THE STORY OF
                             EROS & PSYCHE




                             THE STORY OF
                             EROS & PSYCHE

                        (RETOLD FROM APULEIUS)

                    TOGETHER WITH SOME EARLY VERSES


                                  BY

                           EDWARD CARPENTER


                       [Illustration: colophon]


                   LONDON: GEORGE ALLEN & UNWIN LTD.
                RUSKIN HOUSE, 40 MUSEUM STREET, W.C. 1




                _First published in this form in 1923_

                        (_All rights reserved_)

                     _Printed in Great Britain by_
     UNWIN BROTHERS, LIMITED, THE GRESHAM PRESS, LONDON AND WOKING




CONTENTS


                                                                    PAGE

INTRODUCTORY NOTE                                                      9

THE STORY OF EROS AND PSYCHE                                          13


IN A CANOE                                                            55

THE ARTIST TO HIS LADY                                                58

APHRODITE                                                             60

SCHRECKHORN                                                           65

THE VEILED ISIS                                                       67

THE TIDE                                                              71

SUMMER LIGHTNING                                                      72

IN THE GRASS: BY A MONAD                                              75

THE WORLD-SPIRIT                                                      79

TO A FRIEND                                                           83

BY THE MOUTH OF THE ARNO                                              86

AS ROUND A LIGHTHOUSE                                                 87

THE COMPLAINT OF JOB (CHAP. III)                                      89

THE EVERNEW                                                           93

ON A CRUCIFIX                                                         94

THE GREAT PEEPSHOW                                                    99

THE FELLOWSHIP OF HUMANITY                                           106

THE FELLOWSHIP OF SUFFERING                                          108

THE ANGEL OF DEATH--AND LIFE                                         110


SONNETS:

  GENOA                                                              117

  BEETHOVEN                                                          118

  IN MORTEM. F. D. MAURICE                                           119

  WILLIAM SMITH: AUTHOR OF “THORNDALE”                               120

  INSCRIBED ON A GRAVE                                               121

  DEATH                                                              122

  SINCE, IN THINE HOUR OF SORROW                                     123

  SEVERANCE                                                          124

  IT SHALL BE                                                        125

  WALDSTEIN SONATA. BEETHOVEN                                        126




THE STORY OF EROS AND
PSYCHE




INTRODUCTORY NOTE


Tho’ the story of Eros and Psyche is alluded to by various earlier
writers, our only source for its details is, I believe, in that animated
and amusing romance, the _Golden Ass_ of Apuleius; where it occurs as an
Episode, and where it is told at considerable length and with
elaboration.

Apuleius was a Roman citizen of Madaura in N. Africa, and was born about
130 A.D. He inherited a large sum of money from his father, and after
spending much of it in extensive travels, settled down ultimately to a
literary life at Carthage, where he was held in great honor. He had an
inquiring adventurous turn of mind and character, uniting a thorough
enjoyment of life with a tendency to mysticism and oriental speculation
(the theosophy of the time), which shows itself in his works. He is said
to have been initiated in the ‘mysteries’ of various religious
fraternities.

The story of Eros and Psyche (or Cupid and Psyche as he calls it)
probably came to Apuleius thro’ Greek channels; but it seems to be one
of those world-old fables to which it is difficult to assign a date or
locality, and which owing to some hidden pregnancy of meaning are
graciously received in all ages and places. In this respect _Eros and
Psyche_ may be compared with _Cinderella_ and with the _Sleeping
Beauty_, to both of which stories it shows considerable resemblance both
in detail and meaning.

    Cinderella the cinder-maiden sits unbeknown in her earthly hutch;

    Gibed and jeered at she bewails her lonely fate;

    Nevertheless youngest-born she surpasses her sisters and endues a
    garment of the sun and stars,

    From a tiny spark she ascends and irradiates the universe, and is
    wedded to the prince of heaven.

To what extent Apuleius may have amplified and elaborated the material
that came to him, it would be impossible to say. As a writer he is full
of invention, humour, lively wit and varied learning and experience; but
his style is often overloaded and affected; and the Story as told by him
is somewhat involved and laborious in places.

In re-telling the story I have taken the liberty (while adhering to his
outlines) of using Greek instead of Latin names for the divinities,
also of cutting down the details and transposing and slightly varying a
few items--with the view of rendering the whole more _transparent_, so
to speak.

For the conduct of Aphrodite, however, who is represented as ‘bawling’
and brawling in so undignified a way Apuleius is alone responsible!

Here and there I have adopted a phrase from the excellent translation in
Bohn’s “Classics.” For the rest, there is a prose paraphrase of the
story by Mr. Walter Pater in _Marius_, and one in verse by Mr. Robert
Bridges, which may be consulted by those interested in the subject.

       *       *       *       *       *

As to the “Early Verses” here reprinted with _Eros and Psyche_, they are
selected from a small volume entitled _Narcissus and other Poems_, which
was published by Henry S. King & Co. in 1873 (i.e. some fifty years
ago). I was at that time at Cambridge, and I vividly remember the care
and even anxiety with which--following the ideals then and there
current--I launched these first attempts at verse. Nor is it impossible
that as specimens of the work of that period they may (notwithstanding
their juvenile character) present even now some points of interest.

                                                                  E. C.




THE STORY OF EROS AND PSYCHE


I

Once, in a certain land, there dwelt a King and Queen who had three
daughters--the eldest charming for her bodily grace, the second equally
charming for her wit and intelligence. Even as children every one
admired these two. But as time went on it began to be noised abroad that
the third and youngest was after all the fairest of the three. The name
of this one was Psyche. She was retiring, shy perhaps, nor had she all
the gifts of her sisters; but it was seen that there was something
unearthly in her beauty, some strange light in her countenance which
entranced those who gazed upon it. Indeed it was whispered here and
there that she was fairer than Aphrodite herself, whom all Nature
adores. And some, actually deserting the temples and the service of the
foam-born goddess, came and paid their worship to the lovely maiden.

To Psyche herself there was no pleasure in all this. The innocent child
thought nothing of her own beauty, nor did she care for the renown and
worship it brought her. She longed for Love, but these things only
served to make a distance between her and other people, and to make love
more difficult. She felt sick and lonely, and when presently her
sisters, hearing the common talk, became envious and full of
unfriendliness, she felt lonelier than ever. But her fame continued to
spread, and at last reached the ears of the great Aphrodite herself.

Now when Aphrodite heard she was very wroth, and hurrying over the
beautiful ocean to the edges of the land, she called her son Eros, and
“What is this I hear,” she said, “that my altars are deserted, and men,
leaving me, are paying their sacrifices to a maid of mortal birth? Truly
I am incensed beyond measure. But I will make this impudent hussy know
her place, and who it is that even Zeus, the lord of Heaven, pays homage
to. Go thou, my son, and sharpening thy keenest arrow cause her to fall
in passionate burning love with some wretch, some renegade, the very
lowest of mankind.” Then, sealing her command with a kiss from her
fragrant lips, she mounted her rosy ocean-car drawn by white doves, and
sped forth over the laughing waves, surrounded by troops of Tritons
sounding their melodious shells, and the daughters of Nereus sporting
over the deep.

But Eros obediently, having selected a dart and disguised himself with
the garment of invisibility, went forth to seek Psyche, that he might
wound her. And at last, after some searching, far in the Interior of the
king’s palace he found her. And lo! as soon as he set eyes upon her, he
was wounded himself. He, the god of Love, was overcome by her beauty,
and pierced as with an exceeding pain. Yet did he not dare to declare
himself, for fear of the anger of his mother; but returning his arrow to
the quiver retraced, for the time being, his steps.

Meanwhile Psyche sat at home and felt herself lonelier than ever. Though
men praised, yet came none to woo her for a bride. Her two elder sisters
were already mated, and to powerful chiefs; but she a forlorn virgin,
faint in body and weary at heart, bewailed her lonely plight, and
loathed her own beauty though it delighted the rest of the world. Thus,
and filled with strange forebodings, she sat; till at length her
father, foreboding ill himself, suspecting the hostility of the gods,
and dreading their anger, determined to consult the ancient oracle of
Apollo. And lo! when he did so, the Voice, in words of deepest dread,
pronounced as it seemed her inevitable doom. For, “Take her,” it said,
“attired as for her funeral to the top of some high crag and leave her
there; a wild and tameless husband she shall have, and for her wedding
bid the world good-bye.”

Then the King, misunderstanding the meaning of the oracle, and the Queen
and the whole land with him, were greatly grieved, and plunged in
mourning. Ten days they passed in tears and lamentations; but on the
tenth day they formed a procession, and, conducting her to the summit of
a high mountain, went through the rites as for her burial; and then,
with torches inverted and loud wailings and plaintive strains of music,
leaving her alone in that dread place, they took their homeward way, and
abandoned themselves to despair.

But Psyche, meanwhile, lay trembling and weeping on the summit of the
rock; till Zephyr, the gentle god, came and caressed her with his
soothing breath, and at last, fluttering and playing amid her garments,
gradually expanded them, till he lifted her up and wafting her softly
down the mountain side, laid her in the flowery turf of the valley
below.


II

Now when Psyche came to herself, after her aerial flight, she found
herself in some kind of Enchanted Garden. Lovely groves and thickets,
streams and fountains, were on all sides; and in the midst stood a
palace of fairy beauty, all carven in cedar-wood and ivory and gold.
Soft strains of music, she knew not whence, drew her feet onward, and
voices, from forms she could not see, hovered round; till at length she
stepped across the threshold; when the beauty and richness of the
interior still more amazed her. But what amazed her most was that this
Treasure-house of the Universe (as it seemed) was protected by no chain,
no bar, no lock, but was open apparently to all the world.

And while she wondered, an unseen voice addressed her. “Why, lady,” it
said, “are you astonished at such riches? All are yours. Repair
therefore to your chamber, or to the bath, and refresh your wearied
limbs; for we, whose voices you hear, are your handmaidens and will
attend to all your commands, and when we have dressed you, will serve
some refreshment without delay.” Psyche therefore obeyed the pleasant
instructions, and when she had rested and bathed, sat down to a dainty
banquet at which the dishes moved of their own accord, while the air
vibrated with music and to the voices of an invisible choir.

But when these pleasures had come to an end, and slumber began to press
upon her lids, Psyche retired to her chamber, and lying down upon the
couch was soon wrapt in profound repose. From which however ere the hour
of midnight, she was awakened. For there came a gentle murmuring voice
which at first alarmed, but presently by its sweetness overcame her
fears; and her unknown bridegroom, Eros (for he it was who was lord of
that place), ascended the bed and stretched himself beside her. But
Psyche lay trembling and hesitant as she felt in the darkness his close
embrace, and caught the fragrance of his breath, and the passionate
kisses of his lips--and full of agitation as she wondered what his form
and feature might be; till at length he consummated his love and made
her his wife, and she forgot all question in her gladness. But, as soon
as the first faint streak of Dawn ran along the distant hills, and
before it was yet light, Eros arose and left her. And Psyche, sad at his
departure yet joyous in the prospect of his return, spent the day in
that beautiful domain, and yet longed for the night which should hide it
from her eyes. And so passed many days and nights; and each night Eros
came, and ascended the couch, and remained entwining her with his love
through the hours of darkness; but at the first streak of dawn he
fled--and Psyche saw not his face. And when she was grieved at this, and
implored him more than once to reveal himself and show her his true
form, he would only reply: “I entreat you, my darling Psyche, not to
seek to behold me at present, or to ask me who and what I am--lest a
great evil come upon us.” Then he would kiss her very tenderly, and for
the time being she would be content. Nevertheless, after a time, feeling
her loneliness in that place, she would again fall into grieving.

