The Poetical Works of Robert Montgomery Collected and Revised by the Author |
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HUSH OF NIGHT. |
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 | The Poetical Works of Robert Montgomery |  |
HUSH OF NIGHT.
But the night is come;
The Moon, with her pale hierarchy girt
Of stars, is gliding to the ocean's brim,
And listen! for the chime of far-off bells
O'er a dead Sabbath tolls their dying tone:
And now, the Day is buried; to thy tomb
Eternity! with all its hopes and fears,
Gather'd and gone. But oh, how thrill'd
The chords mysterious of our secret frame!
As if the stirrings of a life unborn,
Latent but lovely, this rapt hour inspired,
The Dead seem gazing on our hearts again!
Illapses deep, irradiations pure
Glide through our spirit from a source unknown;
Until, by awful loveliness subdued,
Above, the pilgrim lifts his eye of prayer
Expressive: youth, and home, and long-fled days
With soft revival touch him into tears
Unshed; and while yon arch of midnight rings
With the soft echoes of those sunken chimes
Around him, many a thoughtful sigh is heaved
O'er visions gone; and things that once becharm'd
His dazzled fancy, pale and cold appear,—
Weeds of the past on Mem'ry's lonely shore!
The Moon, with her pale hierarchy girt
Of stars, is gliding to the ocean's brim,
And listen! for the chime of far-off bells
O'er a dead Sabbath tolls their dying tone:
And now, the Day is buried; to thy tomb
Eternity! with all its hopes and fears,
Gather'd and gone. But oh, how thrill'd
The chords mysterious of our secret frame!
As if the stirrings of a life unborn,
Latent but lovely, this rapt hour inspired,
The Dead seem gazing on our hearts again!
Illapses deep, irradiations pure
Glide through our spirit from a source unknown;
Until, by awful loveliness subdued,
Above, the pilgrim lifts his eye of prayer
Expressive: youth, and home, and long-fled days
With soft revival touch him into tears
Unshed; and while yon arch of midnight rings
With the soft echoes of those sunken chimes
Around him, many a thoughtful sigh is heaved
O'er visions gone; and things that once becharm'd
His dazzled fancy, pale and cold appear,—
Weeds of the past on Mem'ry's lonely shore!
And now, amid thy hush, most holy Night!
Here let us stand beneath yon hanging cliff,
Closing our song beside the placid sea
Which now lies breezeless. Who that thus beholds
Her bosom, by the braiding moonlight deck'd,
And heaving only to attraction's orb,
As pant young hearts beneath the eye they love,
Could ere imagine, everlasting Sea!
Thy billows, like the roar of human wrongs,
Clamour on high and cleave the heavens with sound
So often! Such thy halcyon slumber now,
The stars are mirror'd on thy glassy wave,
With beam unbroken; while the feet which press
The pebbled margin of yon moonlit-wave,
Rudely and loudly on the hush intrude
Their faintest motion.
Here let us stand beneath yon hanging cliff,
Closing our song beside the placid sea
Which now lies breezeless. Who that thus beholds
Her bosom, by the braiding moonlight deck'd,
And heaving only to attraction's orb,
As pant young hearts beneath the eye they love,
Could ere imagine, everlasting Sea!
Thy billows, like the roar of human wrongs,
Clamour on high and cleave the heavens with sound
282
The stars are mirror'd on thy glassy wave,
With beam unbroken; while the feet which press
The pebbled margin of yon moonlit-wave,
Rudely and loudly on the hush intrude
Their faintest motion.
Here, then, be farewell
To this blent strain of meditative truth,
E'en by thy bulwark, O Britannic Isle!
Whom Ocean ramparts with her wall of waves.
Now in the trance of this untroubled night
While all seems holy, our adoring hearts
To that supernal Power of truth we lift,
Who guardeth Empires, and Who guideth thee,
My country! with a most peculiar love:
That once as out of Zion peal'd the trump
Of ancient Gospel, hence the battle-voice
Of Truth should never cease to challenge Rome;
But waken echoes, bold as Luther's cheer
Might welcome, deep as lofty Cranmer loved,
Or Ridley o'er his pangs of fire prolong'd.
To this blent strain of meditative truth,
E'en by thy bulwark, O Britannic Isle!
Whom Ocean ramparts with her wall of waves.
Now in the trance of this untroubled night
While all seems holy, our adoring hearts
To that supernal Power of truth we lift,
Who guardeth Empires, and Who guideth thee,
My country! with a most peculiar love:
That once as out of Zion peal'd the trump
Of ancient Gospel, hence the battle-voice
Of Truth should never cease to challenge Rome;
But waken echoes, bold as Luther's cheer
Might welcome, deep as lofty Cranmer loved,
Or Ridley o'er his pangs of fire prolong'd.
| The Poetical Works of Robert Montgomery | |