shall be impossible unto you.” S. Matt. xvii. 20.

From fear to hope, from hope to fear,
God to Himself through faith draws near,
And even 'mid the things of sense
Gives something of omnipotence.

It is a secret of the good,
The first perceiv'd—last understood;
Taught by His grace and by His rod,
Till we ourselves are lost in God.

XXXII.

“Nulla dies sine lineâ.” Vetus Prov

Wondrous the things of giant birth
That range the sea—the air—the earth;
But mightier powers for ill or good
Work by an insect multitude.

Great deeds of Martyrdom and Grace
As marvels fill all time and space;
But deeds and thoughts of hourly range
Work transformation's endless change.

“Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of Judgment.” S. Matt. xii. 36.

The shadows of eternity
Which on each little action lie,
Enlarge all trifles as they pass,
As mirror'd in a watery glass.

As multitudinous waters' sound
Is heard like voice of God profound,
Thus countless waves that rise and shine
Make up the destiny divine.

XXXIII.

“Ευ γαρ χρη ειδεναι, ο τι περ αν σωθη τε και γενηται οιον δει εν τοιαυτη καταστασει πολιτειων, θεου μοιραν αυτο σωσαι λεγων, ου κακως ερεις .” Plato, De Rep, lib. vi.

Thus ever struggling with their fear,
And nigh o'erwhelm'd the good appear,
Beyond all human aid they stand,
And see and own a heavenly hand.

It was so amid them of old;
Though better hopes have made us bold,
Yet even now as then of yore
We are at sea and not on shore.

“Be assured that in whatever respect a man may be saved, and become what he ought, in such a condition of public affairs, it is the Divine aid that saves him

“Be not afraid: for the Lord thy God is with thee.” Jos i. 9

Foes of the Church would seize her helm,
And strive Christ's witness to o'erwhelm,
Corrupting her and bent on ill,
Yet onward is she labouring still.

Though powers of evil fill the gale,
The tempest raise, well nigh prevail;
Yet Christ, though in the hold He sleeps,
On edge of death His people keeps.

XXXIV.

“Οταν παραδοξον η, και μη προς την εμπροσθεν δοξαν, ωσπερ εν τοις γελοιοις .” Arist Rhet, lib. iii. 11.

The laugh to man alone is given,
For differences of earth and heaven
Are found alone in man's estate,
So little yet withal so great.

Angels above, and beasts below
Ne'er in themselves such contrasts know;
For nought doth in their natures dwell
Incongruous, unsuitable.

“Something paradoxical and beyond previous expectation, as in subjects of laughter.”

“Wherefore did Sarah laugh?” Gen. xviii. 13.

Their mother's laugh—it is indeed
The name of the accepted seed,
So beyond thought the mighty change,
In that salvation new and strange.

They on their way who walk and weep
Shall laugh ,on wak'ning from their sleep,
When they in glad surprise have found
The everlasting arms around.

“S. Luke vi. 21.

XXXV. COINCIDENCES.

“Teste David cum Sibyllâ.”

“Paucis mutatis verbis atque sententiis Christiani fierent.” Ang. De Ver. Rel. iv.

Is it as stars and blue profound
Are imag'd in the ground,
Where waters lie beneath our feet,
Or gather in the street ,
That truths of Heaven their shadows find
In man's reflective mind?

Or is it that the voice of God
Is in the multitude,
In stillness like a casual word
'Mid broken ruins heard,
That Faith that walks the heavenly span
Her echo hears in man?

Or where above the glassy Sea
Stands everlastingly,
Some drops in secret reach the cells
Of subterranean wells,
And bear to every clime of earth
The traces of their birth?

Or that the four-fold streams below
From ancient Eden flow,
And as they gather stains abroad,
Diverging on their road,
Yet still retain beneath all skies
Something of Paradise?

Or as some simultaneous throe
Through nature seems to go,
When birds appear divinely wise
Beyond their destinies,
And all untaught in every clime
Respond to varied time?

Or as by some celestial art
With friends that are apart,
Associate feelings will awake,
Or thoughts responsive break:
As if some spirit of the skies
Convey'd their sympathies?

Moves there 'mid minds some unseen power,
Like bee from flower to flower?
With intermingling of their kinds
From each to each it winds,
The seed, or dust, or honey brings
On loaded thigh or wings.

Or is it in man's nature deep
Truth's embryo forms may sleep,
As trees which high-embow'ring shoot
In fibres of the root;
Their miniatures there seem to lie,
Which ne'er saw sun or sky?

Or as when 'neath the vengeful skies
Ruin'd and buried lies
Some ancient City, not in vain
The relics yet remain,
And mystic pillars long may stand
Upon Oblivion's strand?

Or is the wisdom of the wise
The pedestal which lies
Beneath the feet of Christian Truth,
Which there in endless youth
Reflected sees her form divine
In pavement of her shrine?

Or as the strains which through the gloom
Slumber in Memnon's tomb,
Till on them morning sunbeams fall,
And thence their echoes call,
In golden radiance forth are shed
Harmonies of the dead?

Or like as when our shadows gleam
On some deep glassy stream;
Kingdoms of nature and of grace
Thus answer face to face;
Though right and left revers'd we find,
No substance true behind?

Or that the Father, from Whose home
They wander'd forth in gloom,
Still darkly with His children walk'd,
And with their spirit talk'd,

And dimly left in every place
The footmarks of His grace?

Or that the glorious orb of light
Had baffled their weak sight;
And when their back on Him was turn'd
Who is in Christ discern'd;
They in the creatures manifold
His Image still behold?

Or is it as God's wondrous hand
Through air, and sea, and land,
In herb, and beast, and bird is seen,
And poisonous snakes unclean;
So 'mid the nations in each place
His Wisdom leaves a trace?

Or while naught hideth from His heat
Who makes the sun His seat,
As day to day with tongue of flames
His kingdom wide proclaims,
So night to night where shadows dwell
May of His knowledge tell?

Or is it as dark shores of Nile
Once cradled Christ awhile,
And infant Moses safe could sleep
On that Egyptian deep,

The Law and Gospel thus were laid
Beneath a pagan shade?

Or is it as when Israel's God
Was seen in Moses' rod,
The shadow of the power of Heaven
Was to magicians given,
Till they, surpass'd in their own strife,
Should own the Prince of Life?

Or as to the Chaldean Seer
Searching the starry sphere,
Tho' other his design and thought,
And more than all he sought,
Appear'd the glorious Bethlehem's star
To lead him from afar?

Or is it as 'mong Prophets old
Who of things sacred told,
Before us Saul, and Caiaphas,
And wicked Balaam pass;
Who while the good they set aside
Christ's kingdom prophesied?

Or as through that Divine command
Which guided Pilate's hand,
All nations on that hallow'd spot,
Although they knew it not,

Their King on Sion's hill enthron'd
In Greek and Latin own'd?

Or that where Christ, a hidden guest,
Hath by His Presence blest,
Although His hour be “not yet come,”
To make the world His home,
Nature hath caught a ray Divine,
And water turns to wine?

Or is it as when Christ appear'd,
The devils saw and fear'd?
'Neath some mysterious power unknown
The Lord of life they own,
Although to them no leave was given
To own the God of Heaven.

Or is it, though a veil of clouds
Christ's going ever shrouds,
Where He hath pass'd upon the night
There is a track of light,
And 'mid the dark-blue vault serene
A lucid gleam is seen?

Or is it as on Tabor's height,
When broke forth wondrous light,
Frail sons of men in nearness brought,
The glorious radiance caught,

Thus in the Gospel's light Divine
E'en heathen sages shine?

Or is it thus the wilderness,
Forgetting her distress,
Can bloom like garden of the Lord,
Like Eden fruits afford:
The fountain in the desert flows,
The thistle bears the rose?

Or is it that the seas profound
With goodly pearls abound,
Wherein the merchant spent his toil
Through that long night's turmoil,
The pearl of endless price to gain
Still seeking though in vain?

Or is it as the gleams that fall
On the lost Prodigal,
On his disfigur'd face appear
His homeward course to cheer,
The Father hastening from His place
With His preventing grace?

Or is it as 'mid deserts dry
The solitary cry
Of the lost sheep, when heard aright
In stillness of the night,

By the good Shepherd from of old
Heard in the distant fold?

Or is it that the mystic race
Was symbol of His grace,
When the torch went from hand to hand
Through Greece's festal band;
Thus age to age pass'd on the fire,
Nor let it all expire?

It is that the true God of Heaven,
By fruitful seasons given,
Ne'er of His light mankind bereft,
Nor without witness left;
But as in nature's course around
His voices did abound,
So was His witness heard within,
Pleading with man and sin,
And ever blending precepts high,
Which never more shall die.

Corpora mirando sub terras abdita cœlo.”

Lucret, iv. 214, 415.

“Την φιλοσοφιαν Ελλησιν... υποβαθραν ουσαν της κατα Χριστον φιλοσοφιας.” Clem. Strom. vi.

GREEK PHILOSOPHY.

“Ταχα δε και προηγουμενως τοις Ελλησιν εδοθη τοτε, (scil. η φιλοσοφια) πριν η τον Κυριον καλεσαι και τους Ελληνας: επαιδαγωγει γαρ και αυτη το Ελληνικον, ως ο νομος τους Εβραιους, εις Χριστον. Προπαρασκευαζει τοινυν η φιλοσοφια, προοδοποιουσα τον υπο Χριστου τελειουμενον.” Clem. Strom., lib. i. c. 5.

“PHILOSOPHI AUTEM QUI VOCANTUR, SI QUA FORTE VERA ET FIDEI NOSTRÆ ACCOMMODATA EIXERUNT, MAXIME PLATONIOI, NON SOLUM FORMIDANDA NON SUNT, SED AB EIS ETIAM, TANQUAM INJUSTIS POSSESSORIBUS, IN USUM NOSTRUM VINDICANDA.” Aug. De Doc Chr., lib. ii. ch. 1.

PLATO.

I. THE DEMON OF SOCRATES.

“The reason of this is what you have often heard me speak of, the God or spirit,—a certain voice which has come to me from a child.” Apolog. Soc,

From age to age descends the honied store
Of that old man who dwelt Hymettus nigh ,
Himself the rock of sweet philosophy,
Though nothing he hath left of letter'd lore.
I ask not what that unseen monitor
Which check'd him when of evil aught was by,
Yet left him free to suffer and to die;—
Whether some phrase mysterious, and no more
Than Heaven's protection and its peace serene,
Or allegoric parable,—or nought
But conscience thus embodied in his thought,—
Or haply some good angel-friend unseen,
Or more:—but I would ask not, for to thee
It speaks, my soul, a dread reality.

—“dulcique senex vicinus Hymetto.” Juv. xiii,

II. SOCRATES ON JUDGMENT AFTER DEATH.

“Such appears to me, O Callicles, the case with the soul; all things in it become manifest as soon as it is stripped of the body, its natural disposition, and the affections it has contracted by the pursuit of any object during life. When therefore they come into the judge's presence he attentively examines each soul; and oftentimes meeting with the soul of some great man, he finds it covered with sores and wounds from perjuries and injustice, such as the conduct of each has impressed on his own soul, corrupted by falsehood and pride, and from having lived without truth.... On beholding which he forthwith dismisses it to a place of suffering suited for it.” “Now I, Callicles, for my part, am persuaded by these accounts, and keep watch over myself, that I may manifest to the judge a soul as healthful as possible: and therefore bidding adieu to the honours of the world, and looking to truth, I will endeavour to be as good as I can while I live, and to continue so when I come to die. And all other men I exhort so to be as far as in me lies.... Now all these things perhaps appear to you to be as an old wife's tale, and you despise such stories. And indeed we might well do so, if by our enquiries we were able to discover any thing better and more true.” Gorgias.

O worthy e'en a martyr's death to die
Who thus could live and look beyond the tomb,
A heathen world by dying to illume,
And after death to leave along the sky
Of Grecian sages such a galaxy,
That they continue to the day of doom,
Lighting the horrors of that pagan gloom!

But if Truth's shadow so could charm thine eye,
What words thine adoration would express
Couldst thou but on the Man of Sorrows gaze!
How would that sight have lit and cheer'd thy ways!
For all-divinely didst thou speak e'en then
Of Truth, that had “no form nor comeliness,”
In tortures and in death from hands of men

De Rep., b. ii.

III. SOCRATES REFUSING TO ESCAPE FROM PRISON.

“If thou injurest us,” I think I hear the Laws saying to me, “if thou injurest us, we shall be angry with thee during life, and after death our sisters, the Laws which are in the unseen world, will not receive thee kindly, knowing that thou hast done what in thee lay to destroy us. Therefore be not persuaded by Crito, but by us.”

“Now such, my dear friend Crito, are the things which I seem to hear, as they who act the Corybantes imagine that they hear musical pipes; and as for myself the din of these things is so loud in mine ears, as to render me incapable of hearing any thing else beside.”

Crito.

Sleeping and waking didst thou seem to hear
The melodies of that angelic chime,
Which ever sound beyond the sea of time,
So pure Philosophy had charm'd thine ear,
And deaden'd to the noise of this low sphere;
Nothing to hear but the sweet sound sublime
Of heavenly Laws, which from the ethereal clime
Go forth in Laws that upon earth appear!
For in the breast of God they have their birth,
And though so soil'd in contact with our earth,
Yet are they His own ministers below,
And have celestial voices: which to know
Were better, youthful spirits to o'er-rule,
Than all the harmonies of Plato's school.

IV. THE LAST WORDS OF SOCRATES.

“And now the parts about his heart were becoming cold, when uncovering himself, for he had a mantle thrown over him, he spake these words, which were the last that he uttered, ‘O Crito,’ said he, ‘we owe a cock to Esculapius. Now repay this, and see you neglect it not.’” Phædon.

Thus Death spake out as from a sacred shrine,
Or from an haven where all sorrows cease.
With life he bore as with a long disease,
Resign'd to meet its ills with look benign,
And arguing, with presentiment divine,
That there may be in death a sure release,
To those who strive the Great Unseen to please
In ways of truth and godly discipline.
When now the poisonous draught 'gan to prevail
Upon his vitals, and to seize his breath
Mysteriously, as from an oracle,
Yet confidently he spake of Health in Death,
That hope's long cherish'd promise doth not fail,
But with the great Physician All is Well.

V. EGYPT.

“Pythagoras, the son of Mnesarchus, appears to have entertained thoughts concerning the One God worthy of his sojourn in Egypt.” Just. Mart. Cohort. ad Græc. 19.

First from the Orient came the golden light
Of the world's early morn, but from our eyes
Lost in the Egyptian shrines Tradition lies,
In priestly hieroglyphic hid from sight,
'Mid the dark pyramids: thence like thick night
Emerging, throng'd with ghastly deities,
Foul Superstition fill'd the Grecian skies.
Yet like the sun on some cloud-mantled height
Tinging the shadows, still Tradition's lore
On priest or sage a stream of light might pour
With fable not unblended, like a glass
Reflecting man's deep self; and thence to pass
To shrine or porch or grove,—Socratic lore,
Or mystic school of good Pythagoras.

VI. MYTHOLOGY.

“What can we suppose to be the cause of this, but that there is some perverse power, an enemy to truth, whose delight is in the errors of mankind, whose continual work it is, by pouring forth darkness, to blind the minds of men, that they may not behold the light, nor look up to heaven.” Lactan. Instit, lib. i. De fals. Sap. c. 1.

For since the knowledge of the One Supreme
Was the sole fountain which refresh'd mankind,
And purified and fill'd the inner mind,
To foul the source of that soul-cleansing stream
Did evil spirits labour,—made the theme
Of God and heaven amid the multitude
(Which ever blends with ill essential good)
A worship soul-corrupting; poet's dream,
Or language veil'd in priestly mysteries,
They turn'd to fond idolatry and lies;
On sacrificial victims laid the rod
Of their enchantments, made them deities,
Isis or Apis. Trembling at their nod,
Men worshipp'd some old emblem for a God.

VII. THE GRECIAN JUPITER.

“The philosophers made two Jupiters, one the natural, the other the fabulous.” Lactan., Instit. lib. iii De fals. Rel c. 11.

“The later Platonists consider Jupiter to be the soul as it were of this world.” Aug De Cons Evan, lib i. 35.

In the vast world, around, beneath, above,
Reflected as in a mysterious glass
They dimly saw a mighty spirit pass,—
Amid the clouds of sin and woe which move
O'er man's fast-waning race—and called it Jove:
Therein embodying both good and ill
In a fond image of the Invisible;
A shade and soul of Power, but not of Love.
And this they mirror'd as the God of Heaven,
To whom a new and iron reign was given,
After the realm of Saturn once all gold,
The God of man in Paradise of old.
But Jove spoke man as fallen, not restor'd,
The soul of a disorder'd universe,
On whom as frail Creation's feeble lord
The shadow rests of a primeval curse.

VIII. PLATONISM.

“They found in the knowledge of God the first Cause of the universe, the Light of Truth, the Fountain of Blessedness. They who thus think of God, whether Platonists or other Gentile philosophers, they think with us.” Aug De Civ. Dei, lib. viii. cap 10: and cap 6. and 7.

That God Himself is the essential Light,
Which is not subject to corporeal change,
The Fountain of all life, beyond the range
Of these our senses, and material sight;
That One Chief Good, supreme and infinite,
Wherein the soul, from bonds terrestrial free,
May drink of bliss and immortality,
And disembodied find serene delight;—
That he who seeks that pure Intelligence
Must walls of this our universe transcend,
Made like to God;—and ever heavenward tend
Beyond the reach of outward elements;
That true philosophy thus wean'd from sense
Is but the love of God, our being's end.

IX. THE PLATONISTS.

“That the Word was God, I read in those Platonic books, but that the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, I read not there.” Aug. Confess., lib. vii. cap. 9.

Divine philosophy, that could afford
Such light to wandering men, and with its lore
Lead upward! yet in all their wisdom's store
Eye saw not, heart conceiv'd not, nor ear heard
Humiliations of the Incarnate Word,
Hid from the wise, reveal'd unto the poor;
Therefore they nothing knew of Christ the Door,
The Way, the Truth, the Life; a dying Lord
They knew not, Who descending from above
Emptied Himself in His eternal love,
That He might to Him gather those that mourn,
The “Man of Sorrows.” Like the moon, heavenborn
Their light, but dim and powerless; on them springs
No Sun of Righteousness with healing wings.

X. THE STOICS.

“Christian erudition subjects the mind to the government of God, and the passions to the control of the mind, that they may be converted to the uses of righteousness. The Stoics are wont to blame even pity.” Aug de Civ. Dei. lib. ix. c. 5.

If Plato too ethereal and refin'd,
So Zeno and the Porch were too severe,
Rooting out all affections, hope and fear,
Love, pity, hate; the body and the mind
Asunder rend, which God had once combin'd,
And sanctified in Him Who draws us near.
He came in our own flesh, and this our sphere
Of feelings and affections hath assign'd
To have a place in Christian righteousness;
Pity hath turn'd to love, anger to zeal,
On hopes and fears, which human souls possess,
By recompence eternal sets the seal,
The perfect man restoring from the dust
In the last Resurrection of the Just.

XI. THE PYTHAGOREANS.

“Of the hearers of Pythagoras some were content with his mere authority and the master's word; others were in secret instructed in such things as were not suitable to be disclosed to common ears, before they were purified by obedience.” Origen Cont. Cels, lib. i.

The Samian sage of ancient Italy
On contemplation dwelt and life divine,
And such his wisdom veil'd in mystic sign;
Yet till the God illumin'd and set free
Obedience was his door, and Faith the key,
While Silence kept the path of discipline,
Taught disputatious questions to decline,
Bright speculation, baseless theory;
Till strengthen'd by long duty, Self-control
Had purified the mirror of the soul.
But who hath such authority of rule
Save He Who is the Truth, the Word of God;
And he to whom He giveth Aaron's rod?
Such is the type of His diviner school .

See also Clement Alex. Strom ii. 11; and Theodoret, Serm. i. de Fide.

XII.

“Ibant obscuri solâ sub nocte per umbras
Perque domos Ditis vacuas et inania regna.
Quale per incertam Lunam sub luce malignâ
Est iter in sylvis; ubi cœlum condidit umbrâ
Jupiter, et rebus nox abstulit atra colorem.”
Æn. vi.

They seem to walk 'mid the surrounding mass
In light of goodness, virtue's benison,
Gazing upon all nature as a glass
Of things in Heaven; but unto us, alas!
In nightly groves obscure they wander on;
Good Socrates, sweet Plato, Xenophon,
And Plato's other sire, Pythagoras ,
With virtue-loving sage, Stagira's son.
In their imagin'd realms beyond the tomb
They see but shadows mingling with the gloom,
Which meteor lights may fitfully illume,
Serene yet all uncertain, fair but cold,
Nothing distinct, all vague and manifold;
Yet still they strove the better part to hold.

“Plato dicitur post mortem Socratis magistri sui, quem singulariter dilexerat, a Pythagoreis etiam multa didicisse.” Aug. Con Acad., lib. iii. 37.

XIII. THE CHANGE.

“Largior hic campos æther et lumine vestit
Purpureo; solemque suum, sua sidera norunt.”
Æn. vi.

'Tis no more wandering in a gloom profound ,
For our own Sun, our stars to us are known,
The suffering Saints who their bright goal have won.
To us an ampler far horizon's bound,
And our own purple light hath o'er us shone,
Investing all things; while our own true Sun,
And constellations which our path surround
Lead on the way with light and glory crown'd.
With Socrates and Plato have we been,
But issue in a temple full within
With light, poetic strains, and melody.
Where aged rustics understand, and see,
Yea, they in His own beauty see their King,
And little children of His glories sing.

“The great doctrines of a future state, the danger of a course of wickedness, and the efficacy of repentance, are not only confirmed in the Gospel, but are taught, especially the last is, with a degree of light, to which that of nature is but darkness.” Butler, Anal. pt. ii. ch 1.

XIV. POETS ADMITTED TO THE CITY OF GOD.

“Quique pii vates, et Phæbo digna locuti;—
Omnibus his niveâ cinguntur tempora vittâ.”
Æn vi.

But He—Who all things which to us belong
Hath ta'en unto Himself, and with the coal
From off His altar touch'd the human soul—
Hath sanctified and bless'd the Poet's song,
To set forth wisdom and make virtue strong;
By all that is upon the Prophet's roll,
And David, mightier with the poet's scroll
Than with the kingly sceptre, to prolong
A kingdom in men's hearts. But the true Seer
At the sole well of life must drink most deep,
By prayer and deeds of alms and life severe;
Or nature's inbred taint those streams will steep,
Conveying their own love, and hate, and fear;
And over his own issues he shall weep.

XV. PLATO'S MUSIC OF THE SOUL.

“Exiit ad cœlum ramis felicibus arbos,
Miraturque novas frondes et non sua poma.”
Georg. ii.

Such may instil, as Plato's self design'd,
Love of eternal beauty, which is Truth,
And harmonies that speak of endless youth;
With that celestial music which may wind
Like amarynthine gales into the mind,
Like airs from odorous places breathing health ;—
Insensibly conveying, and by stealth,
E'en from their tender years, the love resign'd
Of Justice, Courage, Temperance; till these,
As beauteous statues in a temple stand,
Shall all the heart possess. Those melodies,
Which Plato dream'd of, like a purple band
Of clouds, part off and shew a stable strand,
The love of God and Christian charities .

“Οποθεν αν αυτοις απο των καλων εργων η προς οψιν η προς ακοην τι προσβαλη, ωσπερ, αυρα φερουσα απο χρηστων τοπων υγιειαν, και ευθυς εκ παιδων λανθανη εις ομοιοτητα τε και φιλιαν και ξυμφωνιαν τω καλω λογω αγουσα.” Plato, De Rep. lib. iii.

See Augustin De Civ. Dei, lib. xvii. cap. 41. “Harmonia musica .. bene ordinatæ civitatis insinuat unitatem.”

XVI. PLATO EXPELLING POETS.

[_]

From De Republica, lib. x.

“Ah, did but Homer so belov'd from youth,—
Did poetry that charm'd us, only move
To virtue and build up immortal Truth,
Hymning the heroic dead and Gods above!—
No, we must pluck her love from the fond heart,
And grieving bid her beauteous form depart.

“Though Heaven-descended, mingling with mankind,
With charm of numbers and melodious song,
She is too fair for the untutor'd mind,
Strength'ning the Passions in themselves too strong;
A pleasing poison, soul-enfeebling joy;—
Destroy we that which else will us destroy.

“For 'tis not wont with poets to convey
Into men's souls true Wisdom's light austere,
But by their imitations to pourtray
Shadows of good, to please the eye and ear,
Bidding men weep, joy, sorrow; and enroll
Unworthy gods and heroes in the soul.

“For great, my friend, beyond all seeming great
The struggle and the hazard to be good,
That not for honours, wealth, or high estate,
Nor poetry, if she hath hind'ring stood,
'Twere well to lose the meed of righteousness,
Or virtue which the inner soul doth bless.”

XVII. ON A FUTURE STATE.

[_]

Ibid. continued.

