A Midsummer Day's Dream :: :: University of Virginia Library

A Midsummer Day's Dream

A Poem. By Edwin Atherstone

Atherstone, Edwin (1788-1872)

[section]

A MIDSUMMER DAY'S DREAM.

[prologue]

THE DREAM.

DREAM CONTINUED.

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A MIDSUMMER DAY'S DREAM.

A POEM.

“When Reason sleeps,
Oft in her absence mimic Fancy wakes
To imitate her; but, misjoining shapes,
Wild work produces oft, and most in dreams.”
Milton.

It was the morning of the merry day
Of Midsummer;—the sun was not yet up,
But the blithe larks were looking out for him;
The swallows twitter'd on the cottage thatch;
The cocks in neighbouring farm-yards clapp'd their wings,
Answering each other's challenge.

All the night
I had not slept. The casement, open'd wide,
Let in the pleasant night air; and the sound
Of softest waves that linger'd on the beach,
Washing the sands so gently, 'twas more like

The slow and quiet breath of one who slumbers,
Than the strong voice of the great deep. And still,
As I look'd out upon the night, the sea
Was flat and motionless as glass; and throng'd
With bright stars, as it were another sky.
A ship lay on the dark and smooth expanse,
Still as a rock.—There was no ripple seen,
No gentlest swell;—yet, ever and anon,
The slow, soft pulse of ocean heavily
Threw on the beach a sleepy wave;—then sank
To rest again. The dark, dim, lofty cliffs
Hung o'er the deep like drowsy sentinels.
All nature was in gentle sleep;—but I
Wish'd not to sleep. The air was fresh and pure,
Yet of luxurious warmth; and luscious scents
From the new hay, and fields of flowering beans,
Borne on the slow wings of the unfelt wind;
And woodbines from the cottage porch beneath,
And wall-flowers, whose dark heads were bent with dew,

Floated with sweetest interchange.

It seem'd
Ingratitude to all beneficent nature
To shut out such delicious sights, and sounds,
And smells, and wrap my senses in dull sleep;—
So at my window I had sat all night,
Silently revelling in that pure bliss.

But, when the sounds of day-break came, I rose
To climb the loftiest cliff, and watch from thence
The glorious God of light and heat spring up
From the blue deep to ride his highest course
Along the heavens; resolved this joyful day
To track him from his rising to his fall.
This day, said I, I will forget the world,
Its cares, and guilt, and passions, and will live
In sunshine and in beauty. So I went
Through fields and green-bank'd lanes, where the spring flowers
Live on till summer; now enveloped quite

With hedges over-arching, whose low roof
And sides, as with a thousand tiny fingers,
Had from the passing hay-cart pluck'd away
Its fragrant burthen: catching now through gap
Or uncouth gate a glimpse of some far vale,
Steep'd in the grey mist;—now of some bold cliff
Standing alone, with nought but the blue sky
Behind it:—now of the dim quiet sea.

Soon I began with eager foot to climb
The high cliff, from whose top I might behold
The glorious spectacle. The short soft grass
Had caught a plenteous dew: the mountain herbs
Repaid my rude tread with sweet fragrance: long
The ascent and steep; and often did I pause
To breathe and look around on the rich vales
And swelling hills, each moment brightening.
Thus with alternate toil and rest I climb'd
To the high summit, then walk'd gently on,
Till by the cliff's precipitous edge I stood.

O, then what glories burst upon my sight!
The interminable ocean lay beneath
At depth immense;—not quiet as before,
For a faint breath of air, ev'n at the height
On which I stood scarce felt, play'd over it,
Waking innumerous dimples on its face,
As though 'twere conscious of the splendid guest,
That ev'n then touch'd the threshold of heaven's gates,
And smiled to bid him welcome. Far away
To either hand the broad, curved beach stretch'd on;
And I could see the slow-paced waves advance
One after one, and spread upon the sands,
Making a slender edge of pearly foam
Just as they broke;—then softly falling back,
Noiseless to me on that tall head of rock,
As it had been a picture, or descried
Through optic tube leagues off.

A tender mist
Was round th' horizon, and along the vales;
But the hill tops stood in a crystal air;

The cope of heaven was clear and deeply blue,
And not a cloud was visible. Towards the east
An atmosphere of golden light, that grew
Momently brighter, and intensely bright,
Proclaim'd the approaching sun. Now—now he comes:—
A dazzling point emerges from the sea;
It spreads;—it rises:—now it seems a dome
Of burning gold:—higher and rounder now
It mounts—it swells:—now like a huge balloon.
Of light and fire, it rests upon the rim
Of waters; lingers there a moment;—then—
Soars up.—

Exulting I stretch'd forth my arms,
And hail'd the king of summer. Every hill
Put on a face of gladness; every tree
Shook his green leaves in joy: the meadows laugh'd;
The deep glen, where it caught the amber beams,
Began to draw its misty vale aside,
And smile and glisten through its pearly tear

The birds struck up their chorus; the young lambs
Scour'd over hill and meadow;—all that lived
Look'd like a new creation, over-fill'd
With health and joy; nay, ev'n the inanimate earth
Seem'd coming into life.

But glorious far
Beyond all else the mighty God of light
Mounting the crystal firmament: no eye
May look upon his overwhelming pomp:
Power and majesty attend his steps;
Ocean and earth adoring gaze on him:—
In lone magnificence he takes his way
Through the bright solitude of heaven.

The sea
Was clear and purely blue, save the broad path
Where the sunbeams danc'd on the heaving billows,
That seem'd a high-road, paved with atom suns,
Where, on celestial errands, to and fro,
'Tween heaven and earth might gods or angels walk.

Here, drinking in with rapture every sight,
And sound, and odorous smell, from point to point
Of precipice or rock I walk'd;—now look'd
At the white, dazzling cliffs that stood out clear
And sharp-edged in that bright light, tinted o'er
With shrubs and flowers;—now towards some distant village,
With its white cottages and simple church
Half hid in trees:—now on some peak or mount
Tip-toe I stood, catching with eager sense
The faint sweet perfume of a neighbouring hill,
From base to summit all emblazon'd thick
With golden gorse flowers: now upon the brink
Of the steep cliff I stood, and look'd below,
Where lay gigantic ruins, rock on rock
Up-piled in mimickry of wall and spire;
Till, dizzy with contemplating that depth,
I almost long'd to start and plunge below.
Now looking forth I saw the playful salmon
Leaping from out the waves; the mackerel shoals

Ruffling the surface; or the unwieldy porpus
Throwing his huge bulk high from out the waters
That, as he fell, recoil'd, and flash'd, and rock'd
In trembling widening circles. Here and there
The various sea-fowl floated smoothly on,
Or dived at times to snatch their prey. And now
The fishermen upon a distant beach
Were launching their dark boats. Some, just push'd off,
Went gliding on like swans: sail after sail
Rising to catch the scarcely-breathing wind:
Some they were dragging down the shelving sands
With measured pull: their hoarse and long-drawn shouts
Came faintly up the steep. Now on the waves
The prow is lifted: now the sailors leap
Hastily in,—save one, who at the stern
Stands yet a moment, with his utmost force
To give the last strong push that makes the keel
Slide from the grating sands:—he too leaps in:

The oars are snatch'd,—they flash into the water:—
The white sails one by one are spread,—and now
Slowly and steadily they steal along.

Soon from a dale below I heard the sound
Of cheerful voices, and the whetted scythe.
O! many a merry joke there seem'd to pass,
For they laugh'd out right heartily and long;
Then bent them to their task; and all was still,
Save the scythe's measured hiss; and, oft between,
The sharp, clear ringing of the whetted blade,
Much interrupted for some pleasant word,
Or side-convulsing laugh, and many a call
To milkmaid tripping by, and piping loud
Some merry tune to some disastrous lay:—
A sweeter music in the early morn,
Than stirs the haggard dancer's jaded limbs,
In the unhealthful ball-room, to try yet
One dear, delightful, toilsome pleasure more.

This day, said I, no roof shall cover me
But that majestic vault of heaven: no couch,
No table shall be mine, but the green earth:
In those fields will I take my simple food,
And look abroad, and see continually
The glorious aspects of rejoicing nature,
And feel her unalloyed presence. Then
Down to the vale I went, and, as I hoped,
Met hearty welcome. Frothing milk, just drawn,
And savoury brown-bread were my morning meal.
That done, awhile I bask'd amid the hay;
Suck'd from the clover-flowers the honey; traced
The shining-coated insects in the grass
Threading their beautiful labyrinth; or the bee
Eagerly rifling the fallen flowers, to catch
Their fragrance ere the hot sun drink it up;
Listen'd the little chorus of the gnats,
And flies innumerous wheeling round and round
In the warm sunbeam. Now, stretch'd out at length,
I watch'd the many-colour'd birds that sail'd

With various flight in the ethereal air:
The lark with quivering wing mounting aloft
Till my strain'd eye had lost him; though even then
His ceaseless song came down, mellow'd and fine,
And fainter, and yet fainter, till it died:
The swallow darting to and fro: the hawk,
Round, and yet round, with slow and wary course
Gliding; or hanging like a cloudy speck,—
Or sinking slow with gently tremulous wing,—
Or like an arrow rapidly darting down.
The linnet, and the red-breast, and the thrush,
The goldfinch, and the little wren, all birds
That sing and frolic in the sun were there.
I mark'd their differing motions; listen'd oft
To their dissimilar songs, all sung at once,
Yet without discord. Sometimes far above
The heron flew with long, slow-flapping wings;
Sometimes the cooing wood-pigeon came near;
The crow, and sea-gull with his plaintive cry.

Thus long I lay 'mid all delightful sights,
All lovely sounds: the sun and shade-tinged fields;
The gently quivering leaves; the flower-fill'd hedges;
The hills and vales; the blue immense of sky;
The songs of birds; the softly whispering wind,
As it brush'd lightly o'er the bowing grass;
The far off sighings of the languid waves
Fainting away on the warm sands; the scent
Of the new hay, of clover, and sweet herbs,—
Wild roses, honeysuckles, eglantines,
All breathing out their sweet souls to the sun.

Unsatiated with these, yet wishing still
To taste that day all nature's luxuries,
I left those pleasant meadows, and went down
To bathe me in the bright and tempting waves,—
My daily wont from earliest morn of spring
Till lingering autumn's last.

O! ye who go
Surcharged with meat and wine, to a hot bed,

At midnight, or perchance at early morn;
Lie in a gross and apoplectic sleep
Till the bright sun hath journey'd half the sky;
Then rise with trembling limbs and heavy head,
To talk of “shatter'd nerves” and “wretched health;”
To pour down drugs into your palled stomachs,—
Ask the grave doctor's counsel, and bemoan
Your sickly frames;—would you indeed be heal'd,
There's a physician who exacts no fee,
Who gives no nauseous drugs, and who still warns
And counsels you; but ye attend her not.
'Tis Nature! she prescribes you temperance
And exercise. Have ye indulged in foods
Or slothfulness? she visits you with pain
Or sickness. Have your meals been simple, few,—
Not eaten to delight a pamper'd palate,
But satiate hunger earn'd by exercise
In the pure air?—why then she gives you strength,—
A clear and active mind,—a spirit free
As school-boy's on a holiday,—a foot

Ready to start for far-off hill or dale;
For walk by hushing moonlight, or beneath
The brilliant, burning noon-tide sun; a feat
To overpower the feeble-footed sluggard,
Or bloated epicure. If ye love not
Your indigestions and your bilious aches,—
Up, sluggard, and gross feeder, with the sun;
Or in the morning's prime, while yet the dews
Jewel the meadows:—to the brook repair,
Or the sea-side; plunge boldly in, for health
Is there, like gold within the mine; but both
Lie underneath the surface. Then set forth
With brisk tread for the fields, or up the rocks;
No languid lady's saunter, often check'd
That she may breathe, and rest her delicate limbs,
Tired with some half mile's journey; but with step
Rapid and unabating, till the heart
Sends the warm life-stream dancing through the veins;
Flushing the cheek, and brightening up the eye.

Then for a simple, but a hearty meal,
Grateful, thus earn'd, and wholesome:—next with books,
Or friends, an hour or two; then exercise
Again, and plain repast:—thus through the day;
And let night find you early at your rest,
Unheated by full meals, or beds of down:—
So shall pure slumbers visit you; and health,
And buoyant spirits, wake with you at morn.

As I approach'd the hot and steaming beach,
The waves, that from the cliff's top had appear'd
Small as the circles on a quiet pond
Made by a dipping fly, were now of strength
To make an anchor'd boat rock to and fro
With slow, full swing: the pleasanter to him
Who loves to dally with them, and to ride
Their swelling backs. There is a luxury
That city feasters, and room-keeping souls,
And those that shiver if a breath of air

Thread their close folded garments, cannot know;
When on a summer's day, morn, noon, or eve,
The bather stands retired beside clear stream,
Or ever-whispering beach, and, one by one,
Throws off his heating garments, stopping oft
To cool, and watch the swelling waves, or stream
Crisping and sparkling; till, the last thin screen
Cast by, he stands an instant, free as first
Adam, ere sin brought shame; then he looks down
A moment on the enticing waters; longs
To leap, yet almost wishes to delay
The certain joy;—now a few steps retires;—
Draws one full breath;—bounds lightly on, and springs.

Then for the plunge—the sinking down—the boom
Of waters closing o'er his head—the rise
To air and light again—the quick rebound
Of the dash'd waves;—and then the outstretch'd limbs,

Easily poising him, or oaring on,
As fancy wills:—now motionless he floats,
With arms thrown back, and swelling chest, and eyes
Gazing awhile upon the glorious sky,—
A double pleasure;—now with quick stroke turns;
On this side, and on that, cuts smoothly on;—
Now prone, and now supine:—with head erect
He treads the waters now as on the land;
Now plunges down, and dives along beneath
The waves, that tell not of his track below;
Anon emerges at some distant spot
To take fresh breath, and wanton o'er and o'er,
Till, satiate and cool, he comes at last
Dripping and glistening to the shore or bank.

