cending pure, the bell-like fame this or that down-trodden name, icate spirits, push'd away the hot press of the noon-day. do'er the plain, where the dead age its now silent warfare wage—
r that wide plain, now wrapt in gloom,
ere many a splendor finds its tomb, ny spent fames and fallen mights— e one or two immortal lights e slowly up into the sky shine there everlastingly,
e stars over the bounding hill. e epoch ends, the world is still.
undering and bursting torrents, in waves- olling and shouting er tombs, amid graves- e! on the cumber'd plain Paring a stage,
attering the past about, mes the new age. rds make new poems, Linkers new schools, atesmen new systems, itics new rules.
I things begin again; fe is their prize
rth with their deeds they fill, Il with their cries.
et, what ails thee, then?
-y, why so mute?
orth with thy praising voice! rth with thy flute! Diterer! why sittest thou ink in thy dream?
empts not the bright new age? ines not its stream? ok, ah, what genius, rt, science, wit! oldiers like Cæsar, atesmen like Pitt!
culptors like Phidias, phaels in shoals,
Dets like Shakespeare- eautiful souls!
e, on their glowing cheeks eavenly the flush!
-Ah, so the silence was!
was the hush!
SET where the upper streams of Simois flow
Was the Palladium, high 'mid rock and wood;
And Hector was in Ilium, far below, And fought, and saw it not-but there it stood !
It stood, and sun and moonshine rain'd their light
On the pure columns of its glen-built hall,
Backward and forward roll'd the waves of fight
Round Troy-but while this stood, Troy could not fall.
I ASK not that my bed of death From bands of greedy heirs be free; For these besiege the latest breath Of fortune's favor'd sons, not me.
I ask not each kind soul to keep Tearless, when of my death he hears. Let those who will, if any, weep!
There are worse plagues on earth than
I ask but that my death may find The Freedom to my life denied; Ask but the folly of mankind Then, then at last, to quit my side.
Spare me the whispering, crowded room, The friends who come, and gape, and go; The ceremonious air of gloom- All, which makes death a hideous show!
Nor bring, to see me cease to live, Some doctor full of phrase and fame, To shake his sapient head, and give The ill he cannot cure a name.
Nor fetch, to take the accustom'd toll Of the poor sinner bound for death, His brother-doctor of the soul, To canvass with official breath
The future and its viewless things- That undiscover'd mystery
Which one who feels death's winnowing wings
Must needs read clearer, sure, than he!
Bring none of these; but let me be, While all around in silence lies, Moved to the window near, and see Once more, before my dying eyes,
Bathed in the sacred dews of morn The wide aerial landscape spread- The world which was ere I was born. The world which lasts when I am dead;
Which never was the friend of one, Nor promised love it could not give, But lit for all its generous sun. And lived itself, and made us live.
There let me gaze, till I become In soul, with what I gaze on, wed! To feel the universe my home; To have before my mind-instead
Of the sick room, the mortal strife, The turmoil for a little breath- The pure eternal course of life. Not human combatings with death!
Thus feeling, gazing, might I grow Composed, refresh'd, ennobled, clear; Then willing let my spirit go
To work or wait elsewhere or here!
COLDLY, sadly descends The autumn-evening. The field Strewn with its dank yellow drifts Of wither'd leaves, and the elms. Fade into dimness apace, Silent ;-hardly a shout From a few boys late at their play! The lights come out in the street. In the school-room windows:-but el Solemn, unlighted. austere, Through the gathering darkness, arie The chapel-walls, in whose bound Thou, my father! art laid.
There thou dost lie, in the gloom Of the autumn evening. But ah! That word, gloom, to my mind Brings thee back, in the light Of thy radiant vigor, again; In the gloom of November we pass'd Days not dark at thy side: Seasons impair'd not the ray Of thy buoyant cheerfulness clear. Such thou wast! and I stand In the autumn evening and think Of bygone autumns with thee. Fifteen years have gone round Since thou arosest to tread. In the summer-morning, the road Of death, at a call unforeseen, Sudden. For fifteen years, We who till then in thy shade Rested as under the boughs Of a mighty oak, have endured Sunshine and rain as we might, Bare, unshaded, alone, Lacking the shelter of thee.