“Something of its rewards and heritage
And prizes laid before it have I told;
Yet nothing can be great on this short stage,
So brief the period ere the young are old;
But what if souls of men can never die,
And this be part of immortality?

“For Vice doth not the soul annihilate,
Though she corrupts it till the body dies,
And death can be to it but change of state,
('Twere well if death could end its miseries!)
But if its own corruption doth not slay
The substance which it preys on, nothing may.

“As in the eye or body its disease,
Canker on corn and rust on iron fed,
In flesh putridity, decay in trees,
Destroys the life of that where 'tis inbred,
So not wounds, death, or aught of outward ill,
Nothing but Vice itself the soul can kill.

“Think, then, friend Glaucus,—though I have but shewn
That righteousness were to the human soul
Its own exceeding guerdon, though alone;
And it were well to live in her control
Though Gyges'ring could shelter us from harm,
Or helm of Hades were our saving charm.

“Think, when the soul of man shall cast aside
The incrustations, sea-weed, shell, and slime,
That now her form deface, her lustre hide;
And from the Ocean of our nether time
Shall free herself, shake her fresh wing, and shine
Cognate to the immortal and divine.

“What though 'neath penury, disease, or shame,
Here Virtue be unknown, scorn'd, and belied;
Yea, 'neath a cloud of obloquy and blame
May seem awhile of men and gods denied;
Yet in the end e'en men themselves shall own,
And to the God throughout 'tis surely known.

“It cannot be but she the palm must bear;
For bad men are like they that in the race
Haste for awhile, then fail and disappear,
Uncrown'd and hang the head; while in their place
The better persevere and gain the crown;
Shadows must flee away, truth stand alone.

“Therefore though Goodness shine below, at length
Herself her own reward in human eyes,
Yet this is nought comparèd with the strength
And greatness of the things beyond the skies.
But in a tale of Hades let me tell
Of thoughts which are themselves unspeakable.

“Herus, a warrior of Pamphylian race,
Upon a battle-field unburied lay;
After ten suns when men now sought the place,
Corruption there had made the slain her prey,
Yet touch'd him not; his body still entire
Borne home was laid upon the funeral pyre.

“Then he, though twelve days dead, to life awoke,
And spoke of places where his soul had been;—
That when forth from the body first it broke
With many others, to a place serene
It came, where spirits met, a dread retreat,
Where two from earth, from Heaven two openings meet.

“And there sat Judges, in that middle space,
Judging the souls; and to the Just was given,
Bearing their deeds adjudg'd before their face,
On the right-hand thence to ascend to Heaven;
The wicked on the left were sent below,
And bore upon their backs their deeds of woe.

100

“When Herus to those Judges now drew near,
They bad him to this earth again repair,
To mortal men a solemn messenger,
Warning them of the things he witness'd there;
For awful sights he saw where spirits dwell,
Too vast and manifold for tongue to tell;—

“Unheard of punishments for varied crime,
Ten or a hundred or a thousand-fold,
For rapine, treason, murders of past time;
'Mongst which impieties, late or of old,
Against the gods or parents foremost stood,
And Self-destruction, stain'd with its own blood.

“And then he heard another Soul enquire
Where the great Ardiæus might be seen,
He who his brother slew and aged sire;
A tyrant in Pamphylia he had been,
For crimes and mighty deeds renown'd of yore,
Who reign'd on earth a thousand years before.

“‘Great Ardiæus cannot hither come,’
Was answer'd;—then appear'd a fearful sight,
They on a sudden in the gulf of doom,
'Mid tyrants and great criminals of might,
Saw Ardiæus; as they sought to rise
With a terrific moan of miseries

101

“The Gulf arose and hinder'd them; and then
Incurably they sunk; and forth there came
Burning with lurid fire what seem'd like men,
Who seizing him with partners of his shame
Bound them together, hands, and feet, and head,
And dragg'd them down to Tartarus most dread.

“Then corresponding to those penal pains
Rewards in multiform varieties,
Majestic calm delights and endless gains.
And first a middle place of rest and ease,
A meadow lit up with a radiant gloom
Whereto innumerable spirits come;—

“After long travail thither they repair,
Their trials over and awhile repose;
Meetings and greetings sweet of friends were there,
And much recountings of past joys and woes,
And questionings for those they left behind,
And sad and sweet memorials brought to mind.

“There unto each an interval was given
In that fair meadow for a Seven-day's space;
On the Eighth day the good arose toward Heaven;
Thence after one day's journey reach'd a place
Empyreal, whence from earth extending bright
They saw a pillar of ethereal light,

102

“Like Iris, but more clear and pure it burn'd;
It was the vast world's circumambient bond;
Thence chains from high descending they discern'd
Amid that light, within, above, beyond;
O'er which sat Destiny, in whose vast woof
Their circuits are, of adamantine proof.

“Each on its circling sphere, Eight Sirens move,
With notes whose Octave forms Heaven's harmony,
And thron'd at equal intervals above
Of Destiny there sat the daughters three,
Lachesis, Clotho, Atropos,—all crown'd
With golden crowns, with white robes flowing round.

“Those, the three Fates, unto the Sirens' chime
The Past, the Present, and the Future sing,—
The evolutions of eternal time,—
Of birth, life, death; while one doth loudly ring,
‘Go forth, ye Souls, choose your immortal state,
For you Fate chooses not, but ye your Fate.’

“Thus while each takes his earthly destiny
From lap of Lachesis, 'tis sung in Heaven,
That virtue her own mistress is and free,
Whatever mortal lot the God hath given:
As more or less of holiness men choose,
More of eternal good they gain or lose.

103

“In this, friend Glaucus, then, in this must dwell
All of man's danger; let us care to know
No other science but of living well,
Our whole, sole being upon this bestow,—
How we to life's true knowledge may arrive,
And living better, better know to live.

“Unto all other things to bid adieu,
Or ask them what they bring for the soul's health,
Look on and eye them well with this in view,—
Glory, disgrace, strength, weakness, want or wealth,
Empire or private state, high or low birth,
To question and in this scale weigh their worth.

“Be then by me persuaded, deem the soul
Immortal, and for ever capable
Through all its being and beyond control
Of unknown joy and sorrow, good or ill;
So may we to the gods live friends below,
Hereafter gain such crowns as they bestow.”

Bp. Butler, Anal., pt. i. ch. ii. “Gentile writers, both moralists and poets, speak of the future punishment of the wicked, both as to the duration and the degree of it, in a like manner of expression and of description, as the Scripture does.” &c.—See the whole passage.

104

XVIII. ON CONSCIENCE.

[_]

FROM DE REP., LIB. I.

“For know, O Socrates, as time draws near,
When man by nature must expect to die,
There comes into his soul an anxious fear
Unknown before, which will not be put by;
And tales of Hades which were once a jest
With terrible forebodings haunt his breast.

“Lest it be true that wrongful deeds done here
Must there encounter after-recompence;
And haply to that state as he draws near,
Or old age deadens the external sense,
He sees more clearly somewhat of the dead;—
His soul, howe'er it be, is full of dread.

“Anxious he thinks, if any he hath harm'd;
Should many guilty deeds his past life fill,
Like children, oft from sleep he starts alarm'd,
In expectation lives of coming ill:
But if from evil free his course hath been,
Hope to him comes, Eld's pleasing nurse serene,

105

“As Pindar sings full well, when man his days
With justice and with holiness hath past,
Hope, cheerful friend, Hope, that as steersman sways
Man's wave-toss'd heart, Hope, solace sweet, at last
Comes, best of help-mates, with old age to dwell :
O Socrates, 'tis said how wondrous well!”

The picture is reversed by a modern infidel: “I must reluctantly observe, that two causes, the abbreviation of time and the failure of hope, will always tinge with a browner shade the evening of life.”—Last words of Gibbon, in “Memoirs” of his own life.

106

ARISTOTLE.

THE HYMN TO VIRTUE.

“O sought with many toils and strife
By those of mortal race,
Virtue, thou noblest prize of life,
Whose love in us finds such deep place;
Thy beauteous form, O Maid, to gain,
'Twere deem'd in Greece an envied lot to die;
And fiery toils unwearied to sustain;
For fruit which thou dost bear is Immortality.

“Better than gold, ancestral ties,
Or sleep's soft-vision'd eye;
For whom the Jove-born Hercules,
And Leda's sons in labours vie;
Pursuing while it seem'd to flee
The power that is with thee, of suffering bred;
Achilles too in longings after thee,
And Ajax sought for thee the chambers of the dead.

“Atarnæ's nursling, great and good,
For thy dear beauty's sake,
Hath turn'd our sun to widowhood,
Such mourning doth his dying make:

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Him shall the immortals praise and love,
The Muses, daughters of Mnemosyne,
For honour paid to hospitable Jove,
And Friendship's guerdon built on stedfast constancy.”

ON THE FOREGOING, AS ILLUSTRATED BY THE ETHICS.

So spake the Stagyrite,—mysterious Hymn,
Breathing deep pregnant thought! yet oh, how dim
And powerless, to embody the full soul
Of one that yearn'd for that supernal goal,
Where man may find a resting-place with God!
Clear as with pointing hand or guiding rod
Did Virtue thither shew that middle road;
Yet well he knew of that serene abode,
That neither Jove-born Hercules, nor those
The sons of Leda, who endur'd such woes,—
Nor Peleus' son nor Ajax, who in quest
Of thee to Hades went in his unrest,—
Nor that Atarnæ's offspring, whom he mourn'd,—
Full well he knew those chiefs by fame adorn'd,
Knew not that glorious essence which he sought.
The substance empyrèal of his thought
Was too transcendent, of too heavenly mould
To have been grasp'd by them whose prowess bold

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With feats of arm'd achievements fills the earth,
Oft multiplying ills and nothing worth.
But yet such names, by suffering glorified,
As emblems serv'd and shadowy types, allied
To that pure archetype which fill'd his thought,
Amid the things of men that come to nought:—
Which after mortal labour gives repose,
Whose shadow haunts our being till its close,
A crown invisible that mocks our toil,
Yet beckons us to follow: in the coil
Of labours difficult still seems to flee,
And beckons on to immortality ,
Still promises yet gives not, flies from view,
And turns in death that promise to renew.

Εφ' οσον ενδεχεται απαθανατιζειν, και απαντα ποιειν προς το ζην κατα το κρατιστον των εν αυτω. Ethics, lib. x cap. 7.

109

PYTHAGORAS.

THE GOLDEN VERSES.

“First worship Gods above ordain'd by law;
Respect thine oath; next Heroes hold in awe;
And pay due reverence to the Dead below;
Honour to Parents, love to kindred shew;
Of others for thy friend the best man choose;
Yield to mild words, nor kindly deeds refuse;
For a slight fault hold not thy friend at bay,
Long as thou canst,—and can dwells next to may.
These things observ'd in constant mastery keep
Thy belly, and thy lust, thy wrath, thy sleep.
Nought base do with another, nor alone,
To thyself most of all be reverence shewn.
In deed and word keep justice still in view;
Nor without Reason any end pursue.
Remember we are destin'd all to die,
That riches come to one, another fly.

110

But in Divine-sent ills which mortals bear
Resist not, but with meekness take thy share;
Much may be remedied, and of such woes
On good men seldom much the God bestows.
Many are the reports which range abroad,
Be not by these o'er-awed to quit the road
Of self-restraint; if Falsehood should assail,
Bear it with meekness; hold this without fail,
That none by word or deed thy purpose wrest
To do or say but what appeareth best.
Think before action, lest it come to nought;
Fools only act and speak without a thought.
Do nothing which may leave a grief behind;
Know what thou doest, and, if ignorant, find
Instruction; so thy life shall please thy soul.

“Nor of thy body's health neglect control,
Keep to the mean, in food, drink, exercise,—
That mean from which no after-pains arise:
Let not thy food be delicate, but plain.
Avoid what may to envy cause a pain.
Thrift marks a weak, expense a vulgar mind;
In all things it is best the mean to find.

“Always with fore-thought look unto the end;
Nor with sweet slumber let thine eyelids blend
Ere each of thy day's works thou thrice review,—
Where have I err'd? what done? what fail'd to do?
As each successive action comes to sight
Mourn o'er the ill, and in the good delight.

111

“Labour in these, these meditate, and love,
To Virtue they as steps divine will prove,
Through him who in man's soul hath made thus rife
A fount quaternion of immortal life.
In every action first ask aid of Heaven,
Then do thy work. Thus to the soul is given
To know of gods and men the eternal laws,
The course they hold and the restraining cause.
To know the nature which doth each contain,
That nought should 'scape thee, nor thy hopes be vain.
Mark what self-chosen evils mortals bear,
Nor see nor hear the good that lies so near.
Few from these ills the refuge know to find,
Such destiny o'er-clouds the human mind.
As on a wheel, from care to care, through life
Men pass, and heap up woes, and seek for strife;—
Strife, their own birth-companion, ever nigh;—
They have no need to seek it but to fly!

“O Father Jove, release us from these woes,
Or shew to each what demon with him goes.
But be thou hopeful, man's race is Divine,
His nature all things sacred would design,
Divinely-born. Let self these Rules control,
They shall from evil save and heal thy soul.

From interdicted meats, as rites ordain,
And for deliverance of thy soul, refrain.

112

Let Wisdom o'er thine actions still preside,
As charioteer ; so thou, as she shall guide,
To the free skies mayst from the body soar,
As an immortal God, and man no more.”

“The Passions, which arise in the soul from the influence of the body, must be kept under by Reason as by a scourge; lest by relaxing the reins to pleasure we neglect the mind, which thus is dragged and borne away like a charioteer by headstrong horses that obey not the rein. Rather should we remember the saying of Pythagoras, who, when he observed one of his acquaintance too much strengthening the flesh by exercise and food; ‘will you not,’ said he, ‘cease from thus rendering your prison-house more severe to yourself?’”—S. Basil, De leg. lib. Gen.

113

GREEK POETS.

Τοις παρα των ποιητων επει παντοδαποι τινες εισι κατα τους λογους, μη πασιν εφεξης προσεχειν τον νουν: αλλ' οταν μεν τας των αγαθων ανδρων πραξεις, η λογους υμιν διεξιωσιν, αγαπαν τε και ζηλουν, και οτι μαλιστα πειρασθαι τοιουτους ειναι: οταν δε επι μοχθηρους ανδρας ελθωσι, την μιμησιν ταυτην δει φευγειν, επιφρασσομενους τα ωτα ουχ ηττον η τον Οδυσσεα, φασιν, εκεινοι, τα των Σειρηνων μελη. B. Basil. De legend., lib. Gentilium.

115

HOMER.

“I have heard from a person of much ability in ascertaining a poet's intention, that all poetry in Homer is the praise of virtue, and that with him all things conduce to this end, except such as may be superfluous to the main design.” S. Basil, De. leg. lib. Gen. 4.

I. THE ILIAD.

Not for thy rapid action at command,
Nor persons in thy living page inwrought,
Which come forth as beneath the sculptor's hand,
Nor for thy sacred loyalty, nor aught
Of comprehensive reach, whereby thy thought
As like a secret providence lies deep
'Neath incident and character, which taught
The wisdom of philosophers, and steep
Affections in the truths which they are slow to keep.—

Living expressions start forth into song,
And in one lighted word some mirror bear;
His soul igniting as it speeds along
Kindles with light the glowing hemisphere;

116

And as he speaks life wakes and forms appear;
Pours itself forth, and like a fiery levin
Melts and moulds all in scene and character,
For ever to retain their impress given,
And scattering golden thoughts which emanate from Heaven.

How like reality the speaking page,
Or some old tale in pictur'd tapestry,
So vividly pourtray'd life's rapid stage,
While fabling verse in colours of the sky
Clothes the pervading God that walks so nigh
As with a garment! Not alone for these,—
Nor like the stars that live and speak on high,
The luminous and beauteous images,
As Nature's wild spring flowers pour'd forth with varied ease.

Now legions stir in shielded bright array,
As mountain forest blazing in the night ;
Now countless as about Cayster play
The clanging cranes in multitudinous flight,
On wing rejoicing, or on feet alight ;
Or flies on milk-pan's brim in vernal hours ;
Or like the bees' wing'd tribes in morning bright,
Now one by one the rocky hive outpours,
Now clustering here and there they fill the blooming flowers.

117

Now camps with watch-towers gleam, as calm and clear
When all the stars in the ethereal space,
And moon breaks forth; heights, cliffs, and woods appear,
The shepherd sees rejoicing . Pleased we trace
Upon thy antique scroll the very face
Of nature—earth, sea, sky; as in the stream
That makes sweet pebbled music every place
Stilly around, and living mirrors teem;
Wondering we gaze, so true to nature every theme.

Yet not for these alone on thee I dwell,
But strive to catch thy solemn undersong,
Thou who of poets art esteemed well
First, best, and wisest; while the after-throng
Is sentimental colouring, weak of tongue.
There is e'en something of a holier fear
To move within a world to which belong
Such unseen visitants, and ever near
Hear the unspoken word, and oft to sight appear.

Those fictions of the Unseen would fain pourtray
Care for mankind in Angels of the skies,
And love in Heaven for creatures of a day;
That prayer is answer'd; but a costly price
Must yet be found of offer'd Sacrifice,

118

To stand 'tween us and Heaven; that strong to save
Presence ethereal lurks beyond our eyes;
The Hero speaks beside the ocean wave,
A Goddess hears afar beneath her watery cave .

And sweet it were—if such sage fantasy
We to a higher wisdom might attune—
To muse beside the solitary sea
Of the cerulean Thetis, like the moon,
Rising from the blue waves with silver shoon:
Or when by funeral pyre in open skies
Achilles prays the Winds, and lo, full soon
To palace of those Winds wing'd Iris hies ;
They speed o'er earth and seas; trees rock, and waves arise.

Though fabled all and fabling, yet such tales
Lay nearer solemn truths than now may seem
To sensual thoughts; when man gets wing, and sails
On self-roll'd chariots drawn by clouds of steam;
The shores, rocks, valleys speak his power supreme,—
Drown thoughts of things invisible that fill
Shores, rocks, and valleys. Therefore more I deem

119

Of wisdom in those tales is breathing still,
Which speak of powers unseen that aid the human will.

Though much of evil in those gods above,—
Since serpents enter'd Eden, and have striven
By heathen shrines and oracles to move
In men such thoughts as place themselves in Heaven,—
Yet good with ill is mingled, and 'tis given
To trace some wrecks of Eden lingering still,
Whether from lore traditional, or leaven
Of mystic truth beyond the poet's skill,
Which speaks as from a shrine and moulds him to its will.

Beings unseen with our unconscious thought
Can blend, we know not how, and help afford;
Achilles, as a lion, frenzy-wrought
Arises, from its sheath just gleams the sword,
Athene, lo, stands by the warrior-lord ,
To him reveal'd;—thus Wisdom at our need
Comes in and stops rash hand or angry word,
'Tis not our own, of One in Heaven we read
Who shapes the saving thoughts which from the heart proceed.

120

In man is no success but in Heaven's might,
And oft to mortal eyes made manifest;
As Diomed amid the thickest fight
With a Divine-sent light o'er helm and crest,
Like some clear star when seen o'er Ocean's breast
In Autumn : or with its portentous blaze
The Ægis, and the golden gloom doth rest,
Covering unarm'd Achilles with its rays,
As when red beacon fires a siege-press'd isle displays

All is Divine,—if 'mid the martial throng
Fierce Rumour stirs the crowds to rapturous fight,
It is Jove's Voice that walks the camps among:
Yea, like a phantom half-reveal'd to sight,
The Jove-sent Dream glides through the ambrosial night.
Alone beside the many-roaring deep
Pelides mourns, soft as the pale moon-light
The spirit of Patroclus with his sleep
In awful sweetness blends, and human tears they weep.

All is Divine,—all Human; we descry
Each form, and e'en each voice is mark'd to sense:
Ulysses as the snow-flakes from the sky
With gradual-falling power of eloquence;

121

While Nestor's words their honied stores dispense ;
Thoughts of great Hector darker shades illume
Touch'd with a human gentleness, and thence
Infuse the love of country and of home;
Achilles towers from sight in a Diviner gloom.

As Ocean takes its hues from changing skies,
Thus human characters and Powers Divine
Blend the unseen with life's realities.
Yet strong is mark'd the interposing line
Men's actions and affections to define;
Changes and chance in super-human scale
Are measured, yet mysterious intertwine
With man's deservings; though it seem to fail,
Leaving a hope that Right shall in the end prevail.

B. ii. 455.

B. ii. 460.

B. ii. 470.

B. ii. 87.

B. viii. 556.

B. i. 358.

B. i. 538.

B. xxiii. 199.

B. i. 194.

B. v. 6.

B. xviii. 203.

B. ii. 93.

B. ii. 6.

B. xxiii. 59.

B. iii. 222.

B. i. 249.

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II. ATE EXPELLED FROM HEAVEN.

[_]

II., b. xix. 125.

“Then Ate by the head and shining hair
Jove seiz'd, such sorrows his deep heart appal,
And this strong oath indignant did he swear;
That to Olympus and the starry hall
Ate should ne'er return, that injureth all;
He spake, and then with whirling hand he caught
And hurl'd her from Olympus' starry wall:
Quickly she came 'mong men. He mourn'd in thought
O'er the unseemly ills on his dear son she wrought ”

123

ATE AND LITÆ, OR PRAYERS.
[_]

Phœnix to Achilles. Il., b. ix. I, 492.

“Subdue thy mighty spirit; 'tis not right
For thee to be relentless; Gods above,
Greater in honour, virtue, and in might,
E'en they too will relent and pitying prove;
Them offerings, vows, and sacrifices move,
When man prays for the sin that on him lies.
Litæ are daughters of the mighty Jove;
Wrinkled, and lame, with side-distorted eyes,
They follow, full of care, wherever Ate flies.

“Revengeful Ate, trampling on mankind,
Strong, swift of foot, hastes onward,—in her rear
Her wounds to heal the Litæ move behind;
Should man these daughters of great Jove revere
As they approach, his friends they will appear
With Jove above, and all lost good renew;
If he unreconcil'd refuse to hear,
Against him they their sire Almighty sue,
And Ate on him comes exacting vengeance due.”

ON THE FOREGOING.

'Tis sweet amid the scenes of war and crime,
Which are the pictures of the world abroad,

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To pause awhile in peaceful thoughts sublime
Meet for a Christian on his heaven-ward road,—
Thoughts such as mitigate the heavy load
Of sin and sorrow,—and not all unmeet
To be admitted to the calm abode
Of prayer, and pardoning peace, and commune sweet
With Heaven, and those who sit in Heaven at saintly feet.

Mentioned by Justin Martyr as a relie of primitive tradition, and closely corresponding with an expression in the Prophet Isaiah, probably Is. xiv. 12, “How art thou fallen from Heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning.”Cohor. ad Græc., 29.

125

III. ULYSSES AND CALYPSO.

[_]

Odyssey, b. v. 203.

Cal.
“Ulysses wise, Laertes' son divine,
So thou to thy dear home and native shore
Wilt go,—to bid thee well shall yet be mine!
But didst thou know what many ills in store
Await thee, ere thy wanderings shall be o'er,
This home with me and immortality
Here wouldst thou stay and share, though evermore
Desiring all thy days thy wife to see;—
Nor sure hath she to boast superior charms to me,

“In face or form; nor can it e'er be said
That mortal with immortal can compare.

Ul.

Her wise Ulysses answer'd, ‘Goddess dread,
Be not displeased, I know that not so fair
Penelope as thou in form and air,
Immortal thou, unfading is thy bloom,
She but a mortal; yet with ceaseless care
I long through all my days, where'er I roam,
That glad return to see, and reach my long-lost home.’”

126

ON THE FOREGOING.

Age after age on his diviner choice
Approving hangs; a stern forewarning rings
Within man's heart against the flattering voice
Of promises too high for human things,
Though in immortal bowers Calypso sings,
That we “shall be as gods:” as one in quest
The soul seeks home in all its wanderings,
And yearns for its own tranquil place of rest,
And Heaven looks on and aids the long-enduring breast.

O beautiful and strange epitome
Of this our life, while through the tale we trace
Homeless Ulysses on the land and sea!
From childhood to old age it is the face
Of heaven-lost—yearning Man:—from place to place,
Whether he wander forth abroad, or knows
No change but of home—nature and of grace,
Still is he as one seeking for repose,
A man of many thoughts, a man of many woes.

Though Ithaca be rude , the rose that there
Hides in bleak rocks but waits the wintry blast,

127

Calypso in her isle blooms ever fair;—
Yet God's own presence seems upon the past,
His shadow rests where He our lot hath cast.
The sacred loyalty of a deep heart
Dreads chang'd affections, stedfast to the last,
From old associations fears to start,
Sending its roots below which upward strength impart.

And healthful Piety, though far she range,
Yet on the stem of early discipline
Links childhood, youth, and age, still dreading change.
Great tale of wisdom, may thy choice be mine!
The lesson in thee stored is half-divine;
Sweetly yet sternly, softly yet severe,
Like solemn music in some ancient shrine,
Insinuating high and holy fear,
And teaching greater things than reach the eye or ear.

