University of Virginia Library

'Tis Morning! she is a glad Reveller here:
What time she speeds on her illumed career!—
And makes all the Earth her Image!—while she seems
Reflected from these rosy-running streams!
And painted on the beauty of the flowers,
And kindling 'mid the rich sheen of the bowers—
On Earth etherial, as amidst the sky
A Light—a Life—a Power—a Majesty!
But yet within that sky how wondrous fair—
How overpowering in her splendour there!
While on her Forehead's Royalty is shown
One Jewel—One—in its own self a Crown!
One Jewel—but how exquisite a one,
The World-awakening—space-enlightening Sun!
And where else glows that Sun so clearly bright?—
Within the Heaven a living Heaven of Light!
Morning! thou art a lovely reveller here;
What time thou speedest upon thy glad career;
Oh! wheresoe'er in watchful mood we turn,
Her breath is breathing, and her glances burn.
She makes all the Earth her Image—while she flies—
And to One Glory kindles all the skies!
And fair and wide her boundless magic flings,
As in an extacy of joy she springs
O'er the flushed waters of this brightened sea,
Which seems her Giant-Worshipper to be;
While every wave is smiling back her smiles,
And rolling golden round an hundred isles.
Lo! how in freedom and in might she speeds
(While nought delays her, and while nought impedes)
Along the mountains, with a foot of fire,
Buoyed by an Energy that ne'er can tire;
Earth, Air, and Ocean, answer to her call,
And bless her Presence Beatifical!
And hail her in all homage and all love,
While she doth in this light of Beauty move!
There's not a little wreath of passing cloud
That is not to her golden service vowed;
And not a lowly flower that doth not wear
Her colours now—that burn upon the air,
And blaze along the Earth, free, clear, and far,
Till all like roses—crimsoned roses are!
And not a chrystal fount that murmuring plays,
But, like a fount of fire, defies the gaze!

The Enchantress Morning—how as she proceeds
On her sweet progress, and unpausing speeds—
Brightening and brightening—fair and fairer still,
O'er Land and Sea, o'er wood, and vale, and hill—
How doth she—as with winged haste she springs
Assert her Empire o'er all earthly things,
And touch them as with keen Ithuriel spear,
Till traced in bright distinctness they appear.
Forth at her stroke they unresisting start,
Distinguished, and developed, and apart;
Forth at her stroke they start—broad, clear, and plain,
In true revealment of themselves again!—
In their own shapes and forms stand boldly out,
Nor leave the mind to wonder and to doubt!
While in her sweepy sway and mystic might,
Walks frowningly abroad the solemn Night—
And spreads o'er all the mantle of her gloom,
Dark as the clouds and shades of mortal doom.
These things may be distorted—masked—disguised—
By the foiled Watcher vainly scrutinized!
A thousand different objects they may seem,
Vague and confused as visions of a dream;
A thousand new appearances assume,
While opening seem the portals of the tomb,
To cast forth haunting shapes, uncouth and grim,
And shadows that 'mongst circling shadows dim,
As in a sea of floating darkness, swim;
Such groupes fantastical are gathering round,
Such wildering mockeries the sense confound!
Here frown a host of phantoms in our path,
There throng embodied forms of threat'ning wrath;
Here dread and overwhelming barriers rise
Before the doubting and deluded eyes;
There startling prospects lenthening out extend,
Still on and on—that never find an end!
And Nothing is, but as 'tis masked and marred
By Conquering Night—the shadowed and the starred;
All contrasts, contradictions, and extremes,
Are mingling seen, as in a sick man's dreams.
But when the enkindling and outshining Morn
Is like a new-created Angel born—
A new-created Angel brightly given
Unto the enraptured and rejoicing Heaven,
How are those forms, so changed and so disguised,
At once disclosed, arranged, and harmonized;
At once, when touched by her Ithuriel spear,
Made to stand forth—in revelation clear!
