Reverberations :: :: University of Virginia Library

In the dead silence of the solemn night,
When men are wandering in the paths of sleep,
A vision past before me, like the light
From that white throne where myriad seraphs keep
Eternal watch with wings athwart their face;
And robed with splendour, lo! a Spirit came,
Until his shadow lightened on the place
Where I was standing, and I felt the same,
And feeling it, I shivered with delight,
For then my soul grew pure, and clear my sight,
And piercing as the day.
I looked—I saw a Shape of light supreme,
Despotic as the thought of God in dream,
Yet calm and stable as the old heavens seem,
And beautiful as they.
The Spirit nearer came: a still, small voice,

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That grew out of the silence, said, “Rejoice!
For unto thee is given
The face of the veiled future to behold,
To draw aside the curtain, fold by fold,
Rolled o'er her shrine as broidered clouds are rolled
Over pavilioned heaven:
But first thou must behold the evils done,
First learn the oppressions wrought beneath the sun.”
Then like a wind-borne flame I rose in air,
And thence o'erlooked the thousand realms of earth,
And since that hour unutterably fair
Are the pale dreams that in my soul have birth.
All that I saw on that oracular night,
I would unbosom now, in words that gleam like light.

High on a crystal pinnacle I stood:
“What seest thou, Child of Earth?” the Spirit cried.
I looked around me in prophetic mood,
And to the Spirit's question thus replied:
“I see a mist whose vaporous surge rolls past
The mural mountains of this catholic frame;
Before the breath of the gigantic blast,
And in fierce outline, underneath the same,
I see a world of restlessness and woe,
A multitude that hurry to and fro,
In utter disarray.
Kings, nobles, priests, and soldiers mingle there,
And trembling babes, and women pale and fair,
And Youth with mournful and indignant air,
And Age forlorn and grey.”

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“What hearest thou, Child of Earth?” the angel said.
“I hear a murmur low, but dense and dread,
Presageful of a storm;
I see the nations gathering from afar,
I see their banner gleaming like a star,
I see the kings of earth go forth to war,
I see their squadrons form.
Amid the prostrate multitude they ride,
Trampling and rending with portentous pride.
The earth, the common mother of them all,
Is crimson with the blood her children shed.
Their corses lie unburied where they fall,
Nor tears nor honour are there for the dead.
But, lo! the conquerors thank a gracious Heaven
For what they call a peace, a victory Christ hath given.

“I see men with a Book in their right hand,
Misquoting words of wisdom and of truth,
Averring still that, at their God's command,
Old Age and Manhood, Infancy and Youth,
In serfship, woe, and want, must till the land,
With sweat like Christ's dear blood-drops on their brow,
While they, a privileged and peculiar band,
Alone shall reap the harvest others sow.
I see young maidens, free-born but not free,
Lashed by the soldiers through the crowded street,
Because they sang, ‘Our country yet shall be
Among the nations known;’ their soft, white feet
Are purpled with their blood, and yet they weep not,

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Though tears are hid in every lidded eye;
But, pale as violets when the frost-winds sleep not,
Still murmuring low sweet songs, they lay them down and die.

“I see the pure in heart, the great in soul,
Shot in their fathers' sight. I see a train
Of kingly murderers, that defy control,
Shedding young patriots' blood as clouds shed rain.
I see grave matrons, at the hollow knoll
Of death-bells, blindfold led, because they asked
Food for their sons, to whom a scantier dole
Is now dealt forth, till by strong grief o'ertasked,
Quenching the light of their aspiring spirit,
With smiling patience and a half-closed eye,
They live no more, yet sweetest life inherit
In hearts wherein their hearts can never die.
But lo! the longed-for hour!—the awakening nations
Kings and their armies fearlessly confront,
And, with serene and earnest expectations,
Await the deadly charge, the battle's stormy brunt.

“The stillness deepens round me. Such of old
Felt He to whom the Vision dread was given,
When far away the waves of sound had rolled,
And only God and silence dwelt in heaven.
I shudder, but the Vision shall be told.
I see the serried squadrons rush afar,
The falchion gleams, banner and flag unfold,—
It is the harvest-home of death and war,

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It is the vintage of the wrath of God,—
And reeling in the wine-press of his ire,
I see the oppressor and the anarch trod.
Beneath white exhalations seamed with fire,
That rise from earth to heaven and blind the day,
Roll hurried voices murmuring, ‘Slay, slay, slay!’
Ha! the keen scent of human blood laughs up,
The innocent earth is splashed with that red rain;
Man drains the dregs of misery's poisoned cup,
And wins the victory but through deadliest pain.
The brave are reaped like sheaves in summer season,
And yet they yield not. The unconquered heirs
Of fathers that once bled for truth and reason
Have cast the oppressors down, the victory is theirs.

