Poems :: :: University of Virginia Library

Let none but priests or lowly men draw nigh
Unto the lofty mountains, to invade
The awful sanctuary God hath built
Upon their desert sides. There was a time,
Ere the unholy stain of blood had flushed
The sunny green of the young virgin earth,
When He did walk with men in shady bowers
And innocent gardens. But when sin grew bold,
The jealous God withdrew unto the hills:
And the bright mists that moved upon the plain,
To gladden and keep fresh the heart of earth,
Were gathered up to Him, and hung in folds
Of glorious cloud before His mountain Throne;
And everlasting barrenness was bid
To take the hills unto itself, that He
Might have a solitude wherein to dwell.

Behold how He hath gifted this His stern
And sacred dwelling-place. Tempests and storms
And the mysterious voices of loud winds,
A thousand lights of beauty, so intense
They make men weep for love of them, and shades
That move obedient to conceal from us
The path of some dear Angel, and o'er all
Bridges of rainbow thrown from peak to peak
In mystic arches, signs of covenant:—
These are His gifts unto the mighty hills.

173

And the blue skies are bid by Him to stoop
Unto the mountain-top, that earth may blend
With Heaven; and alway from their cloven sides
The music of ten thousand springs is heard,
Gushing with water—holiest element,
Wherein the power of our New Birth is laid:
Fed ever from the dews of Heaven that fall
When night is coldest; and free liberal airs
That roam about the mountains, and that come
We know not whence, move o'er the pool unseen,
Like the pure Dove who broods above the Font.
—Fresh are those sources, though no shade is nigh,
Fresh as the wells that stand in natural rock
In summer woods or violet-scented grove,
With lowly flowers all round, and forest-breaths
Just come to dimple their still surfaces,
And now and then to scatter the frail leaves
From off the briar-rose that hangs above.

And here and there, far in the lonely glens,
Huge memory-peopled forests stretch along;
Amid whose glorious tangled aisles, and choirs
Closed in with leafy pinnacles, and shafts
Of tall light trees down which the sunbeam plays,
Our holy sires were taught by God to build
Their venerable Churches, so that He
Might come once more from the eternal hills
To dwell by shrines that mortal hands had reared,
Albeit the pattern of the Holy Place
Was shown them on the mountain's wooded side!

On the high places of the Holy Church,
Strongholds of prayer and lonely steeps of faith,
Lay the first lights of hope, when all around
Was dark and dreary tumult. Savage wastes
Of black and angry waters rolled along.

174

But the strong breath of Him who brooded once
Upon the shapeless seas, closed up the skies
And sealed the fountains of the bursting deep.
When Noe from his single lattice gazed,
The watery gleams of the returning sun
Smiled sadly on the mountain-peaks that rose,
Like islands of the Blest, happy and green.
Unto a mountain-top by impulse drawn,
On Ararat the weary Ark reposed,
Safe anchored there within the rocky veil,
Now muffled by long centuries of snow.
Then were the shades dispelled, and earth was free,
And Stars and Angels shouted round the Throne,
And the victorious Sun broke from the East
Into the sky, beneath a glorious arch
Wreathed with triumphal colors, and the Earth
Sent up a steam of odorous sacrifice
Unto the Threefold Majesty in Heaven!

These are the marvels that of right belong
Unto the mountains. So it came to pass
The children of the old dark faiths went up
To worship there, and lit their altar fires
Upon the even cone of some green hill,
Whose very shape seemed pregnant to their eyes
With an unwonted presence, or dim trace
Of Him they sought. Alas! they little knew
Whence their blind worship came, what Angel forms
Went often with them to the bleak hill-tops.
And so the spiritual Persian climbed
The lofty steep, to feel his God diffused
In the unbounded blue that was around,
As though the mountain-wind, that did embrace
Himself and all, had been the breath of God!

175

Oh! come then to these gifted Altars, come!
They will unteach thee pride, and gird thee round
With types and mysteries of things above,
And wrap thy spirit up in many a fold
Of awful visions. Come and wander now
Among their solemn passes, far withdrawn
From every sound except the waterfall,
And eagle's voice, high up among the clouds—
Wondrous as that dread bird that waited once
In Patmos, when the saintly exile saw
The holy Church pass on from east to west,
Like the bright moon, through shadows manifold.

How fixed and calm they look! Yet on their sides,
Whether by stream or flame impressed, fierce scars
And rugged seams are left as if to tell
Of revolutions past, upheaval slow,
And secular subsidence, and deep grooves
Worn by the ancient glacier on its road,
Like furrows on brave faces made by pain,
The lines of earth's old age. They make the hills
Look old and hoary, and yet not the less
Unchangeable: as if they meant to show
That changes, which efface men's works and ways,
Can only wear God's footprints deeper in,—
For fire and flood are but His chariot-wheels.

Behold the heights man's foot hath never trod!
A cloud of prophecy hangs densely there.
In ancient days the Spirit dwelt in hearts
That knew His presence: in these later times
Men prophesy, and know it not; they strew
The precious treasure up and down, like leaves,
And the wise winds, which are God's Spirit, take
And gather them for Him,—they are not lost.

176

Thus from all seers, both new and old, like clouds
Drifting in little flocks on autumn days
To one dark treasure-house of storm, each year
The weight of prophecy doth grow, and men
Behold its varying outline, bright and dark,
And watch its swelling form with awe, as though
It could no more contain the living fire
Which hath already shone in palest gleams
Through many a rent and at each radiant fringe.

Come, then, unto the mountains—sit with me
Among this spotted fern; for God's decrees
Are wrapped about them like a mantle: they,
Whom He foreknew, perchance may lift the veil,
And see His depths within the blessed light
Which kindles love and yet doth not increase
Our knowledge. Come, then, to this trickling spring,
It will remind thee of thy morning dew.
Let the huge mountains throw their rugged arms
Around thee, while their virtue goeth out
Into thy heart with hidden sacraments!