Meanwhile her Sisters, hearing how she had been exposed to a dread fate
on the summit of the mountain, came thither, if by any chance they
might obtain tidings of her, and remained for some days, calling upon
her name with cries and lamentations. But her Unknown Lover warned
Psyche that she should not listen to them, nor even turn her eyes in
their direction, lest by doing so she should bring the calamity that he
feared. And Psyche would fain have obeyed him; but when she thought of
her own strange fate she was filled with pity for herself, and instead
of listening to him broke into tears, saying: “A hard lot truly is mine,
to be cut off from all human conversation in this splendid Prison, where
I may not behold thy face, nor even reply to the cries of my sorrowing
sisters; it were well indeed if I had never come here,” and she refused
to be comforted. So Eros was moved in his heart, and agreed that her
sisters should visit her, and even gave command to Zephyr to waft them
at Psyche’s order--but on one condition, that she should not by any
means be persuaded to ask who or what he was, lest indeed her curiosity
should be her ruin. And she, with many caresses and endearing embraces,
promised most faithfully that it should be so.

Then the next day, when her lover had departed, to the rock she
hastened, and calling aloud to her sisters bade them dry their tears and
cease their mourning, for she was there and waiting to greet them. And
Zephyr, at her bidding, immediately lifted them from the crag and placed
them safely in her presence; when, after mutual embraces and inquiries,
they accompanied her with much curiosity to her new home. But when she
showed them all its treasures and beauties, and having refreshed them
with the bath and the banquet made them hearken to the voices that
followed, and observe the unseen hands that fulfilled her commands, they
were suddenly seized with fresh envy in the lowest depth of their
breasts. And one of them especially, very minute and contriving in her
mind, persisted in making inquiries about the Master of this celestial
wealth, as to what kind of person he might be, and what sort of husband
to her.

Psyche, however, would not on any account neglect her lover’s commands,
or reveal the secrets of her breast; but, on the spur of the moment,
told them that he was a young man and very good-looking, with cheeks as
yet only shaded with soft down, and that he was, for the most part,
engaged in rural pursuits and hunting on the mountains. And lest, by
any slip in the course of a long conversation, she might betray herself,
she loaded them with presents of gold and jewels, and calling Zephyr
ordered him to convoy them back again.

Then, as they were on their way home, they broke into words of bitterest
envy. “You saw,” said one--the younger of the two--“what riches there
were in that house--what necklaces, what dresses, what heaps of gold,
what gems the very floor is inlaid with. If, besides all this, her
husband is as handsome as she maintains, there lives not a happier
woman--a goddess, one might say, whom the very winds obey. And she
indeed, the youngest of us, who has done nothing to deserve all this!
While I, wretched creature, am blessed with a husband who is older than
my father, and who besides is as bald as a pumpkin and as puny as a boy,
and who is not satisfied but he must fasten up every part of his house
with Bolts and Chains.”

“And I,” continued the elder sister, “have to put up with a partner who
is twisted and crippled with Disease; and who consequently seldom favors
me with his embraces; but wants me instead to be everlastingly rubbing
and treating his crooked and chalky fingers with fomentations and rags
and filthy poultices--as if I were no wife, but a female doctor.”

Thus they continued, ever goading each other with cruel words into a
perfect fury against their innocent sister, till their minds became bent
on her destruction; and they planned to visit her again ere long, if so
they might effect it.


III

In the meantime Eros, foreseeing danger, again and most emphatically
warned Psyche, saying, “Those perfidious she-wolves, your sisters, are
plotting against us with all their might, that they may prevail upon you
to view my features, which, as I have told you before, as yet you must
not see. For before long an infant will be born to us, and child though
you be you are pregnant with another child--which, if you are faithful
to me, will be of nature divine, but if not, will be mortal. Shun
therefore those wicked women, whom, after the deadly hate they harbor
against you, it were no longer right to call sisters; neither see nor
listen to them, when like Sirens hanging over the crag they once more
make the rocks resound with their ill-omened voices.”

Then Psyche, divided between the joy of future motherhood, and anxiety
that she might see her sisters again, besought him with tears in her
eyes to allow the latter once more to visit her. “By the hope,” she
said, “that in my babe I may at least behold your features, whom I so
devotedly love, grant me once more the pleasure of embracing my sisters
whom I have deserted for your sake--nor doubt for a moment my fidelity
which I have already shown, nor my power of keeping a secret that is so
necessary for my own happiness.” Then her husband, enchanted by these
tender words and her sweet embraces, granted that which she desired, and
immediately forestalled the coming of the dawn by flight.

And now the sisters hastened, burning with evil passions, to the rock;
and without waiting for the assistant breeze, leapt straightway with
unbridled rashness from the height; an act which indeed would have been
their last, had not Zephyr, obedient to his mistress’s desire, received
them (tho’ reluctantly) in his bosom, and laid them gently on the
ground. With rapid steps and without delay they entered the palace, and
screening themselves deceitfully behind the name of sister, affected the
greatest interest in her condition. “Why, Psyche,” they said, “you are
not quite so slim as you used to be, surely before long you will be a
mother! What a gift you have in store for us in that satchel of yours
beneath your girdle, and with what great joy you will gladden our whole
house! How we shall delight to nurse this golden babe, for if it only
rivals its parents in beauty, ’twill be a perfect Cupid.”

Thus by false words they gradually stole her heart, while she, after
making them rest and refresh themselves with the bath, presently regaled
them with an exquisite banquet, to the sound of harps and flutes and all
manner of aerial music. But the malice of these evil women was not to be
softened by sweet sounds; and so, shaping their conversation with intent
to lead her into a snare, they began insidiously as before to inquire
what sort of person her husband was, and from what family descended. And
she in her simplicity, having forgotten her former account, invented one
somewhat different; and then, when they challenged this, in her
confusion alas! confessed her ignorance!

But they, as prepared, immediately and in grave tones said: “Happy
indeed are you, dear Psyche, and blissful in your ignorance. There you
sit, unknowing of your own danger, but we who care for you so deeply are
in despair at what threatens you. For we have discovered for a fact, nor
can we longer conceal it from you, that your love, that secretly
entwines you at night, is nothing but an evil serpent of base and
venomous nature. Remember for a moment how the Pythian oracle said you
were destined to wed a wild and fierce animal. Besides it is a fact that
many of the countryfolk have seen a huge snake, with puffed head and
gaping jaws swimming across the rivers in this direction of an evening,
on the way back from his feeding-grounds; and indeed they firmly believe
that he will devour you.”

Poor Psyche, though she hardly gave credit to what they said, yet could
not but be dismayed; and the sisters following up their advantage argued
with her, and brought all sorts of trumped-up stories and hearsay
evidence to confirm their argument, and to prove that her lover, far
from being divine, was nothing but an unclean monster; till she,
overcome by all their talk, completely gave way, and allowed that it
must be so. Then when they had persuaded her that it was her bounden
duty, and her only safety, to rid the world of this thing by stabbing it
secretly in the dark; and had extorted from her a faithful promise that
she would do so; they left her, and being wafted in the usual way to the
summit of the mountain, hastened homeward rejoicing, and full of glee at
the success of their machinations.

But Psyche, left to herself, and in the solitude of that place, was
overwhelmed by the most dreadful doubts. All that her sisters had said
rose up with the most vivid semblance of truth before her, and seemed
only to be confirmed by her unknown paramour’s strange conduct: his
concealment of his own form, his dread of the light of day, and his
terrible threats and forbiddal of all inquiry. All this came back upon
her with painful force and distinctness, till at last she was worked up
into a perfect fever of determination, and felt no doubt whatever as to
what she had to do.

Selecting a knife, the sharpest she could find, she made its edge
doubly keen by whetting it on a stone, and even passed it once or twice
across the palm of her delicate hand; then after placing it in a nook of
safety, she proceeded to prepare a lamp, trimming the wick and providing
it with oil, in order that it might be ready for her need. But by the
time these preparations were completed, and the evening had arrived, the
fever of her anger having now passed away, Psyche fell into a state of
utter wretchedness and misery. Her heart was still hardened against her
supposed enemy, but it was like lead or a stone. Its weight within her
was more than she could bear; and before the usual hour she retired to
her couch and lay there motionless like one who could have wept her life
away but the fountain of her tears was all congealed.

Long hours she lay. But at last, when it was quite dark, there came that
well-known murmuring sound and sweet wafted air as of wings, and in a
moment as usual the unknown One lay beside her.

Strenuously Psyche exerted herself to receive him as usual, and appear
in nowise different in manner; but it was a thing of the utmost
difficulty to throw off the weight and horror that was on her, and
indeed so exhausted was her mind with all its suffering, and so
poisoned by what she had heard, that even the ambrosial feathers of
Eros’ wings seemed to her like horrid scales, and touching them she was
confirmed in her dread resolution. So that when at length Eros lay at
rest, and by the sound of his breathing she knew he had fallen into deep
slumber, rising from the bed and stealing tip-toe across the room, she
took the lamp (ready lighted as it was) from its place of concealment;
and holding it up in her left hand and grasping the knife firmly, like a
dagger, in her right, nerved herself with a great effort--her eyes to
encounter, and her hand at the same time to slay, the monster of whom
they had told her.

But the instant the light fell that way, and the mysteries of the couch
were revealed, she beheld the very gentlest and sweetest of all wild
creatures, even Eros himself, the beautiful God of Love, there fast
asleep; at sight of whom the glad flame of the lamp shone doubly bright,
and even the wicked knife repented of its edge.

But as for Psyche, astounded at such a vision, she lost control of her
senses; and faint, and deadly pale, and trembling all over, fell on her
knees, and indeed would have hid the knife in her own bosom, had it not
nimbly (as it were of its own accord) slipped from her hand. And now,
faint and unnerved as she was, it was new life to her to gaze on those
divine features: those ambrosial abundant locks of golden hue, and ruddy
cheeks, and lips just fringed with down; and to see his dewy wings of
dazzling whiteness, and fair smooth body such as Venus might well have
given birth to. While at the foot of the bed lay his bow and quiver and
arrows, the well-known emblems of the God.

And so it happened that while Psyche with ever new wonder and curiosity
was examining these last, she touched the point of one of the arrows
with her thumb to try its sharpness, and by chance, as her hand still
trembled, punctured the skin--from which some tiny drops of roseate
blood oozed forth. And so, without knowing it, by Love’s own force she
fell in love with Love. Then burning more and more with desire, she
gazed passionately on Eros and kissed him again and again.

But even while she did so, the lamp--perchance by treachery moved,
perchance by envy--suddenly spirted forth a drop of scalding oil, which
fell upon his right shoulder. [O rash audacious lamp, ungrateful
minister of love, thus to burn the very god of fire! You, whom some
lover, doubtless, first invented--even that he might prolong through the
night the bliss of beholding his heart’s desire!] The god, thus
scorched, sprang from the bed, and seeing in an instant what had
happened, spread wings without a word, even before the eyes and
outstretched arms of his most wretched spouse. But she, in the instant
he rose, seized hold and hung to him, a wretched appendage to his flight
through the regions of the air, till at last her strength gave out, and
she fell exhausted to earth.