O strong soul, by what shore Tarriest thou now? For that force. Surely, has not been left vain! Somewhere, surely, afar. In the sounding labor-house vast Of being, is practised that strength. Zealous, beneficent, firm!
Yes, in some far-shining sphere, Conscious or not of the past. Still thou performest the word Of the Spirit in whom thou dost live- Prompt, unwearied, as here! Still thou upraisest with zeal The humble good from the ground, Sternly repressest the bad! Still, like a trumpet, dost rouse
hose who with hall-open eyes read the border-land dim wixt vice and virtue; reviv'st, accorest!--this was thy work ; his was thy life upon earth.
What is the course of the life
f mortal men on the earth ?fost men eddy about
lere and there-eat and drink, hatter and love and hate, Father and squander, are raised loft, are hurl'd in the dust, triving blindly, achieving fothing; and then they dieerish; and no one asks Who or what they have been, fore than he asks what waves, n the moonlit solitudes mild
Of the midmost Ocean, have swell'd, foam'd for a moment, and gone.
And there are some, whom a thirst Ardent, unquenchable, fires, Not with the crowd to be spent, Not without aim to go round In an eddy of purposeless dust, Effort unmeaning and vain. Ah yes! some of us strive Not without action to die Fruitless, but something to snatch From dull oblivion, nor all Glut the devouring grave! We, we have chosen our path- Path to a clear-purposed goal, Path of advance!-but it leads A long, steep journey, through sunk Gorges, o'er mountains in snow. Cheerful, with friends, we set forth- Then on the height, comes the storm. Thunder crashes from rock To rock, the cataracts reply, Lightnings dazzle our eyes. Roaring torrents have breach'd The track, the stream-bed descends In the place where the wayfarer once Planted his footstep--the spray Boils o'er its borders! aloft The unseen snow-beds dislodge Their hanging ruin; alas, Havoc is made in our train! Friends who set forth at our side, Falter, are lost in the storm. We, we only are left!
With frowning foreheads, with lips Sternly compress'd, we strain on, On--and at nightfall at last Come to the end of our way, To the lonely inn 'mid the rocks;
Where the gaunt and taciturn host Stands on the threshold, the wind Shaking his thin white hairsHolds his lantern to scan
Our storm-beat figures, and asks: Whom in our party we bring? Whom we have left in the snow?
Sadly we answer: We bring Only ourselves! we lost Sight of the rest in the storm. Hardly ourselves we fought through, Stripp'd, without friends, as we are. Friends, companions, and train. The avalanche swept from our side.
But thou would'st not alone Be saved, my father! alone Conquer and come to thy goal, Leaving the rest in the wild. We were weary, and we Fearful, and we in our march Fain to drop down and to die. Still thou turnedst, and still Beckonedst the trembler, and still Gavest the weary thy hand.
If, in the paths of the world, Stones might have wounded thy feet, Toil or dejection have tried Thy spirit, of that we saw Nothing-to us thou wast still Cheerful, and helpful, and firm! Therefore to thee it was given Many to save with thyself; And, at the end of thy day, O faithful shepherd! to come, Bringing thy sheep in thy hand. And through thee I believe
In the noble and great who are gone; Pure souls honor'd and blest
By former ages, who else- Such, so soulless, so poor, Is the race of men whom I see- Seem'd but a dream of the heart, Seem'd but a cry of desire. Yes! I believe that there lived Others like thee in the past, Not like the men of the crowd Who all round me to-day Bluster or cringe, and make life Hideous, and arid, and vile; But souls temper'd with fire, Fervent, heroic, and good, Helpers and friends of mankind.
Servants of God!-or sons Shall I not call you? because Not as servants ye knew Your Father's innermost mind,
His, who unwillingly sees One of his little ones lost- Yours is the praise, if mankind Hath not as yet in its march Fainted, and fallen, and died!