“Now brings sweet Peace her glories from afar,
And Song and Thought are throned on Fact and Strife;
Mind crowds on mind, rising like star on star,
And fills with splendour the deep heaven of life.
Bright Science, in her magic bower,
Watches the dædal dance of Power,

This ode was commenced in 1840. In one of the stanzas I ventured to predict the influence which the genius of Carlyle, Mill, Grote, and Comte would exercise on this generation— a prediction which has been amply verified. In revising the ode, I have, however, omitted the names of these distinguished men. The political forecasts which I then made have also had a general justification in corresponding events. In one division of the ode I have described the frightful sufferings of the people in Poland before 1848. The hangings, banishments, and other penalties inflicted on the patriots of 1863 will be in the remembrance of many of us. In the strophe which originally celebrated the great names already mentioned, are two allusions which require explanation. By “the dædal dance of power,” I mean the natural process known as the correlation or convertibility of the forces; and by the “mystic child of change and conflict,” the more perfect human being of the future, suggested by the hypothesis of Mr Darwin, or the evolution theory of Mr Spencer. In the railway strophe, the “blind fair chasms,” &c., is a mental reproduction of the magnificent local characteristics of the Sömmering Pass; and the “violet seas,” of the beautiful bays on the Riviera. The welcome given, in another strophe of the ode, to Egyptian civilisation, under Mehemet Ali's rule, has been fairly justified, though a late residence in Cairo has made me conscious to how remote a period I must postpone the fulfilment of my political ideal. “The vision known of yore,” is the religious ideal, or its philosophic equivalent.

Or greets the far-off mystic Child
Of wizard change and conflict wild,
Or dreams how man in this fair orb shall dwell,
Till, soaring as on golden wings
Love soared from Death, a young world springs
From our old world's chaotic night,
A glorious athlete, clothed with might,

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Fair child of a dark mother born,
A joyful, young, and festive morn,
Panoplied, adult, defiant,
Self-sufficing, self-reliant,
A champion that no might avails to quell,
A spirit that shall live for aye,
A god that cannot pass away;
It rolls, it rolls, a boundless river,
That rolling once shall roll for ever;
Its mighty waters heave, dilate, and swell,
And, charioteered as in an ocean car,
The Genius of the age, with low sweet spell,
Charms the smooth waves that waft him fast and far.

“Labour is free, is free! the lords of labour,
The princes and the peers of Godlike toil,
Mould into spade and share both shield and sabre,
And, from the bosom of the gracious soil,
Raise the mild olive and the bridal vine,
Raise foodful corn, and raise voluptuous fruit.
The slave no longer wails in dungeoned mine
O'er years of darkness; the gnome's spell is mute;
Commodity for fair commodity
With liberal hand is given; hearts half divine
The needs of hearts made kindred; land and sea
Are glorified with commerce grown divine;
Culture hath so transfigured every soil,
That flowers and fruits, long fables, now adorn
The rudest shores, made mild by patient toil,
Where, in full ripeness, rustle golden waves of corn.

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The peasant-kings of a regenerate world
Have deified all labour; graceful drops
Of beaded heat are on each brow impearled,
Dried by the breeze, that, with melodious stops,
Falling from heaven upon the honeyed leaves,
With delicate fingering plays itself to rest,
Still giving more delight than it receives,
Strengthening with health and hope the diligent man,
Whom of her sons dear Nature loves the best,
And consecrates the winds to favour and to fan.