Then her immortal lover, alighting on a neighboring cypress-tree,
addressed her as follows: “O simple, simple Psyche, was it not for you
that I disobeyed my mother Aphrodite? for when she bade me infect you
with mad passion for some base and worthless man, I chose rather to fly
to you myself as a lover. And now I, that all-dreaded Archer, am like a
fool wounded by my own arrow, and have made you my wife in order,
forsooth, that you might doubt me for an evil beast, and be ready to cut
off my head, which you ought to have loved better than anything in the
whole world. As for those choice counsellors of yours, they shall
speedily feel my vengeance, but you I rebuke only by flight.” And so
saying he soared aloft, and mounted into the air.


IV

But Psyche lay powerless on the ground, gazing and gazing on the flight
of her lord and lover, till at last the measured pulse of his wings
through the immeasurable sky bore him completely out of sight. Then she
rose, and without more ado threw herself headlong from the bank on which
she lay into the river below. But the gentle stream, honoring and
fearing the god, whose sway extended even beneath its waters, bore her
safe on the surface of a wave to the bank, and laid her again on the
flowery turf. Then Psyche, since the waters would not harm her, took
courage, and set forth wandering through the lands in lifelong search
for Eros.

But the latter flying straight to his mother’s chamber, lay there
a-groaning and in pain from the wound which Psyche had caused him. And a
snow-white sea-gull, acting as messenger, flew off, and skimming along
the waves of the sea dived down at last into its bosom. There,
approaching Aphrodite as she bathed and swam, it told her that her son
was kept in bed by a bad and painful burn, and that his cure was
doubtful; that all sorts of scandalous stories were flying about
concerning the whole family of Venus; and that every one was saying that
mother and son had gone off, the one to a mountain to carry on an
intrigue with a girl, the other to the sea for some unknown purpose; and
that in consequence Pleasure, Grace and Beauty were nowhere to be found,
and general disorder and slovenliness had taken possession of the world.
Thus did this very meddling bird chatter in Aphrodite’s ear, to make
mischief between her and her son.

The goddess, enraged, insisted on knowing who the girl was of whom this
was said. And when the talkative bird, only too ready to reply,
mentioned the name of Psyche, Aphrodite’s indignation (for she
remembered the rival of her fame) knew no bounds. Emerging instantly
from the sea she hastened to her golden chamber, and finding it true
that her son was lying there wounded, she bawled out at the top of her
voice even before entering the door: “You’re a nice young spark, you
are! first to trample under foot my command that you should torment
this girl, my enemy; and then actually to make love to her and to take
her to your embraces; all that you may vex me, and add insult to injury!
But from your childhood you have been a bad lot! Many a time have you
struck your elders, and even me, your mother. Every day you turn me into
ridicule, and pay me no more attention than if I were a widow. You do
not even fear your stepfather, Ares, that brave and doughty warrior; for
you are always setting him to pursue the wenches, to my torment. But
I’ll make you repent this time, and sour and bitter shall you find this
match. For I’ll set my old foes, Propriety and Temperance, to clip your
wings--ay, and to blunt your arrows and unstring your bow, and
extinguish your burning torch; and Psyche I will torment with endless
tasks and trials.”

Having thus vented her wrath, she bounced out of doors again; but on the
very threshold came upon the goddesses, Demeter and Hera, who seeing her
angry face asked what was the matter. And when she told them her story,
they, glad of an opportunity to jeer at her a little, replied: “What
great offence after all, good Madam, has your son been guilty of--that
you should be so wrathful against him and the young lady? Is it a crime
if he should be somewhat free with a pretty girl? Have you forgotten his
sex, or his youth--or because he carries his years so jauntily, do you
fancy him ever a boy? We have always heard that you were mistress of the
amorous arts and crafts, and you now take your handsome son to task for
following your charming example? But what god or man will bear with you
if, while you are everywhere scattering voluptuous desires over the
world, you insist at the same time on checking the gallantries of your
own house, and shutting up that famous Pandora’s box of female
frailties?”

At these words Aphrodite, incensed beyond endurance, turned her back on
the other two, and took herself off with hasty step and heaving bosom to
her home in the depth of the ocean.

But Psyche’s eldest sister meanwhile, hearing a vague report of what had
happened--and of Psyche’s exile from her enchanted palace--and being
seized with envious desire and maddening lust to obtain all these riches
and the embraces of a god, conceived the idea of supplanting Psyche;
and secretly leaving her husband, hurried to the top of the rock, and in
greedy and ungoverned haste threw herself down, expecting Zephyr as
usual to receive her. A few days after, the second sister, in the same
manner and moved by the same desire, did the very same thing. And thus
these two, dashed to death at the foot of the rocks, met with the
fitting reward of their treachery.

Aphrodite, however, did not remain long in her Ocean-bowers; but having
resolved on a plan of action ordered her chariot to be got ready--her
beautiful chariot of burnished gold, which Hephæstus had made and
presented her on her marriage, and which was the more precious through
the very loss of its material by the file. Four white doves, with joyous
fluttering, harnessed themselves thereto; and Aphrodite seating herself
in it immediately flew through the air and the clouds, and traversing
the lofty æther of heaven itself went straight to the royal throne of
Zeus. Where--in haughty tones and not explaining the whole truth--she
said: “Thou knowest, O Ageless one, that of all the gods and goddesses I
chiefly rule over Nature and the world of mortals below. Now then, one
of my servants there, a female slave I may say, has absconded and
withdrawn herself from my dominion. Grant me then the services of
Hermes, the crier-god, in order that I may find her.” To this the azure
brow of Zeus did not refuse consent; and Aphrodite exultant, as she
descended from heaven with Hermes, conveyed to him her instructions. She
gave him a little book in which were written Psyche’s name and all the
particulars of her life, and Aphrodite’s claims upon her; and charged
him that he should cry her description (as a fugitive) among all the
nations! Which Hermes duly did; adding, by way of reward for her
recovery, that whoever should bring her back or make known her place of
concealment should receive for compensation seven sweet kisses from
Aphrodite herself and one touch of her ambrosial tongue.

But no sooner was this proclamation made, than the desire of mankind to
obtain such a reward excited their endeavors and activity to the highest
degree. And poor Psyche, as she wandered from place to place over the
lands, soon saw that her doom was sealed, and that she could not hope to
escape the hands of her avenger.

First in her wanderings it chanced that she came to the temples of
Demeter and of Hera--and there, with the view of propitiating the
goddesses, she performed all the rites of Religion and the service of
their altars. But even these deities, though they had scoffed at
Aphrodite, did not venture to interfere with her dominion, or to afford
Psyche a permanent refuge and hiding-place within their precincts--so
they gave her in return for her pious service the somewhat empty
consolation of their blessings and good wishes, and bade her move on to
some other locality. Then Psyche, in despair since she could find no
protection in the temples, concluded that it was better for her to
surrender to Aphrodite at once--and that perchance by doing so, and thus
penetrating into the household of the haughty goddess, she might find
that beloved Eros whom she sought.

With this forlorn hope she wandered on; but had not gone far when, as it
happened, she was met by one of Aphrodite’s own retinue, a powerful old
virago whose name was Habit; who immediately bawling at Psyche for a
good-for-nothing wench, seized upon her, and twisting her hands in her
hair dragged her along into Aphrodite’s presence. But the latter,
breaking into a loud and bitter laugh, such as people laugh who are
madly angry, “Have you condescended at length,” said she, “to pay your
respects to your mother-in-law? or have you perhaps come to see your
sick husband, who suffers yet from the wound you gave him? But never
mind. I, at any rate, will give you such a welcome as a good
mother-in-law should.” So saying she called for those servants of hers,
Care and Grief, and delivered Psyche over to them, that they might
torment her to their hearts’ content. And when in obedience to their
mistress’s commands they had scourged and plagued her beyond measure,
they brought her back again into Aphrodite’s presence.

But the latter, noticing Psyche’s figure and condition, set up another
laugh, saying: “How interesting she looks! and how thoughtful of her--to
make me a happy grandmother! I who am just now in the flower of my age!
And now, I suppose, the son of a vile handmaid will be called my
grandson!” Then, working herself up into a perfect fury, and turning to
Psyche, she continued: “But this shall never be, for such a child born
out of due wedlock will be nothing but a bastard, even if I suffer you
to bring it to life at all.”

So saying she flew upon her, tore her clothes in ever so many places,
pulled out her hair, shook her by the head, and shamefully misused her.
Then, taking grains and seeds of wheat, barley, millet, poppy, vetches,
lentils and beans, and mixing them all together in one heap, she said:
“Ugly slave as you now are, I think if you want lovers your best way
will be to learn the virtue of Drudgery. Let me therefore teach you
industrious habits. Take this confused mass of seeds, and sort and
separate them, if you please, each grain into its place--and finish the
task before evening.” And so leaving her before the heap, she forthwith
went off to a wedding supper to which she had been invited.

But Psyche, stupefied by the very thought of what was before her, sat
silent without moving a finger to her task. Till at last a tiny ant,
peeping out of the earth, perceived her sad case, and busily running
about called together the whole tribe of ants, saying, “Take pity, ye
nimble children of the earth, of the wife of Eros (whom ye all adore)--a
pretty damsel, who is now in desperate plight--and come and sort these
seeds for her.” Immediately the six-footed folk came rushing in regular
waves one after another, and with infinite industry separated the whole
heap, grain by grain; and then when they had made so many different
piles, they at once disappeared.

At nightfall, when Aphrodite returned from the banquet, exhilarated with
wine, and fragrant with balsams and the rose-blooms that encircled her
waist, seeing what had been done, she said: “This is not your handiwork,
wicked creature, but his whose head you have turned, to your own sorrow
as well as his.” And so tossing her a bit of black bread, she went to
bed.


V

But as soon as morning broke she called Psyche again and set her a fresh
task, and one full of danger: to wit, to obtain some of their golden
wool from those formidable sheep which pasture along a certain
river-bank; for transported with rage by the burning heat of the sun,
they (as is well known) are the destruction of mortals--either by their
sharp horns, their stony foreheads, or their poisonous bites. Nor could
Psyche possibly have dared to encounter them, had not the gentle Spirit
of the river instructed her to wait till the sun went down, when, the
sheep being lulled to rest by the music of his waters, she would find
the fleecy gold sticking to the branches of the shrubs. So when she
easily performed this command, Aphrodite, smiling bitterly, said: “I see
plainly enough that some one has helped you again. But look! Here is a
fresh task. Do you see the summit of yonder high mountain? There among
the rocks springs a black fountain of dusky waters which lower down
becomes the river Styx, that river of desolation which divides the
living from the dead. Bring me with all haste an urnful of that ice-cold
fluid, nor seek it anywhere but at its source.” Thus speaking she gave
her, with renewed threats, a vase of polished crystal; and Psyche,
starting, hastened towards the height.

But no sooner did she arrive there than she was petrified with fear and
despair, for the waves with a hoarse roar plunged down a channel between
steep and lofty rocks, over which fierce dragons, to right and left,
stretched out their long necks, and kept eternal watch with unwinking
vigilance. And ever as they rolled along, the waters exclaimed: “Begone;
mind what you do; have a care; fly, you will perish.”