Od. ix. 27.

128

IV. ULYSSES SHIPWRECKED AND NAUSICAA.

[_]

Od. vi. 186

“‘No evil man I deem thee nor unwise,
Stranger,’ Nausicaa the white-arm'd replied,
‘To all alike, as pleasing in his eyes,
Olympian Jove doth good or ill divide;
Bear then as sent from him whate'er betide:
Here thou of us shalt nothing ask in vain,
Till all a sufferer's wants shall be supplied;
This is Phæacia's city and domain,
O'er which my honour'd sire Alcinous doth reign.’

“Her fair-hair'd maidens then she bad to stand,—
‘Why fly, ye maidens, with no cause for fear?
There lives not one who on Phæacia's strand
With hostile ill intentions would appear;
For this our isle to all the Gods is dear;
No mortals e'er to this our country rove,
Save some poor ship-wreck'd stranger; him revere;
The stranger and the poor are sent by Jove;
However small the gift, the giver he will love.’”

129

THE FAREWELL OF NAUSICAA.
[_]

Od. viii. 456.

“As from the bath unto the festal board
He went, Nausicaa, fair in beauty's bloom,
In beauty which the immortal Gods afford,
Stood by a pillar of the vaulted dome;
She saw with wondering eyes Ulysses come,
Address'd these wingèd words, and thus begun,
‘Stranger, farewell;—and should'st thou reach thy home
There in thy native land think thou of one
Who saved thee from the sea, and first thy safety won.’”

ON THE FOREGOING.

Still wandering on, still far away from home,
While still the mirror is before him brought
Of some calm place where he might cease to roam,
Some rest'mid Ocean-storms; all turns to nought,
It is not home, his home is ever sought,
Now in his hands, and yet now far away;—
E'en as around us and beyond our thought
The resting-place of Everlasting Day
Lies close, and touches on this falling house of clay,—

Yet seems afar. No more the Ogygian grot,
Embowering deep its sylvan solitude,
The toilsome world excluded and forgot;
Where owls and wild sea-birds skim the dark wood

130

On broad-expanded wing , or nestling brood
On sea and foam delighting;—Nature's shrine
Of grots and lawns and fountains; all imbued
With Godhead—half-terrestrial, half-divine;
Yet toward the “wine-faced sea” the wanderer's heart doth pine.

Another scene of rest, another shore,
Safe from the roar of hostile elements,
Another Fair;—of human presence more,
And less divine in all that charms the sense,
But inly dress'd with nobler innocence;
With goodly nature and sweet modesty,
In kingly roofs parental rear'd, and thence
With youthful maids disporting on the lea,
By fountain, grove, or field,—domestic, regal, free.

She seem'd the guardian spirit of the place,
In palace-halls scarce-seen, and yet the while
Her form, though absent, seems each scene to grace;
Say, cannot aught in that sweet tranquil isle
A wearied spirit into rest beguile,
With kind Alcinous in kingly hall
Of royal gentleness and friendly smile?
No—these delights the home-bent spirit pall,
And on the exile's heart the saddening shadows fall.

131

He who so late the sands of ruin trod,
Himself a naked wreck, more than restor'd
Now in the grace of Pallas walks a God.
Not ships Phæacian, honour'd as their lord,
Nor sports Phæacian, and chaste regal board,
Nor in Phæacian gardens to recline,
Nor all the scenes Phæacian arts afford,
Can soothe; but still the wanderer's heart doth pine,
Bent toward the “wine-faced sea.” That wanderer's heart be mine !

B. v. 66.

B. vi. 96.

“In nothing has Homer more shewn his virtuous design than in his representation of the Cephallenian leader when saved from shipwreck. For in the first place he has described the Princess as full of reverence for him at his first appearance, so far from being ashamed at beholding him in nakedness and alone; since Virtue had in the place of raiment clothed and adorned him with herself. And afterwards he is represented as so highly esteemed by the rest of the Phæacians, that, leaving the luxury in which they were living, all turned their eyes to him in admiration; and none among the Phæacians at that time would have prayed for any thing else than to become like unto Ulysses: and all this on his being saved from shipwreck. In such things one who interpreted to me the poet's intention, said, that Homer seemed to cry aloud, and say, Let virtue, O men, be the object of all your care, which even together with one that is shipwrecked swims safe to shore, and when he is cast forth naked on the dry land, renders him more an object of respect than the happy Phæacians.” Basil. De leg, lib. Gent.

132

V. THE LOTOPHAGI.

[_]

Od. ix. 93.

“With these Lotophagi not open harms
And seen destruction our companions greet,
But the charm'd Lotus, which the soul disarms;
Whereby they ate a strange oblivion sweet
Of home-returning with the honied meat;—
Bent of that Lotus from the enchanted ground
With those Lotophagi to stay and eat;
These with constraint we dragg'd, and weeping bound
Within the hollow ships, then cleave the deep profound.”

ON THE FOREGOING.

It seem'd a spot of rest 'mid Ocean's foam,
Of rural haunts and pastoral quietude,
Yet was no place of innocence or home;
With human face divine earthward to brood,
The Lotus-eaters, with oblivious food
Of home and country,—yea of God and Heaven!
Pleasures of sense that drown the hope of good.
These must by force be seized, compulsion-driven,
Lost is the light within to Heaven-bound spirits given.

133

Hence from the hateful shore;—uplift the sail;—
The brutalizing ease of savage land,
Whose pestilential breath clogs the sea-gale!
Away the Lotus-eaters, and the band
Half-brute, half-man; nor parley with the strand!
Such Pleasure's vile allurements come not o'er
The man of counsels nor the mastering hand,
For him far other dangers are in store;
Lift the sail to the winds! away the hateful shore!

Half brute, half human were, yet part divine,
Those fauns and old poetic fantasies,
Which haunt the classic woods and rural shrine;
Something celestial still within them lies.
Therefore a sadness in their melodies
Still seems to speak of home and rest afar,
Griefs which to hear linger'd the evening skies,
And listen'd long the solitary star;—
These Lotus-eaters—they—man's very being mar.

134

IV. THE ABODE OF CIRCE.

[_]

Od., b. x. 220.

“In portals of the Goddess now they stood,
And Circe heard, who sitting at the loom
Sung with melodious voice that fill'd the wood;
A woof she wrought of bright ambrosial bloom,
Divine the work, and graceful hues illume;
Then first Polites spoke, of men the king,
‘O friends, what sweetness charms the sylvan gloom,
That all around the very pavements ring,
Is it a mortal voice, or doth a Goddess sing?’

“Thus as he spoke they call'd, and lo, were seen
Bright portals opening, and with greeting kind,
Inviting all, advanced the enchantress Queen.
They enter'd in, heedless, secure, and blind,
Eurylochus alone remain'd behind,
Suspecting guile: she leads within, and there
Before them sets, on downy seats reclin'd,
Press'd milk, and honey fresh, and wheaten fare,
And blends the Pramnian wine;—all drugg'd with fatal care.

135

“She gave—and straightway as they drank the wine,
They drank oblivion of their native land,
Transform'd anon they put on forms of swine,
Head, voice, and bristling limbs, by her dread wand
Stricken, and pent in sties at her command.
While all within, their sorrows to confound,
The minds of men remain'd; she with her hand
Strews acorns, mast, and cornel fruits around,
While swine with swine they fed, low grovelling on the ground.”

ON THE FOREGOING.

Surely, said Hope, if rest be in the world,
A home wherein the soul shall find repose,
'Tis in this sea-girt dell, where calmly curl'd
The smoke amid the trees , and welcome shews
Of peaceful hearths within,—or roofs disclose
Sweetly embosom'd haunts 'mid woodland swells,
And sounds of song come forth, and Music's close
Of ease and grateful rest and pleasure tells;
'Tis there the enchantress Queen, deluding Circe, dwells.

They who from Lotus-eaters with disdain
And loathing turn, charm'd with her voice so sweet

136

Unheedingly will join with Circe's train,
Will of her proffer'd viands sit and eat,
And eating find it death with no retreat;
Such magic hath transforming Pleasure's guise,
They once were men which throng her haunted seat,
Now lions, wolves, or inmates of the sties ,
As Pleasure feeds in each the sin that in him lies.

There is an herb which wingèd Hermes gives ,
The wise who blend in faith that sovereign flower
May of those pleasures taste, and yet may live;
Such power hath grace Divine: but if her bower
Thou enter'st, long delays and shadows lower
Upon thine after-course and Hades' gloom:
And well for him who so hath bound her power
That she may wisdom speak of things to come ,
Of dangers, shades, and shoals that hence must be his doom.

And e'en for him who with the swine hath fed
On husks in foreign lands and far from home,
For him there is a rising from the Dead ,
When his Deliverer and his Lord shall come

137

And look upon his sorrows—thence to roam
No longer, taught by suffering; and again
Lead him a weeping wanderer from the tomb,
Make him anew, and give to sit with men,
In City of our God an honour'd denizen.

Od. x. 149.

Od., b. x. 218.

Od., b. x. 302.

B. x. 504.

B. x. 395.

B. x. 398, 399.

138

VII. WARNING AGAINST THE SIRENS.

[_]

Od., b. xii. 36.

“Then Circe spake, dread Goddess, ‘These things o'er
Another coming peril shalt thou find;
Hear thou my words, the warnings given before
The God shall in their season bring to mind;—
The Sirens next waft death upon the wind;
Whoe'er unconscious shall approach their shore,
And hear their voice, for him those left behind,
His wife and children hastening to the door,
Shall gathering stand around and welcome home no more.

“‘Charming the air with their melodious strains,
The Sirens sit within a flowery mead,
With bones heap'd round of the unburied slain:
That thine own comrades may not hear nor heed,
Stop thou each ear with wax, and swift proceed;
They to the mast must bind thee foot and hand;
And if from these thou strugglest to be freed,
Bind more and more and double every band,
Till thou hast ceased to hear the fatal-pleasing strand.’”

139

SONG OF THE SIRENS.

Od., b. xii. 166, 181

“Then swiftly went toward the Sirenian Isle
The full-wing'd bark, and harmless breezes play'd,
When suddenly they sank, and scarce a smile
Ruffled the main, a God the billow stay'd;
The sea-men then arose, and furling, laid
The sails aside, themselves they sat along,
The seas all whitening with the oary blade;
Then near we drew as sounds a human tongue,
They knew of the approach, and thus began the song.

“‘Stay, stay thy course, O thou of Greece the boast,
Much-prais'd Ulysses! stay thy ship, draw near,
For never yet hath mortal pass'd our coast
But first he stops our honied voice to hear.
Hence he departs with song-delighted ear,
And heart with knowledge fraught to make him wise.
All things we know of Ilium, all that there
The brave endured by will of deities,
We know whate'er may be beneath the circling skies.’”

140

ON THE FOREGOING.

And is there then a song the wise can charm,—
The man of many counsels, school'd in woes?
Can all his better soul at length disarm,
Who rose superior o'er so many foes,
With Circe and Calypso scorns repose?
What is that strain so subtle to the soul
That he who listens, till himself he lose
Will listen, though he 'scap'd th' enchanted bowl—
Sounds that from wisdom win her hard-earn'd selfcontrol?

Surely that song is with the promise stored
Which our first parents heard in Paradise,
Whereby the wisest fell, Creation's lord,
The pride that flatters man with honied lies;
And with the fatal promise to be wise;—
“Glorious thou art and prais'd,” the Siren saith,
Then comes that curiosity that dies
In knowing good and evil, which is death:
The Faith which stops her ears alone draws vital breath.

141

VIII. SCYLLA AND CHARYBDIS.

[_]

Od., b. xii. 201.

“Now safe from the Sirenian Isle, behold,
Smoke and a billow huge with distant roar!
Their hands let fall the oars—a bellowing roll'd
Along the deep, the ship moved on no more;—
Then I each comrade labour'd to restore,
‘O friends, in dangers we are not untried,
And may remember this like those of yore;
Be we obedient all, and I will guide,
Ply ye the stedfast oars,—and Jove may help provide.

“‘And, Pilot, hear thou well, and keep in mind,
Bear out from yonder wave and smoking spray,
Steer toward the rock, lest unawares we find
The ship within the whirl-pool borne away!’
I spake, they instantly my words obey;
Scylla I mention'd not, lest at the sound
Trembling they should be chill'd by dire dismay;
Then Circe's warning I forgot, and bound
My shining arms about and anxious look'd around;—

“Station'd upon the deck, two spears in hand,
Expecting rocky Scylla to appear

142

To seize her destin'd prey; long there I stand,
And gazing watch the gloomy rocks draw near,
But her I saw not:—then we trembling steer
The desperate strait between, and onward toil,
Scylla on this side, and Charybdis there;
Dreadful they roar and rush, and then recoil,
Till all the raving floods as in a cauldron boil.

“The white spray dash'd on loftiest crags on high;
With the engulphing tide and the rebound
Within appear'd a dreadful revelry,
With thundering roar the rock rebellow'd round,
And deep beneath was seen blue sandy ground.
Aghast were all, with terror petrified;
But while on this we gaze, with awe profound,
Six bravest champions from our vessel's side
The ravenous Scylla seiz'd, and buried in the tide.”

ON THE FOREGOING.

Such is the chart whereby Philosophy
Would point her course, this is the tale she tells
To steer aright upon life's dangerous sea,
Where upon either side destruction dwells,
And with the tides of Passion ebbs and swells;

143

While Virtue 'tween two Vices has her course;
Shunning Charybdis most with foaming cells.
And there is wisdom too in his remorse
Who vainly seized his arms and met such foes with force.

It is the wise-man's lesson,—for e'en so
In rude impatience oft stirr'd to alarms
Too roughly and too rashly we forego
The gentler wisdom, and rush forth to arms,
O'erleaping caution to fraternal harms;
Then on a sudden find companions gone;
Such violence, vain braving all, hath charms
'Mid rising of rude passions; but alone
The better part of peace too late in tears we own.

And thou whose track is on the pictur'd page,
Thou Chief of many counsels, many foes,
Weaving the web of thy long pilgrimage,
Ever begun anew, still 'mid thy woes
Mock'd by the unreal phantom of repose,
Which like a cloud-built vision seems before
Upon the horizon's verge just to disclose
Ithaca's home, lost Ithaca's loved shore,
Ithaca fair at eve—all cloud and nothing more.

144

But other ills await thee, other forms
Of danger round thy homeward course are strown,
And the disquietude of coming storms;
Faith in that distant home remains alone,
E'en as a shield around thee; all are gone;—
Bear on, brave heart, still bear on to the end!
Thy comrades lost, thy ships wreck'd and o'erthrown,
Tempest-wrought ills thy soul and body rend,
Thou art by Wisdom loved, thou art of Gods the friend.

Arist. Ethics, b. ii. c. 9.

B. xii, 1. 226.

145

IX. THE RECOGNITION OF ULYSSES.

Oft as I read how great Ulysses stood
In his own kingly hall, a beggar poor,
With tatter'd garb and leathern wallet rude,
I would unravel the “good ” Poet's store,
And all the golden argument explore:
Caught in the maze of his melodious wiles
I linger, and suspend the passing oar,
E'en as that hero by those syren isles,
At whose surpassing sounds the sullen Ocean smiles.

But his no syren's soul-enfeebling song,
He lifted up the dull earth to the skies,
Then wander'd forth in healthful virtue strong,
Seeing all earth as with an angel's eyes,
Thick-peopled with immortal Deities;
It is no more the haunt where wrongs prevail,
But in each act of life the Godhead lies,
From sight withdrawn awhile; while ne'er to fail
Stern Retribution holds, but half conceals, the scale.

In nature's stores, and in “the gift” of sleep,
In viands of slain beeves, in cheering wine,
In wafting gales, that o'er the Ocean sweep,
In birds of heaven, or in the surging brine,

146

In darts that pass or miss the destin'd line,
In every thought which human conduct guides,
In morn, in eve, earth, sea, and air divine,
The ever-varying God his presence hides,
And sways of mortal things the deeply rolling tides;—

Wrapping mankind around, serene and still;
And oft the good to see him are allow'd,
While 'mid the revellers all bent on ill
Good Theoclymenus beholds the cloud
Peopled with Stygian shapes, a blackening shroud,
And heads all ghastly with portentous sign,
Going before destruction; from the crowd
He springs aloof, discerning wrath Divine,
While they heed not nor hear, in surfeit lost and wine.

Or as he thence the royal arms conveys,
Telemachus, beside that beggar old,
Beholds the playing of th' unharming blaze
O'er all the inner house, rays which enfold
Pillar and tier and arch in flaming gold,
And far within celestial Power confest;
His Sire discerns the God, and bids him hold
On his high errand, and th' unearthly guest
Honour with speechless awe around made manifest.

147

Now little deeming of that warrior Lord,
Th' insatiate spoilers, ruthless, gay, and proud,
Sure indications of their worth afford;
Antinous in wassails fierce and loud,
Taunter of holy eld; and haughty-brow'd
Eurymachus; the son of Nisus, brave,
Lover of Gods and men, whom from the crowd
Of revellers the Hero fain would save,
But he who shares the feast, must share th' untimely grave.

And thou, divine Eumæus , swineherd poor,
Like the rude stakes that fence thy woodland nest ,
All heart of oak. By his own royal door
The Beggar notes each menial and each guest,
The hospitable word, th' unkindly jest,
The temper good and loyal, him that heeds
Father and King, and age with woes opprest,
And poverty, in whose uncomely weeds
Oft Gods go forth on earth to watch men's words and deeds .

Then arm'd with battle and with glorious might,
As erst at Ilium in the famèd field,

148

Grasping the old Laconian bow, to light
Godlike Ulysses springs, not with the shield
And helmet, but o'erwhelming death reveal'd;
The arrow wing'd with their impending doom
Hangs eager on the string, yet still they wield
The thoughtless flagons through the festive room,
While Justice hath e'en now delved deep their righteous tomb.

There falls a light on this illumin'd page,
And as I ponder with delightèd eyes
Upon the holier lore of earlier age,
Something I read of higher mysteries,
Of One who hath descended from the skies,
And wanders here in His own kingly hall,
A stranger,—and in prison often lies ,
And on His brethren's charities doth call,
Yet weighs and watches each, the God and Judge of all.

“Bonus Homerus.”—Hor.

It may be observed, that Homer generally speaks of him, the Διος υφορβος, and of him only, in the vocative case.

B. xiv. l. 12.

B. xvii. l. 485.

St. Matt. xxv. 35, 36.

149

HESIOD.

I. WORKS AND DAYS .

O sage Ascræan, sire of song,
To what great wealth hath turn'd thy wrong?
Of patrimonial lands bereft,
Thy transient sense of wrong is left
Enshrin'd in precepts grave and high,
Which Wisdom's self shall not let die.
Thus passing evils did enhance
A glorious great inheritance,—
A shadow of the eternal name
Of those who suffer without blame;
Enduring good for short-lived ill,
Which shall a better hope fulfil.

“A lawsuit with his brother, in consequence of which he remained deprived of part of his patrimony, has given occasion to much of his Poem entitled Of Works and Days.” Mitford's Greece. vol i. ch 11. s. 11.

150

II. THE IRON AGE.

[_]

Works and Days, b. i. 1. 172.

“Then the fifth age succeeds, whose course I mourn,
“Would I were dead before, or later born!
“An iron race with toil and care oppress'd,
“Who pause not night or day from their unrest,
“Corrupting; on them woes the Gods shall send,
“Yet even now with good the evil blend.
“For Jove upon them brings a speedy doom,
“And hoary-headed soon they reach the tomb.
“Sons are not like their fathers as of yore;
“The host and guest, the friend and friend no more,
“The brother is no more to brother dear;
“Nor parents soon grown old will sons revere;
“With bitter words they taunt them and complain.
“Wretches, whom not e'en fears of God restrain!
“E'en those who nurtured them they without awe
“Cast off—their own right-hand their only law.
“Each other's cities will they overthrow,
“For one who keeps his oath no reverence know,
“Nor for the just and holy: rather hold
“In honour the ill-doer and the bold .

151

“Justice and Shame their right hand cannot stay,
“But the bad make the better man their prey,
“And add to guileful words dread perjuries.
“Envy, with lurid visage and foul eyes,
“With miserable mortals will resort,
“In ill rejoicing, scattering ill report.
“Soon o'er the spacious earth, from mortal sight,
“Covering their beauteous forms with robes of white,
“Reverence and Right shall quit mankind, and rise
“To the immortal mansions of the skies;—
“Nothing but woes remaining with mankind,
“No remedy of evil left behind.”

Such were the symbols erst which walk'd the earth,
And companied in Greece the elder birth
Of glorious Liberty,
Sprung from its parent's head, all-arm'd and free;
Itself baptizing in unhallowed blood
Of kings, of parents, and of brotherhood.
Paternal, priestly, and the kingly rod,
And in and over all the reign of God,
And all of God's vicegerence set at nought;
And Self enthroned;—on wings of eager thought
Casting all self-restraint unto the wind,
And worshipping each God which Self may find.

152

Such signs again go forth before its rise
In the great “Lawless one,” and mark the skies;
Evil is found no more, for it is good,
Canonized by the full-voiced multitude.
On tiptoe loud Anticipation stands
Waiting th' opening door, and through all lands
The putting forth the head, and far and wide
Golden opinions, glorious hopes, astride
On Expectation: thence on every side
Partition-walls broke down, scatter'd all bands,
Christian and Jew together shaking hands.
Each his own priest and king and his own God
Which none shall interfere with; for their nod
Is as the many waters: wars must cease,
For mammon is enthron'd as king of peace
Throughout all lands: in the new world all-gold
The casting off of dusty trammels old;
And the great Bishop of all Christendom
Hastens to come down from imperial Rome,
Blessing and shaking hands with anarchy.
We see what is, we see not what shall be.

Conf. 2 Tim. iii. 2—4.

153

III. THE WATCHERS.

[_]

Works and Days, b. i. 1. 246.

“Consider, O ye kings, of judgment well;—
“For ever near among mankind there dwell
“Immortals, looking on with keenest eyes;
“Beholding when, regardless of the skies,
“With crooked judgments men each other rend.
“For thrice ten-thousand watchers ever tend,
“Guardians of Jove, on those of mortal birth;—
“With darkness clad they walk the peopled earth,
“Immortal spirits, through all place and time
“Noting the judgments and the deeds of crime.
“For Justice is the virgin-child of Jove,
“Glorious and reverenced by the Gods above.
“When one against her by ill ways hath striven,
“Anon she sits a suppliant in Heaven
“To her Saturnian sire; of deeds of ill
“And unjust men complaining loud, until
“A people for their Prince's crime atone,
“Perverting justice on the judgment-throne.”

154

IV. THE PATH OF VIRTUE.

[_]

Works and Days, b. i. lin. 285.

“Know well that evil we have power to seize
“In cumulative fulness and with ease;
“For short the way, she dwelleth ever nigh;
“But before Virtue have the Gods on high
“Sweat of the brow ordain'd, much toil precedes,
“And long and steep the path that to her leads;
“Arduous at first—until it reach the height,
“Easy thenceforth the way, and fair the sight.”

[_]

ST. BASIL ON THE ABOVE PASSAGE.

“What else can we suppose was the intention of Hesiod in composing those verses which are in the mouths of all, but that of exhorting young men to virtue? It appears to me that in such a description he is but exhorting us all to be good, and not to be so disheartened by the toils as to fall away from the end. And in truth if there is any one else who hath written strains like these in the praise of virtue, we may well receive his sayings as tending to the same end as ourselves.”

Basil. De leg. lib. Gen.

155

V. THE RIGHTEOUS KING.

[_]

Theogon. l. 79.

“Calliope, the noblest of the Nine,
“For she on kings revered attendant goes,—
“Whoe'er he be of kings divinely-rear'd,
“On whom as soon as born they deign to look,
“Daughters of mighty Jove:—upon his tongue
“They shed mellifluous sounds, and his sweet words
“Drop eloquence; his people with one face
“All gaze on him deciding righteous laws.
“While with safe-counsel, and in wisdom skill'd,
“Quickly a great contention hath he staunch'd.
“For thus wise-counselling kings, with subjects bent
“On deeds injurious, work mutation strange,
“With ease persuasive and soft-soothing words.
“Him going through the city as a God
“They tend with kind obeisance; while around
“They gather, he o'er all stands Chief Supreme.
“Such is to men the Muses' sacred gift;
“From Muses and Apollo darting-far
“Poets and minstrels go forth on the earth,
“But kings from Jove himself.”

156

ÆSCHYLUS.

I. THE PROMETHEUS.

Where didst thou glean that strange mysterious tale,
Thou solemn bard, or seer, or sage divine,
Or priest of Heathen Wisdom? In what vale
Of shadowy death or subterranean mine
Chaldee or Ind, or in Egyptian shrine
'Neath some dark pyramid,—or on the shore
Of dim Oblivion left in its decline,
Some fragment old of Babylonian lore;—
Where didst thou gain that tale of days that went before?

