The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson Part 46

Sleep full of rest from head to feet; Lie still, dry dust, secure of change.

[Footnote 1: Possibly suggested by Ta.s.so, 'Gerus.', lib. xx., st.

lviii.:--

Qual vento a cui s'oppone o selva o colle Doppia nella contesa i soffi e l' ira; Ma con fiato piu placido e piu molle Per le compagne libere poi spira.]

[Footnote 2: 1833.

My heart this knowledge bolder made, Or else it had not dared to flow.

Altered in 1842.]

[Footnote 3: Tennyson's father died in March, 1831.]

[Footnote 4: 1833. Mild.]

[Footnote 5: 'Cf.' Gray's Alcaic stanza on West's death:--

O lacrymarum fons tenero sacros 'Ducentium ortus ex animo'.]

[Footnote 6: 1833. Sunken sun. Altered to present reading, 1842. The image may have been suggested by Henry Vaughan, 'Beyond the Veil':--

Their very memory is fair and bright, ...

It glows and glitters in my cloudy breast Like stars ...

Or those faint beams in which the hill is drest After the sun's remove.]

[Footnote 7: 1833, 1842, 1843. My tablets. This affected phrase was altered to the present reading in 1845.]

[Footnote 8: 1833. Holy. Altered to "only," 1842.]

[Footnote 9: 1833. Altho' to calm you I would take. Altered to present reading, 1842.]

"YOU ASK ME WHY, THO' ILL AT EASE..."

This is another poem which, though included among those belonging to 1833, was not published till 1842. It is an interesting ill.u.s.tration, like the next poem but one, of Tennyson's political opinions; he was, he said, "of the same politics as Shakespeare, Bacon and every sane man".

He was either ignorant of the politics of Shakespeare and Bacon or did himself great injustice by the remark. It would have been more true to say--for all his works ill.u.s.trate it--that he was of the same politics as Burke. He is here, and in all his poems, a Liberal-Conservative in the proper sense of the term. At the time this trio of poems was written England was pa.s.sing through the throes which preceded, accompanied and followed the Reform Bill, and the lessons which Tennyson preaches in them were particularly appropriate. He belonged to the Liberal Party rather in relation to social and religious than to political questions.

Thus he ardently supported the Anti-slavery Convention and advocated the measure for abolis.h.i.+ng subscription to the Thirty-nine Articles, but he was, as a politician, on the side of Canning, Peel and the Duke of Wellington, regarding as they did the new-born democracy with mingled feelings of apprehension and perplexity. His exact att.i.tude is indicated by some verses written about this time published by his son ('Life', i., 69-70). If Mr. Aubrey de Vere is correct this and the following poem were occasioned by some popular demonstrations connected with the Reform Bill and its rejection by the House of Lords. See 'Life of Tennyson', vol. i., appendix.

You ask me, why, tho' [1] ill at ease, Within this region I subsist, Whose spirits falter in the mist, [2]

And languish for the purple seas?

It is the land that freemen till, That sober-suited Freedom chose, The land, where girt with friends or foes A man may speak the thing he will;

A land of settled government, A land of just and old renown, Where Freedom broadens slowly down From precedent to precedent:

Where faction seldom gathers head, But by degrees to fulness wrought, The strength of some diffusive thought Hath time and s.p.a.ce to work and spread.

Should banded unions persecute Opinion, and induce a time When single thought is civil crime, And individual freedom mute;

Tho' Power should make from land to land [3]

The name of Britain trebly great-- Tho' every channel [4] of the State Should almost choke with golden sand--

Yet waft me from the harbour-mouth, Wild wind! I seek a warmer sky, And I will see before I die The palms and temples of the South.

[Footnote 1: 1842 and 1851. Though.]

[Footnote 2: 1842 to 1843. Whose spirits fail within the mist. Altered to present reading in 1845.]

[Footnote 3: All editions up to and including 1851. Though Power, etc.]

[Footnote 4: 1842-1850. Though every channel.]

"OF OLD SAT FREEDOM ON THE HEIGHTS..."

First published in 1842, but it seems to have been written in 1834. The fourth and fifth stanzas are given in a postscript of a letter from Tennyson to James Spedding, dated 1834.

Of old sat Freedom on the heights, The thunders breaking at her feet: Above her shook the starry lights: She heard the torrents meet.

There in her place [1] she did rejoice, Self-gather'd in her prophet-mind, But fragments of her mighty voice Came rolling on the wind.

Then stept she down thro' town and field To mingle with the human race, And part by part to men reveal'd The fullness of her face--

Grave mother of majestic works, From her isle-altar gazing down, Who, G.o.d-like, grasps the triple forks, [2]

And, King-like, wears the crown:

Her open eyes desire the truth.

The wisdom of a thousand years Is in them. May perpetual youth Keep dry their light from tears;

That her fair form may stand and s.h.i.+ne, Make bright our days and light our dreams, Turning to scorn with lips divine The falsehood of extremes!