So Psyche’s heart turned as cold as the waters, and she lay down in
that awful place, alone and with no hope but to die. But from the
gracious eye of Heaven the sorrow of the pure soul is not hid. The
fierce and royal eagle, the bird of Zeus, sailing over that land espied
and flew to her, and remembering all he owed to Eros pitied deeply the
young wife. “Psyche,” he said, “to your unaided strength this most
sacred yet most terrible fountain is utterly inaccessible. Even the gods
tremble at the thought of its waters. Give me the cup.” Then snatching
it from her hand, on his strong wings he sailed away, steering in and
out between the rows of raging teeth and the three-forked tongues of the
dragons, till he reached the spring, and filling the cup, returned, and
gave it to Psyche.

Yet not even by the fulfilment of this enterprise was the anger of
Aphrodite appeased. She must needs send her, even beyond the waters of
Separation, into the kingdom of Death itself. With a smile, foreboding
of evil, she said: “Psyche, my dear, you are a perfect sorceress, or you
could never so well have performed my commands; but there is one task
more I must set you. I must ask you to take this box and turn your steps
to the infernal regions and the gloomy palace of Hades. Then give the
box to Persephone, and say, Aphrodite asks you to send her a small
portion of your beauty--enough at least to last for one day; for she has
used up all her own store, in attendance on her sick son. Then return
with the utmost celerity, for I must adorn myself with this beauty of
Persephone, before I go to the assembly of the gods.” So saying, she
gave Psyche the box, and sent her off.

Then truly the wretched girl felt assured that her end had come: for to
everything mortal death is the end, and Psyche knew not but that she
also was mortal. But as she was meditating how to kill herself, as
indeed the shortest way to the infernal regions, there came a voice to
her saying, “Do no violence to thyself, Psyche, for though indeed in
this way thou mayest go to the palace of Hades, yet shalt thou thus by
no means return. But listen to me. Go to Tenarus, which is by Lacedæmon,
that great city of Achæa; and there, at Tenarus, you will find a cavern,
which is the breathing hole of the underworld. This cavern is the
threshold of the direct path leading to the palace of Hades. But before
entering it take care that you provide yourself with certain things;
for with empty hands it is impossible to pass through these shades. In
your mouth place two pieces of money, and in each hand take a cake of
barley bread well sopped in hydromel. Then go rapidly forward till you
come to the dark river, where Charon demands his fee and ferries the
dead in his crazy boat across to the farther shore.

Nothing even there is done without payment. To that unclean greybeard
you will have to give one of the coins you carry, yet in such wise that
you must let him take it with his own hand from your mouth. But while
you are passing over the stagnant flood, a certain dead old man will
come to the surface, and raising his corpse-like fingers entreat you to
take him into the boat. Beware, however, how you do so; for even by Pity
may the soul be ensnared. And when you have passed the river a little
way, behold! some old women, busily weaving a web, will ask you to lend
a helping hand. But still beware how you do so; for even Help is not
always wise and lawful. And all these things, and others, are in reality
snares, prepared for you by Aphrodite, that you may drop one of the
cakes from your hand, and so never fulfil the quest you have before
you. For the want of only one of these sops would surely prevent your
return to the light. A huge dog (as you know) with three ferocious necks
and heads, and barking with jaws of thunder, watches ever before the
black palace of Persephone, and terrifies with his noise the dead,
though he cannot injure them. This dog, Cerberus, you must appease with
one of your sops; then, passing quickly by, you will enter the presence
of Persephone herself. She will receive you kindly and courteously, and
beg you to repose on a soft couch and partake of a rich banquet. But
this you must not do. Seating yourself on the ground, ask for a piece of
common bread and eat it; then give your message, and having got the box,
bribe the fierce dog, as you return, with the other sop. After that,
when you come to the ferry, let the greedy Charon take your remaining
coin; and so passing his river for the second time, ascend, Psyche, to
Heaven, and take your place in the choir of the celestial stars. But
above all I warn you, be careful not to open or even look on the box
which you carry, or to search into its hidden treasure.

In this way the voice advised her. But Psyche, at once and without
delay, hastened to Tenarus, and taking her coins and her sops, ran down
the infernal avenue. Then having given the ferryman his fee, and turned
a deaf ear to the prayers of the floating corpse and the web-weaving old
women, and slipping quickly by the sop-fed dog, she entered the palace.
Here, as instructed, she refused the delicate seat and delicious food
offered her, and instead sat humbly at the feet of Persephone, content
with a piece of common bread. Then when she had received the box
(already filled and closed) she hastened back as before to the glorious
light of day.

But even here her last trial awaited her. For even after having passed
through the Awful Valley in safety and returned, poor Psyche, not yet
freed, was overcome by the contents of the box she carried. Seized with
a desire to learn what was in it, and to partake of its store of beauty,
she rashly opened it. But the box contained not a particle of beauty,
but only an infernal and mortal Sleep, the image of Death from whose
kingdom it was drawn: and this, being freed from its prison, immediately
poured itself over her, suffusing her limbs in a dense cloud of
somnolence, till she lay prostrate and without motion, and just like a
senseless corpse.

And how long she might have lain no one knows, had not Eros, now
recovered from his wound, and grown, even by what had happened, to
greater glory and manhood than before, bethought him of his dear Psyche,
and, escaping from his chamber, gone on swift wings in search of her.
Nor had he flown far before he came upon her thus lying. Then quickly
seeing what had happened, he carefully removed the cloud of sleep,
lifting it off from her like a veil, and folding it together, shut it in
its old receptacle, the box, while at the same time putting his arms
round her he kissed her ardently upon the lips. Psyche thus awakened was
overjoyed to behold her lover once more; and in the tumult of her
emotions nearly swooned away. But Eros, reminding her how curiosity had
for the second time nearly undone her, bade her now finish her task
quickly; and he would attend to the rest. So Psyche, with radiant face,
and looking more beautiful than ever before, took the steep ascent
onward to heaven.

But Eros, flying swiftly to the very throne of Zeus, put the whole case
before him, and begged his aid, for the girl and himself, against the
wrath of Aphrodite. And Zeus, having given the matter full
consideration, bade Hermes summon a full assembly of the gods, adding as
an enforcement that if any one of them absented himself he should be
fined ten thousand pieces of money. So when, owing to the fear of this
penalty, the heavenly theatre was quite full, Zeus sitting on his
throne, and with his arm embracing Eros, who stood by his side, spoke as
follows: “Ye assembled Celestials, whose names are written in the white
roll of the Muses, you are all well enough acquainted with this youth,
this masterful son of mine, whom I have reared with my own hands. You
know that he does not always pay even to me the reverence that is my
due. You know how he fills with his intrigues the whole course of
Nature, including the elements and the stars and the plants and animals
of the earth, and the races of men, not even excepting the gods
themselves; so that all of us, tho’ we are fain to forgive him, are
entangled in his wiles, and have our fair reputations sullied. Now then,
since the whole earth cries out against his adulteries, and since he
himself has come to man’s estate and is no longer a child, it is
fitting that order should be introduced into his ways and harmony where
before was confusion. You are aware that he has made choice of a girl,
and deprived her of her virginity. Let him therefore--this is our
Olympian decree--hold to her, let him possess her, and embracing Psyche
make her ever henceforth the object of his love. Nor do you, my
daughter,” he said, turning to Aphrodite, “be offended, or afraid that
your family will be disgraced by a mortal alliance; for I will now cause
the marriage to be not unequal, but all in order, and agreeable to the
law.” So saying, he commanded Hermes to bring Psyche to heaven; and as
soon as she arrived, extending to her a cup of ambrosia, “Drink this,
Psyche,” said he “and be immortal; and Eros shall never quit your
embrace, but your union shall be perpetual.”

Then, without delay, a sumptuous wedding supper was served. The husband,
at one end of the table, reclined with Psyche in his bosom. In like
manner, at the other end, were Zeus and Hera; and after them the other
gods and goddesses in their proper order. Dionysus supplied the mystic
nectar; the rustic Ganymede waited upon Zeus; Hephæstus dressed the
table; the Hours scattered roses and all fragrant flowers; the Graces
shed love and gentleness; the Muses sang; Apollo struck the lyre; and
Aphrodite danced; till at length with nightfall Ceremony was dissolved,
and gaiety reigned in heaven.

Thus came Psyche by divine ordinance into the hands of Eros; and at
length from a mature pregnancy a daughter was born, whose name was Joy
or Gladness.




SOME EARLY VERSES




IN A CANOE


    From shade to light, from light to shade,
    The overbending boughs between,
    I glide, as in a fairy glade,
    Till the sweet summer day is made
    A melody of summer green.
    The meadows all are clothed with light,
    As with a garment, and the heat
    Swims dreamful where the grass is dight
    With ox-eye daisies and the white
    Of lady’s smock and meadow-sweet.
    And clear-cut in the quiet air
    Move large brown outlines of the cows,
    That nose Earth’s verdure fresh and fair
    And scatter far its perfume where
    With peaceful onward push they browse.
    Beside the brink the swift stream lags,
    And spreads its liquid arms to cool
    The golden-flowered phalanx of flags
    Whereby the water-wagtail wags
    Its mirrored head in many a pool.
    And here a swallow lightly skims
    Or strikes the broad flood, breast to breast,
    And there in shady hollow swims
    The lazy roach between wet rims
    Of water-lilies, where they rest.
    Here by an overhanging bank
    The sunlit soft transparent wave
    Reveals a myriad lives that prank
    In giddy dance within the dank
    Deep water-world which is their grave;
    And there a wild rose overblown
    Showers red rain on the shining way,
    And the fair moving fields are sown
    With countless blossoms random-thrown
    And gliding downwards with the day;
    And here and there a willow dips
    And dallies with the dimpling plain,
    But evermore the river slips
    Onward--as from a maiden’s lips
    Some low melodious refrain.
    And with a soft and rippling sound
    The little bark fleets onward too,
    By bushy brake and meadow-bound,
    The swimming swirling curves around,
    Till in a slumbrous swoon the view
    Slides swiftly shifting, and the shades
    Grow longer, and the evening light
    Dies, and the sunset splendour fades
    Slowly against the stars of night.

CAMBRIDGE, 1869.




THE ARTIST TO HIS LADY

    I put my hands together, palm to palm,
    And say: Take these; and, whereso’er thou wilt
    Go,--I will follow. For indeed I have
    No other life than this--to follow Thee.


    The lady of my love is very fair;
      Often when morning rose above the rain
      She waved her white hand at the window-pane,
    And passed and mounted through the fields of air.

    I never saw her face or felt her smile,
      She seemed to pine among the haunts of men;
      Till at the last I left my city den,
    And followed in her footsteps for a while.

    She led me where the light shines freely down,
      She set me by the river-fringes green,
      And turned herself, and in her face, I ween,
    The glories of all worlds to me were shown.

    Her marble front is not of mortal mould,
      Her look is of the lands which are not seen,
      Broad is her brow, somewhat austere her mien,
    Yet magical her beauty to behold.

    For all the friendless way hedged with offence,
      For all the hours forsaken of her face,
      Now to behold in peace her peerless grace
    Is and remains my perfect recompense.

CAMBRIDGE, 1871.




APHRODITE


I

    Once, when as ever since the world began,
    Dawn touched the silver level of the sea,
    And like a golden shield of growing span
    Crept on the land of twilight stealthily;
    The Sun, yet sunk below his eastern lea,
    Whence all the heavenly limits he could mark,
    As Perseus through Medusa’s locks, in glee
    Shot all his shining fingers through the Dark,
    And once more laid the monster motionless and stark.


