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681

To God who best taught song by gift of thee,
Except with bent head and beseeching hand-
That still, despite the distance and the dark,
What was, again may be; some interchange
Of grace, some splendor once thy very thought,
Some benediction anciently thy smile:

-Never conclude, but raising hand and head
Thither where eyes, that cannot reach, yet yearn
For all hope, all sustainment, all reward,
Their utmost up and on,-so blessing back

In those thy realms of help, that heaven thy home,
Some whiteness which, I judge, thy face makes proud,
Some wanness where, I think, thy foot may fall!

EPILOGUE

AT the midnight in the silence of the sleep-time,

When you set your fancies free,

Will they pass to where by death, fools think, imprisonedLow he lies who once so loved you, whom you loved so,

-Pity me?

Oh to love so, be so loved, yet so mistaken!

What had I on earth to do

With the slothful, with the mawkish, the unmanly?
Like the aimless, helpless, hopeless, did I drivel

-Being-who?

One who never turned his back but marched breast forward, Never doubted clouds would break,

Never dreamed, though right were worsted, wrong would triumph,

Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better,

Sleep to wake.

No, at noonday in the bustle of man's work-time

Greet the unseen with a cheer!

Bid him forward, breast and back as either should be,
"Strive and thrive!" cry "Speed,-fight on, fare ever
There as here!"

682

EMILY BRONTE

[1818-1848]

LAST LINES

No coward soul is mine,

No trembler in the world's storm-troubled sphere:
I see Heaven's glories shine,

And faith shines equal, arming me from fear.

O God within my breast,
Almighty, ever-present Deity!
Life-that in me has rest,

As I undying Life-have power in Thee!

Vain are the thousand creeds

That move men's hearts: unutterably vain;
Worthless as wither'd weeds,

Or idlest froth amid the boundless main,

To waken doubt in one

Holding so fast by Thine infinity;
So surely anchor'd on

The steadfast rock of immortality.

With wide-embracing love
Thy Spirit animates eternal years,
Pervades and broods above,

Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates, and rears.

Though earth and man were gone,
And suns and universes cease to be,
And Thou were left alone,
Every existence would exist in Thee.

There is not room for Death,

Nor atom that his might could render void:
Thou Thou art Being and Breath,

And what Thou art may never be destroyed.

683

684

THE OLD STOIC

RICHES I hold in light esteem,
And Love I laugh to scorn;
And lust of fame was but a dream,
That vanishd with the morn:

And if I pray, the only prayer
That moves my lips for me

Is, 'Leave the heart that now I bear,
And give me liberty!'

Yes, as my swift days near their goal,
'Tis all that I implore;

In life and death a chainless soul
With courage to endure.

ROBERT STEPHEN HAWKER [1804-1875]

AND SHALL TRELAWNY DIE?

A GOOD Sword and a trusty hand!
A merry heart and true!
King James's men shall understand
What Cornish lads can do.

And have they fixed the where and when?
And shall Trelawny die?

Here's twenty thousand Cornish me

Will know the reason why!

Out spake their captain brave and bold,
A merry wight was he:

'If London Tower were Michael's hold,
We'll set Trelawny free!

'We'll cross the Tamar, land to land,
The Severn is no stay,

With "one and all," and hand in hand,
And who shall bid us nay?

'And when we come to London Wall,
A pleasant sight to view,

Come forth! come forth, ye cowards all,
Here's men as good as you.

'Trelawny he's in keep and hold,
Trelawny he may die;

But here's twenty thousand Cornish bold
Will know the reason why!'

COVENTRY PATMORE

[1823-1896]

685

DEPARTURE

It was not like your great and gracious ways!
Do you, that have naught other to lament,
Never, my Love, repent

Of how, that July afternoon,

You went,

With sudden, unintelligible phrase,
And frighten'd eye,

Upon your journey of so many days
Without a single kiss, or a good-bye?

I knew, indeed, that you were parting soon;
And so we sate, within the low sun's rays,
You whispering to me, for your voice was weak,
Your harrowing praise.

Well, it was well

To hear you such things speak,

And I could tell

What made your eyes a growing gloom of love,

As a warm South-wind sombres a March grove.

And it was like your great and gracious ways
To turn your talk on daily things, my Dear,
Lifting the luminous, pathetic lash

To let the laughter flash,

Whilst I drew near,

Because you spoke so low that I could scarcely hear.

But all at once to leave me at the last,

More at the wonder than the loss aghast,

With huddled, unintelligible phrase,

And frighten'd eye,

And go your journey of all days

With not one kiss, or a good-bye,

And the only loveless look the look with which you pass'd:

'Twas all unlike your great and gracious ways.

686

WILLIAM (JOHNSON) CORY

[1823-1892]

HERACLITUS

THEY told me, Heraclitus, they told me you were dead, They brought me bitter news to hear and bitter tears to shed. I wept as I remember'd how often you and I

Had tired the sun with talking and sent him down the sky.

And now that thou art lying, my dear old Carian guest,
A handful of grey ashes, long, long ago at rest,
Still are thy pleasant voices, thy nightingales, awake;
For Death, he taketh all away, but them he cannot take.

687

MIMNERMUS IN CHURCH

You promise heavens free from strife,

Pure truth, and perfect change of will;

But sweet, sweet is this human life,
So sweet, I fain would breathe it still:

Your chilly stars I can forego,
This warm kind world is all I know.

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