How different then his healthy glow from heat
Of a late morning bed, or smoky fire
That dries the wholesome juices up, and stains
The once clear cheek like the Egyptian mummy;
Or the dry heat by wine, or ardent drinks,

Given to the cold, dull mass of diseas'd clay!
How different the warmth, when the pure blood
Dances away through vein and artery,
Driven by a healthy, natural impulse
From the free beating heart to every nerve!
From head to foot all is delicious glow;
The lungs breathe deep and clear; the eye is bright;
The spirits bounding; every muscle braced
For toil or boisterous exercise: the mind
Sees not as through a fog, but through the clear,
Warm, painting sunshine: every object takes
A renew'd beauty: hill, and vale, and flower,
Green, shady lane, and twilight wood at noon;
Close bower for study, or high mountain's top,
To look abroad upon the expanding earth,
With soul expanding also,—lake and river,
And ocean with its ever-varying face,
And the magnificent vaulted roof of Heaven;—
All take renew'd and intense loveliness,
Such as in life's first years they had, when all

We saw or felt was joyous, all to come
Was bright and happy.—

What the bather feels
In his most favour'd hours of luxury,
Was mine that morning.—

Satisfied at length,
I left the pleasant pastime, and return'd,
Refresh'd and light, to the cliff's highest top.
Thence I look'd out again with new delight
On the unbounded glittering sea. White sails
On every side were bellying to the breeze:
Like spirits of the element, they went
On their smooth, noiseless way, gliding. Sea-fowl
Were wafting on the water's very face,
Seeming to touch it; or, as if asleep,
Rested their soft breasts on the softer waves,
That breathed their lullaby. Beside the shore
Others walk'd stately, pausing oft to pick
Amid the watery sands their food. The gulls

Couch'd in the crannies of the cliffs, or stood
Erect on rocky shelf, or jutting point,
Looking with mild eye and inclining head
Above, below, around; headforemost then
One plunges—then another—down the abyss,
Uttering sweet sounding cries that die away
As they descend; till, with long, curving sweep,
And nicely balancing wings, into the waves
They drop down gently.

Over the blue vault
Some delicate white clouds came slowly swimming,
And threw their gliding shadows on the deep,
Like fairy islands floating by a spell:
Nay, the bright sea itself, the rocks and sky,
Seem'd an enchanted vision,—beautiful,
And grand, and gorgeous more than common earth.

The sunbeams, now intolerably bright,
Glancing and quivering on the restless waves,
Seem'd there creating star-like suns as bright—

Created in a moment, and extinct:—
Myriads at once flash'd on the dazzled eye;
Myriads were quench'd at once, and myriads more
Blazed suddenly here—there—and every where.
Nought seem'd substantial in this intense light
But light itself: the wide expanse of earth,
And wider ocean, seem'd unweighty things,
Buoy'd on another ocean circumfused
Of dense light;—nay, the very dome of heaven
Seem'd floating like an ark on that bright flood.
The hill tops, and the surface of the plains,
And dim horizon's outline, waved and trembled
Beneath the hot rays like a rippling stream.

It was the hour of noon: the God of day
Stood on the summer's pinnacle; from thence
With each succeeding morning to descend
Till he sink down in winter's lowest vale:
For ever changing, yet, to healthy minds,
Bringing with every change a new delight.

Such love the summer's brilliant morn, hot noon,
And balmy evening, and perfumed night;
They love beginning autumn, with its fruits
And golden harvest fields;—they love its fall,
Its chilly evenings, and its dropping leaves,
Bringing soft melancholy thoughts;—they love
The winter's cheerful fire-side eve, its bright,
And crisp, and spangled fields in morning frost;
Its silent-dropping snows, its pelting showers,
The mighty roaring of its tempests, heard
At midnight, waking from a gentle sleep,
Glad to be so awaked; for solemn thoughts,
And pleasing awe, come then upon the soul.
And infant spring they love; its delicate flowers,
Its tender springing grass, and swelling buds,
Its soft rains, and its flitting clouds, and glints
Of joyous sunshine.

But of all most sweet
That lovely time when spring and summer meet,

Delightful May, and the young days of June;
When all the bloom and freshness of the spring
Meet all the summer's bright voluptuousness,
Forming a climate such as in the fields
Of unpolluted Eden.

O! to breathe
The nectar'd air of a clear morn in May,
Treading the gorgeous meadows; or to sit
In blissful meditation, drinking deep
The warm, rich incense of a night in June,
Is earth's least earthly joy!

And such a night
Is even now. The sun an hour ago
Went down without a cloud; and, sinking, saw
His gentle partner in the eastern heaven,
Rising with radiant brow: and now she pours
Her golden light on the thick-foliaged trees,
And brightens the far hills that girdle round

This most enchanting valley . A light mist,
So light 'tis almost viewless, gathers o'er
Those meadows, crowded with spring flowers: I hear
A hundred nightingales, remote and nigh.
How beautiful!—here, in a poplar bower,
Entwined thick with jessamine and rose,
Clymatis, and the sweet-breath'd honeysuckle,
I sit alone in a luxurious gloom;
And close above my head one joyous bird
Pours fearlessly a loud triumphant song;
And, as he pauses, far away I hear
Unnumber'd delicate answerings, jocund trills,
And low, soft breathings; and the swell and fall
Of gently-talking waters. O! this hour
Is worth a thousand days in gaudy courts,
Or noisy cities.

Every season thus
Hath for the healthy mind its proper charm;

But to the soul diseased by avarice,
Worthless ambition, cankering envy, guilt,
Or fashion's paltry follies, nature shows
No beauties. If the splendid July sun
Burn in the cloudless heaven,—why—then they wear
Cool dresses:—if a fragrant May-shower fall,
They know 'tis well to carry their silk screen,
Lest they be wetted:—does the thunder lift
His awful voice?—they stir not then abroad,
For lightning sometimes kills:—is the night dark,
And still, and solemn?—'tis to them a sign
That lanterns will be needed:—does the wind
Rock the strong trees, and battle in the sky,
Rolling the ponderous clouds, and making shake
Houses to their foundations?—then they fear
Chimneys may fall, or ships be wreck'd, and goods
Go to the bottom.

O, unhappy men!—
Ye drain the lees, and smack your lips; then scoff,
Or, may be, pity him who quaffs the wine:—

Ye rake the kennels for the glittering earth,
Deeming yourselves wise, prudent, thriving men;
And marvel such should be who love sweet air,
And rambles on the hills, and by the brooks,
And beds on the new hay. What, if the fields
Are studded, thick as stars on frosty night,
With violets, primroses, daffodils,
Gold-cups, or sweetest cowslips,—what is this
To you? will't raise the price of stocks? invent
Some gaudy fashion? make your mortgage safe?—
Will't blast some envied rival's fame, or keep
Your victim in your clutches?—No.—What then
Can these import to you?—Ye see them not,
For ye haunt noisy streets, or factories,
Markets, guildhalls, heated assembly rooms,
Or Babel-like exchanges:—if ye tread
The spangled fields, most likely 'tis to slay
The innocent birds, or hunt the timid hare,—
And that is sport:—the diamond-studded grass

But wets your shoes; and all that gorgeous show
Of flowers you say is not good food for cattle!—

Mistaken men!—too prudent to be wise;
Too thriving to be rich in real wealth;
Too fond of heartless levities to be gay;
Consent to throw your gravity aside,
Your ledgers, and your idle fopperies
Awhile each day:—get out into the air,
And smell the flowers, and climb upon the hills:—
Take books into the woods, and leave your guns;
The birds will give you music, and the leaves
Will whisper wisdom to you:—sit you down
On the sweet grass, or on some bending branch,
And watch the twinkling crystal of the brook,
Where the sun pierces the o'erhanging boughs:—
Look at the silvery glitter of the fish,
That dart, and flash, or rest their elegant shapes
With outspread, poising fins, floating asleep

In some still, sunny pool:—but take not there
The cruel angle-rod:—they feel like you
Pain from the tearing steel; like you they love
To feed and play in their own element.
Do thus, and know, if your last testament
Give to your thankless heirs a thousand less,—
Or if your name at morning visitings,
Or evening gossip, be less mix'd with talk
Of the last fashion'd coat or gown, yet you
Will have been healthier, happier, better men.

It was the hour of noon: the God of day
Stood on the highest pinnacle of heaven,
Glorious, majestic, inexpressibly bright.
His torrid beams seem'd as they would dissolve
The solid earth, and drink the ocean up:
The herbs and flowers bow'd down their fainting heads;
The cattle lay asleep beneath the shade
Of drooping trees:—the distant rocks, and hills,
And fields, were cover'd with a shining mist;

The gossamer trail'd its lazy length along:
All sounds came through the hot, thick, steaming air,
Deaden'd and indistinct. It was an hour
Voluptuously to give up all the soul
To the intoxicating sense of life
Pervading the whole frame, whose every atom
Seem'd with a separate consciousness endow'd,
And drinking in delight.—To breathe, to look,
To move, were acts of pleasure; to lie still,
Feeling at every pore the sunny warmth,
And the rich breezes, like an odorous bath
Of softest, lightest waters, playing round
The happy limbs; or loitering in the hair;
Or in the echoing porches of the ear
Breathing a thousand gentle whisperings,
Or sighs most musical; or tiny laughings;
Or beautiful babblings, as of airy tongues
Heard from afar:—O, it was all delight!
And thus I lay on the soft, fragrant grass;
A purple heath-flower bush beneath my head;

The bright sun shining on me; far below
The languid billows to the silent air
Making faint moans. I gazed on the pure sky
With half-shut eyes awhile, travelling in thought
Th' infinitude of space, and had attain'd
To other worlds, and other suns and stars,
When suddenly a deep sleep fell upon me,
And thus I dream'd.

The Vale of Tone, Somerset.

THE DREAM.

Methought that, as I lay,
A shape of dazzling light stood over me;
His stature more than man's, but full of grace
And indescribable beauty. Gold-tinged locks,
That shone like sunbeams, round his temples curl'd,
And cluster'd in his neck; his ample brow
Was pure and open as the cloudless heaven;
His eye gazed on me with a bright, soft fire,
Like the first sun-tints on some mountain's peak
Seen from the vales below, ere day hath risen.

He seem'd not flesh like man, nor yet mere air;
But like some glorious thing of light create,
Rosy with morn's first blush. High majesty
He had; but therewith blended a divine
Softness, benignity, and gracefulness:
And, where he stood, I mark'd the slender grass,
That would have bent beneath an insect's weight,
Standing unbow'd, and freely vibrating
To every sighing breeze.

He spake at length:—
The tones were tender as the lightest pulse
Of that sweet harp touch'd by the delicate fingers
Of spirits of the air, yet had a power
Upon my soul like low-discoursing thunder
Heard in the still night: with that power a charm
Like woman's voice, when in the deep repose
Of summer's twilight she first owns her love.
I could not fear, for 'twas not terrible;
I could not love, for it was too majestic;

But I could deeply, fervently admire,
And bow my spirit down as when I gaze
At midnight on the unfathomable deep
Of ether, spangled with its myriad fires.
Thus the melodious-voiced one spake; and the air
Took fragrance from his rosy-tinted lips.

“Thou art a son of earth, and earthly eyes
See nought but what is earthly. The fine shapes
Ethereal that people this fair world
And the vast universe, ye cannot see:
Ye can behold the rich vermilion clouds
Of morning and of eve, but cannot view
The beautiful spirits that therein reside,
And make them beautiful. Ye can see the flowers,
Their shapes and colours, and your other sense
Perceives their odorous exhalations; but
The forms from your thick sight are hid, that mould
Their elegant fabric, paint their various hues,

And breathe into them perfume. When the wind
Wails through the gloomy forest, ye see not
The solemn spirit on the lonely hill
Making that mournful music. Ye can hear
The voice of thunders, thronging waves, and groans
Of earthquakes; but ye never could behold,
And live, the terrible and mighty powers
That work them.

“All the earth, the sea, the sky,
Have many such; your fellow planets too
That roll like yours round yon magnificent sun:—
He also hath ethereal ministers
That do his errands here and through all space,
Subjected to his influence. One of these
I am.

“To us, whose purer elements
Are all unfetter'd by gross matter, time
And space are nought, or almost nought; for we
Are not ethereal quite. That highest Spirit

Whom we name not, but, thinking of, bow down,—
That Highest One alone is spirit pure.
Yet farthest space by us is quicker spann'd
Than by man's quickest thought. Pass in your mind
Around the globe,—o'er seas and continents
Speed with a glance,—yet our fleet essences
Shall reach the goal before you.

“When, o'ercome
By the hot blaze of day, and lull'd by sounds
Of drowsy earth and waves, you laid you down
To rest on this soft bank, even then was I
On the sun's orb, awaiting the command
To visit earth; for on this day we hold
A festival, and all the spirits that wait
Upon the summer, giving it its flowers,
And balmy airs, and dews, and rosy skies,
Pour this day all their treasures out, rejoicing;
Yet, ere your languid senses had sunk down
In slumber, I had shot athwart the fields

Of ether 'twixt yon sun and this your globe,—
A distance inconceivable by thought
Of man, though he hath number'd it in words
Pronounc'd as easily as if he took
The altitude of a mole-hill, but no more
Conceived thus than when he names infinity,
And thinks that measures it.

“The race of earth
Love beings moulded like themselves of earth:
Existences more subtile are too fine
For their gross sympathies. Th' ethereal race
Love also more peculiarly the things
Compounded like themselves, yet they disdain not
To hold at times communion with mankind;
Partly that with man's clay a spirit like theirs,
Though much inferior, is join'd, aspiring
Oft-times to noble speculations; partly
That higher natures look with pitying eye
On human weakness, and would aid the worm

To put on wings, and voyage through the air,
If its gross nature make it not prefer
To crawl the dirty ground.

“With some few men
Of highest intellect, and thereto join'd
The highest virtue, that enlarged love,
That makes them see in all the race of men
One family; that bids them gently judge
Their fellow's weakness, knowing that themselves
Are weak; that teaches pity even for guilt;
(For who can know how circumstance, or error,
Venial perhaps at first, hath led the wretch
Step after step, resisting, but compell'd?
For who can know how, in the course from fault
To crime, he hath endured agony,
Remorse, and shame?—how virtuous purposes
Have risen within him,—resolutions great
For future days, only to fall in turn,
As others fell, from force of outward thing

And strain the rack-wheel of remorse and shame
To more endureless torture?)—

—with such men
The spirits of the elements have oft
Commun'd, and giv'n to their frail sense a power
To see the beautiful and mighty workings
Of Nature, else invisible to man.
Such favour'd men their fellows reverence,
And call them great and godlike, and their names
Are glorious through long ages.

“But there are
Who, lacking the high mind, and knowing nought
But a warm love for nature's visible charms,
Have yet by some kind spirit been indulged
With glimpses of her hidden loveliness;
And therefore do I visit thee to show
Thy feeble, but admiring eyes the things
That are around thee; for th' ethereal shapes
That tend these cliffs and glens, and those pure waters,

Tell how from earliest morn, nay through the night,
Thou hast been giving up thy soul to feel
Nature's divine delights on this bright day,
The brightest of the year. Now, up! and look
With a new sight about thee.”

