Poems By Richard Chenevix Trench: New ed |
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THE TRUE PILGRIM. |
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THE TRUE PILGRIM.
The deeper religious minds of Mahomedanism spiritualize the pilgrimage to Mecca, and do not fail to urge that the performance of its outward details of duty will profit nothing, unless regarded as signs and symbols of higher truths. See in proof the Abu Seid of Hariri (Rückert's translation, vol. ii. pp. 36-46), a book equal in wit, and i many higher qualities immeasurably superior, to Gil Blas, the European work with which it naturally suggests a comparison.
To his sole heir the agëd monarch said,—
‘He who on every Moslem did impose,
That once at least before his life should close,
To Mecca he should wend his faithful way,
And in the mother city kneel and pray,
By shadows such as these did understand
The earnest seeking of a better land,
And a more real pilgrimage intend—
Even that which draws for me unto its end.
When thou then on this errand just art bent,
Let not thy labour all be vainly spent,
As vain the toil of many will be found,
Though duly they have paced the holy ground,
Circling the sacred shrine in many a ring,
The Caaba, the aim and object to which the pilgrimage is properly directed, is a plain and unpretending edifice. The Loretto of Mahomedanism having Seth for its builder, it was at the deluge carried by angels into heaven; and when that was past, brought back to earth. The reverence attached to it dates back to a period far anterior to the rise of Islam. The new religion adopted it with so much else into itself.
And duly drank of Zemsem's holy spring,
And kissed that stone, which, white in heaven as snow,
Doth now coal-black through breath of sinners show;
And all the weary desert way have made,
Pacing a-foot, in meanest garb arrayed,
Leaving no tittle unfulfilled of all
Which to a perfect pilgrim should befall.
Oh, many will have known the toil, the pain,
Who yet will miss that journey's truest gain;
For 'tis not merely that thou turn thy face
Towärd the Caaba and the holy place,
Towärd New Zion, and art journeying there.
Vainly whole heaps of pebbles wilt thou bring,
And at a fancied aëry devil fling,
Casting thy stone upon the very field,
Where Abraham's faith the tempter once repelled,
If all the while thou shunnest to molest
A truer devil, lurking in thy breast.
And what will profit to have laid aside
Thy gorgeous robes and outward signs of pride,
Taking in mean attire thy pilgrim way,
If pride be still thine inmost soul's array?
Oh! let humility thy garment be,
Which never suffer to be drawn from thee,
Although a Chosroes' mantle in its stead
By Fortune's hand to thee were offerëd.
Thou ridest; yet remember not the less
That many pace a-foot the wilderness:
Fare gently for their sakes; or if perchance,
Vigorous and strong, on foot thou dost advance,
Bethink thee still that with the caravan
Is many a child, and many an aged man.
Learn other dangers on thy pathway found.
To right or left if sounds thine ear invade,
Like tramplings of a mighty cavalcade,
Or voice by night which names thee by thy name,
As though from some familiar friend it came,
Bidding thee turn a little from thy way,
Or tarry, do not for thy life obey;
But close thine ears, and ever onward haste,
Eluding so the demons of the waste.
And limbs are faint, far off thou dost espy
What seems to thee some broad transparent lake,
Delighting in its lucid breast to take
White clouds, far mountains, and inverted trees,
Do not forsake thy company for these:
'Tis but the floating heat of middle noon,
From sand-flats drawn, and which will vanish soon:
Oh woe! if thee it shall have lured away,
To flatter first, and afterwards betray.
My son, whom I can watch for now no more,
Grave deeply in thine heart this pilgrim lore;
About thy neck a father's precepts bind;
On, on, and leave these perils far behind.’
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