The Voice of Science in Nineteenth-Century Literature Part 18

Was it not great? did not he throw on G.o.d, (He loves the burthen--) G.o.d's task to make the heavenly period Perfect the earthen?

Did not he magnify the mind, shew clear Just what it all meant?

He would not discount life, as fools do here, Paid by installment!

He ventured neck or nothing--heaven's success Found, or earth's failure: "Wilt thou trust death or not?" he answered "Yes.

Hence with life's pale lure!"

That low man seeks a little thing to do, Sees it and does it: This high man, with a great thing to pursue, Dies ere he knows it.

That low man goes on adding one to one, His hundred's soon hit: This high man, aiming at a million, Misses an unit.

That, has the world here--should he need the next, Let the world mind him!

This, throws himself on G.o.d, and unperplext Seeking shall find Him.

So, with the throttling hands of Death at strife, Ground he at grammar; Still, thro' the rattle, parts of speech were rife.

While he could stammer He settled _Hoti's_ business--let it be!-- Properly based _Oun_-- Gave us the doctrine of the enc.l.i.tic _De_, Dead from the waist down.

Well, here's the platform, here's the proper place.

Hail to your purlieus, All ye highfliers of the feathered race, Swallows and curlews!

Here's the top-peak! the mult.i.tude below Live, for they can there.

This man decided not to Live but Know-- Bury this man there?

Here--here's his place, where meteors shoot, clouds form, Lightnings are loosened, Stars come and go! let joy break with the storm-- Peace let the dew send!

Lofty designs must close in like effects: Loftily lying, Leave him--still loftier than the world suspects.

Living and dying.

WHY I AM A LIBERAL

"Why?" Because all I haply can and do, All that I am now, all I hope to be,-- Whence comes it save from fortune setting free Body and soul the purpose to pursue, G.o.d traced for both? If fetters, not a few, Of prejudice, convention, fall from me, These shall I bid men--each in his degree Also G.o.d-guided--bear, and gayly too?

But little do or can the best of us: That little is achieved thro' Liberty.

Who then dares hold, emanc.i.p.ated thus, His fellow shall continue bound? not I, Who live, love, labor freely, nor discuss A brother's right to freedom. That is "Why."

FEARS AND SCRUPLES

Here's my case. Of old I used to love him, This same unseen friend, before I knew: Dream there was none like him, none above him,-- Wake to hope and trust my dream was true.

Loved I not his letters full of beauty?

Not his actions famous far and wide?

Absent, he would know I vowed him duty, Present, he would find me at his side.

Pleasant fancy! for I had but letters, Only knew of actions by hearsay: He himself was busied with my betters; What of that? My turn must come some day.

"Some day" proving--no day! Here's the puzzle Pa.s.sed and pa.s.sed my turn is. Why complain?

He's so busied! If I could but muzzle People's foolish mouths that give me pain!

"Letters?" (hear them!) "You a judge of writing?

Ask the experts!--How they shake the head O'er these characters, your friend's inditing-- Call them forgery from A to Zed!"

"Actions? Where's your certain proof" (they bother), "He, of all you find so great and good, He, he only, claims this, that, the other Action--claimed by men, a mult.i.tude?"

I can simply wish I might refute you, Wish my friend would,--by a word, a wink,-- Bid me stop that foolish mouth,--you brute, you!

He keeps absent,--why, I cannot think.

Never mind! Tho' foolishness may flout me One thing's sure enough; 'tis neither frost, No, nor fire, shall freeze or burn from out me Thanks for truth--tho' falsehood, gained--tho' lost.

All my days, I'll go the softlier, sadlier, For that dream's sake! How forget the thrill Thro' and thro' me as I thought, "The gladlier Lives my friend because I love him still!"

Ah, but there's a menace some one utters!

"What and if your friend at home play tricks?

Peep at hide-and-seek behind the shutters?

Mean your eyes should pierce thro' solid bricks?

"What and if he, frowning, wake you, dreamy?

Lay on you the blame that bricks--conceal?

Say '_At least I saw who did not see me; Does see now, and presently shall feel'?_"

"Why, that makes your friend a monster!" say you: "Had his house no window? At first nod Would you not have hailed him?" Hush, I pray you!

What if this friend happen to be--G.o.d?

EPILOGUE TO "ASOLANDO"

At the midnight in the silence of the sleep-time, When you set your fancies free, Will they pa.s.s to where--by death, fools think, imprisoned-- Low 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, tho' 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!"

PROSPICE

Fear death?--to feel the fog in my throat, The mist in my face, When the snows begin, and the blasts denote I am nearing the place, The power of the night, the press of the storm, The post of the foe; Where he stands, the Arch Fear in a visible form, Yet the strong man must go: For the journey is done and the summit attained, And the barriers fall, Though a battle's to fight ere the guerdon be gained, The reward of it all.

I was ever a fighter, so--one fight more, The best and the last!

I would hate that death bandaged my eyes, and forbore, And bade me creep past.

No! let me taste the whole of it, fare like my peers The heroes of old, Bear the brunt, in a minute pay glad life's arrears.

Of pain, darkness and cold.

For sudden the worst turns the best to the brave, The black minute's at end, And the elements' rage, the fiend-voices that rave, Shall dwindle, shall blend, Shall change, shall become first a peace out of pain, Then a light, then thy breast, O thou soul of my soul! I shall clasp thee again, And with G.o.d be the rest!

ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON

WAGES

Glory of warrior, glory of orator, glory of song, Paid with a voice flying by to be lost on an endless sea-- Glory of Virtue, to fight, to struggle, to right the wrong-- Nay, but she aim'd not at glory, no lover of glory she: Give her the glory of going on, and still to be.