Out of their mossy cells for ever burst; Nor felt the breeze which from the forest told Of grassy paths and wood-lawns interspersed With overarching elms and caverns cold, And violet banks where sweet dreams brood, but they Pursued their serious folly as of old. And as I gazed, methought that in the way The throng grew wilder, as the woods of June When the south wind shakes the extinguished day, And a cold glare, intenser than the By action or by suffering, and whose Throw back their heads and loose their streaming hair; hour Was drained to its last sand in weal or And in their dance round her who dims Their spirits to the conquerors-but as soon the sun, Maidens and youths fling their wild arms in air As their feet twinkle; they recede, and now Bending within each other's atmosphere, Kindle invisibly--and as they glow, Like moths by light attracted and Oft to their bright destruction come and repelled, go, As they had touched the world with Till like two clouds into one vale im living flame, Fled back like eagles to their native noon, Or those who put aside the diadem Were there, of Athens or Jerusalem, seen, Nor 'mid the ribald crowd that followed them, pelled, That shake the mountains when their lightnings mingle And die in rain-the fiery band which held Their natures, snaps-while the shock still may tingle; One falls and then another in the path Senseless-nor is the desolation single, Yet ere I can say where-the chariot hath Nor those who went before fierce and Past over them-nor other trace I find obscene. The wild dance maddens in the van, and those But as of foam after the ocean's wrath Is spent upon the desert shore ;-behind, Who lead it-fleet as shadows on the Old men and women foully disarrayed, green, Outspeed the chariot, and without repose Shake their gray hairs in the insulting wind, Mix with each other in tempestuous And follow in the dance, with limbs Their work, and in the dust from whence He paused; and ere he could resume, Struck to the heart by this sad page. And if the spark with which Heaven lit my spirit antry, Half to myself I said-And what is Had been with purer nutriment supplied, this? Whose shape is that within the car?"Corruption would not now thus much. And why inherit Of what was once Rousseau,- -nor this disguise I would have added-is all here amiss?— turned, and knew (O Heaven, have mercy on such wretchedness!) That what I thought was an old root which grew To strange distortion out of the hillside, Was indeed one of those deluded crew, And that the grass, which methought hung so wide And white, was but his thin discoloured hair, And that the holes he vainly sought to hide, Were or had been eyes :- "If thou canst, forbear To join the dance, which I had well forborne !" "If thirst of knowledge shall not then abate, Taught them not this, to know themselves; their might Could not repress the mystery within, And for the morn of truth they feigned, deep night "Caught them ere evening.' is he with chin "Who Upon his breast, and hands crost on his chain?". "The child of a fierce hour; he sought to win "The world, and lost all that it did contain Follow it thou even to the night, but I the weight Of his own words is staggered, wearily more Of fame and peace than virtue's self can gain "Without the opportunity which bore Him on its eagle pinions to the peak "As the old faded."-"Figures ever new From which a thousand climbers have Rise on the bubble, paint them as you come "And near him walk the The tutor and his pupil, whom Dominion Followed as tame as vulture in a chain. "The world was darkened beneath Of him whom from the flock of conquerors either pinion Fame singled out for her thunder-bearing minion; "The other long outlived both woes and wars, By my own heart alone, which neither Throned in the thoughts of men, and age, "Nor tears, nor infamy, nor now the tomb Could temper to its object."-"Let them pass," I cried, "the world and its mysterious doom "Is not so much more glorious than it was, That I desire to worship those who drew New figures on its false and fragile glass still had kept The jealous key of truth's eternal doors, "If Bacon's eagle spirit had not leapt Like lightning out of darkness-he compelled The Proteus shape of Nature as it slept "To wake, and lead him to the caves that held The treasure of the secrets of its reign. See the great bards of elder time, who quelled "The passions which they sung, as by their strain "And how and by what paths I have been brought mayst guess ;— May well be known: their living melody To this dread pass, methinks even thou Tempers its own contagion to the vein "Of those who are infected with it-I Have suffered what I wrote, or viler pain! And so my words have seeds of misery "Even as the deeds of others, not as theirs." And then he pointed to a company, 'Midst whom I quickly recognised the heirs Of Cæsar's crime, from him to Constantine; The anarch chiefs, whose force and murderous snares Had founded many a sceptre-bearing line, And spread the plague of gold and blood abroad: And Gregory and John, and men divine, Who rose like shadows between man and God; Till that eclipse, still hanging over heaven, Was worshipped by the world o'er which they strode, For the true sun it quenched-"Their power was given But to destroy," replied the leader : Why this should be, my mind can compass not; "Whither the conqueror hurries me still less; But follow thou, and from spectator turn Actor or victim in this wretchedness, "And what thou wouldst be taught I then may learn From thee. Now listen::- -In the April prime, When all the forest tips began to burn Speak!"-"Whence I am, I partly The crown of which his brows were sad thought seem to know, dispossest |