At these words
Methought I started up and saw—Oh heavens!
What words can tell the infinite delight
Of that fine vision! All the hills and vales
Teem'd with celestial shapes: the skies and waters
Were throng'd with them. Some rode upon the sea,
And, where they touch'd, the waves grew suddenly bright,
And crisp'd and danced. Some skimm'd along its face,
With graceful windings bending here and there;
Now slow and languidly,—now shooting out
Right o'er the deep to the horizon's edge,
Diminish'd in an instant to a point,
Yet to my strengthen'd sight still visible.
There, on that delicate line where sea and sky

Seem blending, I could trace their mazy flight
Like atoms in the sunbeam; and anon,
Ere I could speak, again they rode the waves
Close to the shore. Thousands along the sky
In all directions flew, yet without wings,
As if the will alone impell'd them on.
Some gently sail'd along on the mid air;
And if they pass'd at times a thin white cloud,
It would expand, and take a rosy tint,
Like a pale virgin's blush. Some from the sea
Sprang up at once with perpendicular flight
Into the heavens, and there, no more to view
Than the small insects floating in the air
On summer's evening after rain, they flew
In mazy windings; then again glanced down
In straight or curved track; or took sometimes
A flight still upward, and dissolved at once
In the infinite distance.

Here in groups they sport,
Pursuing and pursued; or, forming rings,

They tread the air in merry dance, and still
Fly as they tread,—now sideways, now aloft,
Now down, and up again; and some I saw
Seated on ruby clouds, that gave them music—
As seem'd—from glittering harps, though yet my ear,
Ungifted, heard it not:—and then again,
As I look'd on the hills, the woods, the vales,
The same bright forms were there,—not all alike
In size and hue: some were of infant stature,
With rosy cheek, and ever-laughing eye;
These chiefly sported on the flowery banks,
And brush'd along the tops of the tall grass,
That sway'd and sparkled where they flew. Some were
Like virgins in the blossom of their youth,
Of inexpressible loveliness: these lay
In the rich vales, beneath the shade of trees,
Or floated at their ease along the meadows,
Couch'd on the air: where'er they moved, the flowers
Bow'd down their tender heads, all—faint with bliss

'Neath that luxurious presence. Others wound
Among the woods, their bright shapes gleaming through
The thick shade, and upon the quivering leaves
Casting by fits a sunny glow. But some,
Of noblest form and height, were of the hues
Of those most gorgeous clouds that shrine the sun
At morn or eve, and of each delicate tint
Blended between them. These along the sky
Moved chiefly,—glorious shapes of fire!—lighting
The heavens where'er they flew, and casting down
Upon the hills and waves all radiant hues.

“Those whom thy pleas'd eye tracks along the air,”
My mild instructor said, “are such as I,
Dwellers within the sun: they are come down
On this bright holiday to give to earth
Increased splendour, suited to the time
When their great ruler comes in all his pomp
To mount his summer's throne.

“But, not to tell
The mysteries of their several agencies,—
Too deep for thee, if told, to comprehend,—
I show these beautiful visions, but that thou
May'st truly know how lovely Nature is.
Yet thou hast only seen; but there are sounds,
That earthly ears hear not, as beautiful
As these fine sights,—these also thou shalt know.
Thine ears are open'd: hear ethereal music.”

As when a man who from his birth has lived
In blindness, knowing not the glorious forms
And hues of nature, powerless to conceive
The immensity of ocean, the bright sun,
And the majestic arch of heaven, its blaze
At noon, or deep repose at night, when all
The stars are twinkling silently and clear;—
As when, by skilful hand the darkening spots
Remov'd, he first looks forth and feels the rush
Of beauty on his soul from the green earth,

The many-colour'd flowers, the rolling sea,
The mazy landscape, towering hills and vales,
Rivers and woods, and human form divine,
And the all-embracing firmament of heaven,—
Then knowing first what blindness is;—even so
On me, when that bright spirit ceased, there came
A new and overwhelming sense: it seem'd
As if the earth, and air, and heavens were made
Only for music; for above, below,
Around, all breathed forth harmony. The waves
Sent up with every swell a joyful voice,
Rolling about in multitudinous chorus:
From the rich vales and glens delicious sounds
Arose like exhalations; the hill tops
Chanted aloud in the clear air; from trees,
And herbs, and flow'rs, and the slow-waving grass.
Innumerous and perpetual melodies
Floated about like perfume on the air:
The winds were nought but music; every cloud
As it sail'd o'er sent a soft song to earth;

The murmuring of the sea-shore was a hymn
Sung by sweet voices; every chafed pebble
Rang with a crystal tinkling as it roll'd;
The thin noon mist rose with a gentle swell
Of music exquisitely faint and dim,
Like the first doubtful tint of morning light
On the pure ether, when the watching shepherd
Looks towards the eastern heaven, and asks himself
“Is that the daybreak?” All the air and sky
O'erflow'd with whispering melodies; each breeze
Seem'd like a concert of sweet instruments
Struck by invisible hands that hurried by.

Then, too, of all those fine ethereal shapes
I heard the ecstatic voices, and the harps
Struck by the cloud-throned spirits to the tread
Of jocund dancers in the sky, though they
Needed not such, for every moving limb
Made its own music, and their voices kept
Perpetual song.

Thus could I with delight
Have look'd and listen'd, with still craving eye
And ear, for ever feasting,—never full,—
For months, for years; but now the gentle spirit
That show'd me these began, and to his voice
My pleased ear turn'd.

“But a small space of earth
Thou hast beheld; yet, in whatever part
'Tis now high summer, the same lovely forms
Keep festival. But we will hence, and thou
Shalt go to the deep waters, and shalt see
What thou unharm'd canst see: the depths of earth
Thou also shalt behold. But I must change
Thy mortal clay, and give thee for awhile
A shape of airy fabric, that thou may'st
Descend into the heart of sea and earth,
Or dart across the firmament, or up
Through boundless space.”

Even as he spake I felt
My flesh dissolving, as a water drop

Turns in the hot sun to invisible air.
Oh! what ineffable bliss methought it was
To live uncumber'd thus by clay; to have
Keen love for all that's grand and beautiful
In this sublime creation, and a power
To see and know it all; to be at once
Where thought is; in the inmost heart of earth,
Or in the deep seas, or the crystal skies,
Or in new worlds and suns. But thus again
The ethereal nature spake.

“The tenement
Of earth wherein thy spirit dwells is now
Sublimed like ours to a thin essence, less
In power and beauty, as before it was,
But gifted like our own to fly through space,
To pierce the solid, to endure the breath
Of polar winter, or the fiercest rage
Of fire, unharm'd. The elements have now
No influence upon thee: the soft breeze
Passes, and feels no stop where thou art. Look!

Thy substance casts no shadow on the ground;
The sunbeams through thee go as through the air;
Yet dost thou see, and hear, and think, and move,
Though with no mortal organs. But, away!
I see thee all impatient to put forth
Thy new-conferred powers: give me thy hand.”

This said, he sprang up with me high in air,
And in an instant all the spacious view
That I had gazed on, wondering,—hills, and rocks,
And far-stretch'd plains, and the expanse of sea,—
Look'd like a little plot of garden ground
Standing within a lake. Had I retain'd
Mere mortal sight, our speed had blinded me;
Nor can I tell but with slow course of words
What in the doing fill'd no smallest point
Of time. A thousand leagues of land and sea
Were spread below us; and before the eye
Could on the smallest map have traversed
From Africa to Spain—lo! we had flown

Sheer over seas and islands, and vast fields
Of ever-during frost; and stood at last
Upon the summit of a mountain, high
As Etna on Olympus, bright and clear
As crystal.

The immense expanse of view
Show'd nought but icy mountains, strangely heap'd;
Rugged and sharp, and of all wildest shapes;
Beauteous in their disorder; brilliant
With all the bright and tender hues that flash,
And glow, and tremble in the diamond.

The sun, which we had left in highest heaven,
Now just above th' horizon stood, and threw
His level rays on the clear tinted heads
Of the crystal mountains, leaving the deep dells
Of never melted snow in a soft dark.
There was intensest silence; not a breath
Of air; no life; no motion visible:
The cloudless sky was infinitely pure;

And, farthest from the sun, I could discern
The struggling sparkle of some brilliant stars,
That shone in spite of day.

“Now thou hast known,”
My radiant guide began, “how spirits pass
Through space. An instant back we left the shore
Of southern Britain, with the sun in midst
Of heaven; and now we stand upon the peak
Of the North Pole, and the slow moving sun
Hath, like a falling meteor, sunk behind us,
Down to th' horizon. Here, through half the year,
He never sets; but round and round the sky
Glides like a watching guard; then, when he sinks,
Again through half the year he rises not;
And night continual, and terrific tempests,
Hang o'er this region now so beautiful,
So bright and tranquil.

“Thou hast heard the sound
Of rushing storms, and seen the ocean shook,—
Its billows dash'd above the brim, as 'twere

Some petty bowl o'erfill'd, that thy least touch
Would make o'erwash its edge:—thou hast beheld
The pines bow'd down, and the unbending oak
Dragg'd, crashing, from his socket; the vast forests
Leaning and swinging round, as their strong trunks
Were stubble only:—thou hast heard them groan,
And crack, and roar beneath the torturing wind;
But, to the terrors of the polar storm,
These are but May-day zephyrs. The oak here,
When the unimaginable fury came,
Would dance upon the air, as the least twig
Upon the stream. The strong and deep cast towers,
That barely tremble in your fiercest winds,
Biding the pelting of a thousand years,
Would fall before a blast.

“Look where we stand:—
Seems not this glittering mountain, with its bulk
Immense, and fearful altitude, to rest
Firm as a continent?—And so it doth:—
But where are its foundations?—In the bed

Of ocean, leagues below the surface, bound
In ever-during frost. The tempest there
Can never reach; but these high pinnacles,
Mountains themselves, are split and dash'd down headlong
In its terrific rage: and there are hills
Thou may'st discern, far in the utmost distance—
Hundreds of miles away—as bright as these,
And seemingly as irremoveable:—
They also rest upon the ocean;—all
That thou canst see is ocean;—but they stand not
Like these, foundation'd in the uttermost deeps.
They in the tempest's anger are lift up
Like bubbles. When the troubled sea first swells,
They stand awhile unshook, fast chain'd together
Down to their base: but the thick plains of ice
Begin to heave, bending, and going back
Laboriously. Anon, a groan like thunder
Is heard far underneath, running along
From hill to hill; but nought appears above

Save that slow, long, and heavy lift, as though
The ice-deep then were coming into life,
And swell'd with its first breath. But soon again
Another groan is heard—another yet:—
The whole mass, plain and mountain, slowly rocks:
Thunders and crashings shoot along all round;—
At length the prison'd deep, gathering in wrath,
Bursts up its icy-ceiling with a roar
Like a thousand thunders, rushing fiercely through,
Foaming and hissing. Ponderous sheets of ice
Rise up,—and clash together,—and fall back,—
And come again,—and split,—and shiver to dust.
Then the loos'd mountains float; slowly at first,
With gentle rise and fall; and, if they touch,
They grind together harshly, and go back
Heavily trembling. But if in its rage
The storm advances, they begin to mount,
And sink, and swing their huge heads to and fro,
Like ships at anchor on a rolling sea;—
Higher and higher they go up, and lower

And lower yet they sink;—they clash; they split;—
Down come the shivering pinnacles, and beat
The spray up to the clouds;—and the angry sea
Roars,—and the winds howl awfully:—the hail
Hisses;—and clouds of snow dash heavily down,
Like waves of curded foam. The heavens are black
As pitch; but ever and anon there comes
From the encountering hills a stream of fire,
That now seems lightning in the clouds, and now
A flame within th' abyss: so high they soar,
So low again they sink.

“Such is the rage
Of polar storms. Man never hath beheld—
And could not view them. Thy new-moulded form
Feeleth not fire nor frost; but couldst thou stand
With mortal body for one instant here,
In the keen wintry night, thy breath would fall
In snow-flakes, and thine eyes be frozen stiff
Ere thou couldst close them: but man could not live
To breathe or look; for, as the lightning strikes

With instantaneous death, so suddenly
That intense blast would turn the flesh to stone.

“Yet have these awful regions, even in depth
Of winter, beautiful scenes that milder climes
Know not. The winds are sometimes hush'd as now;
The crystal mountains, and the snowy dells,
Lie motionless and silent, as if they
Through all eternity had stood unshaken:
The skies are deeply pure; the thronging stars
Burn dazzlingly; and those innumerous hills,
With their clear spires, and pinnacles, and domes,
And pyramids grotesque, reflect them back
With shifting and incessant twinklings, bright
As if they were all frosted o'er with stars
Of all fine colours. Glorious meteors too
Sail through the air, and wind among the hills,
Kindling them gorgeously. If thou couldst stand
At such a time where now thou art, thine eye
Would view a splendid sight. Through the low vales,

As the bright fire glides slowly on, the hills
Flash, and go out:—now here a temple starts,
With mighty dome, and glittering cupola,
A thousand fathoms high:—again 'tis gone;—
And you behold a fortress on a rock,
And thronging warriors on its battlements,
Waving their swords, and hurrying to and fro,
And blazing standards fluttering in the wind.—
That passes; and, upon the other side—
Lo! a fierce conflagration, like a tower
Quivering and red with ardent heat.—'Tis gone;—
And, far beyond, you see a diamond hill
On which a ruby palace stands;—its gates
Are silver, and its crystal windows gleam
To the setting sun.—But that too vanishes;—
And, farther yet, behold a cataract
Pouring a flood of silver from the clouds
Down to the earth. Now grottos, palaces,
Vast arches, fiery pillars, shooting up
At once from earth to heaven; all possible shapes,

And of all hues, start up from side to side,
Till the bright meteor dies; or mounts perchance
To sail the heavens like a wandering moon;
Or steals away among the distant hills,
That flash,—and fade,—fainter—and fainter,—till
The quivering gleams are lost in infinite distance.

“Here lightnings too—not such as wake the thunders,—
But noiseless, beautiful, and harmless fires,
Play in the sky, and run among the mountains,
Casting excessive splendour. And there are
Magnificent gleams along the ethereal heavens,
So bright, that even to your lower clime
A faint reflection sometimes hath been sent:
These turn the night into a glorious day:
The sky is fill'd with them; they shoot—and quiver,—
And wave—and shake,—as if some army of Heaven
Were passing with its gorgeous, sun-light banners,
And fiery arms along the fields of space.

“All these fine sights, and those appalling storms,
Are workings of the viewless shapes of air.
Earth every where is beauteous, or sublime,
Though man perceive it not: tis not alone
Within the fertile fields which he hath till'd,
That higher natures dwell;—the barren heath,
The inaccessible mountain, the vast desert,—
All have their favouring visitants, and all
Would to thy purified sight be beautiful:—
But thy short term of life would pass away
Ere I could show thee half their loveliness:—
And there are beauteous and noble things
That mortal sight hath never yet beheld;
These rather will I show thee.”

