For neither didst thou watch the wizard flocks Of the Scald's dreams, nor haunt the Druid's sleep. What if the tears rained through thy shattered locks Were quickly dried? for thou didst groan, not weep, When from its sea of death to kill and burn, The Galilean serpent forth did creep, And made thy world an undistinguishable heap. IX. A thousand years the Earth cried, Where art thou? On Saxon Alfred's olive-cinctured brow: Like rocks which fire lifts out of the flat deep, Frowning o'er the tempestuous sea Of kings, and priests, and slaves, in tower-crowned majesty; And burst around their walls, like idle foam, X. Thou huntress swifter than the Moon! thou terror Luther caught thy wakening glance, Like lightning, from his leaden lance' Reflected, it dissolved the visions of the trance In which, as in a tomb, the nations lay; And England's prophets hailed thee as their queen, In songs whose music cannot pass away, Though it must flow for ever: not unseen Before the spirit-sighted countenance Of Milton didst thou pass, from the sad scene XI. The eager hours and unreluctant years As on a dawn-illumined mountain stood, Trampling to silence their loud hopes and fears, Darkening each other with their multitude, And cried aloud, Liberty! Indignation Answered Pity from her cave; Death grew pale within the grave, And Desolation howled to the destroyer, Save! Like shadows: as if day had cloven the skies XII. Thou heaven of earth! what spells could pall thee then, Dyed all thy liquid light with blood and tears, Round France, the ghastly vintage, stood Destruction's sceptred slaves, and Folly's mitred brood! When one, like them, but mightier far than they, The Anarch of thine own bewildered powers Rose: armies mingled in obscure array, Like clouds with clouds, darkening the sacred bowers Of serene heaven. He, by the past pursued, Rests with those dead, but unforgotten hours, Whose ghosts scare victor kings in their ancestral towers. XIII. England yet sleeps: was she not called of old? Snow-crags by its reply are cloven in sunder: From Pithecusa to Pelorus Howls, and leaps, and glares in chorus: They cry, Be dim! ye lamps of heaven suspended o'er us. Twins of a single destiny! appeal To the eternal years enthroned before us, In the dim West, impress us from a seal, All ye have thought and done! Time cannot dare conceal XIV. Tomb of Arminius! render up thy dead, Till, like a standard from a watch-tower's staff, His soul may stream over the tyrant's head; Wild Bacchanal of truth's mysterious wine, His dead spirit lives in thee. Why do we fear or hope? thou art already free! And glorious world! thou flowery wilderness! Thou island of eternity! thou shrine Where desolation clothed with loveliness, Worships the thing thou wert! O Italy, Gather thy blood into thy heart; repress The beasts who make their dens thy sacred palaces XV. O, that the free would stamp the impious name So that this blot upon the page of fame Erases, and the flat sands close behind! Ye the oracle have heard: Lift the victory-flashing sword, And cut the snaky knots of this foul gordian word, The axes and the rods which awe mankind; XVI. O, that the wise from their bright minds would kindle Till human thoughts might kneel alone Of its own aweless soul, or of the power unknown! 'They stand before their Lord, each to receive its due. XVII. He who taught man to vanquish whatsoever Can be between the cradle and the grave Crowned him the King of Life. O vain endeavour! He has enthroned the oppression and the oppressor. Amplest millions at their need, And power in thought be as the tree within the seed? Driving on fiery wings to Nature's throne, Over all height and depth? if Life can breed New wants, and wealth from those who toil and groan Rend of thy gifts and hers a thousand fold for one. XVIII. Come Thou, but lead out of the inmost cave To judge, with solemn truth, life's ill-apportioned lot? Of what has been, the Hope of what will be? O, Liberty! if such could be thy name Wert thou disjoined from these, or they from thee: If thine or theirs were treasures to be bought By blood or tears, have not the wise and free Wept tears, and blood like tears? The solemn harmony XIX. Paused, and the spirit of that mighty singing When the bolt has pierced its brain; As summer clouds dissolve, unburthened of their rain; Drooped; o'er it closed the echoes far away Of the great voice which did its flight sustain, Hiss round a drowner's head in their tempestuous play. ODE TO NAPLES.* EPODE I. a. I STOOD within the city disinterred;f And heard the autumnal leaves like light footfals The oracular thunder penetrating shook The listening soul in my suspended blood; I felt that Earth out of her deep heart spoke-- I felt, but heard not:-through white columns glowed A plane of light between two Heavens of azure: Because the crystal silence of the air Weighed on their life, even as the Power divine Which then lulled all things, brooded upon mine. *The Author has connected many recollections of his visit to Pompeii and Baixe with the enthusiasm excited by the intelligence of the proclamation of a Constitutional Government at Naples. This has given a tinge of picturesque and descriptive imagery to the introductory Epodes which depicture these scenes, and some of the majestic feelings permanently connected with the scene of this animating event.-Author's Note. † Pompeii. EPODE II. a. Then gentle winds arose With many a mingled close Of wild Æolian sound and mountain odour keen; Within, above, around its bowers of starry green, It bore me like an Angel, o'er the waves I sailed, where ever flows Of the dead kings of Melody.* Shadowy Aornos darkened o'er the helm There streamed a sunlike vapour, like the standard Whilst from all the coast, Louder and louder, gathering round, there wandered They seize me--I must speak them-be they fate! STROPHE a. I. Naples! thou Heart of men which ever pantest The mutinous air and sea: they round thee, even Metropolis of a ruined Paradise Long lost, late won, and yet but half regained! Bright Altar of the bloodless sacrifice, Which armed Victory offers up unstained To Love, the flower-enchained! 'Thou which wert once, and then didst cease to be, STROPHE B, 2. Thou youngest giant birth Which from the groaning earth Leap'st, clothed in armour of impenetrable scale ! Who 'gainst the Crowned Transgressors Pleadest before God's love! Arrayed in Wisdom's mail, Homer and Virgil. |