As in some tree or flower's deep hidden lines,
Or many-colour'd pebble on the beach,
Christ crucified we trace in mystic signs,
Whom stones within their secret bosom preach;—
Or when the skies of blue majestic reach
In starry characters the Cross disclose,
The same beneath our feet may waters teach
In dark reflection,—thus, whence'er it rose,
Beneath this legend strange shadows of truth repose.

157

For who is this amid the mountain peaks
In adamantine fetters on the rock,
Whose very name itself of wisdom speaks?
Two monsters, Strength and Force, huge rivets lock,
Alien to pity, and his sorrows mock,
But Nature through her realms doth sympathize,
And Earth unto its centre feels the shock.
See Ocean on his griffin car arise,
And all his daughter-nymphs too fair for human eyes,—

Full of diviner communings;—from far
Ascending from their azure palaces
And coral caves, upborne on airy car
'Tween earth and Heaven, and sitting on the breeze
With wisdom hold their virgin colloquies;
Poising the scales of virtue; while hard by
Laughing with dimples numberless the Seas,
Ether Divine, swift-wing'd Airs, Earth and Sky
Around him mingling breathe intensest sympathy.

Of what mysterious fate art thou the prey,
Deep-counselling son of Themis , wise of mind,
Or Son of Earth and Heaven , as some would say;
Thus suffering for thy love of lost mankind,

158

Who were to Hades going , weak and blind,
Like shadows in a dream to ruin given,
Despair before and wrath itself behind,
When thou didst give them Hope and Fire from Heaven,
For which thou art thyself to bonds and exile driven.

And who this Jove imperious, new to power,
Throned majesty of evil, given to reign
A dynasty of ill one destin'd hour,
Yet trembling at a captive he would chain?
Men “seeing saw not, hearing heard in vain .”
But who is this with melancholy moan,
That like a death-doom'd victim doth complain,
And comes to thee with supplicating groan,
Whom that dread evil power hath touch'd and made his own?

The horned maid of Inachus, 'neath ban
Of conscience, expiating Jove-wrought sin,
Like some strange symbol of guilt-laden man,
Whom the live stings without and pangs within
From Argus hundred-eyed no respite win,

159

Whom e'en in death earth hides not —but her grief,
Like phantom of the crime that hems her in,
Brings her this way to thee on mountain reef,
For one that's born of her shall bring the world relief.

But, lo, the Earth to its foundation shakes,
'Mid mountain fastnesses the Thunders bound,
And Echo from her rocky caves awakes,
And Lightnings shake their forked hair around,
Wild dusty Whirlwinds ride the storm. 'Mid sound
Of bursting thunders with a mightier chime,
From him upon the adamantine rock fast-bound
Is heard the righteous voice lifted sublime,
Making his loud appeal to furthest shores of time.

I would not force such legends of old lore
To square with truths divine, nor bring from high
Transcendent Love, to blend with tales of yore
Found in the dreams of heathen vanity;—
As when in fiery embers as they lie
We trace out fancied shapes, or in the cloud

160

That rolls and melts upon the azure sky,—
Give shape and mould to falsehood—nor have bowed
To look for beauty's face within a funeral shroud.

But whether deep in man's divining heart
(Like shadow of the Heavens in some dark well)
Such wisdom hath been found; or whether part
Of some primeval lore unsearchable,
Much changed, much fraught with error, which thus fell
Like some stray scatter'd fragments on the strand;—
Methinks if we could all the meaning tell
It bears the mark of some unearthly hand,
On which with awe we gaze, yet cannot understand.

They who the Cross would mark in things of sense,
Earth, sea, or sky, live form, or human face,
Yet lose it soon in other lineaments,
Alien and intricate; enough to trace
Though rude and shapeless;—or in realms of grace
With complications manifold may blend
The Cross of Christ, yet find therein no place
In full distinctness, though through all it tend;
Enough if 'mid dark clouds we. Heavenward still ascend.

Line 18.

Line 218.

Line 244.

Line 458.

Line 258, 260.

Line 456

Line 700.

161

II. KNOWLEDGE OF GOD BY SUFFERING.

[_]

Agamem., 1. 160 to 184. paraphrased.

1

“O Thou surpassing mortal sight,
Wonderful is Thy Name!
How shall I think of Thee aright,
And speak Thee without blame?
Of Thee I fain would sing,
But every thought I to the balance bring
To speak Thy praise is impotent and vain,
And feeble is the strain.

2

“I see below some mighty one
Arises, mantling o'er
With proud defiance; he anon
Is past, and heard no more:
Another for a space,
And lo, a third is towering in his place;
But he who sings of Thine all-conquering Power,
Hath Wisdom for his dower.

162

3

“Thou pointest out the toilsome stair
Which leads to Wisdom's palace fair,
And hast to man Thy law made plain,
That Pain is Gain .
Gentle as dew such knowledge of Thy laws,
And e'en from sleep the soul instruction draws;
But little thanks the lesson own,
For in unwilling hearts such grace is sown,
By them who sit on Heaven's dread throne.”

ON THE FOREGOING.

Thus well he deem'd that God who hides from sight
Must Ever-lasting be and Infinite,
To knowledge of Himself that lies so deep
Still training us by suffering, e'en in sleep
Conversing with our spirit; night and day,
So wonderfully near, so far away.

Scil. τον Παθει Μαθος.

163

III. SACRILEGE.

[_]

Line 367, Διος πλαγαν, to line 396.

“The hand of Heaven is on them, see
Their own madness they deem wise!
O footsteps and mute auguries
Of Him whose will is destiny!
“Tush,” said one, “doth God perceive,
Or for trampled altars grieve?”
Thus they whet themselves to rage
Of abhorrèd Sacrilege.
Sprung are such from them of old
Breathing forth rebellion bold,
Nurs'd to impious hardihood
From full houses flowing o'er
With an over-plenteous store,
Beyond the golden mean of good.
Far aloof from such be mine,
With content in humble cell,
Unharming and unharm'd to dwell,
Hard by holy Wisdom's shrine!
For what shall towers of wealth avail
To them who kick at Judgment's shrine,

164

To save them from th' o'erwhelming jail,
Th' inextricable net of Penalty divine?

“When they the strength of Right let go,
Th' infatuating Judgment's course
Urges them on, and gathers force,
Dread Counsellor for children's woe.
Therefore lowers the heavenly roof,
And all Healing stands aloof.
Now no more the guilt conceal'd,
Horribly it stands reveal'd—
Awfully resplendent light:
It has pass'd for current long,
Through the hands of thousands strong,
And their handling made it bright.
Black forgery is in these lines,
See the adulterous metal shines,
With a curse upon its brow!
Look at it, and sound it now!
It seem'd but sport at morning mild,
And they pursuing, like a child
With feather'd prey his grasp inviting,
Ever before his steps alighting;
But in sad Destruction pale
The City shall such sport bewail!

165

Yea, though ye pray, and cry aloud,
God turns from the abhorred land,
And draws around Him the dark cloud
From sacrilegious heart and gold-defilèd hand.”

ON THE FOREGOING.

Such is, alas! that evil School
Which in our Christian land bears rule,
The only lore it with it brings
Hate of God's Church and hate of kings,
Contempt of Christ in His own poor.

And yet they prosper as of yore,
Grow in possessions more and more;
But o'er them hangs from age to age
Blindness of eyes their heritage,
A heavier judgment to endure .

“Then grieve not at their high and palmy state,
Those proud bad men, whose unrelenting sway
Has shatter'd holiest things, and led astray
Christ's little ones.”

Lyr. Apost.

166

IV. THE BESETTING SIN.

[_]

Ibid., line 716 to line 735.

“There once was one
Who rear'd a Lion from the breast,
And took him for his household guest.
Harmless he play'd in mimic strife
In feats that presaged after-life,
The children's sport—and well I ween
Old age could smile upon the scene,
When one would take him, like a child,
Into his arms; or crouching wild
The hand caressing he put by,
With suppliant tail and glistening eye.

“But lo, anon
He shews the hidden dam within,
And all the house is blood and din.
His foster friends he now repays,
Stays an unbidden guest, and preys
On flock and fold; a torment sore,
The cherish'd inmate now no more.
Rapine and Slaughter on him wait
Where'er he goes; found not too late,

167

Th' exactor he of wrath Divine,
A slaughtering Priest at Ate's shrine.”

ON THE FOREGOING.

Wild beasts which nature fill with awe
But typify the inward law
Of Passion, whether love or hate,
Fawning at first, but waxing great
It preys upon the soul within,
And stands reveal'd “the man of sin.”

168

V. ATE.

[_]

Line 750, Παλαιφατος, to line 781. παν δ' επι τερμα νωμα.

“'Twas said of yore, when Wealth doth rise,
She never childless dies,
But in her fulness doth disclose
A multiplying brood of woes.
But Truth, if I may hold thy hand,
Apart from all with thee I stand;
Some sacrilegious Deed of fear
Hath offspring, which their parent's impress bear,
But houses built with Right have children bright and fair.

2

“The Crime of old, which seem'd long dead,
Lifts up again its head,
Again its destin'd moon it fills,
And giveth birth to mortal ills,
As aye advancing it grows worse
In the black chambers of the Curse,
It bears a nameless progeny,
Hating the light—not yet their form we see,
But doubtless all too like their godless ancestry.

169

3

“In smoky huts Justice shines bright,
Revering holy Right,
But her averted eyes doth hold
From hands defiled with sacred gold;
And towering walks unto the side
Where deeds of Holiness abide,
Nor honours Power which wealth may raise,
Though falsely it be stamp'd with passing Praise,
But unto the Great End she ordereth all her ways.”

ON THE FOREGOING.

“Ate” that word of early time
Deep Wisdom speaks as from a shrine,
Of long-descending Curse and Crime
Which marks the steps of Wrath divine.

When Judgment like a fiery guest
Enters a house and there remains;
On age to age its shadows rest,
Unless Repentance cleanse the stains .

Zech. v. 4.

See Hom. Il. ix. at page 122 and 123

170

VI. THE FURIES OVERTAKING ORESTES.

[_]

Eumen. 1 264.... and 299.

“Justice must overtake thee, thy red blood
Drink we, and thou alive shalt be our food,
To waste thee and drag down below
With the vengeance and the woe
Of the matricide;—
Meet warning-sign for him who sets aside
The God, the stranger, or his parents dear,
That retribution each shall bear.
Hades, great Judge, all mortal things shall right,
Who sitteth out of sight,
With watchful mind as with an iron pen
Noting down the deeds of men.”

ORESTES AT THE SHRINE.

“Neither Apollo nor Minerva's shrine
Shall save thee that thou perish not and pine;—
Nor know a place of joy within thy mind;
The bloodless prey of spirits, shadow blind.

171

Yet me thou answer'st not, but turn'st away,
Fed and devoted all for me, my prey,
My living victim, not on altars slain;
Then hear the charm which shall thy soul enchain.—

SONG OF THE FURIES.

“Let us come and join the dance
Which his spirit shall entrance.
Men's destinies are in our hand,
The disposal of our band;
Stern exactors we of right;
Vengeance is our stern delight.
He his hands who keepeth clean—
Him our anger toucheth not,—
He shall have an unharm'd lot.
But where deed of crime hath been,
And the guilty sinner hides
Blood that on his hands abides,
Witnesses true to the dead
Close upon his heels we tread,
Blood-avengers we draw near,
With him to the end appear.

“Mother Night, who gav'st me birth
For the punishment and dread
Of the living and the dead,
Whether on or 'neath the earth;

172

See how this Latona's son
Takes from me the trembling one;—
Though his hands be fresh-imbrued
With a mother's blood.
O'er our victim not in vain
Sing we this our strain,
Soul-destroying, working-sadness,
And self-despairing madness,
The Furies' ban,
The spirit's chain,
Lyre-less, joy-less, withering man.

“This our office from of old
Fate hath given us firm to hold;—
When deeds of crime on mortal lie
To attend him till he die;
Nor I ken
Shall he be more free e'en then.
O'er our victim not in vain
Sing we this our strain,
Soul-destroying, working sadness,
And self-despairing madness,
The Furies' ban,
The spirit's chain,
Lyre-less, joy-less, withering man.

“Such the offices on earth
Were assign'd us at our birth;—

173

Ne'er to come nigh the Immortals,
Nor approach within their portals;
None of them with us carouses;
For no part, no lot have we
With the white-robed company.
Ours the ruin is of houses;
Should a home-rear'd Mars appear,
Slaying one that should be dear;
Him pursue we;—be he strong
We shall waste him down ere long.

“By our care and by our zeal
Is One set free,
And Gods enjoy immunity
From the criminal appeal.
But Jove with converse ne'er will grace
Our hate-doom'd and blood-reeking race
Therefore wandering far I go,
And down my heavy foot-fall bring
With a spring
And intolerable woe,
When upon him we prevail
As his slippery footsteps fail.

“Glories that once reach'd the sky, in high renown,
All faded and dishonour'd dwindle down

174

On our black-robed advances and the footfalls of our tread.
But he that falls this knoweth not, for guilt hath made him blind,
With such a cloud it falls upon the crime-polluted mind.
But others deeply groan, and speak of what a gloom
There hangs upon the house with a heavy weight of doom.

“Yea, I ween, and it shall stand,
For all ways are in our hand,
All we perfect in its time,
Stern remembrancers of crime.
Prayers with us no access find;
Unaveng'd, unhonour'd crew;
Far from Gods our lot assign'd
While we pursue
With a sunless lamp behind,—
Preciptous dark ways shall flee,
Both the blind and those that see.

“What mortal ear
Heareth these things without fear,
Of our ordinance severe?

175

Given of Gods, by fate made sure,
To the end it shall endure.
While I bear this rite from of old
None shall me dishonour'd hold,
Though 'neath the earth invisible
In the sunless cloud I dwell.”

[_]

SONG OF THE FURIES EXPLAINED.

“When one has been recollecting the proper proofs of a future state of rewards and punishments, nothing methinks can give one so sensible an apprehension of the latter,... as observing that... after the chief bad consequences, temporal consequences, have been delayed for a great while; at length they break in irresistibly, like an armed force: repentance is too late to relieve, and can serve only to aggravate, their distress: the effects of their own doings, overwhelm them, beyond possibility of remedy or escape. This is an account of what is in fact the general constitution of nature.”

Bp. Butler's Analogy, b. l. ch. ll.

“Let their way be dark and slippery; and let the angel of the Lord persecute them.”—Ps. xxxv. 6.

176

VII. DIVINE POWER.

[_]

Supp., lin. 86. Διος ιμερος.

“The will of Jove no one can trace,
All things to him are bright
E'en in dark night,
What seems black chance to mortal race.
Safe it falls out and sure will stand
Whate'er his will shall once command.
His counsels are a secret maze,
Like intricate dark woodland ways,
And difficult to know.
From lofty towers on high he looks, and thence
He hurls men in destruction low,
Yet arms him with no violence;—
All without effort is with Gods.
Seated on high, I know not how, His thought
Hath instantaneously fulfilment wrought
E'en from His pure abodes .”

“Yea, what things Thou didst determine were ready at hand, and said, Lo, we are here.”Judith. ix. 6.

177

SIMONIDES.

What rapture, could ye seize
Some Theban fragment, or unrol
One precious, tender-hearted scroll
Of pure Simonides!
Wordsworth.

I.

All the world is varied madness,
With a healthful cheerful sadness,
Better than light-hearted gladness,
With a sorrow that doth please
Cleanse the heart, Simonides!

Better than the worldling's treasure,
And the lightly-flowing measure,
Or deceitfulness of pleasure,
There must be an undersound,
And a sadness more profound.

Deeper the foundation lieth
Than the worldly heart that sigheth;
In a soul that inly crieth,
Hopeful from a deep despair,
Is the life that is a prayer.

178

II. ELEGIAC FRAGMENT.

“Nought hath on earth abiding stay,
For mortal men like leaves decay;
So said the Chian bard of yore,
All hear, but few in heart will store.
For e'en from youth at each man's side,
Hope will with pleasing tale abide.
While lovely flowers of youth remain
Many designs man hath in vain;
Ne'er thinks he shall grow old and die;
Nor when in health he sick shall lie.
O fools, thus minded still are ye,
Nor know how short man's time must be?
Take this to heart, and to life's end
Of thine own soul be thou the friend.”

179

III. ON THE LIFE OF MAN.

“Deep-thundering Jove each end fulfils,
Disposing all things as he wills;
'Tis not man's wisdom ought to sway,
He lives the being of a day,
God brings fulfilment as He may.
On beauties still feeds Hope divine,
And stirs the impossible design.
While some await a coming day,
Others a year that's far away.
No one but thinks to live a year,
Enjoying wealth and blessings dear.
Old-age unenvied thus on some
Steals, ere the final close is come.
On some Diseases bring their ends,
While others war to Hades sends.
Some on the Ocean tempest-tost
'Mid angry floods their lives have lost.
While others by self-slaughter fall,
And die a death most sad of all.
Thus ills unnumber'd men surround,
And woes on every side abound.
Thyself then fret not, nor complain,
Nor grieve as one in love with pain.”

180

IV. MUTABILITY.

“Say not what yet may happen, being man;
Nor what may be another's mortal span:
For rapid is the change which on us lies,
E'en as the insect spreads its wing and dies.”

ANOTHER TRANSLATION OF THE SAME.

“Say not, mortal, what shall be,
Nor of one whom thou may'st see
When his lot to die:
For the change of human things
Is more swift than glancing wings
Of the summer fly.”

181

V. DANAE AND HER CHILD.

“Loud o'er the chest the night-winds roar'd,
The waves around tempestuous pour'd,
A mother's heart then quail'd with fear,
And on her cheek there was a tear;
O'er little Perseus, as he slept,
She laid her loving arm, and wept;—
‘What do I suffer, O my child,
While thou upon a night so wild,
With baby heart thus breathing deep,
Art in thy joyless house asleep,—
This brass-bound chest, 'mid Ocean gloom
Which nothing but the stars illume.

Thou markest not the wave that rocks
Above thy deep and flowing locks,
Nor wind's harsh voice; so calm doth glow,
In purple wrapt, thy beauteous brow.
If thou with me couldst feel and fear,
Then wouldst thou lend thy little ear.
Sleep on, my infant, smiling fair,
Sleep Ocean, and sleep thou, my care!

O Father Jove, there yet may be
From thee some change for mine and me,
But if a word too bold I speak,
Forgive, I pray, for my child's sake.’”

182

ANACREON.

TO THE GRASSHOPPER.

“Grasshopper, that springest
On the high tree-tops,
Like a king thou singest,
Drinking dewy drops.

“Hail to thee, blithe being,
Thine are all the fields,
All thou thence art seeing,
All the woodland yields.

“Thou the ploughman cheerest
Harmless round his feet;
Welcome guest appearest,
Summer's prophet sweet.

“Loved of all the Muses,
And Apollo's choice,
Who in thee infuses
A melodious voice.

“Free from age and sorrow,
Full of song and mirth,
Careless of the morrow,
Like the Gods on earth.”

183

ON THE SAME.

Happy for thy spirit,
Bard of love and wine,
Could it but inherit
Such a life divine.

That glad insect creature,
Singing on the tree,
True to its own nature
Carols joyously.

As we die to-morrow
Let us eat and drink,
Cast away all sorrow
Even to the brink!

Yes, hadst thou not given,
In thine heart to dwell,
Something form'd for Heaven,
Something fit for Hell.

Thou hast not, blithe singer,
Aught that is within,
Which uplifts the finger,
And reproves of sin.

184

As like thee we perish
So might sing and shine,
Did we only cherish
Innocence like thine.

185

PINDAR.

I.

The feat—the champion—and the prize—
And arts of glorious enterprize—
The glittering steed—the golden car—
The victor's coming, like a star,
When one is in the ethereal tent,
Or one o'er all pre-eminent.
The hopes of years, and every sense
Bent on one moment of suspense,
And every year of after-life
Hung on the turn of one great strife;
Then circled by ten thousand eyes
One thrilling point of glad surprise:
'Mid every tribe of Grecian tongue
Assembled in one massive throng.
Then the triumphant festival,
And heard amid the echoing hall,
While heroes old seem'd listening nigh,
The solemn hymn of victory.

His City bids her bulwark-wall
Before his coming prostrate fall,
The City needs a wall no more
Which owns the Olympian conqueror.

186

The Isles re-echoed to their mirth,
While on his own domestic hearth
The centre of his glory burn'd.
Thence he in all himself discern'd,
While every thing that met his eye
Mirror'd to him that victory.
Years by him crown'd with flowery feet
His course advancing came to meet,
That he forgat he had to die,
Wreathed with such immortality;
When all the world rung loud his worth
He seem'd a God upon the earth.

What was it in those Grecian games
Which like a fount of living flames
Kindled the Theban poet's breast,
And all his labouring soul impress'd,
Till every pulse of rapture high
Beat in full glow of minstrelsy?

Deeply within our nature lies
The source of awe and mysteries,—
The knowledge which, like thoughts in sleep,
Unconsciously our souls will steep;
That this our life and mortal stir
Itself is but a theatre;—
A little point in endless space,—
A strife—a battle—and a race;
And therefore such epitome
Of things beyond our sense which lie,

187

Touches with power the secret soul,
Intensely wraps our being whole;
Which thus as darkly in a glass
Beholds itself in shadow pass.
Hence was it that the Olympic hill
With all its sympathetic thrill,
Through heart and head like lightning flew,
For causes deeper than he knew,
And bathed with fire so through and through.

For thus in our own later day
When Spenser caught the kindling ray,
Till all the minstrel buried lies
In feats of by-gone chivalries,
We see what Heaven-ward Instinct meant
In battle—prize—and tournament:
For he 'neath knightly feats in-wrought
Sublimities of moral thought;
With the romance that fill'd his sail,
The knights and ladies of his tale—
With images that please the eye,
Blended the great reality—
The battle-scene of mortal life,
Which is with unseen beings rife;
Each virtue in its tangled course
Winning its way by thought or force;—
Making the philosophic page
Descriptive of man's pilgrimage,

188

Beneath the woof of chivalry
Weaving the wisdom from on high.

Yea, doubtless, though he knew not why,
Such was the secret mystery
That made the Theban's soul all fire,
With sparks that kindle from his lyre,
Upon the strife his soul and eye
Bent in deep-stirring sympathy.

His thoughts like bubbles children blow
Catch thousand colours as they go,
Though in themselves but mist and air,
As mere poetic fancies are,
In Christian suns they rise and shine,
And gain a radiance more Divine—
Lustres serene, aerial dews,
Fair floating robes of rainbow hues,
Moulded to Christian faith unrol
Thoughts worthy of the immortal soul.

189

II. THE BIRTH OF HERCULES.

[_]

Nem. Od. i. lin. 57.

1

“The Babe now swathed in saffron sheen
Scaped not the golden-thronèd Queen;
In jealous wrath unquenchable
Instant she sent two serpents fell.
Then through the portals opening wide
To the broad chamber's haunt they hied,
Eager to slime their ravenous maw
Over the babe;—the infant saw,
Lifting his eager head upright,
And first essayed the coming fight.

2

“Then with both hands in iron grasp
Both their huge necks he firm did clasp,
And held them struggling fast, until
Their monstrous limbs in death were still.
Then what amazement did astound
The matrons that were gather'd round
Alcmena's bed! and them among,
Lo, she herself that instant sprung
Upon her feet, all disarray,
Those portentous beasts to fray.

190

3

“Then in brazen panoply
Rush'd the Theban chiefs to see;
And, heart-pierced, the warrior Lord,
Brandishing his naked sword,
Came the sire Amphitryon.
Home-felt grief holds every one,
But the cheek is sooner dry
In another's sympathy.”

THE CONTRAST.

Such were the heathen auguries,
Portending feats of high emprize,
Which in his royal cradle gave
A hero-god who came to save;
Shadows that wait the infant born,
Beneath the eye-lids of the Morn,
And in his chamber come to dwell.
Such is the picture—mark it well—
When man would pourtray power of Heaven.
Now look on this which God hath given:—
No cradle in a kingly hall,
A star without, within a stall,
And where three strangers prostrate fall,
The little hands as if to bless
Uplifted in meek lowliness.

191

Or look again,—beneath the night
A helpless pair in hurried flight—
Where nought but stars on either hand
Keep watch o'er the Arabian strand.

Look on each picture, note it well,
And more of wisdom shall it tell
Than kindled heathen poet's theme,
Or walk'd the groves of Academe.

192

III. TRIAL AND REWARD.

[_]

Olym., Od. ii. lin. 101.

“Wealth is like a radiant star,
He who hath it shines afar;
But well he knows what is to be,
That lawless spirits when they die
Must suffer penalty.
That sins in this the realm of Jove
One below doth judge and prove,
And o'er them sentence pass with stern necessity.
“But with sun whose wondrous light
Burns alike by day and night,
Freed from toil the good shall live,
Nor vex the watery wave nor land
With importuning hand,
In life which true peace cannot give;
But 'mid the honour'd of the Gods above,
By them who faithful oaths shall love,
A tearless age is won;
While bad men woes sustain no eye can look upon.
“But the threefold way along,
They who keep their heart from wrong,

193

To old Saturn's tower of strength,
To where the Ocean gales abound
The blessed Isles around,
Their course assign'd fulfil at length.
Where on the ground, or on the glittering trees,
Or on the waters in the breeze
Bright golden flowers are borne,
Whose wreaths upon their brows and on their hands are worn.”

