And gracious Charity remains While there is one untrodden tract And men are free to think and act Not care to live while English homes And England's Trident-Sceptre roams Not live while English songs are sung And England's laws and England's tongue So long as in Pacific main, Or on Atlantic strand, Our kin transmit the parent strain, And love the Mother-land; So long as flashes English steel, He is dead already who doth not feel Life is worth living still. Austin. CXV THEOLOGY IN EXTREMIS OFT in the pleasant summer years, I have mused on the story of human tears, Massacre, torture, and black despair; Passionate prayer for a minute's life; Could I believe in those hard old times, Were the horrors invented to season rhymes, They were my fathers, the men of yore, They would dip their hands in a heretic's gore, I, who had faith in an easy-chair. Now do I see old tales are true, Here in the clutch of a savage foe; Now have I tasted and understood That old-world feeling of mortal hate; For the eyes all round us are hot with blood; Just in return for the kick he gave, Bidding me call on the prophet's name; Even a dog by this may save Skin from the knife and soul from the flame; My soul! if he can let the prophet burn it, But life is sweet if a word may earn it. A bullock's death, and at thirty years! And, God Almighty, what can it matter? 'Matter enough,' will my comrade say Praying aloud here close at my side, 'Whether you mourn in despair alway, Cursed for ever by Christ denied; Or whether you suffer a minute's pain All the reward of Heaven to gain.' Not for a moment faltereth he, Sure of the promise and pardon of sin; Thus did the martyrs die, I see, Little to lose and muckle to win; Death means Heaven, he longs to receive it, Life is pleasant, and friends may be nigh, Of words a poor wretch in his terror may say? That mighty God who created all To labour and live their appointed day; When breaks that mirror of memories sweet, Here stand I on the ocean's brink, Who hath brought news of the further shore? How shall I cross it? Sail or sink, One thing is sure, I return no more; Shall I find haven, or aye shall I be Tossed in the depths of a shoreless sea? They tell fair tales of a far-off land, Here life's ruin will little be rued; But the hand I have pressed and the voice I have heard, To lose them for ever, and all for a word! Now do I feel that my heart must break All for one glimpse of a woman's face; Swiftly the slumbering memories wake Odour and shadow of hour and place; One bright ray through the darkening past Leaps from the lamp as it brightens last, Showing me summer in western land Now, as the cool breeze murmureth In leaf and flower-And here I stand In this plain all bare save the shadow of death; Leaving my life in its full noonday, And no one to know why I flung it away. Why? Am I bidding for glory's roll? I shall be murdered and clean forgot; Is it a bargain to save my soul? God, whom I trust in, bargains not; Ay, but the word, if I could have said it, Hard to be silent and have no credit From man in this world, or reward in the next; |