II

      In that day for the inhabitants of Earth
      And Heaven, moving in darkness heretofore,
      A vision of high beauty came to birth
      Amid the foam of Ocean’s eastern shore:
      Such as the Gods, who tread their golden floor,
      And mortals, dwellers in the orange grove
      Domed with aerial blue, in all their lore
      Feigned not in earth below or sky above,
    Yet, seeing, made the queen and regent of their love.


III

      For while the waves danced onward o’er the deep,
      As at the first day bright and bluely clear,
      And morning mounting up the saffron steep
      In opaline pure splendour did appear
      Pavilioning with flame the ocean-sphere,
      A mist shot upward from the shining main,
      A deep blush brightened through it, like a tear
      That trembles on a rosebud after rain
    And glows with heightened hue on what it cannot stain.


IV

      One cloud-like moment in the air it hung;
      And then the Sun, in eastern state confest,
      Great level arms along the ocean flung,
      Giving to each swart wave a golden crest,
      And let one finger on the foambell rest,
      Which like a hollow fretted crystalline
      Of some rich secret rudely dispossessed,
      Sundered and parted in the bright sunshine,
    Showing the Foamborn in her beauty made divine.


V

      A sunbow bent above her for a sign,
      The spray embowered her in brilliant rain,
      Her rosy feet upon the hyaline
      Danced lightly like rose-petals o’er a plain;
      Heaven was her canopy, a lofty fane
      For incense and for music and high mirth,
      Her laughing eyes, turned sunward, did detain
      As in a mirror, all the smiles of Earth
    Made happier because of beauty’s perfect birth.


VI

      With one hand half uplifted did she hold
      Her fair locks from her in a shining band,
      As if to match the sunlight with their gold
      Glittering with ocean-dew; the other hand
      Sustained a robe sea-woven of glaucous strand,
      Which veiled her limbs as softly as the moon
      Glimmers where dawn-illumined mountains stand
      Rosy in snow, or as in leafy June
    The glowing foliage holds yet hides the hot midnoon.


VII

      And where she stood the waves on every side
      Fell from her into many a hollow space
      And fair concavity, as though they tried
      To keep the impress of her rounded grace
      In inverse beauty; like a crystal case,
      Broken to free some glory of art, they lay,
      But shifting ever as to catch a trace
      Of that fair model, till in fair dismay
    They spread and died upon the distance far away.


VIII

      For with divine consent from arm to arm,
      From breast to brow, the lines of beauty run
      And shift and flow with ever-changing charm
      Which nothing can detain beneath the sun;
      And like a silver fount that seems to shun
      Even momentary rest, but ever flows
      In wasteful beauty till the day is done,
      Lovely in loss, since loveless in repose,
    So rich in love’s regret fair Aphrodite rose.


IX

      And Neptune’s children from the emerald gloom
      Of ocean caverns, in a boisterous pack
      Played round about her path of roseate bloom--
      Sea-nymph and Triton in a foamy track,
      With winds and water-sprites and cloudy rack
      Of morning, and the mountains seen afar--
      Orbed in one onward course which grew not slack
      Till Venus, mounting on her dove-drawn car,
    Went heavenward through the blue vault like a glistening star.


X

      Therefore when Gorgon-headed Night was gone--
      In labyrinthine marble calm and dread
      Unearthly glitter, death to look upon--
      Beauty arose to birth, and so was wed
      To every dawn-lit dell and mountain-head
      And dream of man; wherewith in flowing guise
      Unto the heavenly lands she lightly sped,
      To be Earth’s lovely envoy in the skies
    And chosen Cynosure of Gods’ and mortals’ eyes.

CAPRI, 1873.




SCHRECKHORN


    Upward all day we toiled athwart the rain,
    Henry and I, through Alpine pastures green
    And great firwoods that overhung the vale
    Far spread below; but ever, as evening fell,
    Day’s cloudy curtain parted, and the mists
    Thinned more and more, and fled among the hills,
    Or dropped beneath, or clung in silver threads
    To tresses of dim forest; and we saw
    A clear blue arch of space spanned high above,
    And, burning behind the utmost mountain edge,
    Gold altar-glories of the stricken sun.

    And high amid the snows we found a crag,
    Hung darkly on that argent slope, within
    Stamped hollow as by rage of Titan foot;
    And there we lit the flame, and made ourselves
    Good cheer, while round us dreamed a silent world.
    But ere we slept, he, my beloved, arose
    And lightly left our firelit cave and stood
    Night-circled on a jutting rock beyond;
    And with the setting stars about his head
    And at his feet that purple vale profound,
    He sang the song he sings me evermore.
    He sang to watchful heaven and weary earth,
    To glittering peak and star and crescent moon,
    And high Love, and the loveworn Heart of all.
    And all the vales were filled with melody,
    And o’er the wide wide night and clear profound,
    And over the blank snows and barren crags,
    His song came floating back unto his feet:
    Unto his feet, and deep into my heart,
    There as I lay by the fire and saw him stand,
    Saw him there in the night, and see him now,
    Now, and for ever.
                        For he came not back.
    At morning dawn, when earth was dashed with light,
    Beside the golden summit he slipped and fell,
    And slid, and passed to his own home beyond.

_January_, 1870.




THE VEILED ISIS

    Ἐγὼ εἰμὶ πᾶν τὸ γεγονὸς καὶ ὂν καὶ ἐσόμενον
    καὶ τὸν ἐμὸν πέπλον οὐδείς πω θνητὸς ἀπεκάλυψε.


    Now know I that the white-winged hours of heaven
    ’Twixt me and thee in endless retinue,
    Each after each, shall pass; nor ever pause
    To lift the least light corner of thy veil,
    Or grant thine eyes to mine. O hidden One,
    Supreme-set Mother of all mystery,
    And myriad-named of men, now know I well
    Thou dost endure us but a moment’s span
    Upon thy heaving bosom to behold
    The wonder of thy movement, at thy grace
    To fall and worship--ay, we know not what!
    And then, or ever thou hast heard, to fall
    And pass, remembering ourselves and thee
    No more. O strange, O unassailable,
    Thou that with myriad bright play of eyes
    Provokest our desire, thy seamless robe,
    Set close about for our bewilderment,
    Folds thee in perfect proof. For I have toiled
    And tarried long by thy familiar ways,
    Have known thee going out and coming in,
    And watched thy daily wont; have felt the flame
    Flash from thy face almost to scathe mine eyes,
    And heard at night thy breath about my ears
    Beat, and pass quickly by; yea, I have tracked
    Thy fingers in and out through woven clouds,
    And passionless ebb and flow of waves and streams,
    And rockings of the air, only to know
    The weft is woven without any flaw
    From flight of stars to atoms: rent is none,
    No gap, no visionary gleam, and Thou
    Art hid for ever.
                        Therefore now, once more,
    I see the Spring descend upon the Earth--
    The new life quivering upwards into light;
    I see the plaited green on plant and tree
    Slide from the soil and break the knotted bark;
    The grey elm quickens with a strange delight;
    The golden chestnut-buds against the blue
    Gleam like a thousand lamps; and melody
    Thrills through the woodland air. O now once more
    The primal splendour of the sun returns
    With a most welcome triumph. Thorn and may
    Stand white with bridal blossom unto him;
    The ground is cloven and the sleeping flowers
    Have heard and known their lord: through wood and dell
    Yellow primroses leap and peer to heaven--
    He rideth by begirt with azure wings--
    And bloom and beauty multitudinous
    Break on his path. The violet stands by
    Glad in her grassy covert. In the meads
    Like angel hosts white daisies wave their wings,
    And as he passes bend like one and rise,
    And, while he fires with light the Western lands,
    Close their bright eyes and blush for very joy.
    Once more o’er vale and mountain do I hear
    The voice of Spring’s sweet trouble: nightingales
    And thrushes in the thicket numberless
    Tremble to utter on the quiet air
    The mystery of eve; where all night Earth,
    Orbed in her dreams of star-related life,
    Floats in a flood of moonlight and of dew.
    Once more I see it all, and, seeing, know
    The infinite of beauty--how thy world
    Is charactered with wisdom: each winged sense
    Faints with the weight of wonder, till I walk
    Like one enchanted to a magic sound,
    A king whose eyes are feasted with a play
    Of endless scenic change, a child to whom
    Earth has no bounds for joy.
                                  And yet, ah! yet,
    Deeper than all, and deeper than my joy,
    Thou whom I know, nor yet can ever see,
    Thou, mother Isis, mother over all,
    Thou radiant life and one Reality,
    Vanishest for ever: like the Northern beam
    Decking the far-off mountains, all untouched,
    Unheard, inviolable, Thou movest on
    In the great silence of our hearts, through leaf
    And bud and fairy bloom fleeting for aye
    Wherever we are not. And though our spirits
    Burst through their woven chambers till the heart
    Ache for the stress of passion; though our dreams
    Be girt about with one dull cloud of death
    For hope that cannot pierce; yea, though our eyes
    For gazing vainly on thy vanishings
    Waste away in their orbits; yet at last
    We fall, our arms stretched outward on the earth
    And features folded in the clay-cold ground,
    Nor e’er behold thee face to face at all.

ROME, 1873.




THE TIDE


    Six hours it voiceless sank along the shore
    In the soft cloud-girt eve; turned in its bed,
    And dreamed of other lands. But when the night
    Grew to its stillest, and none knew thereof,
    There crept across the world a wind-like sigh--
    Sweet breath of waking lips--that rose, and passed,
    And died along the night, and rose again
    Ineffable. And Ocean knew once more
    Her crescent tide-mark with its golden range
    Of fretted sands and shell-impearlèd weeds,
    And once more, joyous, filled with rolling waves
    Her creeks and inland waterways; then paused,
    And, wondering at herself, sank back to rest,
    And dreamed again the dream that has no end.

_January_, 1870.




SUMMER LIGHTNING


    Like a dawn the distant lightning,
      Fitful, shadow-crowned,
    O’er the twilit ocean brightening
      Breaks without a sound.

    Softly-fair the clouds are riven
      Crimsoning in bliss,
    As the heights and depths of heaven
      Open to its kiss.

    Calm in western lake-like splendour
      Floats the star of eve:
    All hues opaline and tender
      Round about it weave;

    And that other crystal ocean
      Holds its image clear,
    Like a smile with soft emotion
      Shining through a tear.

    Faintly rings a silver laughter
      As the ripples die,
    And the rising stars thereafter
      Answer, and their cry,

    As of love to passion risen,
      Passes o’er the strand
    From Night’s gloomy eastern prison
      To the golden land

    Where flushed Eve with shining fingers
      For an instant keeps
    Back the curtained dark, and lingers,
      Lovely, ere she sleeps.

    So upon the beachy margent
      Love a moment stands,
    Takes the ocean and the argent
      Starlight on the sands;

    Takes the sunset slowly whitening
      From its golden bloom,
    Takes the cloud-girt summer lightning
      And the distant gloom;
    Orbs them all from world-mutation,
      Whole and unforgot,
    Into his divine creation
      Of immortal thought;

    Where, like essences supernal,
      They nor pass nor range,
    Lifted high in Love’s eternal
      O’er eternal change.