REFLECTION ON THE ABOVE.

So deep within our soul there lies
The shadow of lost Paradise,
Where darkness enters not, nor toil,
Nor tears, nor sorrow,—nought to soil
The mirror which reflects the eye
Of omnipresent deity:—
And in that undisturb'd repose
That none can enter but the good;
So yearns the heart that nothing knows
But her intensest solitude:
So deeply on the soul doth press
The sense of its own lowliness:
Philosophy's most noble thought,
Best image of the poet wrought.

In every heart beneath the skies
That glorious wreck of Eden lies;

194

As 'neath the sea some palace seen
Looks beauteous through the blue serene,
Though now the haunt of things unclean.

And blessed they who labour still
To keep that mirror pure from ill.
We blend that vision with our sin,
And then the serpent enters in;
It is an Eden then no more,
But we again the loss deplore.

195

IV. BEGINNING WELL.

“Ναυσιφορητοις
Δ' ανδρασι πρωτα χαρις
Ες πλοον, αρχομενοις πομ-
παιον ελθειν ουρον: εοικοτα γαρ
Καν τελευτα φερτερου νο-
στου τυχειν.
Pyth. Od. i. 64.

'Tis said the pearl is form'd of dew
And sky's ethereal hue,
Conceiv'd within the opening shell,
When the bright lightning fell.
If in dim noon or fading even
'Neath the obscurer heaven;
That pearl a dusky shade retains,
Which in its hue remains.
But if beneath the lucid morn
The goodly pearl is born,
Clear with the sky's pure virgin white,
The centre of fair light,
Meet for a kingly diadem
Is that transcendent gem.
Such is the child whose early love
Is planted from above,

196

Who stores the Heaven-descended ray
In life's first opening day.
Such of his treasures in the skies
The Merchant most doth prize.

197

V. THE FOUNDLING ON EARTH.

[_]

Olymp. Od. vi. 66.

“A silver pitcher laid aloof,
And a zone of purple woof,
'Neath a darkling hawthorn shade
The child of god-like soul was laid;—
inent=1Sent by the God of golden hair
Soft-counselling Eleutho there,
And the sister Fates stood near.

“Iamus thus saw light of birth,
Deserted left on lap of earth,
When by the counsels of the skies
Two dragons came with azure eyes,
And nurtur'd him beneath the trees
With the honey of the bees.
From rocky Pytho then with speed
Came the king on panting steed,
Of the household to enquire
For the child Evadne bore,
Destin'd amid those of yore
To rise a glorious bard, for Phœbus was his sire.

“Five days born he now had been,
Yet they ne'er had heard nor seen:
He within the pathless glade
'Mid the bulrushes was laid,

198

O'er his body, pearly-wet,
Many a glistening violet,
Hanging with the morning dews
In multiplicity of hues.
Therefore his mother gave his name
From violets for endless fame.”

THE FOUNDLING IN HEAVEN.
[_]

On the above.

From man's cradle for his tomb
May we thus a garland borrow,
With its hues of vernal bloom
In these regions of our sorrow,
Lightening up the morning gloom
In that world of the great morrow?

In that morn of Paradise
When the infant soul reposes,
Shrouded 'neath the glittering eyes
Of the violets and roses,
Angel-tended in surprise
Which eternity discloses.

In the shadow of the tomb
When our Mother Earth is leaving,
Shall not angel wings illume
With new lights our fears relieving,
O'er our slumbers in that gloom
Flowery canopies o'er-weaving?

199

In the silence of that morn
Hid from foes, of friends forsaken,
When the infant 'neath the thorn
To its destinies shall waken,
Terrors of the newly born
With divinest love o'ertaken.

When the soul all infant-wise
In that slumberous land rejoices,
And like birds in morning skies
Hears around angelic voices,
Brighter dreams in her arise
Conscious of celestial choices.

He Who watches infants sweet,
All their wants afar descrying,
Shall He not the soul then meet
In that sleep on Him relying,
While with honey at its feet
Serpents, harmless now, are lying?

Gently rest then, child of morning,
'Neath the mystic violets sleeping—
Crystal drops their heads adorning;
Or are these thy mother's weeping?
In that other wondrous dawning
Angels o'er thee watch are keeping.

200

VI. ASPIRATIONS OF EARTH.

[_]

Olym. Od. vi. the same continued.

“Now when o'er him in its bloom
Golden-wreathèd Youth had come,
By 'mid Alpheus stream descending
He called on his great ancestor,
Neptune of far-spreading power;
And his sire, his bow for ever bending,
The watcher God,
Who makes divine-built Delos his abode;
'Neath the night in open skies.
When lo, responding at his side
The paternal Voice replied—
While he the speaker sought to find;
‘My son, arise,
Seek we where assembled Elis lies;—
Follow thou my Voice behind.’”

ASPIRATIONS OF HEAVEN.
[_]

On the above.

Such a Voice the poet hears
Haply in his own heart sounding,
While it seems to meet his ears
With ethereal speech surrounding,

201

In the dark, where nought appears,
Witnesses unseen abounding.

Like the rainbow in the skies
Drinking with majestic potion;
Cradled in the immensities
Of the sun and of the ocean;
Such a spirit in them lies,
Light and life and space and motion.

'Neath the night's ambrosial halls,
'Neath the sky-encircled hollow,
Thus around the poet calls
Sea and Light—Neptune, Apollo:
And a Voice his heart appals,
‘Rise, my son, my guidance follow.’

Ere it with the many blend
Thus must man's immortal spirit
Through the universe ascend,
Nobler blessings to inherit,
Passing onward to its end,
Nobler destinies to merit.

202

SOPHOCLES.

I. GRECIAN TRAGEDY.

The mighty Witness through all time
At varied interval and clime
His utterance shapes in varied mode,
Nor quits with man His sure abode.
By Patriarchs and by Prophets old,
And shepherds of His own true fold,
In full distinctness is He heard,
Before—around the Living Word.
So 'mid the nations, though less clear
Yet unto those that lend an ear,
His voice mysterious deigns to dwell,
And moulds the awful parable.

By Bards in field, or street, or hall,
Solemn, sublime, and musical,
Orpheus, and Linus, Ascra's sage,
And Homer on blind pilgrimage;—
They pass along from age to age,

203

Teachers of God, like streams that bless
The dried and sultry wilderness,
Where all things else would droop and die
Beneath the anger of the sky.

When rocks of Helicon were mute,
Then, sweeter than Apollo's lute,
Unto Philosophy was given
To speak deep things of God and Heaven.

Then entering pass'd the Tragic Queen,
With graceful and majestic mien
Attended by the virgin choir,
On the Athenian theatre.
Her chasten'd and melodious note
She gave upon the gale to float,
In Attic phrase and Classic line
Veiling the moral thought divine,
Such as the Grecian ear might win
And cleanse the avenues of sin.
The better wisdom of the skies
To point in life's realities.

Ah, would such Attic Muse again
From looser thought and words that stain
Would rise the Christian stage to sweep—
At which the blessed Angels weep!

204

II. THE TRAGIC CHORUS AND THE MORAL LAW.

[_]

Œd. Tyr, lin. 863—996.

“May Providence with me concur
Sustaining reverend purity
Of words and actions all,
For which are stedfast Laws that walk the sky,
Laws born and rear'd in the ethereal heaven,
Of which Olympus is alone the sire;
To which no race of mortal man gave birth,
Nor ever shall oblivion lay asleep;
Mighty in these things is the God,
Nor ever groweth old.

“Tis Pride gives birth to tyranny,
Pride puff'd and pamper'd with vain things,
Untimely and unmeet:
And bearing up to height precipitous,
Then hurls all headlong down into the strait
Where extricating foot can nought avail.
A noble struggle for the city's cause
I pray the God may never-more forego:
To God as my defender true
Ne'er will I cease to cling.

205

“If there be one in hand or word
Who goeth haughtily,
Not fearing Justice, nor
Revering seats divine,
May evil fate him seize
For the requital of his ill-starr'd pride;
If what he gains, he gain not righteously,
Nor holdeth back the sacrilegious hand
From things that are not meet for mortal touch.
What man in courses such as these
Shall ward the shafts of conscience from his soul?
If things like these are honour'd among men
What need for me the sacred choir to lead?

206

III. SIGHT OF ATHENS.

[_]

Œd. Col., line 668.

Stroph.—

“Stranger of this equestrian land,
On noblest seats of earth dost thou stand,
Colonus, marble-white;
Where most oft the nightingale
Warbles most musical
In verdant glade
Out of sight;—
In the wine-faced Ivy shade,
And hallowed grove with fruits of thousand kind,
Where no foot hath descended,
Where sun and wind no entrance find,
Haunts ever trod by Bacchanalian god,
By train of nymphs divine his way attended.

Antist.—

“'Neath heavenly dews is blooming there
Narcissus day by day with clusters fair,
The chaplet worn of old
By the mighty goddesses;
And in silken tresses
Crocus shining bright
With its gold.
Sleepless-flowing day and night
Cease not the founts that in Cephisus pour,

207

Through all the day still wending
With fertile shower the meadows o'er;
Nor tuneful Nine this favour'd land decline;
Nor Venus to her golden harness bending.

Stroph.—

“Here too is a plant which never
Groweth such on Asia's land, I hear,
Nor on Pelops' Dorian Isle doth appear
Blooming ever;—
Self-sown plant no hand may touch,
Terror of the hostile spear,
The child-sustaining Olive, ever green,
Here of all place most fertile seen;
And no one, be he old or young, on such
The mark of a destroying hand hath laid.
On it the Eye that never sleeps
Of Morian Jove its vigil keeps,
And Athena, blue-eyed maid.

Antist.—

“Other theme I have of praises,
Mighty gift of mighty Deity,
Which this maternal city of the free
Ever raises,
For her ships as for her steeds
Famed by land and famed by sea.
O Son of Saturn, thou, Neptunian King,
Dost unto her this glory bring:

208

The steed-reproving charm from thee proceeds,
The bridle first beheld in this our street;
And from thy port the bark with wings
Companion of the Nereids springs,
With her countless, oary feet.”

SIGHT OF OXFORD.
[_]

On the above.

What inspirations hail the view
Of Athens' sacred seat,
And all the poet's soul renew
His own loved haunts to greet!

The nightingale—the ivy green—
The hallow'd shade most dread,
The awful presence of the Unseen
Stills thought and voice and tread.

Minerva there her watch doth keep
On her green olive bower,
The Eye of God which cannot sleep,
The nation's secret power.

But all these words my bosom move
With thoughts more holy still,
Of Oxford seen from neighb'ring grove,
And woodland verdant hill.

209

The nightingale most frequent there
Sings in her covert glades,
While calm religion's gloom severe
Watches the holy shades.

Thus chasten'd awe with gentle love
Are in those haunts combined,
All looser fancies to reprove,
And still the vagrant mind.

The memories of that peaceful place
Fill up our after life,
The prayers and quiet ways of grace,
And yet more holy strife.

The solitudes of summer even,
And thoughts in stillness found,
Like walks with Angel-guests from Heaven,
Which haunt that sacred ground.

May all the lighter joys of youth
Be still'd in that repose,
And the more solemn shade of truth
Subdue its keener woes!

210

The air itself is full of sound
From bells and sacred calls,
And ancient Faith hath cast around
Its shadow on her walls.

What poets spake of haunted grove
Here dwells in bowers and shrines,—
Severity with awful love
Which better hope divines.

There should be here no room for vice,
Nor the luxurious board,
Nor cares of filthy avarice,
And secret-gathering hoard.

Here should be heard no plaint or call
For this world's liberty,
But fear of God be All in All,
Which only maketh free.

Our Church's life here hath its birth,
Her very heart that beats,
The pulse is felt throughout the earth
Which stirs in her retreats.

211

May God, I pray, that holy place
For our own children keep,
When we ourselves behold His face,
And 'neath His shadow sleep.

212

EURIPIDES.

I. ALCESTIS RETURNING FROM THE GRAVE.

“How strange are things divinely wrought!
The Gods have means beyond our thought;
Expected ills they turn aside,
Beyond all hope a way provide.”
Termination of the Alcestis.

As often in the visions of our sleep
Semblances blend of life's realities,
And images of truth therein are found,
Confus'd and intertwin'd with dreamy thoughts
And empty shadows; and oft-times therein
Spirits of good and ill contending seem
More vividly than in our waking life;
That meditative wisdom oft may find
Broken reflections and stray shapes of truth
Set forth at random beneath fancy's garb.

And oft we listen when the dream is o'er,
As one who some sweet music would recall,

213

Labouring the scattered fragments to retain,
If it might give forth aught of prophecy;
For while it blended with the things of sense
It seem'd to hold a commerce with the Unseen,
And Nature spake therein more than she knew,
While Faith is her divine interpreter.

Thus in poetic legends of old time
All strangely intermingling may be seen
Dreamlike similitudes of truth divine;
Wherein man, waken'd in the Christian morn,
May 'neath the tangled web of true and false
Unravelling find broken celestial forms,
Though interrupted oft and lost in clouds,
Yet phantoms and resemblances indeed,
Vision-like and unreal, and yet true,
As shadows in a mirror, though themselves
But airy nothing and an empty shade.

Before our eyes in this our living world
Hath Christ set forth on earth the scatter'd signs
Of Resurrection, when His Voice and Hand
Brought from the silent regions of the dead
Those who this life had left,—the youthful child
Of Jairus, coldly laid on bed of death,—
Or from his bier before the Nain gate
The widow's son, who heard His voice and lived;—
Or Lazarus from the darkness of the grave.
Such preludes of the Resurrection's power

214

Stand forth as pillars of the Truth of God
Till the last Resurrection of the Just.
Compared with these realities divine
Those mythic fables old and Paynim tales
Are but as mirrors seen upon the clouds,
Aerial phantoms of a coming form;
Or shadowy dreams compared with things of life.

Yet sweet is Resurrection's power pourtrayed
In that fair story of Admetus' bride,
Brought by Alcides in the veil of death
From the dark regions of the place of souls;—
Alcides—that mysterious hero-god,
Himself encountering and o'ercoming death;
And who that dreaded serpent slew of old.

Mantled she stands, and waiting the third day
When after her lustrations she may speak;
Fair as the veilèd form of coming Spring,
At whose approach Nature breaks forth in song
And gratulation, with instinctive joy
Unconsciously divining deep within
Of something better than a fading spring,—
A new Creation which shall not see death.

Alcestis, noblest woman, worthy found
In dying resurrection to attain,
Who for another dared herself to die;—
Admetus too, that good Thessalian king,
Albeit not unmeet for such a boon;

215

Who even now his deeply-rankling grief
Had cover'd with a show of courtesy
To entertain a stranger, and thereby
Had unawares receiv'd a saving God.

And I would in my heart engrave his words,
In this unlook'd-for blessing from the grave,
Beyond all thought to life and light restor'd.—

Adm.—

“Now we will set in order and remould
“Our lives, far better than they yet have been,
“For great I own is this my happiness .”

Alcest. lin. 1176.

216

II. THE GARLAND OF HIPPOLYTUS.

[_]

Hip., lin. 72—86

Thou Maid of maids, Diana, the goddess whom he fears,
Unto thee Hippolytus this flowery chaplet bears;—
“From meadows where no shepherd his flock a-field e'er drove,
From where no woodman's hatchet hath woke the echoing grove,
Where o'er the unshorn meadow the wild bee passes free,
Where by her river-haunts dwells virgin Modesty;
Where he who knoweth nothing the wisdom of the schools
Beareth in a virgin heart the fairest of all rules;
To him 'tis given all freely to cull those self-sown flowers,
But evil men must touch not pure Nature's sacred bowers.
This to his virgin mistress a virgin hand doth bear,
A wreath of unsoil'd flowers to deck her golden hair;
For such alone of mortals can unto her draw nigh,
And with that guardian Goddess hold solemn converse high.

217

He ever hears the voice of his own virgin Queen,
He hears what others hear not, and sees her though unseen;
He holds his virgin purpose in freedom unbeguiled,
To age and death advancing in innocence a child.”

Chaste Hippolytus thus spake upon the Attic stage,
And worthy were the story of Christian pilgrimage,
Though hated by the many the tale is half divine,
And his death not all unmeet 'mong martyrdoms to shine.
'Mid Nature's hid recesses, 'mid unshorn meads and woods,
Where broods an unseen Presence o'er sacred solitudes;
Where stars are wildly silent in watches of the night,
And the virgin moon comes forth all like a vestal white;
When awful hangs the stillness upon the earth and sky,
Man's spirit longs to mingle with purer things on high.

218

When wean'd from earthly longings it hears the voice of God,
Who in that solemn evening in Eden's garden trod.
It is an awful converse, it is a holy time,
When the soul awakes to wisdom majestic and sublime,
Like an effluence divine that rests on virgin youth,
Ere tainted breath hath passed on the mirror of its truth.

And well the tragic bard hath blended that high tale
With the Venus and her loves and Phædra waxing pale,
Incestuous passion mad upon her like a spell,
The scorpion that awakens with foretaste of its hell;
Things noblest thus shine forth by contrast base and vile,
The star for clouds seems fairer in its cærulean Isle.
Is this that gentle love-god of which the poets speak,
Which sheds light upon the eyes and bloom upon the cheek?
Is this that love of woman that like the evening star
Fills up the skies around us with tender thoughts from far?

219

Or is that fabled Venus upon her car of gold
But form'd of painted splendours which earth-born mists enfold?
What seems so fair to glisten is but a thundercloud,
And leaves a tale of vengeance that speaketh clear and loud.

What wish could parent cherish for most beloved child,
But to walk before his God a virgin undefiled?
While others train their children to graceful arts and dress,
And all the worldly ways that wait on loveliness;
That they in nuptial brightness might walk like ladies fair,
And in their hands bear garlands, and garlands in their hair,
To wed with wealth and station, and walk in high degree,
With Christ's own virgin poor lest they should number'd be;
Their first thoughts thus to marry or be in marriage given,
Their second for God's Church and for the things of Heaven.

220

Far other thoughts and training, my dearest child, be thine,
Rear'd in that low simplicity which nurtures faith divine;
A virgin through thy life, angel-like spirit blest,
The more to love thy Saviour and on His love to rest.

Not as the untaught Heathen the tragic buskin bore,
Conversing with the Goddess in woodland, grove, or shore:
But with those saintly spirits that wean'd their hopes from earth
That they might have in Heaven a yet more glorious birth:
With Daniel, man of loves, who saw beyond the tomb;
And John in trance beholding the Judgment yet to come;
And with good Ken, the Witness of this our later day,
From whom his Church hath learned her morn and evening lay.
There's found in life no sweetness like the awakening soul
Which to God's love in childhood devotes the being whole.

221

The bloom it has upon it is of eternal youth,
Though with the thorns encompass'd which shelter heavenly truth.
The spring it hath no fragrance which doth such freshness bear,
No sight or sound hath nature which can with it compare.
When Satan and the world our course aside have driven,
To that bright spot turns Memory as to a gleam of Heaven.

οισθ' ουν βροτοισιν ος καθεστηκεν νομος,
μισειν το σεμνον, και το μη πασιν φιλον.

lin. 92.

222

BION.

THE EVENING STAR.

[_]

Idyll. vii. imitated.

“Thou star of Eve with golden light,
The sacred gem of dark-blue night,
Fairest of all the stars that shine,
And only than the moon less bright,
Hail, friendly star of Love divine!

“To me more friendly than the moon,—
She new to-day hath set too soon;—
For no ill deed I speed along,
Thou art thyself love's benison,
And sing'st with me love's vesper song.”

223

MOSCHUS.

[“When the calm wind upon the dark-blue sea]

[_]

Idyll. v. translated.

“When the calm wind upon the dark-blue sea
“Softly reclines, kissing it tremblingly,
“It lures my timid mind to quit the shore,
“And all the varied landscapes please no more.
“But when the deeps white-foaming heave profound,
“Crest the curved billow, and the waves resound;
“Then from the sea I fly to haunts I love;
“The land is welcome and the shady grove;
“Where gently comes the ruffle on the trees,
“And the tall pine is singing to the breeze.

“How hard the Fisher's life who night and day
“Toils on the seas for an uncertain prey,
“His home with winds and waves upon the deep,
“While'neath the broad-leaved plane I sweetly sleep,
“Or listen to the rill that murmurs near,
“Which soothes without alarm the vacant ear.”

THE CONTRAST.

Not so the Christian—he must fear and flee
The pleasant scene and calm tranquillity

224

On sea or shore, the inner soul to brace
With sorrow, and look hardship in the face.
Such halcyon days, and calms Elysian
Before the time, the Heaven-ward soul unman.
She dreads false pleasures and alike hath striven
With shine or storm as they to her are given.
His is the patient Fisherman's hard life
With wind and wave and seasons all at strife.
And when his bark is on the nightly sea
Cover'd with waves and all in jeopardy,
The Tempest will disclose his Saviour's Form,
Walking upon the waves amid the storm;
Then He will enter and appease the roar,
And bring them near unto the stable shore.

225

CALLIMACHUS.

I. FROM THE HYMN TO APOLLO.

“Lo, how the laurel of Apollo shakes!
How the whole temple to its centre quakes!
Far, far aloof, thou sinner! 'tis the God,
With beauteous foot who on his threshold trod.
See how the Delian palm nods suddenly,
And sweet the swan is singing in the sky.
Open yourselves, ye portals! wide expand,
Ye glittering bars, it is the God at hand!
Ye youths, attune your songs, the dance enfold,
None, but the good, Apollo can behold.
On him that sees thee not a curse doth rest,
Great he that sees thee; O be manifest
To us, far-darting God, and we are blest.”

ON THE SAME.

Was it from Siloa's stream and hallowed well,
Or Grecian Scriptures in Egyptian cell,
That, bard of Alexandria, thou hast caught
The fragmentary records of high thought—

226

From Prophet and from Psalmist,—that each word
More in the heart than on the ear is heard;
And tones of Inspiration there enshrined
Speak higher things than were within thy mind?

When on His threshold treads the Christian's Lord,
The Sun of life and light, the eternal Word,
Shall be invisibly, where'er it stands,
The shaking of His Temple through all lands.
His coming on Mount Sinai shook the earth,
In premonition of that second birth,
Which by its coming shakes the earth and Heaven,
With all the universe asunder riven.
Then shall there be your lifting up on high,
Ye everlasting portals of the sky;
And all spontaneous from its burning shores
The rolling back of the eternal doors.

Of that His presence in majestic power,
For which Creation waits the destined hour,
Gentile and Jew some shadowy gleams discern'd,
Faces of all were to its coming turn'd;
To good and ill shall it be manifest,—
Seen of all eyes, by every tongue confess'd.

There is another Coming, silence-shod,
Wherein none but the holy see their God;
Who lowly stooping down to meet our needs
The threshold of His shrine in meekness treads.
In His humiliations thus brought near
To none but to His own doth He appear.

227

II. EPITAPH.

“His sacred sleep Acanthian Saon lies
“Here slumbering; say not that the good man dies.”

ON THE SAME.

Like golden hues, when tempests flee,
Which may an evening sky illume;
Like moon-beams on a stormy sea;
Or lamp that burns within a tomb;—

Such was this truth at random thrown
Which shed its light upon a grave;
Yet 'twas enough if rightly known
To cheer in life, in death to save.

229

LATIN WRITERS.

[_]

“NAM QUID ALIUD FECERUNT MULTI BONI FIDELES NOSTRI? NONNE ASPICIMUS QUANTO AURO ET ARGENTO ET VESTE SUFFARCINATUS EXIERIT DE ÆGYPTO CYPRIANUS, DOCTOR SUAVISSIMUS ET MARTYR BEATISSIMUS? QUANTO LACTANTIUS? QUANTO VICTORINUS, OPTATUS, HILARIUS, UT DE VIVIS TACEAM? QUANTO INNUMERABILES GRÆCI? QUOD PRIOR IPSE FIDELISSIMUS DEI FAMULUS MOYSES FECERAT, DE QUO SCRIPTUM EST QUOD ERUDITUS FUERIT OMNI SAPIENTIA ÆGYPTIORUM.” S. Aug. De doc. Chr., 1. ii. 61.

231

LUCRETIUS.

I.

Stretching unfathomably at boundless thought
Intensest visions were before him brought,
Unreal shadows; yet his spirit stern
Did still unconscious for that Presence yearn,
Which clothes Itself with circum-ambient day,
Swifter than solar beams or lightning ray.
Grasping infinity, he nothing found,
Then shrunk from vacuum that yawn'd around;
Spread like the blind his hands, therein to clasp
Annihilation in his feeble grasp;
As if some fiend that mock'd him in its place
Left but a shadow in his void embrace.
And thus he fail'd that mystery to scan
The greatness and the littleness of man.