Saying thus,
The glorious spirit caught me by the hand,
And up into the air we flew. Our course
Was now less swift than at our first ascent,
Yet inconceivably rapid. O'er the deeps

We took our way toward the sun, that rose
Higher and higher in the sky. Still, still
The huge abyss was underneath us. Islands
Seem'd in our rapid flight to sail the deep,
Like shadows of swift travelling clouds. The sun
With every instant mounted till he stood
In middle heaven; then gradually fell,
While over a vast continent we pass'd,
As he were setting in the East. Again
The ocean was below us; and the sun,
As over that immensity we flew,
Sank down,—and down,—and dipp'd his burning disk
Into the waves, as it were evening there:
But when we check'd our course he also paused,
And turn'd his chariot back into the sky;—
And it was morning now.

A thousand leagues
Beneath us I beheld,—one boundless plain
Of flashing, burning, ever-rolling waters.

“Thou hast beheld,” the placid spirit said,
“The climes of everlasting frost;—and now
We hover o'er the regions where the sun
Makes a perpetual summer:—these vast waters
Know little of the tempest, but still lie
In a calm majesty; and numerous hosts
Of airy shapes have here their loved abode:
Through them our passage lies to the heart of earth;—
Let us descend.”

So saying, we dropp'd down,
And sank into the waves. There was no dash
Of parted waters, as our subtile forms
Plung'd underneath, for we cut smoothly through,
As through the air;—but the bright sunshine soon
Became a glowing emerald hue, that changed
To deep—and deeper;—and when I look'd up,
I saw no sun, but a green canopy
Above us, exquisitely pure, yet dark,
Like a new firmament. Still down we sank
Unfathomably deep; and reach'd at length

The rocky bottom. Not a ray of light
Pierc'd to this awful depth: there was no sound
Heard there, nor motion felt.

“This is to thee,”
My gentle and beneficent guide began,
“All blank:—thy mortal fabric is sublimed
To spiritual fineness; and thy senses are
Strengthen'd and clear'd; yet thou hast not the powers
That airy beings have; thou canst not hear
The voices and the sounds that I now hear;
Thou canst not see the thousand shapes that dwell
Within these awful depths; for I have left
Thy human faculties, lest terrible forms
Or sounds o'erwhelm thee:—but I will light up
These dark abysses like the sunny fields;
And thou shalt see how Nature, even here,
Is beautiful.”

Now suddenly the darkness
Fled; and a glorious light shone round about,

As if the waters, over-charged with heat,
Had burst into a blaze. Then I beheld
The bed of the great deep:—mountains of rock,
Huge as earth's highest hills; and rocky valleys,
All bright, and glittering, and pure: no weed,
Or earth, or slime, as in the shallow seas,
Defil'd them;—the transparent waters rested
Upon them like an emerald atmosphere.

Then thus again the beautiful spirit spake.
“Here are not verdant fields and waving trees,
Flowers of sweet perfume, fanning airs, or clouds
Of gorgeous colours;—nought that makes the face
Of earth so lovely:—but, is there no charm
In these majestic, unadorned hills,
Those brilliant plains and valleys, this pure light,
This awful solitude? Thou hast beheld
The shapes of air and earth; there also are
That in these watery deeps oft make abode.
Some love to sport in the calm seas, and toss

The sparkling waves, and creamy foam about:—
Some go down to these lowest depths, where storm
Can never reach; but everlasting silence,
And a green twilight reigns, or total dark.
Here are the down-prest waters heavier
And harder than the adamant:—no plummet
Can ever fathom here:—the weightiest anchor
Would float as lightly as the thistle-down
Upon the whirlwind:—were the hugest rock
Cast forth into these waters, it would find,
Ere it could sound their depths, a buoyancy,
Strong as their surface gives the fleetest bark:—
Here the enormous monsters of the deep
Can never come; their region is above,
In the lighter waves:—the vertical sun looks here,—
If all above be calm,—faint as the moon,
When through thick mists her orb may just be traced,
But of a deep, soft green:—his hottest ray

Gives here no warmth, more than the glow-worm's beam:—
Yet in this everlasting silence and repose,
And thickest dark, alternating with light
That seems but darkness of another hue,
There's a sublimity and awfulness
That suits some natures well.

“Others there are
That love to work the tempest,—turn the deeps
Round like a chariot-wheel; and in the gulf
Suck navies down, whirling the huge ships round
And round, like atoms of the dust, that winds
Catch from the parch'd road in their sportive curls.
But these are not the shapes that thou hast seen:
Mighty they are, but terrible. The wretch
Who rides the roaring deep in the thick night,
Dreading each mountain wave may bury him;
Who, in the shoutings of the elements,
Finds his own loudest shout become a sound

Faint as the breathing of a sleeping child;—
He doth not know how these appalling forms
Are round him, and beneath him, and above,—
Rolling the waters up from their deep bed,—
Riding upon the black and labouring clouds,
And howling in the winds.—

“Look upward now
Tow'rds yon huge mountain!—on its top thou seest
Enormous masses of black rock, that seem
Like some gigantic city overthrown:
And such it was; the work of those who lived
Ere man was; for the ocean hath not always
Cover'd these hills. That mighty wreck was once
The abode of life and joy:—the sun shone there;
And the winds play'd amid the trees and flowers.
How silent, dark, and lonely is it now!
So deep beneath the topmost waves, no storm
Can move those waters that enshrine it, keeping
The elements of decay at rest. Yet there

The wise have counsell'd, and the fair have smiled:—
There generations first drew breath, and lived,—
And saw their children, and their children's sons
Grow up in peace! What myriads from that height
Have look'd out on the sea beneath, to hail
The rising sun; or to espy the ship
Coming from distant lands, that brought their sons,
Fathers, or husbands! That black, mournful wreck
Was once magnificent temples, palaces,
And dwellings of the wealthy!—and they deem'd
Their city was eternal. In a moment
It ceas'd to be:—the waters cover'd it.—
Listen! and thou shalt hear how this befell.

“Oh! it is beautiful to see this world
Pois'd in the crystal air,—with all its seas,
Mountains, and plains majestically rolling
Around its noiseless axis, day by day,
And year by year, and century after century;
And, as it turns, still wheeling through the immense

Of ether, circling the resplendent sun
In calm and simple grandeur!

“Yet a time
Hath been, in the profound of ages past,
When this fair order was disturb'd. The earth
Was then not what ye see it now; nor man,
Such as now is, existed then; nor beasts;
Nor did the globe bend toward the sun its poles
As now; but yet it held sublimely on
The same unerring path along the heavens.

“Then suddenly there came a fiery star,
Wandering from out its orbit, masterless.
The dwellers of the earth,—they were a race
Mightier than yours,—look'd nightly on the sky,
And their thoughts were troubled: night by night the star
Grew brighter, larger;—waving flames shot out
That made the sky appear to shake and quiver.
Night after night it grew;—the stars were quench'd

Before its burning presence;—the moon took
A paler—and a paler hue:—men climbed
Upon the mountains every eve to watch
How it arose; and sat upon the ground
All night to gaze upon it. The day then
Became the time for sleeping; and they woke
From feverish rest at evening to look out
For the terrific visitor. Night by night
It swell'd and brighten'd:—all the firmament
Was kindled when it came. The waning moon
Had died away; and when she should have come
Again into the sky men found her not.
Still, still the heaven-fire grew!—there was no night;
But to the day succeeded a new day
Of strange and terrible splendour. Darkness then
Became a luxury; and men would go
To caves and subterranean depths to cool
Their hot and dazzled eyes. The beasts of the field
Were restless and uneasy, knowing not
Their hour for slumber: they went up and down

Distractedly; and, as they fed, would stop,
And tremble, and look round, as if they fear'd
A lurking enemy. The things of prey,—
Monsters that earth now knows not,—came abroad
When the red night-sun had gone down; for day
With its mild light less glar'd upon their eyes
Than that fire-flashing firmament. Yet,—yet
With every coming night the terrible star
Expanded: men had now no thought but that:
All occupations were laid by:—the earth
Was left untill'd:—the voyagers on the deeps
Forsook their ships, and got upon the land
To wait the unknown event. O'er all the world
Unutterable terror reign'd. Men now
By thousands, and by tens of thousands, met—
Wond'ring and prophesying. Day and night
All habitable regions sent to heaven
Wailings, and lamentations, and loud prayers.
The ethereal shapes that peopled earth, as now,

Saw with astonishment, but not with fear,
This strange disorder;—for the wreck of worlds
Injures not them. The spirits of the sun
Look'd wondering down, expecting what might come;
For right tow'rds earth the blazing Terror held
Its awful course; and all the abyss of space
Resounded to the roarings of its fires.

“Night after night men still look'd out:—it grew
Night after night, faster and faster still.
The crimson sky announc'd its terrible coming
Long ere it rose; and after it went down
Look'd red and fiery long. Each night it came
Later,—and linger'd later in the morn,
Till in the heavens the sun and it at once—
Eastward and westward—shone, with different lights:
The sun, as still he shines, ineffably pure;
The other of intensest burning red.
But one was still the same;—the other swell'd

Each day to a terrific bulk, and grew
Dreadfully bright, till the out-blazed sun
Look'd pale,—and paler,—and at last went out;—
And men knew not when he arose or set.

“The terrible event was then at hand:
Throughout the day the roarings of its fires
Oppress'd all ears;—and when the fury sank
Beneath the horizon, still throughout the night
They heard its threatenings; dying far away
Till midnight; then with every hour returning
Louder and louder, like advancing thunders
Riding upon the tempest.

“Yet once more
It rose on earthly eyes. One-fourth the heavens
Was cover'd by its bulk. Ere it had reach'd
Its middle course, the huge ball almost fill'd
The sky's circumference;—and anon there was
No sky!—nought but that terrible world of fire
Glaring,—and roaring,—and advancing still!

“Men saw not this:—th' insufferable heat
Had slain all things that lived. The grass and herbs
First died:—the interminable forests next
Burst into flames:—down to their uttermost deeps
The oceans boil'd,—spurting their bubbling waves,—
Rocking and wallowing higher than the hills:—
The hills themselves at last grew burning red;
And the whole earth seem'd as 'twould melt away.

“Intensest expectation now held all
The ethereal natures silent. From the heights
Of space they look'd, and waited for the shock;
For in right opposite courses the two orbs
Rush'd tow'rds each other, as two enemies haste
To meet in deadly combat. 'Twas a sight
Sublime, yet sad, to see this beautiful earth,—
Stript of all verdure, empty of all life,—
Glowing beneath the comet's terrible breath,
Like a huge coal of fire!

“They now drew nigh:
Rapidly rolling on they came!—They struck!—

The universe felt the shock. We look'd to have seen
The earth shatter'd to dust, or borne away
By that tremendous fire-star; but they touch'd
Obliquely,—and glanced off. The comet soon
Shot swiftly on again:—the weaker earth,—
Jarr'd from her orbit,—stood awhile,—turning
Backward upon her axis,—vibrating
Down to her very centre;—then went on
Faltering,—swinging heavily to and fro
Upon her alter'd poles.

“Such was the shock,
Hills started from their roots, and flew away
Leagues through the air:—islands and deep-fix'd rocks
Leap'd from the sea, and on the continents
Became new mountains:—continents were rent
Asunder; and the boiling seas rush'd in,

And made of them new islands:—all the waters
That round the earth rose upward, and rush'd on
Toward the new equator. Then the hills
Were overflow'd;—the highest mountain tops,
Still peeping o'er the flood, became sea rocks
And islands;—and the bed of the old deeps
Was left dry land.”

DREAM CONTINUED.

That said, he ceased. We sank,—
Cleaving the earth in utter darkness. Rocks
Were passive to us as the waves. We shot
Rapidly down, immeasurably deep;
Then burst at length into a blazing vault,
Bright as the sun, when in his highest course
Men turn them from his splendour.

I shrank back
Amazed and terrified! for, deep within,
Self-balanced like the moon in the clear heaven,
I saw what seem'd a world of fire, that burn'd

With inexpressible ardour; yet I felt
No heat, and heard no sound. The roof, the floor,
Were shaped alike,—one arching over head,
One underneath,—a bright concavity,
Like to a double sky, immensely huge.

“This,” said the gentle Spirit, “is the heart
Of earth; and there thou seest the central fires
That burn eternally. On this vast arch
The mountains, and the valleys, and the seas
Have their foundations. All that flashing roof,
That glittering concave floor, is adamant.
Nought can pass through, save the ethereal forms
That, as I told thee, 'tween these sun-light fires
And the great sun himself go to and fro.
Myriads of these I now behold; but thou
Mayst not look on them:—some there are like those
Whom thou hast seen,—delightful shapes; but some
Are terrible and mighty powers: thine eye
Might not endure their aspect. Thou dost dread

Those brilliant flames; but they will harm thee not.
Come,—let us enter them.”

With that he took
My half-reluctant hand, and in an instant
We stood within the centre of that brightness.

But—as in dreams the riotous fancy oft
Delighteth to distort the fairest forms,
Or from things disproportion'd and uncouth
To put together shapes of finest beauty,—
So, suddenly, methought my guide was gone:—
An indescribable terror came upon me:
The fires were round me still; yet not, as first,
Silent and calm, but furiously tost about
Like a stormy ocean, and roar'd hideously.
And then methought I saw the enormous axle
On which the earth turn'd like some monstrous engine.
It seem'd to my starting eyes thick as the base
Of hugest mountain, red with intense heat,
And rolling rapidly and furiously round.

And everywhere gigantic beings stood
Like statues of hot iron glaring on me.
And now it seem'd a thickest darkness fell
About me. I beheld the fires no more;
But heard them bellowing dreadfully; and heard
The earth upon its monstrous centre whirling
Outrageously, with noise of iron clankings
And ponderous wheels, groaning, and grinding harsh.
I could not bear that terror: every sense
Grew dim and fail'd.

But the melodious voice
Of that bright, affable Spirit came again
Into my ear, recalling me to life
Gently, as in a summer's night the moon
Comes with her mild face from beneath the hills,
Waking the dark earth from her dewy sleep,
And calling up the slumbering nightingales.

I found myself again within the deeps,
In stillness and in darkness. “We are now,”

The Spirit said, “beneath another sea:
These waters wash the Indian shores: the sun,
Whom in the great Pacific we just left
Beginning a new day, is setting here.
Look! as we pause, thou mayst discern a dark,
Dim purple tinge above;—'tis his last ray
Firing the topmost waves. Thou canst not know,
In this deep silence, and these motionless waters,
What even now is doing overhead:
These awful depths are sleeping peacefully,
As they for ever sleep; but, higher up,
A storm is raging. Come, let us ascend.”