At once unveiled in that transcendant blaze,
And opened out before the observer's gaze,
Bare to the bright sky, to the sunshine bare,
Exposed in all their true proportions there.
Oh! could the Morning, with triumphant sway,
Thus—as by stroke of magic—clear away
The endless mists and shadows frowning round
Man's Universal Heart—deep, dark, profound;
Could she command that masked and hidden Heart
Forth in revealment of itself to start—
Aye! could she show, uncovered and revealed,
All that for ages there hath lain concealed,
(And much is there that is perforce even bowed
Beneath the veil, the shadow, and the cloud;
Much that weak language never could disclose,
That outward action but distorted shows.
Though Myriads share the Feeling and the Thought,
By none to light and observation brought,
Those Thoughts and Feelings of long centuries wear
The Chain of Silence, and her dull yoke bear!)
How new—how awful—and how deep and strange
The World around were—in that startling change!
How wond'rous—how o'erpowering would it be,
Could the Great Heart of Our Humanity
At once be laid in all its workings bare;
Yet who to gaze on that dread Sight would dare?
Yet who would dare to gaze on the unveiled Deep,
The exposed Abyss—could any Power but sweep
The Shadows and the covering mists aside,
And open forth the astounding Prospect wide,
And with a stroke of more than Magic chase
The clouds that clasp—the deep folds that embrace?
And thus to curious observation yield
That mighty and immeasurable field?
Earth's countless, myriad mansions of the Dead—
Her crowded sepulchres—unbounded spread—
At one wild instant open'd to the sight
With all their hideous secrets bared to light,
Might ne'er such awful fearful mysteries show
'Mongst all that lurks their lampless domes below!
That Under-World—discovered to the view
(As at the Judgement-hour—when graves burst through
Shall give their tenants up in countless throngs,
Men of all climes, and births, and stamps, and tongues)
Might ne'er a more o'erpow'ring sight present
Than would that World Unknown—if thus were rent
Its shrouding veils of gloom—dense, deep, and black,
And its dread curtains were e'en thus drawn back!
But Morning! not thy keenest brightest ray
Shall ever clear those covering clouds away—
Disperse those shadows—or display that scene.
For that a ray must shine—far, far more keen!
Far, far more keen, more dazzling, and more bright
Than any that compose thy crown of light.
Those hidden depths thou never canst illume,
Thou never canst pierce through those folds of gloom!
Alone the Almighty and All-Seeing Eye
Can dart through those dense shrouds of mystery!
And doubtless it is right—'tis doubtless well
That skill nor power should those thick shades dispel.
What spectacles of awe should we behold!
What unimagined scenes should be unrolled!
The old laurelled Wars by fervent Poets sung,
When kingly Chieftains mixed the Hosts among—
When marshalled Nations trampling trod the field,
And every breast with stern resolve was steeled,
When slaughtered victims pressed the ploughed up ground,
While clattering arms and thundering wheels rang round,
And the scythed chariots drove with deadly haste
Through those thinned ranks—by headlong ruin chased,
Those mighty Wars, that left on Earth's changed face
A terrible and sanguinary trace;
Depopulating Realms—at one fierce blow
(So copiously the crimson tides did flow
In their fast-swelling and unebbing stream,
Appalling Earth with a new Deluge-dream!)
Uprooting even whole Races of Mankind
Before their fearful shock—fierce, desperate, blind—
And in their hideous and unnatural sway
Heaven's bright Creation—in its fair array
Heaven's bright Creation—that hath proudly stood
Since Heaven approved—and blessed—and called it good!
Dark plunging as with mad and savage aim
(While fiery throes convulsed its startled frame)
Into a Chaos—gloomier than before,
All peace disturbed, all glory darkened o'er,
All Hármony deranged—all charm defaced—
All Energies destroyed—all forms displaced!
Those mighty Wars, so stormy and so dread,
Which black Destruction's gloom so widely spread.