Before him Nature's volume was unroll'd
Sublime, unmeasured, strange, and manifold,
Expatiating there with eager view;
The Ocean, and the vast resplendent Blue,
The Elements, the Sun, the Moon, the Stars
Were but the breathing mighty characters

232

Whereby he read vast Nature, to his soul
Presenting visions of th' unbounded Whole.
With awful horror blends delight divine,
Where bodies traverse depth and height, and shine
Wandering like sheep amid the infinite,
And feed on fields of the ethereal light .

The sounds his burning fancy did rehearse
Were but the songs of the vast Universe,
We hear—and listen to the impassion'd theme,
And catch strange truths in his bewilder'd dream.

Flammea per cœlum pascentes corpora passim.”

Lib. v. 525

233

II. VANITY OF HUMAN LIFE.

Φωναντα συνετοισιν.

[_]

B iii. 907-931.

“Thy joyful home shall welcome thee no more,
“Nor wife, nor children sweet as heretofore
“Snatch the fond kiss, and to thy bosom press'd
“With an unutter'd sweetness fill thy breast.
“To aid thyself and thine no more thy power!
“‘Poor man!’ they say, ‘poor man! one evil hour
“Hath all life's blessings swept from thee away.’
“But thus bewailing they omit to say
“That no desires of these with thee remain;
“Which could their hearts perceive, their words attain,
“From anguish and despair would set them free.
“Thou in thy death for all eternity
“From human griefs and sickness art relieved.
“We by thy dismal tomb, of thee bereaved,
“Weep on insatiably, and left forlorn
“For ever think on thee, for ever mourn. . .

“Thus too when men the festive board around,
“Lifting their cups, with flowery chaplets crown'd,

234

“Say from the heart, ‘Short these enjoyments last
“To feeble man; 'tis soon among the past,
“And then for ever and for ever gone!’
“As if the dead hereafter would bemoan
“Such loss, when all such longings have an end,
“Or thirst for wine would after death attend.”

[_]

Ibid. 1058—1098.

“But wilt thou doubt, and think it hard to die
“Whose life is but a death with wakeful eye?
“The greater part of life in sleep to lie,
“And through the day no less, as one asleep,
“In an unreal dream to laugh and weep:
“Thy mind oppress'd with apprehensions vain,
“Unable oft to find what gives thee pain:
“On all sides, like a drunken man , distress'd,
“In vague uncertainty of thine unrest.

“Thus heavily doth on men's spirits dwell
“A weight of which they seem thus sensible;
“But could they once of this the sources find,
“From whence so great a burden weighs the mind,
“And knew the cause of their own misery,
“They could not spend their lives as now we see,
“Each knowing not, yet seeking still to know
“What he would wish,—fast hurrying to and fro,

235

“As if to throw aside some load of pain,
“To change each place, yet no where to remain

“From a great house one issues forth, o'ercome
“And sated with his home,—then back to home
“As suddenly returns; for he can find
“Abroad nought better than he left behind.
“With headlong haste one to his villa drives,
“As if his walls were burning; there arrives,
“And stands upon the threshold, in disdain
“And hesitation;—should he there remain,
“He sleeps and in oblivion settles down,
“Or starts again and hurries to the town.

“Thus each man from himself attempts to flee,
“But bears within him that same enemy
“From which he would escape, that frets the more,
“Nor doth of his disease the cause explore;
“Which did he well discern he soon would cast
“All other things aside, and to the last
“The nature of man's being strive to know:
“For 'tis not one short hour for weal or woe
“That is at stake,—but all eternity,
“All after death—the life that is to be.”

See Job xii. 25; Ps. cvii. 27.

See Dr. Pusey's Advent Sermons, S. VIII. p. 110.—“Where well-nigh all countenances or motions are full of eagerness, anxiety; all bent on something, seeking, but finding not, because they are seeking all things out of God, all but Himself, except when, here and there, they at last become very emptiness, because they know no more what to seek or find, but have lost themselves.”

236

III. EFFECTS OF SIN IRREMEDIABLE.

[_]

B. iii. 1. 991-1036.

“The things they tell of Acheron profound—
“These are but states we see in life around.
“No wretched Tantalus fears o'er his head
“The o'erhanging stone, trembling with empty dread ;
“But fears of wrath Divine hold man in thrall,
“Lest some impending ill should on him fall.

“There are no birds that feed in Acheron
“On Tityus' breast, nor could they find whereon
“For everlasting ages there to prey,
“Though not on acres nine his huge trunk lay
“But on the whole vast world; nor could he so
“Afford them food for his own endless woe.
“But Tityus is seen among mankind,
“When anxious cares, like vultures of the mind,
“Eat out the vitals, and the heart consume,
“That prostrate lies in love or passion's gloom.

“Sisyphus lives reveal'd before our eyes,
“When the ambitious man for Honour plies
“His heavy wearying task, in deep turmoil,
“Seeking State-power with long-enduring toil,

237

“Then frustrated falls back, and cannot rest.
“This it is up the mountain's adverse breast
“To heave the stone, which from the height again
“Rolls down all hurriedly, and seeks the plain.

“Again;—man's thankless soul to feed and fill
“With good, yet ne'er to satisfy; while still
“The beauteous Seasons, in their annual round,
“Return, with varied fruits and graces crown'd;
“While we throughout unsatisfied remain.
“'Tis this, methinks, the legend will explain
“Of youthful-blooming Maidens, which in vain
“Into the leaky urn the waters pour,
“Yet can in no way fill it evermore.

“Cerberus, Furies, and Tartarean night
“Vomiting horrid steams and void of light,—
“Such things as these there are not, nor can be;—
“But fear in life of some dread penalty
“Atoning dreadful crimes;—the Dungeon-hold,
“Tarpeian rock, Stocks, Tortures manifold,
“Stripes, Executioners, Pitch, Torch, and Lead;
“And e'en if these were wanting, yet the dread
“Of Conscience, with remorseful bodings stern,
“Applies the secret goad and stripes that burn.
“For she in apprehension sees no end
“Of punishments like these, but doth portend
“That they in death grow deeper, and thereon
“Builds the fond tales of fabled Acheron.”

238

The Voice of God spake in the multitude,
The poet heard it not, nor understood;
For man's divining soul foreboded well
Of an Hereafter and of Heaven and Hell:
Though unreveal'd without, yet from within,
In after-fruits of unatoned sin,
Links and beginnings of a chain they saw,
Iron developments and things of awe,
And thence inferred the adamantine law;—
That guilty sufferings, (should no Power forefend,)
Which here begin, pass on, and without end
Or intermission after death attend.
This they perceived, perceiving represent
In subterranean forms of punishment.
The mighty Truth which lay itself behind
Threw forth those legends for the vulgar mind,
Like giant shapes the Magic Lamp pourtrays
On the white wall, where wondering children gaze;
Those lineaments without but manifest
Reasonings that lay within, though unexpress'd;—
Truths which in secret self the spirit learns,
Where Instinct in the soul celestial burns

“Cassa formidine”. .“metus inanis.” “There were they brought in great fear, even where no fear was.” Ps. xiv. 9; liii. 6.

“For even thereafter as a man feareth, so is Thy displeasure.”Ps. xc. 11.

239

IV. BIRTH AND REARING OF MAN.

[_]

B. v. 1. 223.

“Then, like a mariner by cruel waves
“Cast forth, the new-born babe for pity craves,
“Naked and speechless on the cold ground laid,
“Utterly helpless, needing vital aid.
“Upon the shore of being amidst woes,
“Thrust from its mother's womb with struggling throes,
“He fills the place with melancholy cries,
“As one that's born for so great miseries.
“Then cattle, herds, and beasts that range the wild
“No plaything need, nor nurse, whose accents mild
“And broken prattle moulds the lisping tongue;
“But of themselves grow up the woods among.
“Nor need they varied vests for changeful clime,
“Nor arms of moulded form, nor walls sublime
“Their goods to guard; Nature doth all provide,
“Her varied stores have all their wants supplied.”

Such is the external type of man within,
Into a world of sorrow “born in sin,”

240

And from the nakedness and ills of earth
Lifting his cries for a new better birth,
To be “clothed on from Heaven;” for thus forlorn
Better not born at all unless twice born.
Helpless himself, on others he relies
For saving aid, for without aid he dies.
And if on earth the infant's cry of pain
For food and shelter is not rais'd in vain,
Doubtless in Heaven, beyond our mortal sense,
Those speechless cries have their own eloquence;
Telling alike the greatness of his need,
And such sure aids as shall from God proceed.

The cradle left, man's growing wants no less
Not weakness, but a nobler kind express,—
Powers incomplete, sublimer destinies,—
Symbols without, within him mysteries:
Not rear'd as “beasts that perish,” but he still
Needs the formation of a higher Will,
Needs daily new ablutions, growing powers,
Raiment to clothe, and arms, and sheltering towers,
A tongue train'd to new language, ere 'tis given
To have a place amid the ranks of Heaven.

241

V. DREAD OF ANNIHILATION.

[_]

B. iii. 1. 59—81.

“Then Avarice and Ambition, Passions blind,
“Which beyond bounds of Right urge on mankind,
“Associates and ministers of crime,
“To labour nights and days upward to climb.—
“These rankling wounds that tend on mortal breath
“Are but occasion'd by the dread of Death:
“For Shame, Contempt, and Poverty severe
“Apart from sweet and stable life appear,
“Dwelling beside Death's portals. Hence men fear,
“And far, far off to flee them with false dread
“They strive, as from the dwellings of the dead;—
“Inflame sedition, civil wars, and heap
“Wealth upon wealth, slaughter on slaughter, steep
“Their hands in citizens' and kinsmen's blood,
“And find no safety but in solitude.

“'Tis for like cause, the same unconscious dread,
“That Envy pines away and hangs the head,—
“To see another rise before their sight,
“Be gaz'd upon and walk in honour's light,

242

“Themselves in darkness and in dust to lie.
“Others for statues and a name would die:
“Yea, oft so far proceeds this strange dismay,
“To mortal loathing of the light of day,
“Some rather than that misery abide
“From dread of Death by their own hands have died.”

But why this apprehension not to be,
This fear of non-existence, like a sea
Which secretly beneath our nature dwells,
And by some unseen influence heaves and swells;
Oft-times with this tempestuous fury wakes,
And all our being to its centre shakes?
'Tis that God's Breath within us gives to be
Partakers of His own eternity—
For this the unconscious soul toils day and night,
Turns in and out all things of sense and sight,—
For reconciled reunion with its God,—
For this in paths so alien hath it trod,
And through all phases of tumultuous strife
Annihilation flees, and clings to life.
Therefore we thus recoil, and strive to soar
From those sad shapes which sit beside death's door.
Yet but unreal phantoms are they found,
Mists which the vestibule alone surround.

243

For Shame, Contempt, and Poverty severe
With Christ Himself in death's dark shades appear,
And reconciled with them in Him to die
Is to be clothed with His eternity.

244

VI. OCULAR DECEPTIONS.

[_]

B. iv. 388.

“The Ship in which we sail seems at a stand;
“Another seems to pass tho' fix'd to land;
“And hills and plains seem toward the stern to fly,
“While with wing'd sails ourselves are hurrying by.

“The Stars in their ethereal caves above
“Seem motionless, yet doubtless ever move,
“Since they to distant settings, when they rise,
“Haste, with bright bodies measuring out the skies.
“Thus too the Sun and Moon seem fix'd in Heaven,
“While they are on their courses onward driven.

“Mountains amid the sea in distance seen,
“With space for mighty fleets to pass between,
“Appear all one,—one island of firm land
“Together join'd, though far apart they stand.

“Halls seem to turn and columns round to reel
“With boys, when they themselves have ceased to wheel ;

245

“They scarce believe but o'er their heads the hall
“Totters with all its roofs about to fall.

“Her morning beam, trembling with ruddy blaze,
“When Nature o'er the hills begins to raise,
“The Sun upon those hills appears to stand,
“With fervid fires touching them close at hand,
“Scarce twice ten thousand arrow-shots apart
“From us, or scarce five hundred of the dart:—
“Yet 'tween them and the sun huge spaces lie
“Of Ocean, and vast regions of the sky;
“And many thousand climes may intervene
“With varied tribes and forest kinds between.

“Water—a finger's depth—which at our feet
“Stops 'tween the stones within the pavèd street,
“Gives under ground a prospect, vast and deep
“As 'tween the earth and sky the ethereal sweep;
“Clouds down in earth are seen, Heavens as on high,
“And bodies hidden in a wondrous sky.

“In the mid river should our horse stand still,
“We look down on the rapid waters, till
“Borne down athwart on the still horse we seem,
“Labouring confusedly against the stream,
“And, wheresoe'er we look, all we survey,
“Seems flowing down alike, and borne away.

“In porticoes or long arcades that lean
“On pillars of like size, like space between,
“The lengthening vistas seem from end to end
“Contracting, as in distance they extend,

246

“Pavement and roof, right and left sides draw near,
“And darkly in a point at length appear.

“At sea the Sun seems to uplift his fires
“From out the waves, and in the waves retires;
“For nought but sea and sky are seen from thence;
“Nor think this shakes the evidence of sense.

“Shipping in port all maim'd appears to be,
“With rigging broke, and struggling 'gainst the sea;
“Straight seem the oars which o'er the spray appear,
“And straight the helm which rises in the rear;
“While parts that 'neath the fluid glass decline
“Seem chang'd, refracted, upward turn'd supine,
“And floating on the surface of the brine.

“When winds through heaven bear the thin clouds at night,
“The splendid Constellations seem in flight
“To glide against the clouds, and fleet on high
“To other regions of the untravell'd sky.

“If, placed beneath, the hand should press one eye,
“It so may be that objects we descry,
“Themselves unchang'd, are double to behold;
“Fire-flowering candles seem anon twofold;
“All household sights a doubled form retain,
“Men's faces seem twofold, their bodies twain.

“When Sleep the limbs hath in sweet slumber bound,
“And all the body lies in rest profound,

247

“Yet to ourselves awake we seem, aright
“Our limbs to move, in darkness of the night
“The sun itself to view and light of day;—
“Pent in one place abroad we seem to stray,
“Skies, seas, streams, mountains passing on to change,
“And over mighty plains on foot to range;
“In night's stern stillness sounds we hear around,
“And give reply in slumber's silence bound.”

With visible motion her diurnal round!”

Wordsworth, vol. i. 43.

Thus e'en in seeing do our senses fail,
And knowledge on them built is found thus frail,
Although the unconscious mind is present still,
To guide, correct, or frustrate at her will:
Thus God must still be present at our side,
And with His own mysterious language guide,
E'en in this world wherein we walk by sight.
Then how shall feeble man be thought aright
To judge of things which, vast and manifold,
Surround us, and wherein the human mind,
By use distorted and by nature blind,
Puts forth with sightless orbs her hands to reach,—
Till God Himself shall through our spirits teach?

E'en as the sun which nature's face reveals,
While the celestial mansion it conceals;
Thus Sense may things disclose our path around,
But hides the secret Godhead more profound;—

248

Until remov'd from objects of the sense,
Converse we with the hid Magnificence,
And God gives hearing ear and seeing eye.
Then from “the temple” of Philosophy
Are men beheld all wandering forth abroad,
As those that in the dark have lost their road.
That glorious temple in the height serene
Is Christ our Light, in Whom all things are seen,
E'en as they are, and shall be, and have been;
While with our very eyes He doth converse,
And reads to us the speaking universe.

Errare, atque viam palantes quærere vitæ.”

See b. ii. lin. 1 to 16.

249

VII. TRUE PHILOSOPHY.

[_]

B. v. 8, 12; B. iii. 11.

“For if we speak as suits the majesty
“Of so great knowledge, sure a God was he,
“Renown'd Memmius, 'twas a God indeed,
“Whence this life's law call'd Wisdom did proceed.
“From waves and darkness Who this mortal scene
“Hath placed in light so cloudless and serene.”...

“As bees leave nought untouch'd in flower-fraught mead,
“So we on all thy golden words would feed,—
“Thy golden words with life immortal crown'd;
“Since thence hath issued forth their glorious sound,
“The terrors of the mind away have fled,
“The Universe's walls cleave o'er our head,
“Through the whole mighty void in vision clear
“The place of Gods and quiet seats appear.
“Which the winds cannot shake, nor clouds assail,
“Nor snow white-falling, nor the beating hail
“Can violate; but cloudless skies around,
“And light itself diffus'd smiles without bound.
“Where Nature all supplies, nor aught draws near
“To lessen endless peace or cause a fear.

250

“Abodes of Acheron are no where seen,
“Nor Earth to bound their view doth intervene,—
“Depth 'neath their feet extends from boundless height,
“Which the soul views with a divine delight
“And horror, lost at the o'erwhelming sight .”

“They shall fear and tremble for all the goodness and for all the prosperity that I procure unto it.” Jer. xxxiii. 9.

251

VIII. ATHEISM CORRECTED.

[_]

(In imitation of Lucretius.)

If it be so—then this o'er-arching hall,
And Heaven's deep-thundering temples covering all,
On pillars of blue ether, sown with stars,
Where walks the Sun imprison'd in strange bars,—
And Earth, with trees and streams and mountains crown'd,
And girdle of blue waters girding round,—
This scene, o'er which there hangs the clear profound,
Is but a cavern where the soul is pent;
And the blue roofs of this our firmament
Shall tumble in, by ruin dash'd, or fly
Like a white cloud vanish'd from Summer sky.
Then Death is to the soul the dungeon door,
As Eve lets out the sun on twilight's shore.
It follows—this our poor and fretful talk
Of men, and states, and kingdoms, is to walk
With shadows, with the substance at the gate,
And it may be to waken all too late.

For if, from out the star-encircled tent,
To be with us the golden Sun is sent,
To touch with life-giving ethereal touch
The springs of life, it matters surely much

252

Whether we walk in that serener day,
Or turn'd to darkness work our own decay.

Like cause doth like effect in like produce,
In all but man; the Elements let loose
Range o'er the earth, yet bear a hidden rein;
Each doth his given work in given chain,—
Traceable by eye of reason though unseen.
Two roses nurtured 'neath one canopy,
Together rise and bloom, together die;
Two elms coeval in harmonious strife
Throw round their green arms, and drink equal life;
Two streams together haste to Ocean's hall;
Two upward flames together mount or fall .
Not so in man, himself creates the cause
Of his own acts; he moves by self-framed laws,
Self-framed each hour, while on the verge that lies
'Tween good and evil stern Probation tries;
And all he does is seed to something still
Beyond, more strong in grace or prone to ill.
Two mortals by the water side of life
Spring from one root, yet gradual prove they rife
With different natures, this with healing dight
And gladness, that with deadly aconite;
E'en as the Will within her secret shrines
Gathers the heavenly influence or declines;

253

'Tis not our own, it cometh down from high,
And therefore 'tis that Virtue cannot die,
Since not of birth terrestrial, born of light
That comes beyond the ebon house of night.
To choose or shun the path to good or ill,
Severing each moment, this doth form the Will;
Thus they who 'mid the varied things of sense
Trace out the maze of cause and consequence;—
Nor own 'mid mighty waters calm and deep
His footsteps;—on they dream—till in their sleep
Hearing His Voice they hear not, nor detect
In His own house the glorious Architect.

The golden Sun perchance is on the Sea,
Listening to Hymns of Evening's harmony,
So sweet,—Silence herself is audible
With the Creator's praise,—from hill or dell
Sound birds and lowing herds, till o'er the close
Darkness lets fall her mantle of repose,
And Night adoring climbs with silent urn,
To light the lamps that round His temple burn.
Or when the Morn sends forth her harbinger,
Which with her coming doth all nature stir,
And noisy crow on wing, and thrush on bough,
Give signals of the twilight on Night's brow
Appearing, strains prelusive of the choir,
Which soon shall burst from Nature's morning lyre,
Woke by the Sun unto Creation's King;
All to new life arise and stir and sing.

254

Mean while the Sage, in Wisdom's tower sublime,
Sees the small atom from his unseen clime,
Posting before the Sunbeam—as most fit
Marshal his troops, or in sage council sit,
Life to create and order, into light
Come from beyond the regions of the sight,
And hurry on his mantle, red, blue, green ,
T' invest creation, paint and deck the scene.

As if the Echo to its green retreats
He had pursued, unfolding its wild seats,
Till he, 'mid rocks grotesque, and tangled wood,
Forgot the Voice itself from which it flow'd.
As if the glorious thought and golden strain,
So wondrous bound in the melodious chain
Of some great Pindar, were but sounds that broke
Responsive, by some gale Eolian woke,
Dying upon it; or as if the rays
Of some lov'd countenance on which we gaze,
Were lit up by no unseen light behind;
So dark a cloud the faithless eye doth blind!

This comes of seeing and of tracing on
Cause after cause,—in wondrous union
Concentrating, combining to a whole,—
And owning not the Maker. For the Soul

255

At every step when she around her cell
Sees yet adores not the Adorable,
More faint and faint the gleams, which with Him dwell,
Break out on her, more feebly His dear voice,
That which alone bids nature to rejoice,
More faint and faint she hears; till all alone
From scene to scene of doubt she wanders on
Along a dreary waste, starless and long,
Starless and sad a dreary waste along,
Uncheer'd—unsatisfied—for evermore,
Companionless, and fatherless, and poor.

Enough is given that they who would adore
Might find their Maker; ever more and more
Himself disclosing to the pure in heart,
He leads them in Himself to have a part.
Else it were sad indeed through things of sense,
Or sweet scenes form'd by sportive elements,
To range on sick at heart; for sad and lone
Was Youth in all its freshness, though when gone
So seeming fair; beneath a vernal sky,
'Mid flowers and singing birds it heaved the sigh;
But as it flew, it turn'd, and cast behind
Longing, regretful looks, and seem'd most kind
When lost for ever,—from the things of sight
A bird of golden wing hath ta'en his flight,
And left us desolate: o'er gathering years
Silent and cold Winter her head uprears.

256

Far otherwise when hopes of better Love
Fill all with sacred breath,—rays from above
Light up the cloud—then toilsome nights and days,
To rise, to sleep , to live o'er weary ways
In loneliness, to wed with solitude,
To go out, and return, and find no good ,
These all are by a Holy Presence warm.
In each dark shade there stands a living Form,
By the wayside, by lonely shore, in feast
Else wearisome,—beside the well , nor least
In holy Temples doth that Form abide,
Who ne'er from them that sought Him turn'd aside.
His sheltering mantle rests upon the Earth,
'Neath whose bright folds we have our second birth;
Be we content awhile therein to lie,
Until the storm and whirlwind have past by.

'Tis better that thus dimly we should scan
His steps, disclos'd as meet for sinful man;
For but suppose that Heaven's familiar door
O'erarching, and the star-indented floor
Flew open, and disclos'd the towers afar ;
As fishes ranging 'neath their watery bar
Know nought of tower or city, grove or glen,
Green mantled earth, and singing bird, and men,
So rove we in this vapoury prison pent,—
Emerging in ethereal element

257

We should see that which would our hearts appa.
With wonder, more than all this varied ball,
Yea, more than blind men dream of untried light.
But in th' amazement of th' o'erwhelming sight
How should we love Him? rather for awhile
Let us with prayer this winding cave beguile,
And lowlier thoughts more meet for earthly bond,
For fearfully the Glory shines beyond
This twilight—rapidly 'tis onward borne,
And we have much to do, and much to mourn.

In these I linger not, for thus to dream,
And meditate, and choose the learned theme,
For these we have no leisure—bound for far
We loiter, while we talk the leading star
Is setting, yonder breaks on distant lawn
The skirt of Day—the trees are in the dawn.

See the Christian Year for St. Luke's day, also Aristotle's Ethics b. iii. c. ii.

See Lucretius, b. ii. that the motion of these atoms is more rapid than that of light, that they are of themselves colourless, but assume colour in their combinations.

See p. 234.

See p. 235.

See p. 233.

S. John iv. 6.

See p. 249.

258

CATULLUS.

I. THE PINNACE.

[_]

Car. iv.

“Guests, this pinnace which ye see,
“Swiftest of the swift was he,
“There was not a swimming raft,
“None, says he, of all the craft,
“But alike, although he try
“Oars or sail, I pass him by.
“Not unknown to me, I trow,
“Is old Adria's threatening brow;
“Nor the flowing of the seas
“Round the island Cyclades;
“Noble Rhodes, nor horrid Thrace,
“Nor Propontis; or thy base,
“Pontus, with its savage shore.
“Pontus, where in times of yore
“He that's now a sea-worn skiff
“Waved his branches on thy cliff.

259

“There upon Cytorus high
“Once his whispering boughs would sigh.
“Amastris, thou Pontic town,
“Box-bearing Cytorus, known
“Unto thee from first to last
“Is, he says, his story past.
“How at first a leafy wood
“On thine highest top he stood;
“In thy bay then dipped his oar;
“Thence on seas from shore to shore
“Bore his master, if the gale
“Right or left hath woo'd his sail;
“Or with full-sail'd power to move
“Favouring came the breathing Jove.
“Ne'er had he for dangers o'er
“Vows to pay to Gods on shore,
“Till, his wanderings o'er, at last
“To this limpid lake he pass'd.

“These are things which erst have been;
“Castor, with thy brother twin,
“Here he in tranquillity
“Dedicates his age to thee.”