With that we mounted; and anon I saw
The waters swaying round us, and soon heard
The faint moan of the raging waves on high.
Still, as we slowly rose, the uproar grew
Louder and louder: the vex'd waters rush'd
Vehemently from side to side; and, lo!
I saw in the dim light a goodly ship,

Prow foremost, shooting like an arrow down
Into the gulf:—fast to the ropes and masts
The stiffen'd dead men clung as when they sank.

It pass'd us in an instant; and we rose
Higher and higher, and the noise increased,
And the billows gather'd fury, and were mixed
With foam. Enormous fishes roll'd about,
Lashing the waves in terror. Soon we sprang
Into the air; and then the hurricane
Added its howlings to the ocean's roar:
The rain beat fiercely down; and massive clouds
Roll'd heavily over: thunders too began
To call from the dark sky; and lightnings broke
From out their holds, and ran along the waters,
Kindling the foam. But we went slowly up,—
Passing the thick clouds, and the shouting thunders;—
And saw the clear sky over head, and stars
Twinkling serenely, and the rising moon
Throwing her silver rays on the dense vapours

That rock'd and roll'd beneath us. Up we went
In the still air above the fighting winds;
The noise of waves, and storms, and thunders died
Softly away, and we reposed at length
In the calm moonlight, and intensest silence.

I gazed upon the lovely lamp of night,
And scenes and times gone by came to my view,
Bringing a gentle sadness: lonely walks
In summer evenings, or at dead of night
Through solemn shadowy woods, or by the banks
Of broad, clear, whispering river, when the light
Of that same quiet orb was shining there,
As now upon the warring clouds beneath.
I had just heard the noise of waves and winds,
And seen the rocking waters, and the clouds
Mingling in fury: now they seem'd to lie
In a soft slumber, save that here and there
Some cloud top turning red, and quivering
Hastily through and through, announced the strife

Still raging; but no thunder could reach there:
Each flash came fainter, and the reddening clouds
Grew less and less: the moon, too, climbed the sky
With an unusual swiftness:—yet, intent
On what I had beheld, and thinking much
Of that fine ship, with her ill-fated crew,
Floating beneath the dark deeps; and the eyes
That must look vainly out for their return
From day to day,—and week to week,—and month
To lingering month;—and of the agonies
Of hearts that, hoping long, must cease to hope,
And sink into despair;—with such thoughts fill'd,
I mark'd not that we still went slowly up,
Till suddenly the sunshine burst upon me,
And brought my senses back.

“Thou hast been lost
In thought,” the radiant Spirit said, “nor I
Would stir thee, that thy feeble faculties,
Wearied with contemplating things so far
Beyond thy little knowledge, might repose,

Ere on a longer journey we set forth
To view still nobler sights. Thou marvell'st much
To be again in day-light, when, but now,
Night was beginning; but the mountain's top
Catches the sunshine while the vale is dark;
And at this altitude we see him still,
Though mountains, were they here on mountains piled,
Would be in shade. We now have soar'd above
The atmosphere of earth, and fly in ether.
Turn thine eye downward.”

While he spake, I looked,
And saw a wondrous sight: unbounded ocean,—
Islands,—enormous continents. Three parts
Lay in dim moonlight, and the fourth in day;
And every instant the horizon spread,
And took in other lands and wider seas.
Up,—up we went,—and yet the prospect grew:
The sun and moon were in the sky at once;—
The stars, too, all were out; not quivering

As men behold them from the ground, but clear
And steady. Still we mounted;—still the view
Expanded;—till, at length, from pole to pole,
From west to east, the rim of the round earth
Was bounded by the ether.

“Now thou seest,”
The Spirit said, “one half the globe,—divided
By day and moonlight night: there Africa,—
Here Asia,—Europe there,—and, opposite
To the south pole, the ocean without shore.

“How soft and tranquil all from hence appears!
Like a most exquisite garden, where nought evil
May ever come! Those mazy winding shores,—
Those calm bright seas,—those sleeping vales,—those hills
Dappled with light and shade,—those rivers,— forests,—
Islands,—and lakes,—not visible hence to thee,
But to me clear;—how beautiful are they all!

Doth it not seem a spot where happy things
Should dwell, for ever happy? Who would think
To find in such a paradise broken hearts,—
Emaciated forms,—limbs bent and rigid
With years of ceaseless toil,—faces where health,
If ever known, hath left no bloom behind;
But where the miserable heart looks out,
Telling in every feature—wretchedness?
Is this the doom of nature? No! 'tis man,—
Weak and mistaken man,—that hath himself
Inflicted on his fellows misery
To purchase that which yet he hath not gained,—
A happiness more than simple nature gives.
Pride and self-love have been and are the source
Of general misery: each man for himself
Strives only,—not for needful sustenance
Or harmless joys, which, with a wiser course,
All might, and should have; but to rise above
His fellow men in wealth, and rank, and power,
Unheeding how, to elevate himself,

Others must be depress'd. As in the sea
Disturb'd by tempests, every wave that climbs
To touch the clouds must leave the waters nigh
The lower sunk as it the higher mounts;
So the rapacious, and the ambitious man,
Heaping together wealth, or grasping power,
Must leave his fellows poorer, and less free.
One is not great or rich but as the rest
Are poor and weak:—one bloated epicure
Makes many hungry:—one who rolls in wealth
Leaves hundreds pinched with want:—one despot lives
That millions may be slaves. Did they create
The luxuries they seize, it were not so;
And they alone were pitiable things,
Mistaking their own good, deeming the means
To be the end. Life's real joys are few;
But ample for the reach of happiness:
Health and a quiet mind include them all.
But can the wretch who, by unceasing toil

From early morn till night, year after year,
Must earn his meagre food, feel peace of mind?
Can his worn frame have the fresh glow of health?
Can he look pleased on nature's endless charms,
Which he must never taste? The fields and woods,
The seas and hills are beautiful; but he
Must sweat in the hot factory or mine,
Shut from the wholesome airs of heaven, the sights,
The pleasant sounds of nature. When he rests,
'Tis not to enjoy the happiness of being,
The consciousness of life on this fine earth;
But to prepare his jaded limbs to meet
Another day of toil and misery.
And for what end?—that some proud pamper'd man
May drink himself to drunkenness,—may gorge
His greedy stomach till the bloated mass
Becomes corruption,—deck his useless limbs
With gaudy ornaments, and call himself
Wealthy and great. But is he happy then?
Hath the unremitting toil and wretchedness

Of hundreds given in one heap to him
The happiness that hundreds should have shared?
No! he is proud and wrathful,—covetous
Of more, though he already hath too much:
A thousand foolish wants are satisfied,
But thousands more arise. Look at his nights,
Sleepless and feverish; or distraught with dreams
That well repay on him the misery
That hundreds feel through him:—he knoweth not
The luxury of a vigorous limb,—the glow
Of health,—the lightness of the heart,—the dance
Of innocent spirits:—he is but a cancer
Upon the general body,—in itself
Painful and foul,—and draining the whole mass
Of health and strength.

“Doth the proud monarch sleep
More soundly on the gorgeous couch for which
Thousands have made their bed upon the ground?
If he have wisdom, 'twould as brightly shine
Without the glittering jewels on his head,

To furnish which what numbers have lack'd food
And shelter from the elements! But not
To kings or nobles doth the blame belong
Exclusively: even those who think themselves
Robb'd by their lords, do rob as greedily
The ranks below themselves, till they whose toil
Gives all the rest their luxuries, are depress'd
To want and misery. Self-love, thou seest,—
Self-pride,—the cause of all. Would man but learn
That—to be truly happy, he should strive
To make his fellows so,—all might be well.”

The son of ether ceased, and we flew on.
The moon behind us sank; the sun before
Rose upward, and pass'd on above us, lighting
All that we saw of earth; then fell again
Eastward, till only on three parts he shone;
And on the other part the moon again,
Seeming to have backward run her course round earth,
Cast her mild gleam.

Then the huge continent,
America, from north to south, outstretch'd
Almost from pole to pole, we saw, encompassed
By mighty oceans. 'Twas a glorious sight!
Seas, shores, with every curve and angle, plain
As on a map; but the whole globe appear'd
Not larger than some wide-spread valley, seen
From top of central mountain. Here and there
An island in the great deep I beheld,
As 'twere a dark-sail'd vessel seen far off;
And oft I thought I could distinguish hill
And vale; and some broad rivers I could spy,
That went to the Atlantic.

“Beautiful
And gentle Spirit!” I exclaim'd, “oh! say
How I shall thank thee? thou indeed hast shown
The loveliness and the sublimity
Of nature.”

Thou hast thanked me,” he replied:
“Man, for his petty benefits conferred,

Demands loud praises,—still renewed thanks:
We ask not such,—contented if we see
The good we tender felt to be a good.
The thankless oft are noisiest in their thanks;
As on the unfruitful pavement every drop
That falls from the kind sky is told aloud:
But in the grateful heart a blessing sinks,
Like the same shower upon a sunny field,
That drinks it silently, and shows its thanks
By smiles and glad increase.

“But now again
Look downward to the earth, for I have clear'd
Thine eyes, that thou like us mayst see.”

Then I look'd down, and on the sea descried
A fleet of atom ships, that softly stole
Along the small white waves; all sails were up,
Leaning and bellying to the wind; and men
Were on the decks, and in the shrouds. Some walk'd
With proud and stately step, and some lay down

100

Stretch'd at their length asleep. I cannot tell
By any words their wondrous littleness;
Yet I could see each feature, every smile,
And every changing look. And there was one
Who through a telescope look'd out, then seem'd
To give some order:—certain signals straight
Were made, and answering signals given anon
From other ships; and then the tiny sails
Were alter'd, and the masts swung round, and lean'd
On the other side.

Now to the land I look'd,
And saw thick-peopled cities, that appear'd
Small as a daisy's rim; and fortresses
And temples smaller than the delicate spots
Within the cowslip's bell; and hosts of men
With serious, busy faces; steeds and chariots,
And crowded market places.

I turn'd then
To look upon the mountains, and the lakes,
And the primeval forests, where man's foot

101

Hath never trod. Then, from its petty spring
Amid the hills, I track'd some little stream,
That further on became a river; took
Hundreds of other streams as it flow'd on;
And grew a mighty current that bore ships;
Then fleets, as 'twere an inland sea; and last
Roll'd its tempestuous waters to the ocean;—
Driving far out,—wave foaming against wave.

Now on some bright green island I look'd down,
Bedded within the pure and boundless deep;
There I saw graceful trees, and fertile fields,
That, rounded by the foamy breakers, seem'd
Like a rich emerald set in orient pearl.

Thus with insatiate eye, from sea to land,
From land to sea, I turn'd; with new delight
Glancing from moonlight west to sunny east,—
From pole to pole; till suddenly methought
We soar'd again, and the huge ball began

102

To lessen rapidly;—each outline grew
Smaller and dimmer,—every moment less—
And less:—where ocean ended, or the shore
Arose, I knew not oft: still, still it shrank:
All soon was but one mass of pleasant light,
With delicate shadowings scatter'd here and there,
Like the full moon seen through astronomer's glass:
Yet, yet it lessen'd,—till it seem'd anon
A smaller moon,—and last but a bright star
Amid a host of stars.

“Benignant Spirit!”
I cried in rapture, “whither dost thou take me?”

“I told thee,” he replied, “thou shouldst behold
New regions. Thou hast look'd upon the sun,
When he arose or set upon the earth,
With awe and admiration; how wilt thou
Endure to stand within his burning sphere?
For thither are we bound; nay,—look not up
Till I have given thee strength to bear that sight;

103

But list awhile. Thou seest these shining orbs
That wing their smooth way through the fields of ether;
And thou didst hear on earth the seas and hills
Giving out joyful music:—think'st thou then
These mighty worlds are voiceless?

“To thine ear,
Unopen'd, what a deep and awful silence
Is in these lonely realms of endless space!
The murmur of a stream, the gentle cooing
Of a young dove, breaking upon this hush,
Would seem to thee loud as a cataract;
But thou shalt know that silence is not here,
Nor dead vacuity: throughout all space
Nature hath her own music:—all that gives
To the eye beauty, yields, to gifted ears,
A melody as beauteous. Listen, now!”

Oh! then there was a burst of glorious sounds,
Such as I never heard, and could not hear

104

With waking sense, and live:—nor can I tell,
Nor could man comprehend, by any force
Of words, the beauty, the sublimity
Of that o'erwhelming chorus; for, at once
From every star there issued forth a voice
That might have sounded to the uttermost ends
Of space,—majestic,—awful; yet inspiring
Joy,—tenderness,—devotion,—rapture,—all
That melts the spirit down in bliss, or lifts,
Expands, and glorifies, as if it felt
The presence of the actual Deity.
At once the mighty spheres sent up their song
In various and magnificent harmony:
Each twinkling star among the countless host
Chanted exultingly, with tone distinct,
As if alone it sang; yet all commix'd
In wondrous chorus:—and the sun above
Pour'd out his voice as if the infinitude
Of space were fill'd with deep, melodious thunders.

105

I heard; and could not move, and could not think.
But suddenly all was silent;—a dead hush,
Deeper than midnight stillness in the heart
Of a vast arid desert, where no tree,
Nor herb, nor grass is, nor a living thing
For ages enters. Then the tuneful voice
Of that benignant Spirit came again,
Sweet as the dashing of a mountain brook
To the parch'd, gasping traveller, who, from morn
Till sultry eve, hath toil'd in the hot sun
O'er burning sands, and found no shading tree,
No cooling cave, no water.

“Thou hast heard
The music of the skies, and all thy soul
It did absorb, that thou hadst found no sense
For things of sight, had I still left thine ears
Awake to its divinity: but come,—
We must away: thine eyes I strengthen now
To bear the dazzling visions that await thee.
Look up!”

106

With that I raised my eyes, and saw
The sun in bulk like an inverted sky;
Not of fierce fire, as from the earth he seems,
But flashing, glowing like a diamond,
Unutterably bright and pure: all tints
Glitter'd and trembled there; came,—went,—and came
Incessantly. Campared with this, the flare.
Of noontide sun on earth had been a blank;
Yet I look'd up undazzled: more and more
It swell'd and brighten'd, till it seem'd to fill
The furthest ends of space. Nigh and more nigh
We flew: we enter'd soon what seem'd a sea
Of dense light:—through it rapidly we shot,
And saw beneath us, at amazing depth,
A bright, interminable landscape,—mountains,
To which earth's loftiest are but specks, that seem'd
Of diamond, ruby, sapphire, emerald;—
Forests that would have cover'd all our globe;—
Rivers more broad than are the seas of earth;—

107

And ocean, that appear'd like liquid sapphire,
So vast, methought through ages upon ages
The swiftest bark might sail, and find no end.