NAPLES, 1873.




IN THE GRASS

BY A MONAD (OF LEIBNITZ)


    Here in the grass they laid me long ago,
      Far from the tumult and the tears of men,
    Soft in the summer grass, forlorn and low--
      The face of all the world is changed since then.

    Here, on my back and scarce beneath the turf,
      To lie and lie for many a summer day,
    Hearing the faint far ocean-sweeping surf,
      Seeing the blue midnoon and twilight grey.

    Yea, though you seek and find me not at all
      In these wide meadows and the shoreward plain,
    Though in the ground and tangled grasses tall
      No vestige of my mortal part remain.

    Yet, peradventure, where you plant your heel
      And heedless start the lizard on the sand,
    I am, and all day watch wild duck and teal
      Fly northward in a blue-enamelled band.

    Here, void of will, of action unaware,
      And dwindled to a mere perceptive point,
    Changeless I watch the light divide the air
      And glitter on each reedy knot and joint.

    Changeless I watch the changes of the sky,
      Its liquid blue, its motionless light clouds,--
    A solitary seagull sailing by,
      A butterfly that him from sight enshrouds.

    Now midway-down a thin mist thunder-driven
      Moves on the air-built battlements beyond;
    Still is the land, until the heights of heaven
      Burst and break backward, detonant with sound.

    And on the earth fire and a flood are spilled,
      The air is no more sultry, but the wind
    Drives forward in the grass. The moor-fowl, chilled,
      Huddle and crouch in hollows water-lined.

    Then, all night long, grey spectres of the dark
      Fly onward overhead in strange disguise,
    With shriekings of the wind, and weird blue spark
      Lighting their myriad white hail-like eyes.

    But in the morning with a song the land
      Resumes the primal harmony of dawn;
    A lark the latest of its tuneful band,
      Into the heart of Paradise is drawn

    To sing that sweet and slender hymn that I
      Have heard so many ages ever new,
    Never the same, yet, as the world goes by,
      The same hymn steeped in sunlight and in dew.

    And sometimes in the reeds a feathered thing
      Will shyly peer about, as though it sought
    Some old forgotten love of kindred wing
      Amid the grass with last year’s dead leaves fraught.

    Sometimes a mouse will move, or spider thread
      His amber beads betwixt the sky and me,
    Sometimes a frozen swallow will fall dead,
      Sometimes the southern winds will bring a bee.

    Or sometimes in the later autumn days
      A red-fanged rough retriever will come nigh,
    Threading the scent all through that reedy maze,
      And anxious, earnest, panting, pass me by.

    But oftenest the world is very still;
      A light breeze o’er the land will break and shiver
    With musical low melancholy thrill
      Among the grasses and the reeds for ever.

    I ask no more. The liquid summer light
      About this poplar, when its leaves are green,
    The change, when glitteringly bare and white
      Its branches on the wintry blue are seen.

    All are but changes of delight to me,
      In each I lose myself, and live, and die,
    And rise upon the next with equal glee,
      Like one who feasts for ever with his eye.

    I ask no more. The slender drooping grace
      Of stem and blade seen thus obliquely clear
    Suffice me while the moments interlace
      To minutes and the minutes to a year.

    The centuries soon pass, and, while I live,
      The world, which without me were but a dream,
    Its changing image to my mind shall give,--
      One image and one aspect of its scheme.

1873.




THE WORLD-SPIRIT


    Like soundless summer lightning seen afar,
      A halo o’er the grave of all mankind,
    O undefinèd dream-embosomed star,
      O charm of human love and sorrow twined:

    Far, far away beyond the world’s bright streams,
      Over the ruined spaces of the lands,
    Thy beauty, floating slowly, ever seems
      To shine most glorious; then from out our hands

    To fade and vanish, evermore to be
      Our sorrow, our sweet longing sadly borne,
    Our incommunicable mystery
      Shrined in the soul’s long night before the morn.

    Ah! in the far fled days, how fair the sun
      Fell sloping o’er the green flax by the Nile,
    Kissed the slow water’s breast, and glancing shone
      Where laboured men and maidens, with a smile

    Cheating the laggard hours; o’er them the doves
      Sailed high in evening blue; the river-wheel
    Sang, and was still; and lamps of many loves
      Were lit in hearts, long dead to woe or weal.

    And, where a shady headland cleaves the light
      That like a silver swan floats o’er the deep
    Dark purple-stained Ægean, oft the height
      Felt from of old some poet-soul upleap,

    As in the womb a child before its birth,
      Foreboding higher life. Of old, as now,
    Smiling the calm sea slept, and woke with mirth
      To kiss the strand, and slept again below.

    So, without end, o’er Athens’ god-crowned steep
      Or round the shattered bases of great Rome,
    Fleeting and passing, as in dreamful sleep,
      The shadow-peopled ages go and come:

    Sounds of a far-awakened multitude,
      With cry of countless voices intertwined,
    Harsh strife and stormy roar of battle rude,
      Labour and peaceful arts and growth of mind.

    And yet, o’er all, the One through many seen,
      The phantom Presence moving without fail,
    Sweet sense of closelinked life and passion keen
      As of the grass waving before the gale.

    What art Thou, O that wast and art to be?
      Ye forms that once through shady forest-glade
    Or golden light-flood wandered lovingly,
      What are ye? Nay, though all the past do fade

    Ye are not therefore perished, ye whom erst
      The eternal Spirit struck with quick desire,
    And led and beckoned onward till the first
      Slow spark of life became a flaming fire.

    Ye are not therefore perished: for behold
      To-day ye move about us, and the same
    Dark murmur of the past is forward rolled
      Another age, and grows with louder fame

    Unto the morrow: newer ways are ours,
      New thoughts, new fancies, and we deem our lives
    New-fashioned in a mould of vaster powers;
      But as of old with flesh the spirit strives,

    And we but head the strife. Soon shall the song
      That rolls all down the ages blend its voice
    With our weak utterance and make us strong;
      That we, borne forward still, may still rejoice

    Fronting the wave of change. Thou who alone
      Changeless remainest, O most mighty Soul,
    Hear us before we vanish! O make known
      Thyself in us, us in thy living whole.




TO A FRIEND


    Fair friend, of the sweet hours that are no more,
      Canst thou not charm from chambers of the Past
    Those happy days of old, the summer wore
      Like roses in her emerald zone set fast?
    The dawn returns o’er ocean-meadows blue,
      And still the moon in ancient splendour glows;
    Alas, the mortal mind no magic knows
    To render back the joys that once it knew.

    Ah me! that day we sat, two souls in one,
      Couched in a rocky vale, the summer hours,
    And heard in trance the murmurous waters run,
      And saw the sunbeam sleep amid the flowers.
    A mighty boulder, cloven from the steep,
      Cast on the meadow-green its silent shade,
      Where we our pleasant rest together made
    Till day dipped downwards on the fields of sleep.

    From noon till eve the mountain shadows wheeled
      And slid from slope to slope and cleft the air,
    The hollow vale with laughing light was filled,
      Like sunny wine that brims a flagon fair.
    The barren crags gleamed moist with heavenly dew,
      Forthstreaming from a thousand rills of snow
      And dripping dark through mountain halls below
    Or leaping with the cataract into view.

    The clouds rode overhead, as in a dream,
      Piled high in shifting splendour grandly calm,
    Until, by magic moved, on us did seem
      To fall delicious sleep, like some sweet balm
    That steeps the soul in memories divine;
      And Fancy, soaring high on wings of Love,
      Held revel in the heaven of hope above,
    Where dawned the daystar of my life and thine.

    So were the happy hours that were; but now
      Only sad echoes of sweet voices heard--
    Visions that flit along the rugged brow
      Of that broad-featured past: like some swift bird

    That touching slowly stirs a sleeping flood,
      And while its broad face brightens into smiles
      Is past already westward many miles,
    To where the red sun sinks in fire and blood.

    So pass the years, and ever in the past
      Old Nature smiles at us frail houseless things;
    And if in love or in derision vast
      Men scarcely know; alone thy memory brings
    To me a hope that cannot fail: a calm
      That spreads where else despair: for in thy soul
      I see the mould of Nature’s mirrored whole--
    One love, like thine, to shield mankind from harm.

1871.




BY THE MOUTH OF THE ARNO


    Here, where the crawling river seaward sets,
      And riverward the sea, about a land
      Laid under heaven in lonely flats of sand
    Saltblackened, where the sluggish water frets
    Its margin till marsh-deltas interlace
      In reedy desolation; on each hand
    The long gray grasses shiver in their grace
    Through sun and shadow, till salt winds deface,
      Their wasted beauty; here--by such a strand--
    Pale Shelley passed, and so his course did keep
    To sail Death’s unexplored and open deep.

           *       *       *       *       *





AS ROUND A LIGHTHOUSE

TO----


    As round a lighthouse swept of sea and air
      The waves plunge many fathom deep, and flow
      Unresting o’er the rocky base below,
    And glimmer shifting in the fitful glare;
      So great unrest about thy heart doth go,
    So deep a flood of turbulent despair.

    Stand true, O tender heart and strong, stand true:
      For I, who steer alone across the deep,
      By thee, unknown of thee, my course must keep
    O’er the foam-crested fields for ever new;
      And thou, alone, unknowing, on the steep,
    Must watch the waves with ruin all bestrew.

    Not overnear to thee my course may run;
      Yet pray I, somewhere on the bitter tide
      Thy beam the shuddering night for me divide,
    And show the heart-red splendour of thy sun
      Reorient with delight upon the wide
    Waters of gloomy death when life is done.

1871.




THE COMPLAINT OF JOB

CHAP. III


    O perish the day I was born, and the night when my mother conceived;
      Let that day be darkness, let God regard it no more from on high;
    Let fear fright it back to the gloom, and let it no more be reprieved
      From the shadowy challenge of death and clouds that about it lie.

    O let it no more rejoice with the light-footed days of the year,
      Let the pale moon know it no more, let it not be reckoned as one;
    O curse it all ye that curse the day! let that night be dear
      To them that pray to the Dragon that preys on the light of the Sun.

    Let the stars of the twilight thereof be dark: let it long for the day,
      And know it not, nor behold the fragrant eyelids of morn,
    Since it shut not the doors of the womb when my mother in travail lay,
      Nor hid mine eyes from the dawning light of sorrow and scorn.

    Why died I not from the womb, nor gave life back to the deep?
      O why was I nursed on the knee, and suckled so well at the breast?
    For now should I long have lain in quiet and folded in sleep,
      And gathered of old to the great assembly of them that rest:

    With judges and kings of earth in their pyramid-sepulchres lone,
      With mighty princes that stuffed their tombs with treasures of worth;
    So had I not been; so had I sweet peace and nothingness known,
      As infants that never saw light, as a hidden untimely birth.

    Ah! there do the wicked cease from troubling, the weary rest;
      The prisoners rest together, they hear not the tyrant’s word.
    Both small and great are there, the oppressor with the opprest;
      But the small man hath not fear, the servant is free from his lord.

    O wherefore is sweet life given to a soul in bitterness clad?
      And wherefore light unto him whom sorrow and darkness hold?
    Who waiteth for death all day, and seeing the grave is glad;
      But finds it not though he dig for it more than treasures of gold.

    O wherefore light unto him whose way is circled with gloom,
      Whom God hath girt with a hedge, that he cannot or see or think?
    O wherefore light unto me, or meat for my life, to whom
      Sighing comes sooner than bread and weeping quicker than drink?