See! In the rocks of the world Marches the host of mankind, A feeble, wavering line. Where are they tending ?-A God Marshall'd them, gave them their goal. Ah, but the way is so long!
Years they have been in the wild! Sore thirst plagues them, the rocks, Rising all round, overawe;
Factions divide them, their host Threatens to break, to dissolve. -Ah, keep, keep them combined! Else, of the myriads who fill That army, not one shall arrive ; Sole they shall stray; in the rocks Stagger for ever in vain. Die one by one in the waste.
Then, in such hour of need
Of your fainting, dispirited race, Ye, like angels, appear, Radiant with ardor divine! Beacons of hope, ye appear! Languor is not in your heart, Weakness is not in your word, Weariness not on your brow.
Ye alight in our van! at your voice, Panic, despair, flee away.
Ye move through the ranks, recall The stragglers, refresh the outworn, Praise, re-inspire the brave! Order, courage, return; Eyes rekindling, and prayers, Follow your steps as ye go. Ye fill up the gaps in our files, Strengthen the wavering line, Stablish, continue our march, On, to the bound of the waste, On, to the City of God.
(FROM HEINE'S GRAVE)
THE Spirit of the world,
Beholding the absurdity of men—
Their vaunts, their feats-let a sardonic smile,
For one short moment, wander o'er his lips.
That smile was Heine!-for its earthly
The strange guest sparkled ; now 'tis pass'd away.
That was Heine and we, Myriads who live, who have lived, What are we all, but a mood,
A single mood, of the life Of the Spirit in whom we exist, Who alone is all things in one? Spirit, who fillest us all! Spirit, who utterest in each New-coming son of mankind Such of thy thoughts as thou wilt! O thou, one of whose moods, Bitter and strange, was the life Of Heine-his strange, alas, His bitter life!-may a life Other and milder be mine! May'st thou a mood more serene, Happier, have utter'd in mine! May'st thou the rapture of peace Deep have embreathed at its core; Made it a ray of thy thought, Made it a beat of thy joy!
And stony mounts the way,
The crackling husk-heaps burn, as if I left them yesterday !
Across the valley, on that slope, The huts of Avant shine!
Its pines, under their branches, ope Ways for the pasturing kine.
Full-foaming milk-pails, Alpine fare, Sweet heaps of fresh-cut grass, Invite to rest the traveller there Before he climb the pass-
1 Probably all who know the Vevey end of the Lake of Geneva, will recollect Glion, the moun tain-village above the castle of Chillon. Glion now has hotels, pensions, and villas; but twenty years ago it was hardly more than the huts of Avant opposite to it,--huts through which goes that beautiful path over the Col de Jaman, fol lowed by so many foot-travellers on their way from Vevey to the Simmenthal and Thun.
And who but thou must be, in truth, Obermann! with me here? Thou master of my wandering youth, But left this many a year!
Yes, I forget the world's work wrought, Its warfare waged with pain ; An eremite with thee, in thought Once more I slip my chain,
And to thy mountain-chalet come, And lie beside its door,
And hear the wild bee's Alpine hum, And thy sad, tranquil lore!
Again I feel the words inspire Their mournful calm; serene, Yet tinged with infinite desire For all that might have been-
The harmony from which man swerved Made his life's rule once more!
The universal order served,
Earth happier than before!
-While thus I mused, night gently ran Down over hill and wood.
Then, still and sudden, Obermann On the grass near me stood.
Those pensive features well I knew, On my mind, years before, Imaged so oft! imaged so true! -A shepherd's garb he wore,
Montbovon. See Byron's Journal, in his Works,
vol. iii. p. 258. The river Saane becomes the Sarine below Montbovon. (Arnold).
"In his cool hall, with haggard eyes, The Roman noble lay:
He drove abroad, in furious guise, Along the Appian way.
"He made a feast, drank fierce and fast, And crown'd his hair with flowers
No easier nor no quicker pass'd
The impracticable hours.
"The brooding East with awe beheld Her impious younger world.
The Roman tempest swell'd and swell'd, And on her head was hurl'd.
« AnkstesnisTęsti » |