Downward we shot like lightning: I just caught
A glance at all these splendours; then sank down
Giddy and senseless, and oblivion came
On my o'erpower'd faculties awhile.

109

DREAM CONTINUED.

111

When sense return'd, methought I found myself
Reclined beside a fountain, whose sweet current
Whisper'd a crystal music to my ear
While yet my other senses slept. It seem'd
Like waking first to life, when, one by one,
The new-created feels his faculties
Coming upon him. First the liquid sounds
Of those delicious waters play'd about
My ears, that passively took in the bliss:
Then to my nostrils all rich fragrancies

112

Arose; yet I awoke not:—last, my eyes,
Slowly unclosing, met a beautiful,
Soft, violet-tinted light, whose grateful coolness
They for awhile drank in unconsciously;—
And then at length I stirred, and seem'd awake.

Beside me, pillow'd on a flowery bank,
As if asleep, my bright conductor lay;
But, as I moved, he spake. “Well, child of earth,”
Methought he said, “thou hast enjoy'd long slumber,
And needful to thee, after such far flight,
And such unwonted visions, and fine sounds.
I too have slept, and others thou mayst see
Still sleeping near thee; for the ethereal race
Ofttimes like men do slumber; not, as they,
To rest their wearied bodies, which would else
Refuse their task, but for sweet interchange
Of pleasure; else, untired, they might remain
Thousands of years, as men compute, unsleeping.

113

While thus he spake, I look'd around, and saw,
Bedded in flowers of indescribable beauty,
Beside the fountain, and beneath the trees,
Along the vale, and on the gentle hills,
Many ethereal shapes that lay asleep,
Like roses slumbering in the dewy night.
Upon the crystal waters also some
Had made their couch; or, rather, seem'd to float
Upon the rosy mist, that from the surface
Went up like a rich incense.

Save the voice
Of that most musical fountain, a deep hush
That seem'd itself a music, so its full,
Luxurious sereneness held my soul
In a sweet rapture, everywhere was round us.
I would have risen from my perfumed bed
To look more freely on those lovely scenes,
But the benignant Spirit thus began.

114

“Repose thee yet awhile; and, while thine eye
Feeds on this delicate light,—thine ear is fill'd
With that sweet fountain's melody,—and all
These mingling fragrancies delight thy smell,—
I will discourse with thee; for yet the hour
Of stillness and repose hath much to run.

“Here, as on earth, there is perpetual change
Of hours and seasons; and, as ye have night
And day, so have we sweet variety
Of light, from the bright, glorious atmosphere
That at thy coming thou didst view, to this
Soft, violet ether. It is now our night;
Yet clearer mayst thou see than at mid noon
Upon the earth. That crystal rock that stands
From out the sapphire deep, which thou mayst see
Distinct as the round moon in a clear heaven,
Is distant from us, as ye count on earth,
Thousands of leagues: this flowery valley, bounded

115

By that fine chain of amethystine hills,
Is vaster than earth's largest continent.
See! up yon winding river, where the trees
Dip their down-bending branches, every leaf
Thou mayst discern; and all the pearly drops
Trembling within those flowery cups that fringe
Its banks: yet in the brightest noon of earth
They would be viewless, so remote look'd at,
Even through your boasted tubes. Look overhead!
That flood of light through which we pass'd, that girds
This mighty orb about, takes, hour by hour,
As here we measure hours, a varying hue,
Thou saw'st in entering its bright noon; then comes
A ruby tint, that all this ether turns
To its own colour; next, with soft gradation,
All deep and golden hues that thou hast seen
In the rich topaz, that beneath your earth
The sun's ray hath created, with all gems

116

And glittering metals: imperceptibly
Then steal upon our firmament all shades
Of the pure emerald; they, dying, change
To sapphire hues; and, last, this violet tinge,
Which thou dost see so beautiful and pure,
Comes with slow step upon us: then 'tis night.
After a time these lovely hues return
In backward order to the ruby glow,
And then to the full splendour of the day.
Even such soft, blending colours men behold,
Though infinitely dull with these compared,
In the bright bow that arches o'er their sky,
When the mild spring-rains and the sun contend
To hasten on the flowers.

“Beside the shapes
Ethereal that thou hast seen, this orb
Hath other habitants; a race, like men,
Form'd from the globe they dwell on; but more bright,—

117

More powerful,—beauteous,—of more subtile mould,
As this magnificent sphere is more than earth
Splendid, and great, and beautiful. Like men
They have their cities, temples, monuments,—
Built from the quarries of yon colour'd hills,—
Ruby, or amethyst, or other stones
Of lustrous hue, such as are common here,
But deck the diadems of kings on earth.
They have their gardens, and their baths, their bridges
That span the ocean rivers thou didst see.
They have their horses too,—creatures of size,
And strength, and beauty inconceivable
By man,—with eyes like sunshine,—manes of fire;
Their neigh is louder than a thousand trumpets;
The hot breath from their nostrils would appear
To thee like the red smoke from burning cities;
The trampling of their hoofs would rock your earth,—
Their might drag up your mountains,—in their speed
They would deride your hurricanes. Yet these,

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The dwellers of the sun have tamed, as ye
The earthly steeds; but have not bow'd them down
By unremitting toil, nor broke their spirit
To groan beneath the lash and torturing goad,
As proud, mean man hath. Here are chariots, too,
High as your highest hills, of sapphire built,
With wheels of ruby oft, or diamond:
These the strong horses whirl along the plains
Lightly as yours would draw an infant's toy.

“But see the night's deep hour is passing by:
The ether's delicate tint of violet
Melts to a rich deep blue. Some airy shapes
Are up I see already. Look! upon
Yon sapphire hill a glorious figure stands,
Like a vermilion cloud in the eastern sky;—
And there, far over that blue ocean, go
Some spirits that delight in the clear deep;
But most will slumber till the golden ray
Hath chased the emerald. Now thou mayst see

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What ships are here to navigate our seas:
There,—lying by that rock of chrysolite,—
With crimson sails, and ropes of twisted gold.
Its planks of fragrant, undecaying wood
Are sheathed in silver:—all your boasted fleets
Might float within its hull:—the masts are cedar,
Coated with gold; and its bright decks are pearl.
How still it rests!—And that blue ocean, too,
How like a polish'd gem,—so bright and smooth!
For in our nights the winds too sleep: at morn
They wake again with sounds like distant music,
That, as the day advances, still come on,
Louder and louder, till the blazing noon;
Then all the ether, all the hills and seas,
Give out delightful music, that, towards eve,
Softens and sinks again; and, ere night comes,
Dies quite away.

“We know not tempests here,
Such as on earth, that bring dismay and darkness,
And make destruction sport; but oft the winds

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Rise from their slumber with excessive joy,
And rush vehemently about the forests,
And over the blue deeps; yet all is bright
And beautiful: the music only sounds
More joyfully and loud,—the fragrant airs
Are but more fragrant. Then thou shouldst behold
Those waters that now lie so placidly:
Up, up they go, higher than all the Alps
And Andes each upon the other piled:
Of sapphire blue more bright than earthly sunshine;
Their foam is like a crest of diamonds,
And pearls, and every lustrous gem: their voice
Would madden thee with rapture:—to and fro
They sway, and flash, and burn; millions of shapes
Hover above them, or upon them lie
Rocking; and with their fine aerial harps
And voices join the music of the waves.

“Then shouldst thou see how through the mighty billows

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The glittering ship rides on; its crimson sails
Full swell'd, and leaning gracefully; its sides
And silver keel shining intensely bright
Beneath the blue waves; from its glowing prow
Dashing the waters by, and throwing up
Clouds of all-colour'd spray that wrap it round
With a hundred rainbow-girdles:—up it climbs
To the liquid mountain's top, and the sails strain
And quiver: there it stands a moment, glittering
Like some most gorgeous bird pluming itself
In the golden light of morn: then down it goes
Swiftly and smoothly o'er the long descent
To the deep watery vale; and then again
Its prow is lifted, and it shoots aloft
Exultingly.

“Here nothing feels decay,
Sickness, or death. Those forests are eternal,—
These fields are ever green,—for ever breathe
The same delicious perfume:—every morn
Brings to all things fresh youth:—the ripe fruit hangs

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Still ripening to more exquisite lusciousness:—
The flowers die never; but are still in youth
As when their buds first open'd:—the still waters
Here stagnate not, nor gender noisome things;
But lie like crystal ever pure and bright.
Here too we have our morning mists and dews;
Thou mayst behold them gathering even now
Above the waters, and along the plains,
Like a transparent veil of rosy light:—
They hide not, but refresh and beautify:
And see how the bright dew-drops gem the flowers:
They shine not by reflected light like yours,
That flash but in the sunshine; every drop
Hath its own radiance; every possible tint
Thou mayst behold among them. As the morn
Puts on its glory, they too take new lustre
Till the day comes: they then melt gently off,
Breathing, as they dissolve, dim, exquisite sounds,
And delicate odours.

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“Let us now away,—
Ere yet the pleasant hours of rest, and this
Mild light and stillness have pass'd by: the blaze
And pomp of noon o'ercome thee, and the sounds
Of joyous nature, and the innumerous hosts
Of bright creations may distract thy sense,
Unable yet to see and hear at once
So much of what is glorious.”

That said,
We started from our flowery couch, and shot
Rapidly o'er the plains till we had reach'd
The borders of a forest. I look'd up
Delighted and astonish'd at the bulk
And loftiness of those fine trees:—each stem
Might have enclos'd an army of earth's sons;
Their tops had stood above our highest clouds;
The branches were all hung with colour'd fruits,
Transparent, and of richest smell. We enter'd:
The ground was cover'd with delicious flowers,
That droop'd with the night dew, all shapes and hues:

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The mighty trunks on every side shot up,
Like pillars for a temple where the gods
Might worship the One Deity. In bowers,
And by the banks of many crystal streams,
That gave out delicate music as they flow'd
In graceful windings, beauteous shapes were sleeping:
Some singly, some in pairs; and on the ground,
And on the topmost branches, many birds
Of dazzling plumage were reposing. All
Was fresh and silent. Swiftly we pass'd on,
And soar'd unto the summit of a mountain,
Whose height seem'd such, as when, in our ascent
From earth, I look'd down, and beheld at once
The rim of the whole globe. On either hand
Arose, to infinite distance, other mountains
Of every radiant gem: beneath, the vallies,
At depth immense, lay sleeping quietly
In the pure light: forests, and fields, and rivers;
And farther on, what seem'd an ocean, vast
As our Atlantic; but from side to side

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Spann'd by a bridge of but a single arch,
Glowing like fire. Upon the farther shore
A city stood of inconceivable splendour:
Towers,—pillars,—arches,—domes of every hue,—
Mingling together gloriously.

Away,—
Away we flew o'er mountains, plains, and seas,—
A flightimmense through splendours beyond thought,—
And saw at length, on the horizon's edge,
What seem'd at first a cloud of dazzling fire;
But nearer as we drew, behold! a mountain
Of brightest diamond, in breadth outstretch'd
Like to an earthly continent; so high,
A human foot, unaided, might, I thought,
In seeking to attain its summit, toil
From boyish days to manhood's fiery prime,—
From manhood to decrepit age,—nor reach
At last its top sublime. Yet on that top,
Still shooting up immeasurably high,
A wondrous fabric stood.

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Onward we glanc'd,
And lighted on the mountain's brow, facing
The gates of that vast temple.

I know not,
With aught on earth comparing it, to paint
Its inconceivable grandeur: mortal words
No more can tell its splendour, than the brush
In earthly colours dipp'd, can paint the sun
When he stands burning in the deep blue vault
At the meridian hour, and every eye
Shrinks from his dazzling brow.

Its substance seem'd
Purer and brighter than all clearest gems,
As they excel in purity the clod
Dug for the modelling potter. In the midst
A mighty dome, sky-tinctur'd, towered up,
Till like the twinkling of a distant star
Its burning diamond pinnacle appear'd.
The high and spacious gates, through which methought
The congregated nations of mankind

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Might in loose order pass at once, were tinged
Like morn's most delicate ether, rosy-hued:
So lofty, that an eagle, fleetest winged,
Might from the dawning till the noontide hour
Of a long summer's day shoot rapidly up,
Yet scarce attain their height.

As I look'd on
In wonder, lo! the gates roll'd open wide,
And, on their diamond hinges turning, gave
A sound as of a multitude of harps
Celestial, and sweet voices joyfully
Filling the air; and one deep thunder-note,
As of a storm-swept ocean heard from far.

Forth from the portal came three beauteous shapes,
Each bearing in his hand a glittering trumpet.
When first beheld in that stupendous arch
They seem'd of human stature; but, more nigh
Advancing towards us, they became in size
Like fabled Titans, or that mountain man,

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Design'd, but never sculptur'd, from the rock
Athos, whose hand a city should have held.
Yet were their forms surpassing beautiful,—
Graceful and light in motion,—of aspect
Not hideous to behold, like the dark brow
And eye ferocious of earth's pigmy giant;
But full of bright sereneness, health, and joy,
Temper'd with looks of high and solemn thought.
A crimson drapery, of airy lightness,
Flow'd loosely round their pure and polish'd limbs.

Now by the mountain's edge they pause, and lift
Their golden trumpets, whose capacious mouths
Were in circumference greater than that pile,
The pride of ancient Rome, in which, with ease,
Ten times ten thousand men at once sat down.
Then came the loud, deep, solemn breathings forth:
No jovial, airy flourish this, that makes
The heart leap up,—the dancing eye flash light,
As from earth's martial brass; one solemn chord

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Alone the mighty three awoke. It came
Gentle and sweet at first, as a lone flute
Heard on a summer's evening far away
By musing wanderer in the twilight woods;
Then louder,—louder,—and yet louder swell'd,
And unimaginably loud,—till all
Above, beneath, about me, seem'd to swim
In floods of sound; yet was it music still:
And when, with gentle fall, it died away,
And all the echoes ceas'd, the oppressive hush
Was like the approach of death. Three times they blew:
Three times, from infinite space, came the long answers back.

That done, with graceful step they turn'd again
Toward the temple gates. With marvelling eye
I saw their swift receding figures shrink;
And when again beneath the portal arch
Their mountain stature seem'd of human height,

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I thought them scarce the same. Far, far within
I watch'd them gliding amid endless ranks
Of glittering columns, till to pigmy size
They were diminish'd; and at length I gaz'd,—
And gaz'd,—but found them not.