    For even all things that I feared have alighted on me from the air;
    I have nought of rest, or peace or quiet, but trouble is there.

_June_, 1870.




THE EVERNEW


    I walk as one who, walking through the night
      From village unto village far withdrawn,
    Sees here and there a light and men who wake
      With confused murmur growing unto dawn.

    And suddenly the birds start into song,
      And cart-wheels creak along the flinty ways,
    And men are in the field, and lights are out,
      While the first sunbeam fills the air with praise.

    So louder, as I wander through the world,
      Sounds that glad anthem of the glimmering day,
    And lamps of men that grope within the dark
      Flash quick and quicker through the morning grey,

    Ere they grow dim. O glance a thousandwise
      Through cold airs wreathing round my brow,
    Ye heralds of a sun, before whose face,
      The whiles ye fade, men hasten forth to bow.

           *       *       *       *       *





ON A CRUCIFIX

IN THE CHURCH OF ST. JOHN LATERAN ROME


    Still, still they crucify thee, O great Christ.
      They took thee from thy cross on Calvary,
    And nailed thee in a splendid place unpriced
      Of malachite and gold and porphyry.
    They counted all the wounds thy body bore,
      They measured all the hours of misery,
    On spear and reed and sponge they set great store:
    Still, still they crucify thee, gentle Christ.

    They used thy name, because thou wast so meek,
      To be the watchword of all godless pride;
    Because thou wast so gracious to the weak,
      They held thy flaming cross up far and wide,
    A curse and terror in the common street
      To poor and ignorant and world-untried,
    And then they came and crouched and kissed thy feet,
    With folded hands and lips slavish and sleek.

    Still, still they crucify thee, who didst say
      Suffer the little ones to come to me,
    Whose heart with love beguiled the beaten way,
      And made all men behold thee joyfully;
    For now they wave away the vulgar crowd,
      No simple child of man may come nigh thee:
    With obscure rites and incantations loud
    They crucify thy love fresh every day.

    Once, where the churches offer stones for bread,
      And in their Holy Place call darkness light,
    Thy sun-like truth-revealing presence shed
      Shame on each false and Pharisaic rite:
    Till, as thy lustre more intensely shone,
      They took thee from thy chosen lowly site,
    And set thee for their own especial sun,
    And called thee by the name of Church’s Head.

    And now, when in an aisle loud trumpets bray,
      And facing thee the priests go to and fro,
    And, distanced off, the kneeling people pray
      And breathe thy name in trembling accents low:
    High o’er the incense and the altar cloud,
      Afar, and folded in thine own great woe,
    Alone, thy head in deep dejection bowed,
    Great Christ, they crucify thee every day.

    Thy face is turned aside from all that scene,
      Thine eyes are weary of their age-long gaze,
    Thy frame is worn, thy shrunken limbs grow lean,
      Thou seem’st to tremble at the song of praise;
    For here, and in thy name, the evil word,
      The ban, the curse, and damning pious phrase,
    Century after century were heard,
    Christ, as if thou their Counsellor hadst been.

    So long? These twice ten hundred years, O Christ?
      Hath no one yet come near to lift thee down?
    Hath no one yet thy holy spirit priced
      Above the three nails and the thorny crown?
    Thy seamless robe the Roman soldiers took,
      But these have woven thee another gown
    Of all thy bitter shame and sharp rebuke
    Wherein to crucify thee still, great Christ.

    Slowly the days run on, the time is long,
      The kneeling generations come and go,
    Thy word is to them as an empty gong,
      They look upon thee, but they do not know.
    Thine arms, wide-spread for all the world’s embrace,
      Are empty evermore of friend or foe,
    Still, still set stiff and rigid in their place,
    And straightened back from love with rivets strong.

    Ah, surely in the seeming endless years
      Some momentary glance hath gladdened thee,
    Some smile of recognition reached through tears
      Hath shed light on thy later Calvary.
    Yet is thy love more like a thing untold,
      To stay and suffer still so patiently,
    By suffering to overcome the cold
    Heart of estrangement of thy loved compeers.

    And now, the end, what is it? For each day
      The magic ceremonious circle, drawn
    Betwixt thee and the people, doth betray
      Less room for love and more for serge and lawn;
    The world grows weary seeking thee in vain,
      And leaves thee to the priests, who self-withdrawn
    In secret pride find popular disdain
    And pitiful desertion and dismay.

    The Papal pride has triumphed: it has set
      Itself for thee. The world has turned away.
    The Papal pride has fallen. Wilt thou yet
      Remain to lead us in this later day?
    Or will thy name, as something that is not,
      Pass from the ears of men unlearned to pray,
    Thy centuries of suffering forgot,
    Thy love to men for evermore unmet?

    Ah! greater is thy love than this, great Christ.
      Thou givest, but thou askest not again:
    And though our wayward worship be enticed
      To other shrines, thy spirit shall remain,
    Unknown, to breathe upon us purer life,
      Refine us with the flame of earthly pain,
    Until, our hearts with thine no more at strife,
    We learn how not to crucify thee, Christ.

ROME, 1873.




THE GREAT PEEPSHOW


I

      Walk up! walk up! This way to see the world!
      Scant time allowed, must make the best of it:
      Seventy years or so: your hair’ll be curled
      Before that, though, with two or three sights fit
      To set your eyes wide open--if you’ve wit,
      That is to say, to win in the great strife
      For bare existence ’gainst each brother chit--
      To keep one eye upon the slide of life,
    As ’twere an instant, ere death hood you with his coif.


II

      Walk up! walk up! Well, you’re a stranger now;
      But that won’t last. It’s excellent rare fun
      Up here; but as we’ve much to see, allow
      Me to begin at once. Now, there’s the Sun.
      Where you come from I doubt that there was one
      Or aught to match it; ’tis too far to touch,
      But has its use, natheless, which is to run
      From end to end of heaven, and give rays such
    As may suffice to warm and light our earthly hutch.


III

      It shines by day and is obscured at night--
      A capital arrangement, such as I
      Should have suggested if the Infinite
      Had asked my counsel. If you ask me why,
      ’Tis clear ’twould not have suited men to lie
      Abed with sun full-orbed at midnight blaze
      And work their days by gaslight. We descry
      Throughout these things the providential ways,
    And are prepared in all to render them due praise.


IV

      Walk up! walk up! There’s plenty more to see
      By this said sun’s rays--simple and sublime.
      The world’s a show which is, you’ll all agree,
      The greatest ever advertised in rhyme,--
      We’ve had the management of it some time
      And can explain it fully;--and to-day
      ’Tis not too much to say ’tis in its prime;
      Admission free--that is, if you obey
    Our fatherly direction, there is nought to pay.


V

      Move with the rest, and do not stop to gaze
      Too long or closely. All is very good:
      So the Creator said--in some amaze
      At his own skill. Besides, in any mood,
      Doubting or not, ’tis deemed a little rude
      To look a gift-horse in the mouth. Move on:
      And thank your planets--as indeed you should--
      That you have got such good advice to con,
    For which the world were worthy visiting, alone.


VI

      Your eyes are caught at first by empty shows--
      Bright colours, smiling faces, forms of grace.
      To chase gold butterflies by green hedgerows,
      To play regardless both of time and space
      In unrestricted freedom, and to race
      Propriety and prudence out of breath,
      Seem pleasant and surprisingly in place
      In this fair world where, as the preacher saith,
    What profits he that works in that he laboureth?


VII

      But look around you, and you’ll soon perceive
      Your judgment is at fault, and, once for all,
      ’Tis best surrender freedom and not grieve,
      But bend your neck demurely to the thrall--
      Remembering the weak _must_ take the wall.
      And get by rote, if not by heart, the themes
      Which age and ancient custom learning call,
      And leave enthusiastic youthful dreams,
    To labour for what is and not for that which seems.


VIII

      Such labour profits. Since it pleased the Lord
      To shut us out of Paradise, the sweat
      Of each man’s brow alone secures reward
      (His or another’s); and we need not fret.
      The bargain’s just, for if we do not get
      Interest, we get profits, which are more.
      Life’s interest is Nature’s secret, set
      In untrod plains, and if all pleasant lore
    Is there, Knowledge and Life,--an Eden-land whereo’er.


IX

      The sun of freedom shines--still, here is gold,
      Which, after all, surpasses any sun:
      For without light were nothing to behold,
      But without this is nothing to be done.
      Therefore seek first for gold, and therefore shun
      Unthrifty habits or excessive vice:
      Honesty’s best policy in the long run,
      Dishonour ruins credit in a trice,
    And virtue, being its own reward, thus pays you twice.


X

      Yet all with moderation. We, who came
      Into the world and learned our lesson flush
      Ere you were thought of, have the prior claim
      In law as well as profits. Do not push!
      As if gold were the very flaming bush.
      Order! If there’s not room, why, some must wait;
      First comers first: ’tis just. And I’ll not blush
      To say I’ve tarried yearlong for a great
    Opening which now the due rotation brings--though late.


XI

      Nay, do not push. Ah! Vengeance on you all!
      ’Tis lost. What greediness!--a vulgar crowd
      Pressing and trampling forward--I shall fall.
      Help! hear me! Here is hard cash: I’m not proud.
      In vain. All lost. Before my eyes a cloud
      Hides the great show, the scene becomes obscure.
      I could have wished that chance had been allowed;
      But no, the risk of limb outweighed the lure,--
    And, taking all in all, the show’s a little poor.


XII

      Adieu. See how they fight! So has it been
      Since the beginning, as if unaware
      The panorama’s but a shifting scene,
      And all its wonders only empty air.
      Hear me, my friends. Believe me that I bear
      No grudge against you, but would have you know,
      For your own good, the lust of gold’s a snare.
      The world’s no shop, but only a peepshow:
    What’s seen or handled you surrender when you go.


XIII

      Carry him out! more room! come up behind!
      One peephole vacant! now the show’s at height.
      Strange, that our predecessors--though not blind--
      Ne’er fully saw or understood the sight,
      Withal so anxious to display their light
      For our illumination! But away:
      Our time for all such questioning is quite
      Too limited. Enough, while yet ’tis day,
    To use the precious hours. Let night come when it may.

FLORENCE, 1873.




THE FELLOWSHIP OF HUMANITY


    As one who, late at eve returning home
      Under the stars, hears on the common road
    A fellow-footstep fall, and sees one come
      Dimly, he knows not whom, nor can forebode;

    But cries to him ‘God speed thee,’ and is glad
      Hearing his restful answer through the night,
    And dreams of love, and though his heart be sad
      Feels darkly some strange instinct of delight;

    So I to thee. If on this earthly way
      Our paths had lain together, I perchance
    In the sweet sunlight had beheld thy day
      And known thee as thou art--as in a trance,--

    And loved thee, and thou me. But seeing now
      Sad night compels us, and our way is won
    Through ignorance and blindness to the brow
      Of that fair mountain of the morning Sun
    Whence Truth is manifest, let us remain
      In word and action strangers, yet in heart
    One and well-known by every joy and pain
      That makes divine our little human part.

1872.




