Poems By Richard Chenevix Trench: New ed |
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THE MONK AND SINNER. |
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 | Poems |  |
140
THE MONK AND SINNER.
See the same, p. 251. All must be struck with the deep moral resemblance which this story of Sandi's bears to the incident recorded by St. Luke, vii. 36-40. We have here reproduced to us the Pharisee and the woman that was a sinner, and all the deeper relations of law and grace which belong to that history.
In days of old, when holy prophets trod
This earth, the living oracles of God,
What time one such his mission did fulfil,
There lived a youth, a prodigy of ill:
So foul the tablets of his heart and black,
That Satan's self from them had started back;
Him as the plague sought every soul to shun,
At him in horror pointed every one.
And in the city where this sinful youth
All bosoms filled with horror or with ruth,
In the same city dwelt a Monk as well,
Round whom all crowded when he left his cell;
And those who only touched his garment's hem,
Counted that heaven was nearer unto them—
Such name for prayer and penance he had gained:
And he one day that Prophet entertained:
When in their sight this sinner did appear,
Who yet for awe presumed not to draw near,
But falling back, like moth from dazzling light,
Lay on the ground, as blinded by their sight.
And as in spring relents the frozen ground,
Even so it seemed as though his heart unbound;
Streamed from his eyes like loosened floods the tears:
‘Woe's me,’ he cried; ‘for thirty guilty years
My life's best treasure have I spent in vain,
And death and hell are now my only gain.
I totter on a dark chasm's dreadful brink,
Hell's jaws are yawning for me, and I sink:
Yet since none ever Thou didst from Thee cast.
I stretch my hands to Thee; Lord, hold them fast.’
This earth, the living oracles of God,
What time one such his mission did fulfil,
There lived a youth, a prodigy of ill:
So foul the tablets of his heart and black,
That Satan's self from them had started back;
Him as the plague sought every soul to shun,
At him in horror pointed every one.
And in the city where this sinful youth
All bosoms filled with horror or with ruth,
In the same city dwelt a Monk as well,
Round whom all crowded when he left his cell;
And those who only touched his garment's hem,
Counted that heaven was nearer unto them—
Such name for prayer and penance he had gained:
And he one day that Prophet entertained:
When in their sight this sinner did appear,
Who yet for awe presumed not to draw near,
But falling back, like moth from dazzling light,
Lay on the ground, as blinded by their sight.
And as in spring relents the frozen ground,
Even so it seemed as though his heart unbound;
Streamed from his eyes like loosened floods the tears:
‘Woe's me,’ he cried; ‘for thirty guilty years
My life's best treasure have I spent in vain,
And death and hell are now my only gain.
141
Hell's jaws are yawning for me, and I sink:
Yet since none ever Thou didst from Thee cast.
I stretch my hands to Thee; Lord, hold them fast.’
But here the Monk with lifted eyebrows—‘Peace,
Blasphemer,—from thy useless clamours cease:
And darest thou, thus steeped in sin, make free
With him, God's holy Prophet, and with me?
My God, this one thing grant me, that I may
Stand far from this man on the judgment day.’—
More he had said, but on the Prophet broke
Swift inspiration, and he straightway spoke:
‘Two here have prayed—diverse has been their prayer,
Yet granted both their supplications are.
He who in mire of sin now thirty years
Has rolled, forgiveness asks with many tears:
Ne'er yet has head of contrite sinner lain
Upon the threshold of God's throne in vain.
All he has sinned to him shall be forgiven;
Him God has chosen a denizen of heaven.
That Monk has prayed upon the other hand
That he may never near this sinner stand;
That this may be so, hell his place must be,
Where never more this sinner he shall see.
Whose robe is white, but heart is black with pride,
He for himself hell's gates has opened wide,
For, weighed in God the all-sufficient's scale,
Not claims nor righteousness of man avail;
But these are costly in his sight indeed,—
Repentance, contrite shame, and sense of need.’
Blasphemer,—from thy useless clamours cease:
And darest thou, thus steeped in sin, make free
With him, God's holy Prophet, and with me?
My God, this one thing grant me, that I may
Stand far from this man on the judgment day.’—
More he had said, but on the Prophet broke
Swift inspiration, and he straightway spoke:
‘Two here have prayed—diverse has been their prayer,
Yet granted both their supplications are.
He who in mire of sin now thirty years
Has rolled, forgiveness asks with many tears:
Ne'er yet has head of contrite sinner lain
Upon the threshold of God's throne in vain.
All he has sinned to him shall be forgiven;
Him God has chosen a denizen of heaven.
That Monk has prayed upon the other hand
That he may never near this sinner stand;
That this may be so, hell his place must be,
Where never more this sinner he shall see.
Whose robe is white, but heart is black with pride,
He for himself hell's gates has opened wide,
For, weighed in God the all-sufficient's scale,
Not claims nor righteousness of man avail;
But these are costly in his sight indeed,—
Repentance, contrite shame, and sense of need.’
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