“How rapt
Art thou in admiration of this sight!”
The gentle spirit said. “Material man
Sees power and grandeur still in magnitude:
The aspect of a cloud-topt mountain bends
His spirit with a sense of his own littleness:
The might of the chaf'd ocean makes him feel
How puny his own strength:—through desarts vast
He journeys; and along the boundless deep,—
And sees how like an atom of the sands
He might unnotic'd pass away:—he comes
To life, and Nature seems like him new-born:
He waxes grey with age, but all around
Is young as at the first; and well he knows
Thousands of generations rose and fell

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Ere he knew being:—many thousands still,
When he is gone, will come, and pass,—and yet
Nature and Time be young as at their birth:
And thus he learns to see in magnitude
Of form,—or boundless space,—or endless years,—
A power and awful grandeur. And to him
These are realities. We feel them not,
For we are ancient as the eternal hills,—
And as immortal. Infinite extent
To us is nought; for in the uttermost depths
Or heights of space our spiritual essences
Can never perish. Thou hast pass'd the void
'Tween earth and this vast orb; and know'st how swift
Aerial nature's speed:—a thousand years
Have I, in swifter flight, unpausing, pass'd
On errand through the illimitable depths
Of space,—yet felt not solitude, or fear,
Or toil: and least of all hath corporal bulk
Terror to us who are impalpable
As light or sound;—or, were we not, could take

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At pleasure what stupendous form soe'er
To match the hugest. At a thought, behold!
The form in which thou seest me,—little more
Than that of man,—I could dilate and lift,
Till on the pinnacle that crowns the top
Of that vast temple's dome I could look down,
As now upon the crystal floor we tread;
Or, insufficient that, again as high
Above that height I rise. Such as thou saw'st,
Are on this orb what man is on the earth,
The highest of material things:—their hands
Have rear'd this glorious temple; and they come
At certain periods here to offer up
Thanksgiving to the Infinite,—Unknown,—
And Unapproachable;—the One Pure Spirit.”

Thus saying, the bright Nature bow'd his head,
And veil'd with both hands his resplendent brow;
Then rose again and spake.—“Myriads of years
Have pass'd since first this fabric was; nor time

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Hath aught impair'd; nor, while this orb endures
Undarken'd, can it moulder: pure as light
Its substance is; of the same elements
Compounded. Congregated millions joined
In the delightful labour; nor their aid
Ethereal natures did disdain to lend
For such high purpose. That majestic dome,
In whose inverted hollow half the seas
Of earth might find capaciousness enough
For all their waves to thunder in, I saw,—
Entire as now it stands,—uplifted sheer
From off the adamantine floor, and placed
Upon its massive, ever-during pillars.
A thousand hands of mightiest Spirits join'd
To bear the glorious burthen through the sky;
And, as it rose above them like a world,
Th' innumerable multitudes beneath
Stood in a breathless silence looking up
Till the great work was finish'd; and they saw
The mighty round in the immense of air

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Resting untouch'd, in proud security.
Then sent they up exulting shouts; and all
Th' ethereal Natures gave their voice,—that earth,
Had earth existed, might have heard th' uproar.

“To-day is held a solemn festival:
Those trumpets have announc'd the temple gates
Expanded,—and, ere long, a million forms,
Such as the three thou hast beheld, will come
To worship here. But let us enter now.”

With that we pass'd beneath the gates; and on,
With lingering step, through almost endless ranks
Of dazzling columns, and majestic arches,
Leagues high, and fretted with all glorious hues
Of purest and intensest light; nor paused
Till right beneath the centre of the dome
We stood,—and I look'd up. But with what words,
To earthly object likening it, shall I
Tell of its wonders? It appear'd, methought,

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Like one vast sapphire of most delicate tint:
Magnificent as our terrestrial sky
To one who on some mountain's dizzy peak
Stands breathless, and beholds the gilded clouds
Far underneath him rolling;—and above,
And all around, the interminable vault
Resting its viewless rim on lands and seas
A thousand miles remov'd.

Yet this is nought
To express its majesty and awfulness.
He only who in spirit hath gone forth
Into the infinite abyss of space,
And seen the starry vault without a bound,
Outspread above him,—he alone may know
That grandeur inexpressible,—may feel
Some portion of the spirit-sinking awe
That fell upon me while I gaz'd. It seem'd
As though my overwhelmed faculties
Saw not what yet they saw: for, as I look'd
Again, and yet again, on what before

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I had oft gaz'd at, still new wonder burst
Upon me, as at some stupendous sight
The eye had never seen, nor thought conceiv'd.

Like one absorb'd in pleasant reverie,
Reclin'd beside a shady brook at noon
Of a hot summer's day; and in his hand
A book, on which he looks, but reads not,—borne
In fancy far away to other climes:
The hours pass by, but he hath mark'd them not,—
The waters journey on unseen,—the winds
Talk music in the leaves unheard by him:—
Perchance some saunterer like himself hath pass'd
The seldom-trodden way; and marking him
So rapt, hath deem'd him slumbering,—and gone on
Unnotic'd:—even like such a one entranced
I stood,—looking and wondering;—nor what time
Had pass'd knew aught; nor heard a voice or step;
Nor any thing beheld save that vast dome
That hung in awful majesty above,—

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Astounding, yet elating, to the eye,
As on the lost imagination comes
The contemplation of eternity.

But, suddenly arous'd, I saw about me
A countless multitude of godlike shapes,
Ethereal forms, like my benignant guide;
And with them myriads of stupendous size,
Such as the three I had beheld;—and some
Of lower stature and more delicate shape;
With less of majesty, but more of grace,
And of ineffable beauty. To the first
They look'd what lovely woman is to man:
Nor, save at the first glance,—or when in thought
With earthly stature measur'd,—did they seem
Of larger mould; for they were but a part,
In harmony with the majestic whole.
All that in woman we think lovely;—all
Of dignity, or purity, or grace,

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Was theirs with tenfold charm:—the bright, mild eye,—
The locks of radiant gold,—the sunny brow,—
The soft and rapturous blush,—the rosy lip,—
The smile that maddens with delight,—the glance
That kindles us like the first glimpse of heaven,—
The gentleness,—the tenderness. Their robes
Were pure as light,—of every beauteous hue:
Their presence was divinity:—they mov'd,
But I heard not their footsteps:—they discours'd,
And it was more than music:—all the air
Teem'd with delicious fragrance where they pass'd.

Now underneath that awful dome all stood;
A countless host of great and lovely shapes:—
They stood in deepest silence, looking down
With reverential lowliness, like such
Who utter inward prayer:—on one knee then
Sank gracefully; and, lifting up their eyes,
With faces radiant as the rising sun,

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And voices such as round the throne of heaven
Sing sweetest; mellow as the softest tone
Of plaintive nightingale, in the deep calm
Of summer's midnight breathing from the woods;
Yet powerful each as the tumultuous sea,
Or shouts of meeting armies; thus they sang.

“Praises to Him,—all bountiful—all good,—
Creator of all beauty,—all delight;
The infinite—the everlasting God,—
The One Pure Spirit.
He out of light, impalpable, inert,
Created us; and made us beautiful,
And bade us live. Through ages undecay'd
We joy in our existence:—pain or grief
Comes not to us; but ever new delight
Meets us in all we see, and all we do.
Who made the sapphire waves of the great deep,
And rear'd the glittering, many-colour'd hills?

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Who bade the winds breathe fragrance and sweet sounds,
And cloth'd the vallies with perfumed flowers,
The trees with all delicious fruits? Twas he!
Praises to Him,—all bountiful—all good,—
Creator of all beauty—all delight;
The infinite—the everlasting God,—
The One Pure Spirit.

“Glory to Him,—omnipotent—all wise—
Only Creator—of all nature Lord,—
The omnipresent, everlasting God,—
The One Pure Spirit.
He bade the sun arise from the deep void
Of long-enduring night, and circled it
With clouds of living fire. He also made
The lesser worlds that in their orbits move
Unerringly around. The abyss of space

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He spread out with his hands, and set therein
Th' innumerable multitude of stars.
All things are from Him,—all on Him depend:—
He stretcheth out his hand,—and new worlds spring:
He speaketh,—and bright suns have pass'd away.
He only from eternity hath been;—
He only to eternity must be.
Glory to Him,—omnipotent—all wise—
Only Creator—of all nature Lord,—
The omnipresent—everlasting God,—
The One Pure Spirit.”

Thus, but with words of thrilling power, they sang;
And with the chorus, far above, I heard,
Filling th' immense of that majestic valut,
Sounds of invisible instruments:—vast harps
Full chording now;—now an aerial voice
Dropping down crystal notes,—or floating round
With a pervading power, as if the air
Ran over with sweet sounds:—now came at once

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A burst as of a thousand deep-ton'd trumpets,
That all the temple quak'd,—and then a pause
Such as the tempest leaves when gathering up
Its might to rage the more. Anon there rose,
As if in the far æther, other sounds,
Voices, and instruments, in full accord,
Yet gentle as the breeze that o'er the meadows
Sighs in a still May night, nor shakes the dew
From out the bosoms of the sleeping flowers.
Nearer and nearer rapidly it came,
Swelling and deepening:—voices now were heard
Chanting in harmony with those below;
With utterance distinct, and heavenly sweet:
And instruments of glorious tone and power,
Such as earth knows not. Nigher still, and nigher
The viewless choir came on:—there was a sound
As of a tempest rushing round the dome:
Trumpets and cymbals, crystal-ton'd,—and peals
As of gigantic organs blowing full.
Louder, yet louder it came on: the sounds

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Deepen'd and spread like an o'erwhelming flood:—
The million mighty voices more and more
Arose exultingly:—th' invisible band
Drew nigher still, and nigher. But, at once,
Through all the eternal dome deep thunders roll'd.
I saw, descending from its utmost height,
A dark cloud edg'd with lightning:—sure I felt
As if in presence of the Eternal One!
My senses reel'd:—the mountain seem'd to shake,—
The temple to and fro appear'd to swing,—
The voices and the instruments grew faint,—
Then sank at once into an awful hush!
I saw the astonish'd millions on the floor
Stretch'd prostrate,—and the dark cloud opening.

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DREAM CONTINUED.

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We stood again on that bright mountain's brow:
The temple gates were clos'd, and all was still.
Then thus the Son of Ether. “I have said
This goodly fabric shall unfading stand
Till the great sun himself shall be extinguish'd.
Space hath such; orbs as bright as this, as vast,
Have perish'd from the sky, with all the worlds
Dependent on them. In the depths of space
So far remov'd they lie, that, were man's life,
From the first dawn of thought to the last hours
Of trembling age, employ'd in summing up,
Each minute adding millions of long leagues,

148

The vast extent were but an infant's span,
Compar'd to their remoteness! There we go.
But with a speed far fleeter must we pass
Than in our flight from earth. Fix now thine eye
Upon this blazing hill, and, as it shrinks
In distance, measure, if thou canst, our speed.
Now we ascend!”

Scarce had he ceas'd to speak
When, with rapidity to which the glance
Of lightning were a slow and creeping thing,
We darted upward,—and the enormous hill
Was viewless.—In an instant more the sun
Shrank to a star,—twinkled,—and died away!

The Spirit spake not yet: I could not speak.
Astonishment, and awe, and terror, crush'd
All faculties. I felt myself a thing
More powerless than the scarcely visible mote
That floats upon the sunbeam, toss'd about
By pettiest insect's wing. But I began,

149

Erelong, to kindle with supreme delight;
Forgetting fear, and in the majesty
Of all about me glorying. Still on!—
On still we flew! All constellations known
In earthly sky were far behind us now.
Nigh many a star, that soon became a sun,
We darted, leaving it again a star:
And many a streaming comet we glanced by
Those swiftest travellers of heaven's blue road:
Meeting or shunning us, it matter'd not,
We pass'd them still the same: now in full blaze
Of sunshine journeying—now in starry night.
On! on!—A thousand different firmaments
Had met, and pass'd us, floating on each hand
Like shining bubbles on a rapid stream.

“These are His works,” the radiant Spirit said.
“Each star of all this countless multitude,
Falling behind us in our rapid flight,
Even like a shower of sparks from some huge fire,

150

Kindled at midnight on a mountain's top,
When the wind rages—every petty star
Is a majestic sun,—like ours, the soul
And centre of revolving worlds. Where ends,
If it hath end, this universe of suns,
He only knoweth. As the adventurous man,
In search of unknown seas and lands, puts forth
In ships on the great deep; so, on the vast
Of space, ethereal natures oft have launch'd,
To explore the immensity of worlds unknown,
To find creation's limits. I have said,
A thousand years, as mortals measure time,
In flight as swift as now I have advanced,
And found no boundary. Ten thousand years,
And ten times multiplied, have others sped,
And that hath not suffic'd:—they have gone up,
Yet never reach'd its height; they have gone down,
Yet fathom'd not its depth:—before them still,
As at the first, illimitable space,—
Stars densely thronging still.”

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The Spirit ceased,
And we went on in silence: a deep hush—
A long dead stillness, interrupted not,
Save, at wide intervals, by the deep moan,
And rush of some far comet hurrying on,
As 'twere the heaving of stupendous wings
Invisible, driving impetuously on through the night.

Oh! power of fancy, when the reason sleeps!
In few short hours, how seem'd an age's span
Compress'd! Less lengthen'd to my waking sense
Appears the lapse from first remember'd days
Of infancy till this, the noon of life,
Than to the free imagination seem'd,
In that short, pleasant dream, the stretch of time,
While through th' immeasurable vast of space
We urg'd our ceaseless flight. On,—on,—still on,—
For ever with unutterable speed
Away,—away!—and still the unnumber'd suns
And worlds behind us fell; and others still

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Approach'd,—and grew;—and pass'd,—and wan'd,—and sank;—
Quench'd in the infinite.

At length again
The Beautiful Nature spake. “Behold!” he said,
“We enter in the realms of death and night!—
True night and death are here:—the night of earth
Is but a passing shadow; and its death
A change of being merely. Look! the stars
Are dwindling far behind us:—they are gone.—
Darkness impierceable is all around:—
Silence,—and death,—and undisturbed rest.

“Hither, when first I came, methought I found
Creation's end,—interminable night:
Yet I held on my dark and cheerless course,
Unbating, till amid the murky air
I spied a huge round mass of lurid light,
Towards which I sped, and found a darken'd sun,
Not yet quite dark; and there one airy shape,

153

The only one of its unnumber'd host
That haunted yet its dying majesty.
The rest to brighter suns were fled; but he
Linger'd awhile behind: for much he loved
The once-magnificent orb where he had pass'd
Almost eternal years of joy. He said,
From my first entrance in the fields of night,
I must have pass'd, unseen, a million such;
And that before me still a longer tract
Lay ere I could again behold the light
Of living suns:—‘That fearful chasm o'ergone,
New, glorious firmaments stretch on for aye.’

