The Poetical Works of Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton, Bart. M.P Part 99

I saw a soul beside the clay it wore, When reign'd that clay the Hierarch-Sire of Rome; A hundred priests stood ranged the bier before, Within St. Peter's dome.

And all was incense, solemn dirge, and prayer, And still the soul stood sullen by the clay: "O soul, why to thy heavenlier native air Dost thou not soar away?"

And the soul answer'd, with a ghastly frown, "In what life loved, death finds its weal or woe; Slave to the clay's Desires, they drag me down To the clay's rot below!"

It spoke, and where Rome's purple ones reposed, They lower'd the corpse; and downwards from the sun Both soul and body sunk--and darkness closed Over that twofold one!

Without the church, unburied on the ground, There lay, in rags, a beggar newly dead; Above the dust no holy priest was found, No pious prayer was said!

But round the corpse unnumber'd lovely things, Hovering unseen by the proud pa.s.sers by, Form'd, upward, upward, upward, with bright wings, A ladder to the sky!

"And what are ye, O beautiful?" "We are,"

Answer'd the choral cherubim, "His Deeds!"

Then his soul, sparkling sudden as a star, Flash'd from its mortal weeds,

And, lightly pa.s.sing, tier on tier, along The gradual pinions, vanish'd like a smile!

Just then, swept by the solemn-visaged throng From the Apostle's pile.

"Knew ye this beggar?" "Knew! a wretch, who died Under the curse of our good Pope, now gone!"

"Loved ye that Pope?" "He was our Church's pride, And Rome's most holy son!"

Then did I muse: such are men's judgments; blind In scorn or love! In what unguess'd-of things, Desires or Deeds--do rags and purple find The fetters or the wings!

THE BEAUTIFUL DESCENDS NOT.

In Cyprus, looking on the lovely sky, Lone by the marge of music-haunted streams, A youthful poet pray'd: "Descend from high, Thou of whose face each youthful poet dreams.

Once more, Urania, to the earth be given The beauty that makes beautiful the heaven."

Swift to a silver cloudlet, floating o'er, A rus.h.i.+ng Presence rapt him as he pray'd; What he beheld I know not, but once more The midnight heard him sighing to the shade, "Again, again unto the earth be given The beauty that makes beautiful the heaven."

"In vain," a sweet voice answer'd from the star, "Her grace on thee Urania did bestow: Unworthy he the loftier realms afar, Who woos the G.o.ds above to earth below; Rapt to the Beautiful thy soul must be, And not the Beautiful debased to thee!"

THE LONG LIFE AND THE FULL LIFE.

IMITATED FROM CLAUDIAN'S "OLD MAN OF VERONA."

In mine own hamlet, where, amidst the green, By moss-grown pales white gleaming cots are seen, There dwelt a peasant in his eightieth year, Dear to my childhood--now to memory dear; In the same hut in which his youth had pa.s.s'd Dwelt his calm age, till earth received at last; Where first his infant footsteps tottering ran, Propp'd on his staff crawl'd forth the h.o.a.ry man; That quiet life no varying fates befell, The patriarch sought no Laban's distant well; Of Rothschild's wealth, of Wellesley's mighty name To that seal'd ear no faintest murmur came.

His grand event was when the barn took fire, His world the parish, and his king the squire.

Nor clock nor kalend kept account with time, Suns told his days, his weeks the sabbath chime; His spring the jasmine silvering round his door, And reddening apples spoke of summer o'er.

To him the orb that set o'er yonder trees, Tired like himself, lit no antipodes; And the vast world of human fears and hopes Closed to his sight where yon horizon slopes,-- That beech which now o'ershadows half the way, He saw it planted in my grandsire's day; Rooted alike where first they braved the weather, He and the oaks he loved grew old together.

Not ten miles distant stands our County-hall-- To him remoter than to thee Bengal; And the next s.h.i.+re appear'd to him to be What seas that closed on Franklin seem to thee.

Thus tranquil on that happy ignorance bore The green old age still hearty at fourscore; To him, or me--with half the world explored, And half his years--did life the more afford?

There the grey hairs, and here the furrow'd breast!

Ask, first--is life a journey or a rest?

If rest, old Man, long life indeed was thine; But if a journey--oh, how short to mine!

THE MIND AND THE HEART.

"MA VIE C'EST UN COMBAT."

Why, ever wringing life from art Do men my patient labour find?

I still the murmur of my heart, My one consoler is my mind.

Though every toil but wakes the spell To rouse the Falsehood and the Foe, Can all the storms that chafe the well, Disturb the silent TRUTH below?

The Mind can reign in Mind alone.-- O Pride, the hollow boast confess!

What slave would not reject a throne If built amidst a wilderness?

Before my gaze I see my youth, The ghost of gentler years, arise, With looks that yearn'd for every truth, And wings that sought the farthest skies.

Fresh from the golden land of dreams, Before this waking world began, How bright the radiant phantom seems Beside the time-worn weary man!

How, then, the Heart rejoiced in all That roused the quick aspiring Mind!

What glorious music Hope could call From every Memory left behind!

Experience drew not then to earth The looks that Fancy rear'd above, And all that took their kindred birth From thought or feeling,--blent in love.

In vain a seraph's hand had raised The mask from Falsehood's fatal brow; And still as fondly I had gazed On looks that freeze to marble now.

Can aught that Mind bestows on toil Replace the earlier heavenly ray, That did but tremble o'er the soil, To warm creation into May?

But now, in Autumn's hollow sigh, The heart its waning season shows, And all the clearness of the sky Foretells the coming of the snows.

Farewell, sweet season of the Heart, And come, O iron rule of Mind, I see the Golden Age depart, And face the war it leaves behind.

Me nevermore may Feeling thrall, Resign'd to Reason's stoic reign-- But oh, how much of what we call Content--is nothing but Disdain!

THE LAST CRUSADER.

Left to the Saviour's conquering foes, The land that girds the Saviour's grave; Where G.o.dfrey's crosier-standard rose, He saw the crescent-banner wave.

There, o'er the gently-broken vale, The halo-light on Zion glow'd; There Kedron, with a voice of wail, By tombs[F] of saints and heroes flow'd;