Tranquil lake, calm halcyon nest,
Tutelary Gods of rest,—
Stars, whose gentler light is shed,
When the storm is gone and fled,—

260

Welcome quiet which ye bring,
After life of suffering!
Blessed calm of peaceful age
After toilsome pilgrimage,
Harbour'd in the lake at even
Which reflects the eye of Heaven,
And the star above the hill
In its mirror clear and still.

261

II. HOME.

[_]

Car. xxxi.

“Brightest Eye of Islets fair,
“Or peninsulas most rare,
“Which in watery friths around,
“Or in either sea are found;—
“Sirmio, with what delight
“Do I see thee safe again,
“And can scarce believe me quite
“'Scaped from the Bithynian plain!

“Oh, how blessed thus to cease
“From all cares, and find release,
“When the mind throws off her load
“After wanderings long abroad,
“Wearied out with toils to come
“And to be again at home,—
“There resign ourselves oppress'd
“On the accustom'd bed at rest;—
“Moment long'd for;—this at last—
“This repays all labours past.

“Sirmio, hail, my pleasant Isle,
“Greet thy master! gently smile,
“Lydian lake! About me come,
“All ye laughs that haunt my home.”

262

Foxes have holes, the bird a nest,
The last wish to a human breast:
Yes, sweetest spot to them that roam,
It is a little quiet home:
Yet 'twas a Christian's wish to die
With none, or none but strangers, nigh,
At a lone inn: that thought express'd
A fear on earth to find its rest:
'Twas this of old the pilgrim led
To have no place to lay his head,—
No spot on earth to call his own,
Except a grave in lands unknown.
Foxes have holes, the bird a nest,
Man hath on earth no place of rest.

Abp. Leighton.

263

III. THE FADED FLOWER.

[_]

Car. lxii. lin. 39.

“In shelter'd gardens hid the flower is born,
“Known to no cattle, by no plough-share torn,
“Rear'd by soft airs, warm suns, and genial shower,
“And many youths and maidens love that flower.
“Should some rude hand but nip the bloom in twain,
“No youths nor maidens love that flower again:
“E'en thus the spotless virgin doth appear,
“Cherish'd by kindred, to companions dear;
“But if once stain'd, that loveliness is o'er,
“By youths and maidens is she prized no more.”

'Tis so among mankind, there is no power
Of restoration for a wither'd flower,
Therefore 'tis cast away; but angels know
No joy in all the things that bloom below,
Till they are taken from that parent stem,
And grafted in the new Jerusalem.
So when a flower on earth may seem half-dead,
And sever'd and despised to hang its head,
Yet in the “inclosed garden ” God may give,
It may be yet transferr'd new life to live.

264

When men despair, blest angels may rejoice
Hearing from out the dust a suppliant voice,
And thence convey it where it yet may bloom,
Water'd with blood;—and in the tearful gloom
Foster'd awhile, till it can bear bright skies,
Sun, air, and shower in that new Paradise;—
Unharm'd by herd or plough or spoiler rude,
Safe in that Gardener's keeping, Who once stood
In dawn of Resurrection; and is seen
There lifting up the drooping Magdalene.

[_]

“Thou that dwellest in the gardens, the companions hearken to thy voice: cause me to hear it.”—Cant. viii. 13.

Cant. iv. 12.

John xx. 15.

265

IV. A BROTHER'S DEATH.

TO HORTALUS.
[_]

Car. lxv.

“Though, Hortalus, unceasing sore distress
From the Aonian maids withdraws my mind,
For how can it the Muses' theme express,
Which toss'd by its own woes no rest can find?

“For lately hath my brother cross'd the strand
Where Lethe's wave flows by his pallid feet;
He on the Rhetian shore in Trojan land
Lies buried, and mine eyes no more shall meet.

“No more to speak to thee! no more to hear!
No more to see thee! from my bosom torn
My brother! unto me than life more dear!
Still will I ever love thee, ever mourn;—

“As in the thickest shades the Nightingale
Sings sad, of her lost Itys to complain.
Yet 'mid these woes, my friend, I do not fail
To send Battiades,—the promised strain;

266

“Nor think thy words are from my bosom driven
By sad distress; the pledge I now recall;
As when an apple by her lover given
Should from the virgin's bosom chance to fall;—

“Hid in her dress forgotten there it lay,
Till at her mother's entrance with a start
It falls down on the ground, and rolls away;
The conscious blush betrays her grieving heart.”

TO MANLIUS.
[_]

Car. lxviii. lin. 13.

“From me whom floods of sorrow drown
Seek not such happy gifts again.
Since first I took my manhood's gown,—
A flowery spring my life was then,—

“Much have I played,—the Goddess knows
Who blends with love sweet misery;
A brother's death now all o'erthrows,
O brother snatch'd from wretched me!

“My comforts now with thee have perish'd;
With thee our house doth buried lie;
And all the joys thy sweet love cherish'd,
Liv'd in thy life and with thee die.”

267

OFFERINGS AT A BROTHER'S GRAVE.
[_]

Car. ci.

“Through many nations and through many seas,
“Brother, I come to thy sad obsequies,
“To bear thee these last gifts, by sorrow led,
“And to address in vain the silent dead.
“Since my sad lot hath me bereft of thee,
“Alas, dear brother, gone from wretched me!
“This one sad consolation now remains,
“Receive these gifts as ancient rite ordains,
“Gifts with a brother's tears all dripping o'er,
“And now, farewell, my brother, evermore.”

ON THE FOREGOING PASSAGES.

Sweetest of poets, one spot good and pure
'Mid all thy bosom stains could still endure,—
'Neath thy deep breast wherein far ruder things
Folded too oft their pestilential wings,—
The love of a lost brother;—as hope died
To nobler duties rais'd and sanctified.
As if thy tender spirit in its woes
Could in that pure affection find repose,
Like evening gleams which light surrounding gloom,—
The love of thy lost brother and thy home.
Yet could that grief most sad, most sweet, most calm,
Have met our Christian Gilead, breathing balm,

268

Then quieted in faith thy ruffled breast,
Finding upon the ground a tranquil nest,
Might thence have soar'd unto diviner things,
And shed a holier music from thy wings.

269

V. TO HIMSELF.

[_]

Car. lxxvi.

“If good deeds past bring to mankind delight,
In pious memories if aught is sweet,
Ne'er to have broken faith, forsworn the right,
Or call'd on God with purpose of deceit—

“Catullus, many joys in life's review
'Neath this ungrateful love are yet in store;
For of things kind that men can say or do,
All have been said and done by thee of yore.

“Though these be lost on an ungracious soul,
Yet why thyself torment, to sorrow given?
Strengthen thy mind, draw thence in self-control;
Cease by thy griefs to struggle thus with Heaven.

“'Tis hard at once to yield love cherish'd long;—
'Tis hard, yet safety lies in this alone;
Thou must, by mastering self, subdue the wrong;
Canst thou, or canst thou not, it must be done.

270

“O Gods, if ye are pitiful, if e'en
On verge of death ye e'er have brought relief,
Look on my woe; if pure my life hath been,
Remove this plague, this pestilential grief;—

“It creeps like poisonous torpor through each vein,
And every sense of joy drives from my breast;
I ask not that her love I may regain,
And with restor'd fidelity be blest.

“It is for mine own health is all my prayer,
For power to cast aside this foul disease.
O Gods, in my life past if pious care
Hath aught of you deserv'd, grant me release.”

ON THE FOREGOING.

'Tis so with every passion of the breast,
Ambition, covetousness, or love of praise;
Though men awhile, by vain success caress'd,
Know not the weight which on the heart it lays.

Yet if the soul thwarted and check'd should turn
Upon itself, it feels the deadly chain,
Nor seeks whereby that flame may stronger burn,
But knows no freedom while it doth remain.

271

The covetous would oft give worlds away,
Could he but 'scape the thirst within his breast;
Love, scared by disappointment, in dismay
Yearns from itself to flee, and so to rest.

Then oh, how vain is every heart's desire,
Enslaved the more the more that it hath won!
It is the kindling of a deathless fire
In souls that find their rest in God alone.

272

VIRGIL.

I. FIRST ECLOGUE.

What is there in these strains unearthly sweet
That charm'd our boyhood once, our manhood greet
With untired freshness,—scenes of pastoral love,
Fill'd with the poet's breath that live and move;
While exile o'er them casts a shade of fear,
And makes their image rise more sadly dear;
With shifting landscapes such as Poussin drew,
Or Claude Lorraine; while evening's radiant hue
Comes forth and with it blends her sabler suit?
For with the Arcadian scene and pastoral lute
Mingles the sense of our lost Paradise;
Which deep beneath our ruin'd nature lies,
And wakes 'mid vernal earth or summer sky,—
That image which within us ne'er can die.
Like gales of youth our senses they beguile,
Yet only as in sleep and for awhile,

273

A visionary covering of our care;
For evil and the curse are hidden there.
Some secret spring within it seems to press,
Which overflows with a deep tenderness,
As sense of that sad time awakes anew
When erst we unto Eden bid adieu.

Yea, with thee, Melibæus, would I go
To exile 'neath the mantle of thy woe,
Yet let not thy sweet sadness soothe my mind
To cast thy loving, lingering look behind;—
But rather as old Patriarchs in the skies
May we behold a better Paradise.
'Mid pastoral homes and herds and gifts divine,
Mounts, springs, and shades of their own Palestine,
Still upward with departing eyes they turn'd,
To hopes more fair than evening skies that burn'd,
Where they might hide and lose themselves in God;
And here their way as exile pilgrims trod.

274

II. THE GEORGICS.

So great and silent was thy love
For Nature's children, thence to prove
A power within thee to make wise
In all their ways and sympathies;—
With inmates of stream, vale, and wood,
E'en like a sacred brotherhood;
Looking on their things with their sense,
Nay rather with intelligence
Investing them, and thought and eye
Of reflective humanity.
Till lifeless things begin to breathe,
Things animate their ways inwreathe
With intellect and human thought;
So Passion is with all inwrought;
For parts of her own self she makes,
For sympathizing spirits takes:—
With playfulness , as one that smiled
Still inwardly, and so beguiled
The thoughts that on his bosom press
From burden of some home-distress,
Or sense of mortal nothingness.

275

For love without will shadows find
Of what lies in the feeling mind.

Thus Eden's curse and Eden's woes
Seem reconcil'd in that repose
Of spirit, which divinely still
Breath'd of high virtue, thought, and will,
Judgment, and souls to good allied,
Thus exercised and purified.

We the same phases still explore
On Nature's face with him of yore—
Features the same that grow not old
With their expression manifold;—
See the same moon and stars and sky
Woods, streams, and Nature's progeny,
So multiform, yet still they rise
The same in their varieties.
But unto us to free from harm
There rests a new and holy charm,
All things are to the Cross allied,
And by Its shadow sanctified.

At Nature's shrines all seem'd to be
To him replete with deity,
All living things with power indued,
Like children of his solitude.
Hence with instinctive Godhead wise,
And eloquent with auguries,—
Interpreters that are from high,
And messengers of destiny.

276

Creatures of God that meet our eyes,
They are like living mysteries;
And unto us they are made known
As children of the Holy One,
That teach a Father's care and love;
But how far of the things above
The varied semblance they may bear,
To things eternal minister,
No lights their airy paths illume,
'Tis hid in shadows of the tomb.
They share our woes, and speak the wrath
That is upon our mortal path,
Defy our knowledge, leave behind
Our vain enquiries on the wind.

------“Molle atque facetum
Virgilio annuerunt gaudentes rure Camœnæ.”

277

III. ORPHEUS AND EURYDICE.

[_]

Georg. b. iv.

“All chances 'scaped, from shades below
“He back retraced his steps, and now
“He near'd the realms of light, and she,
“The lost and loved Eurydice,
“Follow'd his upward steps behind,
“So Proserpine's stern law assign'd.
“Day's threshold now was scarcely won,
“When, ah, unmindful and undone,
“He stood, and with love-trancèd eye
“Look'd back on his Eurydice!
“Then all was lost, the word was spoken—
“His treaty with the dead was broken,
“For ever! thrice with crash profound
“The Avernian lakes gave back the sound.
“‘Orpheus,’ she cried, ‘O misery!
“Who hath destroyed both me and thee?
“What madness! cruel fates advance
“O'er me again, and death's dark trance.
“Fare thee—farewell—borne from thy sight,
“Surrounded by the mighty night,
“I stretch to thee from death's dark shore
“These powerless hands—but thine no more.’”

278

He in whose soul is born from high
The music of Heaven's harmony,—
Which soothes dark passions into peace,
And from their kingdoms gives release;—
He with him draws to realms above
The objects of his earthly love,
And leads them onward, while his face
Is upward turn'd:—with faltering pace
Should he on them turn back and gaze,
He then lets go the harmonious maze;
The music of that love divine,
That bears all heavenward, must decline.
The backward tide no power can stem:
He loses both himself and them.

279

IV. THE ÆNEID.

“Sum pius Æneas.”

Could we but dive into the Poet's soul,
And see the embryo stirrings of his thought,
Before itself it glasses forth in words,
Or is embodied in some moving tale,
We should there read more deep philosophy
Than in the starry countenance of Heaven.
For in the soul of man there seems to sleep
An image of the boundless Universe,
Ebbing and flowing with its restless tides,
Breathed forth unconscious oft in feigning tales;
As in the shell the echo of the seas
Indwells, and giveth forth its soul in sounds,
So strangely heaving from its winding folds.

On this the sweet creation of thy brain,
O Mantuan Swain, thou hast a halo set,
And crown'd him with a name and character—
But not from prowess, nor stern fortitude,
Nor kingly dignity, nor wisdom known
In council, nor endurance,—but the name
Of Piety; thine own mysterious soul
Betraying, which could find no genial rest

280

In aught but aspirations after God.

It is a beauteous picture, from the walls
Of burning Troy seen in the glaring blaze,
'Tween mountains and the sea in hurried flight,
His aged Sire upon his shoulders borne,
His household Gods, and with unequal steps
The boy Iulus holding firm his hand.

And well, great Poet, did thy heart divine
Of messages from Heaven, with trails of light
Dropp'd down to earth—and calling—at whose voice
Conjugal tenderness and home-repose
Are to be cast behind; and yet thy hand
Could not pourtray therein thy better thought,
But falter'd, when the victim's funeral pile
Sheds on the parting ships its lurid glare.
And thou thyself, O sacred bard, must sure
Have turn'd away with heavy cold disdain
From this thine own creation, poor and frail,—
Like thine own Dido who in shades below
With cold averted brow in silence turn'd.
A hero, yet no hero; half a God,
Yet less than man!

For all unequal were the Heathens' thoughts
To that mysterious truth they fain would grasp,
Or to pourtray the veiled lineaments
Of that immortal Face, which should arise

281

In genial lumination on mankind.
And hence on this imagin'd type of good
A dreamy indistinctness seems to rest;
No strong ideal of a breathing soul,
No featured countenance of speaking mould
That clings to thought and memory, but this
Like some unreal phantom of a man,
The shadow of a shade in realms beneath,
Or dream that issues from the ivory gate.
Achilles' wrath was stamp'd like fallen man,
Noble in falling and in ruin great;
Great is Ulysses roving seas and lands.
But when the Latian would his pencil dip
In hues of Heaven, beneath his hand came forth
This image, as in water, weak and wan.
It was not found in man to deem aright
Or by his words pourtray lost Eden's Lord,
A form of piety and meet for Heaven,
Unequal by his deeds such form to frame.
When more than that Ideal man would raise,
The Truth and Archetype was given from Heaven,
His Countenance was marr'd beyond all men,
Known for no form or comeliness, but One
Who had no beauty as desired of men,
And clothed with shame and suffering. For to err
Is human, but to suffer is Divine.

Howbeit this the “pious” conqueror

282

We honour less e'en than his conquer'd foe.
A conquer'd side lay near the poet's soul;
And secret love will its own impress find,
And gleam through the disguise of outward veils.
As from the head of one, whose bold proud heart
Was smitten with successful wickedness,
Satan all-arm'd came forth, defying Heaven
With nobleness and grandeur, as might suit
A rebel chieftain;—of far other form
Than evil spirits found in hallowed lore.

This Mantuan—this our Daphnis—must we love,
Daphnis, who Pollio sung, the Mincian Swan,
Who sung the birth of Christ in Latian plains;
As if he had o'er-heard the angelic song;
So near hath he approach'd the eternal doors,
Daphnis , in shining white he walks on high,
Wondering at thresholds of the unwonted Heaven,
And 'neath his feet beholds the clouds and stars.

Pollio, Ecl. iv., as in Pope's Messiah.

Sub pedibusque videt nubes et sidera Daphnis.”

283

V. THE SHADES BELOW.

[_]

Æn. vi.

Then Plato's high philosophy,
Of things that after death shall be,
Was shadow'd in that vision deep,
Which pass'd the ivory gate of sleep.
Lo, where the golden branch displayed
Shone 'mid the green embowering shade;
The wingèd pair that led them on
From step to step, alight thereon,
His Mother's doves, there sitting by
In beautiful sweet augury.
Thence in the darkling solitude,
As through the obscure of some deep wood,
When the pale moon half hides her light,
Through realms of subterranean night;—
Hush'd, lest they do the silence wrong
Which doth to things of death belong;—
With multitudinous ghosts around,
As birds that throng the Autumnal ground.
Then gloomily they pass the bound
Of houses for eternity,
With adamant wall'd to the sky:

284

Their varied place of woe assign'd
To every crime wrought 'mong mankind,
Their penal sufferings manifold
By eye unseen, by tongue untold.
And there to pious souls is given
Elysian realms of nether Heaven:
Another sun and firmament,
And other stars, and o'er them bent
Purple serene, ethereal light,
With gifts beyond our mortal sight.

Sweet teacher of our early youth!
The ancient Keeper of Christ's truth
Hath hail'd and own'd thee most of all
On whom the heathen shadows fall.
For pure thy page and undefiled,
Not unmeet for a Christian child .
Till poets down all Christendom
Thy gentle genius did illume.
Tasso hath lit his lamp by thine;
No other guide the Florentine
Sought in the penal shades below,
And regions of eternal woe.

“Poeta nobilissimus.” Aug. Civ. Dei, iv. xi.

285

VI. ÆNEAS AND DIDO.

[_]

From S. Augustine's Confessions, b. i. 21.

“Alas, my God, while yet a boy
Æneas would my thoughts employ;
To me his wanderings were all known,
While I in his forgot mine own!
O'er dying Dido too I grieved,
Who slew herself by love bereaved.
Yet I in all these things was dead,
But o'er myself no tear I shed.
Apart from God myself could die
Yet tearless was my heart and eye.

Yet what more pitiable could be
Than not to know one's misery;—
To others feel compassionate,
Yet pity not one's own estate.—
That Dido's death my tears could move
Self-slain for lost Æneas' love;
Yet I for want of love could die,
And bear that death with tearless eye?

Light of mine heart, Bread of my soul,
Spouse of my being, my life's Whole,

286

I lov'd Thee not; unfaithful rov'd
From Thee, the adulterous world approv'd,
And sounded in my ears, Well done!
Well done, re-echoed on and on,
And I was sham'd to stand alone.

These things I wept not, yet could moan
For Dido's sorrows and her death,
Mine own was worse than parting breath;
And when forbid that tale of woe
I griev'd that sorrow to forego.”

287

HORACE.

I. LUCRETIUS AND HORACE COMPARED.

“Nec tamen explemur vitai fructibus unquam.” Luc.

“Nimium breves
Flores amœnæ ferre jube rosæ.”
Hor

Like awful tones from Nature's mouldering shrine,
Or voices from the Dead, almost divine,
Two bards of Epicurus seem to preach,
Speaking as from their tombs with wondrous speech.

The one—how poor life's pleasures are and vain,
And cannot satisfy while they remain;
The other with what fleetness they are fled,
When Death amidst them lifts his pallid head.

Such was man's Nature in its fairest show;
She loath'd the roses withering on her brow,
Which as they wither'd left a thorny crown
With blood upon the temples trickling down.

289

II. THE WORLD RENOUNCED.

[_]

Paraphrase.

What youth now courts, with sweets bedew'd,
The World so seeming fair,
Where in some cave with roses strew'd
She binds her golden hair,

Now plain and guileless? he full soon
The fatal change shall weep,
And see aghast the coming on
Of black and stormy deep.

All gold, fond youth, he hopes her now,
And thinks that ne'er will fail
The heart at ease and lovely brow;
Nor knows the treacherous gale.

Ah, hapless they who deem her fair!
Sav'd from a watery grave,
I vow me in His house of prayer
To Him that walk'd the wave.

291

III. ECCLESIA LABORANS.

[_]

Paraphrase.

O ship! shall waves bear thee away
Again to sea? oh, why delay?
Thine harbour seize;—for see how torn
Thy side, of tackle shorn!

Thy mast is marr'd by Afric's gale,
Thy sail-yards groan, thy cables fail,
Thy tottering keel can scarcely brave
The too imperious wave.

Thou hast not left one untorn sail:—
How can thy prayers again avail?
Though noblest daughter of the grove,
The Wood of God's dear love .

Will birth and name avail thee now?
Can sailors trust a painted prow?
Take heed lest sport of every wind
Thou leav'st a wreck behind.

293

Of late my anxious weary care,
Now object of my hope and prayer,
Mayst thou escape the sea that smiles
'Mid fair and shining Isles.

“This Wood in which our weakness is carried is the Cross of the Lord, by which we are delivered from the dangerous tempests of this world.”Aug. Ser. xxv.

295

IV. ECCLESIA MIGRATURA.

[_]

Paraphrase.

Hence with unmanly plaint, and weak dismay!
Fleet by th' ill-fated shores, ye that are found
Still faithful, us vast Ocean calls away,
Flowing blest isles and happy fields around!

Earth's doom of toil ne'er reach'd that peaceful shore;
There the true Vine needs not the Pruner's care!
Nor His own Olive can deceive Him more ;
Nor fig-tree ever found unfruitful there .

But streams of honey flow, which cannot cloy:
From th' everlasting hills the living well
Springs forth afresh; and flocks, without annoy,
By waters still with their own Shepherd dwell.

No evening foe can prowl that fold around
With watchful circuitings,—nor faithless prove
With hidden vipers the o'er-teeming ground:
More shall we there admire, admiring love,—

297

For ever happy—how no watery wind
Can come our better hopes and us between;
Nor sun to grain it foster'd prove unkind;
But all is temper'd to a glad serene.

By the King's countenance. No armed band
Hath e'er come near to vex that quiet shore,
Nor aught polluted ever touch'd the strand:
No toil of restless man could e'er explore

Aught of that bliss, not Thought on venturous sail.
There ne'er been heard poor Nature's suffering cry
From flocks contagion-struck, or 'neath hot gale
And starry influence breathing piteously.

Such seats the Father laid up for the good,
What time the golden bloom, which had its part
In blissful Eden, turn'd to hardihood
Of brazen front, and thence to iron heart,

Of these our latter days, most sad of all,
Spurning a better love! Oh, strange to see,
And yet foretold of yore ! my warning call
Hear ye, and to the Ark of Refuge flee!

Rom. xi.

St. Matt. xxi. 19.

St. Matt. xxiv. 37.

298

V. PROTECTING PROVIDENCE.

[_]

Lib. iii. Od. iv. l. 5.

“Hark, lovely phrensy charms my ear,
“Or sounds unearthly do I hear?
“I seem to walk the hallow'd grove,
“Where pleasant winds and waters rove.
“On Vultur, the Apulian steep,
“Once when a child I lay asleep,
“Wearied with play, and there was found
“Far from my home Apulia's bound,
“Where fabled wood-doves, strange to tell,
“With the fresh leaf had veil'd me well.
“And long there liv'd the wondrous tale
“'Mid Bantia's groves, the hilly crest
“Of Acherontia's mountain nest,
“And rich Ferentum's lowly vale.
“That safe from bears and snakes that creep
“My infant limbs unharm'd should sleep,
“With bay and myrtle o'er me pil'd,
“Not without guardian Gods a fearless child.”

A heathen child, yet without fear
Because he felt his Gods were near,
Instinctive felt and own'd their care;
That child amid the fields of air

299

May look surprise at our unrest,
Who are by angel-guardians blest.

In bulrush ark when Moses lay
Monsters of Nile around him play;
For there is One that cannot sleep
Who rocks his cradle on the deep;
And to th' Egyptian maid his cry
Is full of highest destiny.

And with Elijah in the wild,
Like Angels tending on a child,
Sustaining ravens o'er him borne
Descending wheel each eve and morn;
Wing'd pursuivants, they hear God's voice
And wait on children of His choice.

Then shall one born a child of Heaven
Be bow'd to earth, to sorrow given?

300

VI. THE SICILIAN FEAST.

“Districtus ensis cui super impiâ
Cervice pendet, non Siculæ dapes
Dulcem elaborabunt saporem;
Non avium citharæve cantus
Somnum reducent.”
Lib. iii. Od. i. l. 17.

