University of Virginia Library

Hear, O thou Shepherd of the people's souls—
Hear, O true angels, if when not as gods
But as most needful ministers and helps
To lead us upward, it be well to link
Your lesser names with His—hear, O serene
Good influences, curiously inwrought
Into the complex world, whether in kind
Ye manly be and chivalrous and strong,
Or, being feminine, are soft and pure
And beautiful in weakness—hear and save!
For unto us some sudden strange eclipse
Hath blotted the clear heavens, and all stars
Forget to comfort, which we knew before.

What! in the very inmost neighbourhood
And chiefest intercourse of things most fair,—
At such a time when Nature in the blaze
Of Art's adorning triumphs as a queen,—
When nightly splendours, not of moon or star
Crown her white brow harmoniously and aid
Her native orbs to shine,—when the full scene
And the odorous airs with fertile breath do rear
Out of our sleek serenity of soul
Quick blossomings of delight, and the wide zone
Of spirit that lies along the edge of sense
Is fed with sunshine—gorged with brilliancies
Of motive light, and bashful colours rare,
All intermellowing, as the peasant's cheek
Feels her rich blushes melting thro' the bronze,—
And crowded touches, swift, innumerous,
Of elegant lithe forms, which pass not by
Without stray showers of lispings undertoned
Shed on our sweeten'd ears,—and cataracts
And daring bursts of music large and clear,
Bubbling cool shocks thro' our chill'd quivering hearts
Like waters of the morning,—fed with these;
Nor this alone, but the inner sensitive core
Of intimate Being finds its proper food,
And choosing some more calm delicious face
Moves with her thro' the music and the throng
Link'd in no profitless companionship,
But, crunching bravely the ineffectual briars
Of sere convention, treads itself a smooth
Walk of intelligent converse, and aspires
On tiptoe towards her, grasping eagerly
The ripe o'erhanging fruitage of her soul:—

O love, O purity, O high delights
Of our high nature! Was it not most foul,
Moving from joys and benefits like these,
To light on comrades crown'd with the new crown
Of manhood like as we—vaunting themselves
True knights of courtesy and of gentillesse,—
In whose unworthy arms linger'd e'en yet
The warmth and throbbing of a circled heart
And that a woman's,—to see men like these
Stagger upon the threshold, soak'd in sin
Which e'en the meanest reasonable boor
Beholds with scorn; to see them all unrobe
Their traitorous selves of that high atmosphere
Serene, to plunge and sputter greedily down
Thro' rank and oily mists and fiery breaths,
Likest themselves; and, having so befoul'd
The face of Beauty, from their loathly lips
With words of evil, blasphemous, obscene,
Wipe out the memory of all pure discourse,—
And thus—for whoso ravishes the one
Leaves not the other stainless—thus defile
Her sister Holiness: O that men knew
What very twins they are!

Then did I set
My rigid teeth, and muse in sore amaze
If this were but the native brutishness
Of single few intruders, whose disgrace
Suggests no secret law of ill, or if
'Twere not indeed the damnable result
Of erring rules; of intercourse forbid,
Or warp'd and check'd, with Woman; of the flow
Of our twin vials kept studiously apart,
Whose happy union wise would effervesce
In brilliant blessings over the parch'd world,
But which, alone or mixt with awkward skill,
Grow flat, stale, rancid—doing each his best
To infect the innocent air and make it meet
For fiendish throats to breathe in. Hear and judge,
O men of thought—and for the love of Heaven
Act on your true convictions!

How I joy'd
To feel immaculate and hold those men
In hate and scorn,—till vile discoveries
Throng'd into me like ghosts, and throve and spread
The virulent degradation till my soul
Bow'd from her upright posture, and I grew
To loathe the sense of life and thro' white lips
To think and murmur “O strong agony
And bitter bitter ruin of all hopes
That told us we were gods, and that the world,
And all her broods, was excellent and fair!”

Yea, it was true: we are Promethean gods,
Warm-blooded, full of large humanities,
And loving kindness as the law of life;
And to our souls the very noblest Heaven
Approves itself a mother; but below,
How are we spoil'd and centaur'd utterly
To something less than Man! Nor this alone,
But that small ceaseless devil at the core
Thrills fierce distress thro' all the brutish half,
And up into the godlike. O that thus
The secret of our nature should ooze out,—
That in soft glossy shadows of the hills
The loathsome ore should lie, and with rude lumps
Break the smooth current of sequester'd streams,
And streak with odious veins the hoar serene
Of most majestic mountains! O that thus
Out of the damps that sicken at its base
All toothless chuckling hags should soar at will
Up to the crowning peaks o' the soul, and there
Encamp at ease—lean mothers of despair!

Hush—thou hast heard that never out of thee
Thy stains depart, nor shalt thou wholly snatch
The precious from the vile, nor skim the tares
From off the whitening billows of the corn,
Until the harvest. Let the harvest come!