“And then he question'd me from whence I came;
To what part bent my way; and in what orb
I made abode. Thou wilt not marvel now,
Having beheld of the great universe
Though but an atom in compare of what
Even I erewhile have measur'd,—when I say

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He knew not, of himself, or by report,
Our sun or system. Couldst thou on the shore
Of ocean number each particular sand,—
Give it a name,—and mark it from the rest?
As little on this ocean of all space,
Whose sands are suns, may even the wisest know,
Save only He, the interminable whole.
Then the lone dweller of the desolate sphere
Bade me behold how the majestic forms
Once living, had pass'd off like dreams; but these
Thyself erelong shalt see: and much he told
Of suns, by slow decay, or sudden blight,
Cut off:—together then we lifted up
Our voices, praising Him, the Eternal One—
Embrac'd and parted. On my homeward course
I found the solitary spirit still
Mourning the perish'd grandeur, with such grief
As spirits feel,—a calm and holy sorrow,
Not known to things of clay, nor to be told;

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And, after a brief sojourn, when I turn'd,
Departing for our own more happy orb,
He journey'd by my side.

“Lo! even now
That awful wreck is nigh; nor yet quite dark.
Myriads of earthly years have pass'd away
Since I beheld it; yet it glimmers still.
Seest thou not, as we pause an instant here,
Right opposite, amid the depth of blackness,
That huge round of dark, drear, and crimson glow,
As 'twere a balefire for the fields of space
Burn'd to its last red embers? And behold!
Even here beside us, in the dusk, dark beam,
Dimly distinguish'd, a dependent world,
That with its ruler perish'd:—cold and dark,—
Lifeless and motionless,—a giant corpse
Slowly decaying in this vault of night.
Trees,—rivers,—oceans,—all have pass'd away,—
Dissolv'd into their primal elements
Imponderous,—invisible;—and float

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Through the wide ether,—matter for new worlds.
The very earth hath melted off; and nought
Remains but the huge, mis-shap'd skeleton
Of rock, dissolving also. Men will dream
Of everlasting fame; and conquerors
Slay myriads to be glorious through the earth;—
Let them look here, and ask where lie the bones
Of this earth's great ones?—where their monuments
Of brass, or iron, or unmouldering granite?—
And let the proud worms know a time may come
When their world too shall sicken, and expire,
And dwindle to a skeleton,—and pass
Away like a thin vapour.

“But behold!
As slowly we approach, the huge dim wreck
Of a once brighter, vaster sun than ours,
Expands, and seems to occupy all space.
Look on it:—hence thou may'st descry its form;
Its shadowy hills and mountains,—all entire,
But faded; for corruption comes not here,

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As in beginning of decaying earths;
Nor pass these purer elements away,
Wand'ring like theirs along the infinite,
Till lapse of ages inconceivable.

“Look where the eternal, gloomy forests stand.—
No branch hath wither'd,—not a leaf hath dropp'd;—
The rivers flow not;—the dusk ocean lies
Solid and motionless as rock;—the air
Still as an icy sea,—enveloping,
Like an imperishing tomb, the dark remains.
But view it nearer: on this mountain stand,
And look upon the city at its base—
Huge—dark—and silent. Not a stone hath fallen;
Pillars, and domes, and arches,—all firm-fix'd
As at the first; but their original lustre
Dimm'd by the darkness of a million years.
Where be the builders?—They are here. This, this
Is solitude!—a nation of thy earth
Hath not more habitants than here; and yet—

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Hark! how among the drear, gigantic piles,
The echo of my low voice moans and sighs:
How temple talks to temple; tower to tower;
Dome mutters unto dome, that yet again
Whispers it onward. We descend, and lo!
The dim, huge forms of the departed race!
In them alone can I behold decay;
Yet not as clay decayeth: they are still
Perfect in shape and hue; nor taint of death
Is on them, such as makes the earthly corpse
Ghastly and loathsome: but their mighty forms
Have dwindled somewhat, and the solid hath
Become like vapour. Nor, like parting clay,
Suffer'd they fear or pain, but passed off
In long, sweet slumber; by the fountain side,—
In the cool bower,—upon the mountain's brow,—
Beside the ocean,—or upon the lake,—
Amid the woods,—or in the scented vales,—
In temples,—or in gardens. Wheresoe'er
That moment found them, there they fell asleep.

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Here one who touch'd this shadowy harp, belike
To the sweet voice of her who on his breast
Finds her last slumber. Here they held the feast
Around the fountain;—see!—the colour'd fruits,
Just where they dropp'd from the relaxing hand,
Are fresh still; and the beautiful flowers, upheap'd
In ruby vases, by the graceful hands
Of these fair sleepers, seem perfumed yet.

“All in the same hour perish'd. Tenderly
The ethereal natures bade them to their rest.
For they perceiv'd the doom had passed forth:
The vast orb shook as with a mortal wound,
And year by year flagg'd heavily: the tints
Of the once pleasant, clear night hours grew deep,
And deeper,—and of dense and deepest blackness,—
And lengthen'd as they deepen'd: the bright noons
Wan'd slowly to a dim and sickly light;
Age after age more sickly, and more dim,
Till change of night and day was none,—but all

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Subsided to one drear and lurid red:
And, year by year, the planets in their course
Loiter'd, and swerv'd, through feebleness, aside
From their appointed path; and darkness fell
Slowly upon them,—a long dreary night,—
A night of death,—a night that knew no morn,—
And all things perish'd in them. Yet awhile
They wander'd faintly through the murky air,
Frozen and dead,—huge sepulchres of dead;
Then, one by one, stood still:—the sun stood still:—
The system had expir'd.”

The Shape of Light
Here ceas'd. A long and solemn pause ensued,
And we stood gazing on the desolate orb:
Then took our way in silence,—and again
Voyaged along the melancholy vast—
The burial place of systems. Night—deep night—
Stillness—terrific solitude—dead rest!

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Then thus, at length, after long silence, spake
The Ethereal One. “Such as thou hast beheld
Are in these regions numberless; but they
Perish'd not all by the same lingering course.
Even as a torch extinguish'd in the waters,
They have gone out. The mandate hath come forth,—
‘Be dark!’—and they are darken'd; and all life
Dies, and all motion ceaseth, and all sound:
The ocean hath no waves; the air no winds;
The streams no course; the blank orb, shuddering,
Stands still; the whirling planets, with a jar,
Shock—and are fix'd.

“In what far reach of time
These terrible extinctions first began,
Save He who all things knoweth, none can know.
Myriads of millions of long years must pass
Ere darkness blots them utterly from the sky:
With utter darkness first begins decay
Of their pure elements; decay so slow,

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Through ages more than man can comprehend,
Our eldest Natures scarce have mark'd their wane:
Yet when we first had being such were here;
Suns blank as midnight,—totally extinct;
Their adamantine substance melted down
Almost to shadow; their dependent worlds
Gone—gone like dew-drops of thy earth's first morn.
We pause: thou dost not feel on what we tread;
Thou canst see nothing; yet beneath our feet
Is the thin shadow of an aged sun;
The waters of its oceans all dried up;
Its mountains wither'd; and its hardest rocks
Become impalpable as air.

“Where fleet
Their viewless atoms,—who can tell? Perchance,
Departing hence, they brighten other suns,
Or hinder their decay:—expanded wide
Through the vast ether, do they only wait
The fiat—‘Be ye light!’—to rush again,
And kindle to new glories?—or have these

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Magnificent spheres, like the weak insect race,
Born in the morning, perishing at eve,
Their hour inevitable fix'd to shine,
And fall away in darkness?—Who shall say?

“Again we cleave the fathomless obscure:
From sun to perish'd sun we glance; and yet
Darkness is far before us. On!—yet on!—
Millions of blacken'd systems are behind!
Myriads of millions are before us still!

“But He who hath destroy'd can re-create.
In empty space and darkness, suddenly
We have beheld a cloud of pearly light;
And all about, to infinite extent,
The ether thickening like a radiant mist;
Working tumultuously,—and round, and round,
Rushing in endless circles,—wheel in wheel.
Anon the pearly cloud becomes a sphere;

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Condenses—brightens—glows—revolves—expands—
Flashes—and burns—and darts excessive light,—
And grasps the kindled ether as it rolls,
Turning it all to fire; and round and round,
Swifter and faster vehemently whirls and burns,
And gathers prodigious bulk,—till lo!—it is a sun!

“Then gradually the blazing wheel stands still:
And the great mass of mingled light begins
To break into its primal elements.
Thou hast beheld the sky of earth at dawn,
Or close of summer's day, when like a sea
Of fiery waves it shows; a thousand hues
Mingling and tossing with incessant change:
Billows of ruby over golden billows
Flowing, and ebbing back; and crimson waves
'Gainst purple surges work'd to fiery froth:
Thus—but with glory beyond all compare—
The radiant elements of light ferment,

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And break in clouds of inconceivable splendour.
Masses of purple, ruby, golden flame,
Condense, and grow to mountains of all gems.
Here the mild emerald rays unite,—and see!
Green valleys, forests, plains, and gentle hills;
Trees with ripe fruit, and blossoms,—flowers in bud
And bloom together springing. And lo! here
The sapphire clouds in mighty volume rolling,
Wave over wave; and, as the tumult stays,
See other waves,—a boundless ocean heaving,
Trying its strength 'gainst all its sounding shores.
Now from the hills the silver torrents pour,
And work their untried path along the plains:
Birds of all beauteous shape, and gorgeous hue,
Wing suddenly athwart the fragrant air:
Forth from the ground start up at once, full-form'd,
Majestic animals of immortal mould:
And last of all, and noblest, lo! the light
Thickens, and gathers in unnumber'd heaps,

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Like clouds of brightest fire, that from their height
Descend with gentle motion to the ground;
There rest,—and from the solid element
Exhaling a pure portion, with it mix,
And give vitality. Anon, behold!
Even as we gaze, the beams condense, and take
Solidity and shape, though undefined
As yet, and dim with bright mist circumfused.
But more and more the growing forms appear:
By glimpses we discern a seeming limb
Of heavenly mould,—a gently waving flame
That images a flow of golden tresses;—
A momentary gleam, as of a face
Glowing with heavenly lustre:—yet again,—
And still again,—and brighter,—and more sure
With every look the forming shapes appear;
Till rapidly at length the misty veils
Dissolve,—and lo! in gentle sleep reclined,

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A new creation,—pure and beautiful:
Forms like our own,—majestic and immortal.

“Not long they slumber: with one impulse rising,
Conscious of life,—and love,—and gratitude
To Him that hath created them, they lift
Their voices in instinctive harmony,
Adoring and thanksgiving. And with theirs
Join other voices, coming from afar:—
For, kindling up the ether as they fly,
Millions of new-created essences,—
Creatures of purest light,—ethereal shapes,—
All fresh and radiant from their Maker's hand,
Hasten exulting toward their destin'd sphere.

“The glorious orb is finish'd; but as yet
Hangs in the still air motionless:—as yet
Th' attendant worlds are not. Profoundest awe
Sinks in all hearts;—the voice of praise is hush'd;—

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The mute adorer pauses in suspense:—
Midway the torrent stays his headlong stream:—
The winds are lock'd:—the rolling seas lie still:—
Thronging the ether, countless multitudes
Of airy shapes look on with holy joy.

“Then suddenly in the far air appear,
Illustrious in the light of their first morn,
The new-created planets; and by each
Its tributary orbs, like starry lamps
Suspended. Still the mighty system sleeps:—
The last great word is wanting. Lo! it comes!
The small still voice:—creation hears!—the sun
Starts forth, rejoicing in his strength, to run
His endless course through the majestic heaven:—
The planets know their orbits:—and with songs
Exultant,—and a million quiring harps
Of airy essences attended,—take their way,
Rolling in rapture on through the ethereal blue.

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Then all the new-created race, and all
The innumerable host of spiritual shapes
Burst forth in chorus, praising and adoring
Him,—the Omnipotent,—All-wise,—All-good,—
Who was from everlasting,—and shall be
To everlasting:—the Invisible,—
The Unapproachable—the Great Unknown—
The One Pure Spirit.”—

The Beautiful Nature ceased: I heard no more
The music of his voice, to which all sounds
That earth has sweetest seem untuned and harsh.
Yet on methought we went through the immense
Of death and darkness,—a long flight of years:
But then confusion on my vision came;
One moment I seem'd lost, yet knew not how;
Speechless and motionless:—now toward me came
A multitude of mighty shapes, whose forms,
As earnestly I gazed, for ever changed,

170

As if to mock me. Now like things of light
And power they mov'd, treading on crimson clouds,
To songs of gladness striking golden harps;
And now they pass'd dejectedly away,
Gloomy and dim as the moon's darken'd orb.
Now through a firmament of brilliant suns
I seem'd to voyage with some heavenly thing,
Whom yet I could not see;—and then, anon,
Lo every fire was quenched, and all space
Was one illimitable flood of waters:
Above me, to eternity, all ocean:—
Beneath and round me ocean, shoreless—bottomless—
Heaving in utter night its measureless waves!
And then again methought I found myself
Circling the disk of some enormous sphere,
That now appear'd a sun,—and now a ball
Of fiercest fire, roaring outrageously;—
And now a cold,—dim,—dreary,—shapeless heap,
Mouldering away in night and solitude.

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But then once more I travell'd the abyss
Of darken'd space with that celestial shape.
Away—away we went:—he spake no more;
But turn'd for ever his irradiate face
Upon me with a look of heavenly beauty,
Not to be told;—oh! never to be lost.
I gaz'd—and gaz'd,—it seem'd for years I gaz'd,—
And to eternity had wish'd to gaze
On that ineffable divinity:
But, as some bright star slowly fades away,
Melting to nothing in the beam of morning,
So gradually that heavenly vision fled
From my desiring eye. I look'd,—and look'd;—
'Twas faint,—and dim,—and dimmer;—and the hand.
That still grasp'd mine felt like the touch of air.

There came in the dark vast a milky spot:—
'Twas now a pearly cloud:—'twas now a mist

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Of silvery light:—Oh! 'twas a firmament
Boundless,—and glowing with unnumber'd stars!

The Beautiful Spirit smil'd, and pointed up,—
Then melted into ether. Instantly
I seem'd to pass away, like a thin cloud
In the blue sky at noon, that leaves no trace
Where it hath been. All after was a blank,
A dead pause in the flight of time, as life
Had been for years suspended.

I awoke,
And knew not where, or what I was: but soon
The glorious vision I had seen return'd
Upon me; and I thought again to look
On the majestic Spirit that had led me
Through earth and heaven; and to behold once more
The glittering mountains, and the boundless plains

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And oceans of the sun:—with that I turn'd,
And op'd my eyes:—and found myself on earth.

The sea was whispering quietly beneath;
The evening breeze was on the hills:—and lo!—
Just touching on the rim of the wide waters,—
The sun himself,—sinking in lonely grandeur.

THE END.