The sword of dread eternity
Had we but faith to see,—
Hung o'er our heads by one weak thread
Between us and the dead,—
We ne'er could dare with curious eye
At the World's feast to lie.
No viands which her skill bestows
To work desired repose;
No birds that sing in rural grove,
When all the earth is love;
Nor harps that sound in princely hall
To poet's madrigal,
Could lull us in the spirit's sleep,
When bid our watch to keep.
Yet by a thread o'er old and young
The endless change is hung;
And truth itself is not less true
Though hid from human view.

301

VII. MEN DEIFIED.

“Sive mutatâ juvenem figurâ
Ales in terris imitaris, almæ
Filius Maiæ.”
Lib. i. Od. ii. 41.

“Deus nobis hæc otia fecit,
Namque erit ille mihi semper Deus; illius aram
Sæpe tener nostris ab ovilibus imbuet agnus.”
Virgil's Ecl i.

“They lifted up their voices, saying in the speech of Lycaonia, The Gods are come down to us in the likeness of men.” Acts xiv. 11.

When God in Canaan spake with men,
By tree or mount or glen,
Then erst in Homer's early song
Gods walk'd mankind among;
And worship mix'd with Gods on high
The heroes as they die.
But what time on this world of woes
The Sun of glory rose,
Then kings on earth in their own pride
Themselves were deified;
And the prerogatives of Heaven
To earth and ashes given.

302

As if in souls with flesh inwreath'd
A sense was stilly breath'd
Of God Himself invisible
Come down in flesh to dwell;
Or evil spirits at the time
O'er-heard th' angelic chime
Of truth emerging,—at the birth
Of God Himself on earth.
Thence in men's souls the unconscious news
With poison they infuse,
And blend with their idolatries
The secrets of the skies.

303

TIBULLUS.

[_]

(Left sick at Corcyra by the army of Messala.)

[_]

Lib. i. Eleg. iii. 35.

“How blest they lived in that Saturnian reign,
Ere through long roads the earth was open laid,
Ere yet the pine-tree mock'd the dark blue main,
And its full bosom to the winds display'd.

“To distant shores no wandering mariner
With foreign freight loaded th' adventurous keel;
Beneath the yoke there groan'd no sturdy steer;
No steed champ'd in his mouth the mast'ring steel.

“No house had doors, no limit in the field
Or stony witness did its bounds divide;
Oaks of their own accord sweet honey yield;
And sheep to men at ease their milk supplied.

“No battle-line, no wrath, no warlike sound,
No cruel smith the unpitying sword to mould;
Now 'neath Jove's reign slaughters and wounds abound,
The sea, and ways of death a thousand fold.

304

“Spare, Father, for I have no conscious fears
For perjured oaths or words of blasphemy;
But if I have fulfill'd my destin'd years,
Let these words mark the grave wherein I lie,

“Here lies Tibullus, seized by death's could hand,
Following Messala over sea and land.

“But me, so pliant found to tender Love,
Into Elysian bowers shall Venus bring,
Where choirs and dances bloom, and as they rove
Melodious birds for ever sweetly sing.

“Wild shrubs sweet cassia bear, through all the leas
With fragrant roses teems the genial ground,
Boys intermix'd with maidens sport at ease,
And no contentions but of love are found.

“There is the lover whom death snatch'd away,
The myrtle wreaths his honour'd locks adorn;
But guilty seats, in night profound, from day
Lie hid, black sounding streams around them borne.”

ON THE FOREGOING.

The sensual mind, as pleasures fleet away,
Looks back and longs again to be a boy,
Thence pictures the world's childhood and first day,
Where it might drink delights without annoy.

305

And when it hears of an Elysian youth
Something within acknowledges the theme,
It catches at the shadow of high truth,
Itself delighting in the golden dream.

For deeper than it knew the soul within
Found the great witness of that ancient tale,
Of happy days ere yet the world knew sin,
Which yet shall be restor'd and never fail,—

But that this mingled web of good and ill
Must be unravell'd first, the light and shade
Be parted, which together travail, till
That final separation shall be made.

And this too well they deem'd, that nought but Love
Can lay its hand upon the golden key,
Which shall admit her to those realms above,
And lead her to those bowers which Sorrows flee.

Yet not that Love which is allied to sense
Which fain would bribe e'en Conscience on its throne,
But Love whose light burns pure with innocence,
And binds to God in endless union.

306

“Love hath the keys of Heaven, and Love of Hell,”
So Orpheus spake of old, who all things drew
By his sweet music;—these words ponder well,
And think which Love thine own thoughts now pursue.

307

OVID.

I. THE METAMORPHOSIS.

1.

When in our world, where all was strange and new,
The morn of life first kindling burn'd,
All things it touch'd with golden alchemy.
Then sights and sounds at length familiar grew;
We felt the cold bounds of reality,
And gathering wings o'er-leap'd them all, and turn'd
To other worlds than those we see,
Delighting in wild fancy's realms to range,
While shapes and sights of transformation strange
The bosom fill;
For Childhood with her talisman had arm'd,
'Mid Pleasure's tainted scenes to rove unharm'd,
Yet innocent and ignorant of ill.

2.

What purple-vision'd memories seem to rest
Upon those wild Arabian tales of old,

308

When young Imagination was the guest
Of Caliphs, and of Viziers, dress'd in gold,
Haron Alraschid's court and Bagdad's magic sound.—
Thence issuing forth with wand of ease
Into Aladdin's palaces,
Enchantments o'er and under ground,
Or marble cities 'neath blue Ocean halls,
Pearl-glittering corridors and jewell'd walls;
Or Wonder sail'd with Sinbad on the seas;
Or heard of souls that pined in speechless animals.

3.

Then, older grown, the Classic tale prolong'd
Those fabling sweet delusions of the child,
With things all new and wild,
Which on the wonder-page of Ovid throng'd.
The cradle of Creation as it sprung
From Chaos, when the stars around it sung;
And forms in “golden age” of Paradise
Walking the threshold of the opening skies.
Then burning-bright the Palace of the Sun ,
Harmonious with its silent orison,
Burning yet unconsumed, empyreal proof;
Pillars of carbuncle and ivory roof
And silver doors; there duly-ranged aloof

309

Days, Months, and Years, and Ages glide and stir,
And Seasons, each of varied character.
Where first Aurora, with her veil half-drawn,
Opens the purple portals of the dawn,
And rose-besprinkled halls;
Stars, and horn'd Moon before her flee; the Hours
Harness the steeds from their ambrosial stalls;
Then the full flood of Day-light pours.

4.

Then Souls imprison'd in the living cage
Of Creatures multiform that fill the earth,
Or seas or stream or skies,—run, swim, or fly,
Or branch from rooted trees of leafy birth,
There shrined for periods of long pilgrimage.
Sweet Echo, vocal Maid, that melts to air
In rock-embowering cave or wood unseen;
Or mirror'd in the stream Narcissus flowering fair.
All new, grotesque, and uncouth images,
Beauteous withal as sights in summer seas.

5.

Of such that Seer of Seers in Samian cell
Would speak in transmigration strange to tell;
Thence for the harmless creatures did he plead,
That men no more on blood of life should feed,

310

Like ravening beasts that in the forest dwell:
But on the stores and fruitage manifold
Which nature's teeming bosom freely yields,
In forest, shore, or fields,
E'en as mankind amid that age of gold.

6.

He saw and mourn'd o'er nature's laws,
Which for the slaughtering knife had sanction won,
But knew not the primeval cause;
Nor those remedial ways, in silence seal'd,
How the true Lamb of God, the Holy One,
Upon Whose Blood alone souls feed and live,
Doth hallowed and mysterious sanction give,
Yet Sacramental silence hangs thereon.
O wondrous type, yet unreveal'd,
Whereby the creatures of the field and flood,
That we may live, yield up their innocent blood!
We who the family of Pain let in
Behold them share our woes, but not our sin.

7.

That Sage would bind us in strange brotherhood
With beasts beneath us, as with forms endued
With spirits, upon one alternate road.
Such spells we need not; better Love shall make
All things anew, for His sake render dear
The objects of Creation which appear,

311

Around, above, below our daily path,
Created by our Father for our sake,
And for our sake suffering beneath His wrath.

8.

And haply something too of wisdom lies
In fabling tales of those strange deities,
Assuming every creature's guise around,
Thus multiplying near unearthly eyes.
Or some inverted truth may there be found;
As Satan thus transform'd hath trail'd the ground:
For great the secrets are which our frail knowledge bound.

9.

Beautiful visions, gilt with Childhood's rays,
I watch you, one by one, thus fade and die,
Like sparks as an extinguish'd fire decays;
Or, one by one, passes each lingering star
From the nocturnal sky,
When the Sun lifts his purple beams afar;
Or Morning's roses in the orient halls,
As to the ground each fades and falls,
Then fail and vanish as the sun mounts high.
Be it so.—In that Childhood from above
Realities are fairer than your dreams;—

312

Wonderful changes that await the soul;
And strange and new creations shall unrol
Around her upward path, like clouded gleams,
And there disclose unveil'd a Father's love.
On other worlds, greater than now beseems,
Imagination pours forth golden youth,
Lighting her torch at the eternal truth.

B. ii.

Pythagoras, b. xiv.

313

II. OVID'S EPISTLES.

I loved the Ovidian turn and skill-wrought line,
Well suited to the boyish mind and ear;—
In such good Herman Hugo could insphere
His Angels, and with wisdom most divine
In guise of wingèd Childhood intertwine
Thoughts worthy for Angelic ears to hear
Yet growing sense in Boyhood, while yet clear
From sins that darken spirit, would repine
O'er those impassion'd lays of Heathen love,
In sorrow and surprise, as fain to ask
The wisdom of Instructors, Why this task
So redolent of evil? lights they wake
Are more like gleams upon a Stygian lake,
Than of that innocence which dwells above.

His “Pia Desideria,” a collection of Latin Poems, in very elegant Ovidian lines; the illustrations of which introduce guardian Angels as little children, in a manner well suited to the character of the verse.

314

III. OVID'S TRISTIA, OR LAMENTATIONS.

Yet moving was that exile and distress
Which sought in such sweet strains to find relief,
Fair as the hues on the decaying leaf;
Such pitiful, such touching tenderness,
Yet so unmann'd, so hopeless, spiritless;
These are the fruits of Passion, which so brief
In its enjoyments leaves an after-grief,
A loneliness of spirit, on which press
Life's accidents, with such a piercing gale
Of sorrow; that though blending thoughts of good,
And soothed awhile with its own plaintive tale,
Yet lies an undersound in that deep wail,
As of a soul which, by herself subdued,
Hath lost the inner Friend of solitude.

315

JUVENAL.

I. GUILT THE SELF-AVENGER.

[_]

Sat. xiii. 180.

“But then revenge more pleasant is than life,
“So say the unwise, whose bosoms fraught with strife
“On every trivial cause with anger burn;
“Whate'er the occasion, it will serve the turn.
“Chrysippus and mild Thales say not so,
“Nor the old man of sweet Hymettus, who
“With his accuser in his chains denied
“The poison'd cup to share of which he died.
“Wisdom first teaches right, and gathering strength
“All errors and much vice weeds out at length.
“For aught of pleasure in revenge to find
“Indicates an infirm and little mind:
“Which hence thou mayst infer—for note aright,
“That women in revenge most take delight.
“But think not he escapes thee, though he flies,
“Whom conscious guilt still holds and terrifies

316

“With lash that sounds not, and the scourge of fear,
“The mind itself its executioner.
“Worse pain than can Cæditius here bestow,
“Or Rhadamanthus in the shades below;—
“By night and day, with ceaseless watch oppress'd,
“To bear his own accuser in his breast.

“A Spartan was once answer'd by the shrine
“That he should suffer for his ill design;—
“For he enquired should he a pledge retain,
“And by a perjured oath the fraud sustain;
“If such the Pythian deity would speed,
“And if Apollo would persuade the deed.—
“And so from fear, not conscience, he restor'd,
“A terrible example to afford,
“Well worthy of the shrine and prophet's word,
“Himself cut off, his kindred, and his home,
“Extinguish'd utterly in fearful doom.

“Such punishment awaits the wish to sin,
“For he who meditates a crime within
“Is guilty of the deed; but if the crime
“Itself he perpetrate, for after time
“Endless anxiety will on him lie,
“Nor at the table cease, his throat is dry,
“He cannot the chew'd morsel swallow down,
“From choicest wines he turns with sickly frown . . .
“At night should care allow him brief repose,
“His limbs at length find rest, his eye-lids close,

317

“He sees, all trembling, the Avenger's rod,—
“The temple, and the altar, and the God,
“And thee thyself. With sacred terrors fraught,
“Greater than human, is thine image brought
“Before him, and in slumber's empty dread
“Constrains him to confess the guilty deed.

“Such men at lightnings tremble and turn pale,
“Half-dead at the first murmuring thunder-gale,
“As if not clouds by chance together driven,
“But vengeance had brought down the fire from Heaven.
“When pass'd, then of the next they are afraid,
“Lest Judgment by this calm be but delayed.
“Should side-felt pains and fever hold awake,
“They feel the offended God; and all things take
“As weapons hurl'd by angry deities.
“They cannot sacrifice; what can appease?
“What hope when guilty men in sickness lie?
“What victim not less worthy far to die?

“Though sin be in its nature mutable,
“Yet once admitted, stedfastness in ill
“Remains: when crime is finish'd, men begin
“To ope their eyes to goodness and to sin;
“Yet nature, once perverted, will recur
“To self-condemning ways, nor from them stir,
“Fix'd and unchangeable: when once let in,
“Who to himself can set the bounds of sin?

318

“When modesty is worn out from the brow
“What ever hath restor'd its virgin glow?
“Whom hast thou seen contented with one crime,
“And then to cease from ill? Wait but the time,
“And this our, now successful, criminal
“Will in the nets of sin his steps enthrall.”

THE SAME ILLUSTRATED BY REVELATION.

That calm Philosophy hath music's charms,
And of revenge the soul of man disarms,
'Till neath the angry storms of Passion wild,
By honeyed sweet Hymettus, Wisdom's child
Is gentle as a sleeping infant's breast,
Or the calm sea that heaves and is at rest.—

That ill intention in the All-seeing Eyes
Is guilty, though withinthe heart it dies;—
That there is something in the sinful soul
Which points in fear to some more fearful goal;
And sees in all around the shafts of God,
While that within bids to expect His rod.—
At the first sin that scales fall from the eyes,
Knowledge of good and evil open lies;—
That thence the power of the perverted Will,
Half-lost, is onward borne, till it fulfil
The cup of evil, which itself must drain,
In some intolerable weight of pain—

319

These things stand written in the Gentile's scroll,
All full of mourning, like the Prophet's roll.

What then hath Revelation brought from high,
Which sheds its light on immortality?

All there is life;—of sin the Heathen feels,
But God's own Word the living scene reveals;
Things into fearful form and being strive,
And characters come forth, and burn, and live.

All there is life;—with ways unspeakable
In man's own soul doth the Great Witness dwell.
Before us our Example living stands,
God—Man, our Life, and scattering live commands.
Where is revenge, and thoughts to it allied?
They are all buried with the Crucified.
All things there point to Judgment at the last,
Each thunder-storm a warning of that blast,—
All speak the Accuser who our ways doth scan,
And of a Judge which is the Son of Man.

All there is life;—'tis not the law of sin
But the live Tempter who hath power within;
And if to the first sin he can surprise
Then open to that knowledge leaves the eyes.
With Adam's children who accept his chain
The scene of Paradise he acts again;
Leads to false shades to hide their misery—
To hide from God, and loving life to die.

320

And what is this, when guilt doth once begin,
The fix'd immutability of sin?
'Tis that the evil one in ambush waits
Till he return, and watching at the gates
Enters with seven worse spirits to remain;
Such is the moulding of the sinner's chain.

All there is life;—a seven-fold Spirit still
May aid with His omnipotence the will.
Shall we then circumscribe the power of Heaven,
And cannot e'en at last such chains be riven?
Fearful the struggle, hazardous the strife,
For immortality of death or life.
And awfully the contest is pourtrayed,
Where Heathen wisdom darkens every shade;
Unless the light from Christian Heavens may blend,
Its strength e'en adamantine fetters rend.

All there is life;—can nought then lift the head
Of soul-struck sinners on the dying bed?
No slaughter'd victims can the Conscience ease,
Nor aught those angry deities appease:
No beasts which more unworthy are to die
The sinful soul itself can satisfy.
But yet That Living Sacrifice of Love
May to the sin-sick heart atoning prove:
Yea, though neglected long, and greater grace
Be griev'd, yet not quite hidden is His Face;

321

And pitying still, betwixt us and the skies,
Our living Intercessor never dies.

All there is life; in this our mortal state
Innumerable eyes upon us wait:
Dead bones of Heathen Sages at That Breath
Clothe them with flesh and sinew; they from death
Wake and arise, in stillness most profound;
And stand like living Witnesses around.

322

II. RURAL IMAGES IN THE SATIRIST.

Like pearls upon an Æthiop's arm.

[_]

Sat. iii 17.

“Ægeria's grot—how fairer far
That Goddess with her haunted cave,
Did Nature's stone no marbles mar,
But grassy banks enclose the wave.”

[_]

Sat. iii. 174

“The village Stage of turf is piled,
The well-known Play again appears,
Scared by the mask the rustic child
Hides in its mother's breast its fears.”

[_]

Sat. iii. 286.

“To me—when issuing forth at night
Sole guidance doth the moon bestow;
Or some frail lamp, whose fitful light
I tend and temper as I go.”

[_]

Sat. x. 21

“Thou tremblest, if a reed but wave
And to the moon its shadow stir;
Before the robber, free and brave,
Will sing the empty traveller.”

323

[_]

Sat. xi. 151.

“A herdsman's son—who thinks with sighs
Of mother now so long unseen,
Of little cot dear in his eyes,
And goats which so well known have been.”

[_]

Sat. xii.80.

‘The broken rafts in Baia's cove
Are moor'd—the sailors safe on shore;
There with their shaven crown they love
To tell their dangers o'er and o'er.”

ON THE FOREGOING PASSAGES.

To gentle pictures such as these
The poet turns, as to illume
With Nature's soothing images
A page with horrors fill'd and gloom.

For dark the page as he explor'd
The murky haunts of sinking Rome,
Of which in Paul's inspired word
Is writ the character and doom.

'Neath some appalling grief or dread,
The heart o'ercharg'd thus turns to greet
Some way-side flower with modest head,
Or playful child about the feet.

324

Thus little nooks of tranquil light
Are given to temper shades of woe,
By Him Who on our path at night
Hath bid the insect's lamp to glow.

Rom. i.

325

PERSIUS.

I. SUFFERINGS OF CONSCIENCE.

[_]

Sat. iii. 35.

“Great Sire of Gods, when thou wouldst vengeance take
“On cruel tyrants, which with murders slake
“Their lust of blood,—there is no punishment
“More dire than this which justice can invent,
“The virtue they have lost, that Good Divine,
“Let them behold, and in beholding pine.
“In bronze Sicilian bulls the dying moan
“Of torture, or the terror-stricken groan
“Of him who, clad in purple, o'er his head
“Saw the suspended sword, are not so dread
“As is his fear who to himself doth own,
“‘We go, are headlong going, hurried down;’
“And inwardly turns pale at miseries
“Hid from the wife which on his bosom lies.”

326

II. THE FAITHFUL INSTRUCTOR.

[_]

Sat. v. 19.

“It is not mine with baubles to inflate
“A pompous page, to smoke imparting weight.
“Secret we speak. With thee my muse makes bold,
“To thee my inmost bosom would unfold.
“To thee, Cornutus, would I fain impart
“How much, sweet friend, thou art of mine own heart.
“Sound me, an unflaw'd vessel thou canst tell,
“Varnish of tongue and paint none know so well.
“For this the hundred voices I would seek,
“Could I, with tongue sincere, but fitly speak
“How thou art would within me, and unseal
“What hidden in the reins no words reveal.
“When ceas'd my guardian purple, and still young
“Childhood's gilt dress I to the Lares hung,
“Flattering companions throng'd, manhood's white gown
“Suffer'd mine eyes to wander through the town;—
“Doubtful the course, when unskill'd in life's way
“Error in branching by-paths leads astray;—
“'Neath thee I placed me then, thou with pure truth
“Hast on Socratic bosom rear'd my youth;

327

“To crooked ways applied stern Wisdom's rule;
“Reason my temper master'd; in her school
“Thine was the Artist's thumb deftly to mould
“The character to form which it must hold.

“Long days have we together spent erewhile,
“Together early nights did we beguile,
“One work, one rest we had in sweet accord,
“And cheer'd our studies at one frugal board.”.....

“The lives of men are of a thousand hues,
“Each hath his bent, his pleasure each pursues.”....
“Then days in mud and darkness spent deplore,
“And groan when all too late that life is o'er.
“But pale at nightly studies grows thy brow
“The young to train, in cleansèd ears to sow
“Wisdom's pure fruits, such as Cleanthes own'd.
“Come, young and old, here shall your wants be crown'd
“By their true end, provision for old age,
“For sad grey hairs and life's last pilgrimage.
“‘To-morrow;—yea, to-morrow it shall be!
“What, is it much one day to ask?’ But see
“When this another day hath now arriv'd,
“We yesterday's to-morrow have out-liv'd.
“And soon another morrow will fulfil
“These years, yet be a little distant still.
“For though so near, bound by one carriage pole,
“In vain wilt thou pursue it, though it roll

328

“So close before thee, with thee intertwined,
“Thou roll'st, the second wheel, on axle-tree behind.”.....

“Live mindful thou of death; the hour flies fast,
“E'en while I speak is part of it—and past.
“What dost thou? hooks in twain thy bosom rend,
“Still doubtful to which master thou wilt bend:
“Then unto each according to thy mood
“Alternate yield'st a doubtful servitude.
“Think not when once a stand is made by thee
“Thou hast thy fetters broken and art free;
“A dog may struggling rend its knot in twain,
“Yet on its neck still drag a length of chain.”

329

LIVY.

I. THE ROMAN CHARACTER.

[_]

From S Augustine's City of God, b. v. ch. 18.

A Brutus steel'd against his own heart's blood,—
Mucius with his right-hand in shrivelling fire,—
Curtius engulph'd in a live sepulchre,—
Regulus dying for his country's good,—
Camillus firm in her ingratitude,—
Poor Cincinnatus Rome's imperial sire;—
These all were types on the world's theatre,
Sons by whose love and suffering hardihood
Rome as the Queen of nations took her stand;
Thus e'en the semblance of true piety
Had length of days from the Almighty's hand.
If for a shadow such their self-command,
How should immortal spirits live and die
For an eternal City in the sky?

330

II. NUMA POMPILIUS.

“Sicut Romulus augurato urbe condenda regnum adeptus est, de se quoque Deos consuli jussit. Inde ab augure deductus in arcem.” Lib. i. cap. 18

Thus Paganism judged aright
That Power comes down from Heaven;—
The shadow of the Kingly might
To the Anointed given.

But there are many now who deem
That Power is from below;
And haply they in this their dream
Are wiser than we know.

Holy and saintly Kings may be,
As erst was Charles, the Good;
But always, Lord, we know from Thee,
That evil is the multitude.

They who their King the People make,
And with the Many side,
They for their God must evil take,
And Satan for their guide.

331

III. THE FAITHLESS GUARDIAN.

[_]

Lib. v. ch. 27.

[_]

“It was the custom of the Falisci to have the same person as master and companion of their children: and as it is at this day the custom in Greece, they had many boys committed to the care of one master. The children of the princes were instructed, as is usually the case, by a person pre-eminent for his learning. This man had during peace adopted the custom of leading out the boys before the city for the sake of play and exercise; this practice being not interrupted by the war, he was used to draw them out from the gate at shorter or longer distances; and by varying their sports and conversation he advanced when an opportunity occurred further than usual, and thus led them on within the stations, and from thence into the Roman camp, and the tent of Camillus the general. There to this act of wickedness he added a still more iniquitous speech; saying, that ‘he delivered Falerii into the hands of the Romans; since he gave into their own power those boys whose parents were the heads of the State.’ On hearing which Camillus replied, ‘Thou hast not come, wicked man, with thy wicked gift to a people and a commander like thyself.’....He then had him stripped of his clothing, and with his hands tied behind his back, delivered him up to the boys, furnishing them with rods, to drive the traitor back into the city.”

Such he, methinks, to whom 'tis given
To rear and mould the sons of Heaven;
(All children they of Royal Blood,
A more than princely brotherhood)

332

Yet turns the task to him assign'd
To vitiate the youthful mind;—
And leaves them with the foe to be
For ever in captivity.

Such he who in the untainted soul
Lets vainly loose the visions foul
Of evil spirits, which abide
In classic beauties, there to hide,
Like spiders when on watch they lie
In their sun-gilded tapestry;
Yea, there have been who gather'd lies
Of all those heathen deities,—
Such fabled legends have inwrought
Through limbec of their own bad thought;
And thence in minds yet free from ill
With all impurities instil.
Haply the ends which such await
Are mirror'd in this traitor's fate.

Ye watch Christ's little ones, oh, see
Ye make not this high ministry
The snare of youth, the woe of age;
For 'tis an Angel's privilege.