With all their horrors, all their tumults dire,
(Such horrors as inspired the Homeric Lyre)
With all their dreadful sounds and ghastly sights,
Their barbarous revels and their murderous rites,
Were but as harmless sport—as infant's play
The pastime of a summer's holiday;
With those compared that darkly fiercely rage
In man's deep hidden heart—age after age,
Could the rapt bard from these withdraw the veil
And paint their truth—in terrible detail,
How would those wars, that shook the world of old
By lips and lyres inspired, so proudly told
In insignificance obscurely sink—
And fade, and vanish, and to nothing shrink.
Aye! could the Bard those fields of Battle sing,
And sound their terrors on his echoing string,
Their fiery struggles and tempestuous shocks—
Their deadly strife, (whose wrath all picturing mocks)
The laurelled Wars with all their fame of yore
Would wane—those dark unlaurelled Wars before!
Alas! those hideous conflicts—wild and deep—
That—storm-like through the inmost bosom—sweep;
Broil kindling broil—and feud engendering feud,
Still evermore with fiercer zeal renewed.
Alas! the ills that spring from those wild broils,
The waste—the blight—the ruins and the spoils;
The hopes obscured—the fair dreams overthrown,
The gloom—the desolation left alone.
Alas! the fearful wounds—the desperate scars,
Which they must bear who fight in those stern wars!
The heavy sufferance and the long despair,
Which oft—too oft, is their appointed share;
The aching weariness—the hollow void,
The aims defeated—and the bliss destroyed;
The unblazoned doom—the Untrophied Solitude,
The dark regrets, unbidden, that intrude!—
No deadly Conflicts may with these compare,
Save those which once, Heaven's glorious regions fair,
With uproar fierce and boundless fury shook,
When hostile arms the Apostate Angel took—
When wildly raged the accursed and rebel Host,
With haughty threat and with blaspheming boast,
Against the Embattelled Seraphim who rose,
In radiant league, to overthrow their fated foes;
While stormy Discord, with gigantic stride,
Made way through those bright courts and mansions wide—
And startling Clamour, with distracting sound,
Stirred fiercely all the Elysian Air around.
Those dark and dreadful wars can match alone
With the awful feuds to man's locked bosom known;
The stern and savage conflicts that take place
In that sealed span—a span out-sweeping Space!—
Where mighty Powers are met in stern array,
And struggle sore for Conquest and for Sway;
With deep and ardent aim—impelled—inspired,
With strong and strenuous purpose armed and fired—
Still battling step by step—and hour by hour,
Disputing inch by inch—Power ranged 'gainst Power—
Without cessation battling wildly on,
A field contested still—now lost—now won;
Now these confused and check'd, in doubt retreat—
Now once again the adverse forces meet;
Now those in turn seem scattered and subdued,
And hotly pressed, and hurryingly pursued,
While still fresh Legions to the Combat pour,
And but embroil the embroiled Confusion more—
Add to the tumult and the struggle aid,
And o'er the prospect cast a sterner shade,
Till wild disorder, wrath, and fevered strife,
Seem the conditions of this painful Life—
And in the bosom's torn and tortured core
Wake new and worse commotion evermore.
The impetuous passions and the imperious will,
Raise their unhallowed standard boldly still,
While myriad lesser instincts of the Soul
Flock round that standard as its folds unroll;
Allies by myriads, though of elfin size,
Yet full of might and fearful influence, rise,
And round the Banners of that Battle crowd;
Wrapped in a dense impenetrable cloud,
Surrounded by a close and guarded wall,
That hides from view those mystic conflicts all;
And it is well—of trouble and of care
Each hath enough in his own lot to bear,
Each hath his own ordained and ample share!
And dire and painful 'twere indeed to view
The fiery sufferings borne by others too.
Oh! if these mighty Wars resemble those
'Twixt Heaven's bright Seraphim and Heaven's foul foes,
Would that a farther likeness they might claim,
And evermore be found to end the same!—
Would that the dark and Evil Powers might fall,
And sink, and droop beneath a conquering thrall—
Would that the treacherous and rebellious Host
Might flee away—for ever crushed and lost!