THE FELLOWSHIP OF SUFFERING


    O weary child of man, O mortal friend,
    Afar, unseen, by road or river-bend,
    By mountain, plain, or city, still the same,
    Human, unfriended, with the piercing flame
    Of endless sorrow in thine aching heart:
    Hear me, for unto thee my spirit yearns;
    Touch me, behold me, where the twilight turns,
    Uplifting white arms to the tireless morn:
    Hear me, for in thy torment I am torn;
    Hear me, for in thy passion I have part.

    O child, O child, how sadly sang the world
    Its old old song of keen cold carelessness,
    How blindly blew the wind of loneliness
    About thy soul in frozen garments furled;
    How with pale speechless lips and wan didst pace
    Crushing beneath thy days that deadly feud;
    How to the bitter wall didst turn thy face,
    Glad from the glances of the multitude.

    Ah! here or there; the same sad song of woe,
    More desolate than world-despair or death,
    The cry of souls the cruel sun severeth,
    The moan of love to madness smitten low.
    Ah, here or there; the same sad end of things,
    The same fond fruitless ineffectual life,
    High-feathered hope and passionate pulse of wings,
    Chill sorrow, failure, and despairing strife.

    Behold, beyond the mountains of the West,
    Where sparkle white domes of the purple hills,
    The light of evening Earth’s broad bosom fills
    And like a golden dove broods o’er her breast,
    And fades, afar--for you and me, afar,--
    Shared token of our common deep desire,
    Which fadeth not, but like a beacon-star
    Devours the darkness of our hearts with fire.

1872.




THE ANGEL OF DEATH--AND LIFE


    I call thee in all hours of life and death:
    Friend, whom the days hide and the months and years
    Darken before my face: I call and cry
    Still, as of old time, ere the morning star
    Mounts in the moonlit heavens; and still, ere dawn
    Visits the vale of sleep, I call to thee.
    Friend, like a stranger loved and known before,
    Or brother long forgot, with intricate
    World-written countenance, obscure to read,
    Yet flashing ancient meanings: thou, for whom,
    Morning and night, with ever-new desire,
    I, waiting, watch without the gates of Time,
    If haply at length thy vagrant feet efface
    The way of our estrangement; yea, O thou,
    Who in that way’s delay decipherest
    These words of my great need, I call to Thee.

      O wilt thou hear me: know that night by night
    I dwell beside thee, and before the dawn
    Touch thy loved forehead with my lips, and fill
    With joy each hour of waking. Evernear
    I gaze upon thee as thou goest forth
    To each day’s due encounter; step by step,
    And hour by hour each stroke of all thy work
    Wears out the world to more transparency
    Between us. Even now the flinty way,
    Flaming beneath thy feet, is grown like glass;
    My glance is on thee from the well-turned field,
    The mill, the net, the loom, and woven stuff,
    From desk and counter and rock-quarried gold,
    Waste seas and stormbeat headlands, and from all
    The faces of thine enemies in the fight--
    Strike home: the stroke is fair for me and thee.
    Nay, from these words I spring to meet thy soul,
    Which else were lonely in the world of men;
    O take them as the token of a love
    Within, without thee, Lord and minister,
    Unknown, of all thy actions, until death
    Reveal it, visual, thine, the perfect life.

      Yea, now I call to Love that is in thee,
    And cry, as one that sees her shadow pass
    And the lamp flash, waiting without the house
    For his fair one at the window: O come forth,
    That I may see thee as thou art, and hear
    Thy hidden thought, and hold thy very self
    In presence undisturbed. Thou are descried:
    Thy light is beauty and cannot be hid;
    But, through the tangle of frail purposes
    That fringe the lattice windows of thy life,
    Shines to perpetual promise. Fear thou not.
    Ay, though I come clad grimly as for war,
    In brazen heat or scaly northern cold,
    By rock or river, famine, hatred, fire;
    Though I assail thee at the cannon’s mouth,
    Or drag thee down to listless years of pain,
    Arise thou, and with forehead unabashed
    Come forth, and so confront me. In that day,
    Thine eyes, beholding mine, within their depths
    Shall see, resurgent from the past, all forms
    Of long-lost joy and lovely memory,
    All faces and fair smiles of time, set forth
    And forward in the future; all else fled.
    O stand and conquer so: for see, I touch
    Thee through this outer world, in the hot Sun
    I slay thee with my lips, all day to thee
    I whisper in the Light, and to myself
    Desirous draw thee in the Lightning flash
    Arrayed in death. Arise and vanquish me:
    Grasp firm my tangled hair, brandish thy sword,
    Breathe heavily thy hot breath in my ears,
    And I will yield; and thou shalt know that Love
    Stands ever by thy side through Life and Death,
    Signing allegiance of a thousand hearts
    That still are One.
                        O hear my voice once more.
    I am with thee. Rise up, thy duty calls;
    Pass down into the world; I am with thee.

FLORENCE, 1873.




SONNETS




I

GENOA


    Where Genoa spreads white arms crescent-wise,
      Her feet o’er well-packed bale and polished spar
      Step on the quay with men of every star.
    Her heart stays with her people; but her eyes
    From those high garden-terraces devise
      New realms of peaceful conquest, where afar
      Ocean’s white horses at the harbour-bar
    Wait ever for their rider to arise.

    Here boy Columbus stood, and o’er the blue
    Immeasurable fields imagined new.
    Here young Mazzini, while for men he yearned,
    Another world within their eyes discerned--
    The one Republic without place or date.
    So both for men lived,--and died execrate.

_January_, 1873.




II

BEETHOVEN


    Betwixt the actual and unseen, alone,
      Companionless, deaf, in dread solitude
      Of soul amid the faithless multitude,
    He lived, and fought with life, and held his own;
    Knew poverty, and shame which is not shown,
      Pride, doubt, and secret heart-despair of good,--
      Insolent praise of men and petty feud:
    Yet fell not from his purpose, framed and known.

    For, as a lonely watcher of the night,
      When all men sleep, sees the tumultuous stars
    Move forward from the deep in squadrons bright,
      And notes them, he through this life’s prison bars
    Heard all night long the spheric music clear
    Beat on his heart,--and lived that men might hear.

_January_, 1873.




III

IN MORTEM. F. D. MAURICE


    So day by day my life, thus nearer drawn
    Down the dark avenues unto the dawn,
    Cries to Thee: O Lord, Lord of life and death,
    Whom from our gaze the sad night sundereth,
    Reveal Thyself; be unto us no more
    A darkly-felt thick darkness by the shore;
    But like the wind, that wingeth cold and clear
    Before the dawn by meadow-land and mere,
    Blow on us; scatter from our sickly brains
    The feverish fancies that ill conscience feigns;
    Raise us to stand like men to meet the strife,
    Fearless and grand, because within thy life
    Our lives are hidden,--as is his to-day,
    Thy servant who from sight hath passed away.

_April_, 1872.




IV

WILLIAM SMITH

(AUTHOR OF “THORNDALE,” ETC.)


    Such courage in so sensitive a frame
    Had given the world rebuke, but that it came
    In such light exquisite companionship
    Of gentle glance and laughter-loving lip
    That few, beholding, could forebode the force
    Wherewith that inward current kept its course
    In wave-like large emotion, calm and free,
    Towards Truth, the high compelling deity.

    So when, obedient to the heavenly guide,
    Night-long the sea with stedfast-flowing tide
    Rises along the land and searches o’er
    Each bay and inlet of its bounding shore,
    The moving goddess doth her empire trace
    In lines of silver laughter on its face.

           *       *       *       *       *





V

INSCRIBED ON A GRAVE

TO THE READER


    O child of light and shadow: though I pass,
    The mountains and the plains where we two played
    Our part of earthly pleasance still are laid
    Out in the open world of sun and grass,--
    For thy fruition. Not in stone or brass
    Seek any sign of me. Let no tear braid
    Thy light-fringed lids because my path is made
    Beyond the bounds thy sight cannot surpass.
    Turn thee again unto the sunlit plain,
    Let all pure influences of the air
    And sweet sad fellowship of mortal pain
    Wreathe round thy head immortal fancies fair.
    Where’er suns rise on men or late moons wane,
    I leave thee at this stone to meet thee there.

ROME, 1873.




VI

DEATH


    Since, small or great, and every man on earth,
    Must know thee at the last, thy lonely gloom
    Is bright with something of diviner birth--
    The lamp of human love, that o’er our doom
    Sheds undivided radiance. For in this
    Our modern world of finely graded life,
    The soul is nursed knowing nothing of the bliss
    Of sorrow borne, since human. In this strife
    Of complex individual interests
    Poor man and princely, side by side, share not
    One pain or passion of a common lot,
    Till death, more liberal than life, invests
    All men alike in his wide winding-sheet,
    And in that suit of sorrow makes them meet.

           *       *       *       *       *





VII


    Since, in thine hour of sorrow, unto thee
    Came sweet remembrance of the summer sea
    And one who sat beside it--in his eyes
    The far-off thought of sea and summer skies:
    Since in thine heart the visionary gleam
    Of one half-wasted life, more like a dream,
    Pale in its pleading, stood to be the sign
    Of Love, as Love is, passionate, divine:
    Ah! since in all this world no fuller sound
    Than my faint spirit’s utterance was found
    Bidding thee cherish hope: so let it be.
    Behold, beyond the summer and the sea
    I utter not myself, but am His voice
    Who bids all Nature live, and thee rejoice.

           *       *       *       *       *





VIII

SEVERANCE


    My life thy life unto itself doth fold
    Closer than death. My soul clasps all of thine,
    As in the bud rose-petals intertwine
    Before the light divides them. I behold
    Deep in the mystic shadow-caverns shine
    Thine image on the fire-fed sources cold
    Whereby my spirit dwells; and with the old
    Foreboding unforgotten, dream divine,
    Thou dost disturb me. Yet the dim-lit day
    Dawns down between us, staring face to face,
    Strange as the stormy Atlantic; with swift pace
    We tread the track which sets our steps astray;
    Thy lips are mute; mine move not; evermore
    I wait and wearily knock at Death’s dark door.

1872.




IX

IT SHALL BE


    It shall be. Although far away the sound
      Dies in the infinite silence of the sky,
    Although obscure, and hid in the profound,
      Our days stream outwards, onwards, and pass by.
    It shall be. Behold a new world is made
      Out of the old, and the old dieth not;
    For though the mountain-forms and flowers fade,
      Ageless remains the far-informing Thought.
    Ah! when this troublous dream and mortal sleep
      Fades from our eyelids, and the end is near,
    Down through the spaceless void and starry steep
      Instinct with Love the dreaming soul shall hear
    One whispered word; and all the past shall be
    Up-gathered into Love’s eternity.

           *       *       *       *       *





X

WALDSTEIN SONATA. BEETHOVEN


    O changeless in thy beauty, stedfast, strong,
      Exultant in the calm of victory,
      A mighty poet flung thee forth, to be
    A part of Nature. So that I, thus long
    Listening to thy majestic voices, dream
      Of some vast snow-veiled mountain far away,
      Whose front is crimson fire at orient day;
    Where in the dark Dian’s silver lances gleam;
    Where shadows of the tireless storm-wreathed mist
      Move on in changeless interchange; where call
      Clamorous echoes of the waterfall
    From crag to crag; whom Night alone hath kissed,
    And everlasting silence, and the far
    Glimmering magic of the Morning star.

_November_, 1869.




                     _Printed in Great Britain by_
                        UNWIN BROTHERS, LIMITED
                           LONDON AND WOKING

                   *       *       *       *       *


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