“Joy! time and space are now no more, no more!
True love and tender friendship hourly meet!
Lo! the steam-chariots of the land explore
Arcadian railway and mosaic street,
With no demoniac scream of dread,
But by exultant music led,
Driven by the mighty breath of fire,
As clouds are by the whirlwind's ire,
The magic chariots pant and fly,
While rock and tree rush hurrying by;
Or lingering glide through some embowered retreat
In ancient forest, where the hymn
Of cradled child, in twilight dim,
The silence charms; by fairy leas
That slumber near soft violet seas;

This ode was commenced in 1840. In one of the stanzas I ventured to predict the influence which the genius of Carlyle, Mill, Grote, and Comte would exercise on this generation— a prediction which has been amply verified. In revising the ode, I have, however, omitted the names of these distinguished men. The political forecasts whcih I then made have also had a general justification in corresponding events. In one division of the ode I have described the frightful sufferings of the people in Poland before 1848. The hangings, banishments, and other penalties inflicted on the patriots of 1863 will be in the remembrance of many of us. In the strophe which originally celebrated the great names already mentioned, are two allusions which require explanation. By “the dædal dance of power,” I mean the natural process known as the correlation or convertibility of the forces; and by the “mystic child of change and conflict,” the more perfect human being of the future, suggested by the hypothesis of Mr Darwin, or the evolution theory of Mr Spencer. In the railway strophe, the “blind fair chasms,” &c., is a mental reproduction of the magnificent local characteristics of the Sömmering Pass; and the “violet seas,” of the beautiful bays on the Riviera. The welcome given, in another strophe of the ode, to Egyptian civilisation, under Mehemet Ali's rule, has been fairly justified, though a late residence in Cairo has made me conscious to how remote a period I must postpone the fulfilment of my political ideal. “The vision known of yore,” is the religious ideal, or its philosophic equivalent.

Or wind round blind fair chasms, while ever fleet
Dim shadowy mountains past—a giant crowd;
Or in some marble city's flowery street
Stand breathless, flying shapes of fire and cloud!

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Joy! are not time and space annihilated?
Have not America and England met?
Have not the ocean-chariots created
A path o'er seas which envious Fate once set
For boundary, so to make companionless
Our human world?—In vain! for like a dream
Embodied on the liquid wilderness,
Flies to her unseen home the Thing of steam.
The waves lift up their voice, they clap their hands,
And peaceful Ocean, with a glad caress,
Links to a thousand shores a thousand lands,
In thousand lands a thousand toils to bless.
For noblest embassies of noblest thought,
Of love and hope, worship and sacrifice,
Were these bold travellers of the ocean wrought,
Still consecrating earth to fair humanities.
All men are kings and priests by right divine,
All souls are by the great Soul reinspired,
And lovely deeds and noble actions shine
Beneath the robes with which they are attired,
As heaven with stars, as earth is clothed with flowers,
As man shall be with natural draperies.
Great worship sets to music all the hours,
Fair arts have recreated mortal life.
The man is now returned to Paradise,
And reverential love receives the queenly wife.

In English lanes young children play,
Pure as the light and glad as day,

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With quiet mien, with graceful dress,
In exquisite unconsciousness.
A poetry not found in books
Plays, a bright shadow, on their looks;
A genuine gospel there is read,
For natural thoughts their souls have fed.
Above them are the opening skies,
Around them the true Eden lies.
Kind Nature, with a wise control,
Tempers the body and the soul;
With lordly mien and motion meek,
She bids the child glide, laugh, and speak;
With impulse fine and feeling rare,
With lovely action, simple prayer,
With tears, smiles, kisses, hopes, desires,
She trains, she teaches, she inspires.
From hedgerows green, from vernal bowers,
Gay children strip the laughing flowers;
Large-lapped, full-handed, eager-eyed,
They run and dance, they laugh and glide,
And to their graver playmates bear
These nurslings bright of earth and air.

“The vision changes, and I stand
Where proudly our dear Mother-land
Sees her fair cities gladlier rise
Than Thebes arose to melodies
Of rare Amphion and the sound
Of Dorian harp on holy ground.

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From palace, temple, tower, and hall,
Young Morning lifts Night's thin grey pall:
Here pillared homes are glad with flowers,
There grass is green with singing showers;
And 'mid the chequered bloom and light
Of leaves and blossoms, making bright
The soul of sunshine, over all
Breaks, in fine spray, a silver fall
Of rainbow drops, or wayward flow
Of laughing waters plays below.
A voice that floats upon the breeze,
Or whispers to the whispering trees
That fringe our city, to my ear
Comes for delight, and not for fear,
And through a happy opening cloven
In trees where sun and shade are woven,
Trees through which longing eyes can gaze
Into great depths of purple haze,
I see a stately maiden lead
An old man forth; she bears a reed
With stops melodious, and the Book
Whereat men wonder as they look.
Then to her grandsire in the sun
She chants the starry lore of One,
That, human most, was most divine,
The Martyred Man of Palestine,—
The Shape that wandered, veiled in light,
In the dark shadow of the night,
The prophet that in music told
Of love and power by love controlled,

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He that in dewy cornfields strayed,
Or with the rose and lily played,
Or from the mountain peak sublime
Spake golden oracles to time,
That echo down the ruined years,—
The great Lord Christ, the Seer of Seers.