And by the arms of Faith and Truth o'ercome,
For ever bend unto a hopeless doom!
But who shall rashly with presumption say
That here, where Evil hath so dire a sway,
Such glorious palmy triumphs oft befall,
Though helps divine be proffered unto all—
Too oft—too oft the impious hosts of Sin
Usurp the Empire and the Victory win!
Make theirs the Mastery—and the advantage gain,
And far and wide extend their fatal reign;
The brighter, purer, holier Powers expell,
And make the ruined Soul their lasting Hell,
For where these darkening dwell, where these remain,
There must be found a Hell of wrath and pain.

Great Nature's mighty jars, when dark and wild,
Dense thunder-clouds on thunder-clouds are piled,
Till frowns the Firmament—a solid night,
And forth the Giant tempest stalks in might;
When rave her hurricanes with headlong shocks,
And prone to Earth, the old trees, that stood like rocks
Through countless Winters, loudly-crashing fall,
And bear their blighted foliage for a pall;
When, fierce and high, her stern Volcanoes throw
Their flame-wrought banners, waving to and fro,
And light the World as to its ruin so!
When her triumphant Seas impetuous wake,
As o'er their stated bounds they sought to break,
And whelm all Nature in Destruction dire,
While sweep their bellowing Surges high and higher;
When in the terrors of their licensed hour,
Her swallowing Earthquakes tumble town and tower,
And change at once the outward face of things
With alteration such as time scarce brings
Great Nature's mighty jars, though stern and dread—
And though around a chilling awe they spread,
Are but as dim-drawn traceries, faint and slight,
Of those that in the fury of their might,
In man's dark viewless bosom fiercely rage
Through lapse of seasons, and through every age.
Yea! they are but feeble shadowings forth, and frail
Of those that there, distractingly prevail!
There—Hurricanes of more o'erpowering wing
To instantaneous life impetuous spring;
There Tempests of more dire and dangerous force
Sweep all before them in their lawless course;
And yet more terrible Volcanoes glow,
And scatter round them Wrath and wasting Woe;
And wilder Surges darkly swell on high,
And roll in threatening gloom thick-thundering by—
Nor might the mountain-rocking Earthquake spread
A fierce confusion half so deep or dread
As do the fiery Passion heart-quakes there,
That swallow all things in a stern despair.
Oh! let the Veil—unriven—unraised remain,
And spare the Vision—that were sad—and vain!
If the clear promptings of our own deep hearts
Can teach us not to act our human parts,
Then neither would the hearts of others, shown
(With all their mysteries—all their dreams—made known)
Suffice to lead us on our Earthly way,
Or prompt the parts that we through Life should play!
No! we should study closely evermore
The secrets of our own sealed bosom's core—
We have the Teacher and the Prophets there—
Would we but mark them with assiduous care,
And brood above their lessons day by day,
Nor turn with thoughtless disrespect away—
Then let the unlifted curtain, dark and deep,
'Twixt us and others' hidden Spirits sweep.

Morning! thou lovely and thou radiant Time,
Fairer than ev'n thyself, in this fair Clime!
Thou'rt still the sweetest portion of our day,
Howe'er the rest may shine with cloudless ray!
Deep sultry Noon may passionately glow,
And golden glories o'er all Nature throw,
And burning Sunset flush the Earth and Sky
With one supreme and dazzling crimson dye,
What time that Sun puts all his splendours on,
As though his Empire then were newly won!—
And dwells surrounded—conscious and elate—
With all his gorgeous Royalties—and State!
Morning thou still art—sweetest, fairest, best—
Heaven's whisp'ring Messenger—Earth's welcomed guest!
And oh! how lovely in this loveliest Land,
Where thou bring'st hoards of treasure in thy hand—
And sowest the common ground—the common air,
With diamond wealth and pearly riches rare—
Where each Elysian spot—each flowery place,
Breathes back new Beauty on thy beauteous Face!