“But not alone our nobler England wears
The royal robes of truth and godlike grace,
As heaven wears light for vesture, as the spheres
Apparel evening skies, like smiles on Christ's own face!
But Cambria her glad youth renews,
A maiden gathering the May dews
Of ancient thought and music wild,
Proud of her birth, Time's elder child.
Stern Caledonia is arrayed
In truth, the heavenly Highland plaid;
Prophetic speech and utterance large
She takes for broadsword and for targe.
And thou whose wrongs all lately were redrest,
The helot Lady of the Northern Seas,
Bowing a thousand years thy lightning crest,
Yet with thy flag in battle and in breeze
Still streaming through the stormy sky,
A golden sunburst hurled from high,
Not armed with right, yet suffering wrong,
And weak contending with the strong,
Through death's cold floods and red high ways,
With tears and smiles with blame and praise,

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Cheering thy chiefs, baptized in blood,
A dreadful heroine hast thou stood!
Thou, too, Ierne, for the vest of steel,
Clothed in the quiet garb true heroes love,
Favourest an Union that shall have repeal,
When Time revokes the laws which bind the heavens above.

“Nor these alone, but many a commonwealth,
And many a kingdom, is with splendour clad;
Long fevered states awake in Godlike health,
In strength of nerve and sinew greatly glad.
O'er the Atlantic waves rejoiced I see
The people, born of earth's best blood,
Worship the lovely and the good,
And vaunt no more, but cheaply hold
Their gods of silver and of gold,
And organise a sacred chivalrie.
“And where in dreams the blue mid-ocean sleeps,
I see Osirian Egypt stand,
Sun ward I see her lift her hand.
The Nile his ancient honour knows,
The Eternal Sphinx in dread repose
O'er fairy cities wondering vigil keeps.
The rebel Ali well hath done,
The conquered yet the conquering one;
He that slain Peace to life restored,
And reared her, nursling of his sword.
But lo! maternal Asia breaks
Her trancèd sleep, and, as she wakes,

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She calls the Children of the Sun
From their long slumber, one by one,
Till Persia in the holy light
Of science basks, and Syria's height
Catches the splendour, and once more
Shrines the great Vision known of yore.
Cradled in dreams of ancient power,
See mystic India on the hour
Of happy Western influence smile,
Majestic daughter of the Isle
Enchanted, whose light sceptre still
Sways the high fates of good and ill.
More wondrous yet the changeless clime,
Grey daughter of ancestral Time,
Cathay, hath learned a nobler lore;
She loves who never loved before;
Taught by War's crimson scourge that none
Can leave the just and right undone;
The ancient laws, that had their birth
Ere man was crowned the king of earth,
That suns and spheres and heavens uphold,
Whose years fail not, that wax not old,
The children of the Eternal Prime,
Severe in beauty, strong, sublime,
Beloved in peace and feared in strife,
Will have man's homage or his life.

“The Song prophetic travels back again,
And home returning from her heaven of old,

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Like the great sun above the Western main,
She hovers ere she set, ere eye and lip grow cold.
Austria, the anarch old, is wise;
Russia hath fine humilities;
A tender wisdom hallows France;
Spain makes the common life romance;
Greece lifts her front with eyes serene;
Italia walks a mailèd queen;
And Germany, with crest unbowed
Steps sunward through the mist and cloud.
“But lo! her race of fire my Song hath run,
She sets, she sets in the deep sea of thought;
My seraph guide withdraws, fast fades my sun,
And fade the fairy hues my heaven had caught.
But as the splendour fades afar,
Slow rises under moon and star
A murmured chant, a song sublime,
The gathered music of all time;
And as that mighty music falls
O'er airy heights and shadowy walls,
A brighter heaven gives back the sound;
The Earth is all one holy ground,
And sweeter women, nobler men,
Begin the world's great course again.
And Man of many a man, one Man supreme,
Stands crowned the King of life, the Power of powers,
Lord of all thought, art, action, passion, dream,
Child of the eternal past, and heir of unborn hours.”

The particular external circumstances of the actions.

England—the Faery Land of Spenser.

“Man, oh, not men! a chain of linked thought.”—Shelley.