MONKS AND SCHOOLMEN

39

But mark how gladly, through their own domains,
The Monks relax or break these iron chains ;
While Mercy, uttering, through their voice, a sound
Echoed in Heaven, cries out, "Ye Chiefs, abate
These legalized oppressions! Man-whose name
And nature God disdained not; Man-whose soul
Christ died for cannot forfeit his high claim

10

To live and move exempt from all controul
Which fellow-feeling doth not mitigate!"

V

MONKS AND SCHOOLMEN

RECORD we too, with just and faithful pen,
That many hooded Cenobites * there are,
Who in their private cells have yet a care
Of public quiet; unambitious Men,
Counsellors for the world, of piercing ken;
Whose fervent exhortations from afar
Move Princes to their duty, peace or war; †
And oft-times in the most forbidding den
Of solitude, with love of science strong,
How patiently the yoke of thought they bear !
How subtly glide its finest threads along !
Spirits that crowd the intellectual sphere ‡
With mazy boundaries, as the astronomer
With orb and cycle girds the starry throng.

5

10

* Cenobites (κοινόβιοι), monks who live in common, as distinguished from hermits or anchorites, who live alone. -ED.

↑ "Counts, kings, bishops," says F. D. Maurice, "in the fulness of their wealth and barbaric splendour, may be bowing before a monk, who writes them letters from a cell in which he is living upon vegetables and water." (Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy (Edition 1873), vol. i., Mediæval Philosophy, chap. iv. p. 534.)-ED.

e.g. Anselm (1033-1109); Albertus Magnus (1193-1280); Thomas Aquinas (1226-1274); Duns Scotus (1265-1308). -ED.

VI

OTHER BENEFITS

AND, not in vain embodied to the sight,
Religion finds even in the stern retreat
Of feudal sway her own appropriate seat; *
From the collegiate pomps on Windsor's height
Down to the humbler 1 altar, which the Knight
And his Retainers of the embattled hall

5

Seek in domestic oratory small,

For prayer in stillness, or the chanted rite;
Then chiefly dear, when foes are planted round,
Who teach the intrepid guardians of the place - 10
Hourly exposed to death, with famine worn,
And suffering under many a perilous wound-2
How sad would be their durance, if forlorn
Of offices dispensing heavenly grace !

VII

CONTINUED

AND what melodious sounds at times prevail !
And, ever and anon, how bright a gleam

Pours on the surface of the turbid Stream!
What heartfelt fragrance mingles with the gale

CRUSADERS

That swells the bosom of our passing sail !
For where, but on this River's margin, blow
Those flowers of chivalry, to bind the brow
Of hardihood with wreaths that shall not fail?-
Fair Court of Edward! wonder of the world ! *

I see a matchless blazonry unfurled
Of wisdom, magnanimity, and love;
And meekness tempering honourable pride ;
The lamb is couching by the lion's side,

And near the flame-eyed eagle sits the dove.

41

VIII

CRUSADERS

FURL we the sails, and pass with tardy oars
Through these bright regions, casting many a glance
Upon the dream-like issues the romance 1
Of many-coloured life that 2 Fortune pours
Round the Crusaders, till on distant shores
Their labours end; or they return to lie,
The vow performed, in cross-legged effigy,
Devoutly stretched upon their chancel floors.
Am I deceived? Or is their requiem chanted

1 1845.

Nor can Imagination quit the shores
Of these bright scenes without a farewell glance
Given to those dream-like Issues

Given to the dream-like Issues-that Romance

that Romance

1822.

1837.

5

10

5

By voices never mute when Heaven unties

10

Her inmost, softest, tenderest harmonies;
Requiem which Earth takes up with voice undaunted,
When she would tell how Brave, and Good, and Wise,1
For their high guerdon not in vain have panted!

IX

"AS FAITH THUS SANCTIFIED THE
WARRIOR'S CREST"

Composed 1842. - Published 1845

As faith thus sanctified the warrior's crest
While from the Papal Unity there came,
What feebler means had fail'd to give, one aim

Diffused thro' all the regions of the West;

So does her Unity its power attest

5

By works of Art, that shed, on the outward frame Of worship, glory and grace, which who shall blame That ever looked to heaven for final rest?

Hail countless Temples! that so well befit

Your ministry; that, as ye rise and take

10

Form spirit and character from holy writ,
Give to devotion, wheresoe'er awake,

Pinions of high and higher sweep, and make
The unconverted soul with awe submit.*

1 1837.

Good, and Brave, and Wise,

1822.

* In a letter to Professor Henry Reed, Philadelphia, September 4, 1842, Wordsworth writes: "To the second part of the Series" (the "Ecclesiastical Sonnets") "I have also added two, in order to do more justice to the Papal Church for the services which she did actually render to Christianity and humanity in the Middle Ages."-ED.

WHERE LONG AND DEEPLY

43

X

"WHERE LONG AND DEEPLY HATH BEEN FIXED THE ROOT"

Composed 1842. - Published 1845

WHERE long and deeply hath been fixed the root
In the blest soil of gospel truth, the Tree,
(Blighted or scathed tho' many branches be,
Put forth to wither, many a hopeful shoot)
Can never cease to bear celestial fruit.
Witness the Church that oft-times, with effect
Dear to the saints, strives earnestly to eject 1

5

Her bane, her vital energies recruit.

Lamenting, do not hopelessly repine
When such good work is doomed to be undone,2
The conquests lost that were so hardly won :-
All promises vouchsafed by Heaven will shine 3
In light confirmed while years their course shall run,
Confirmed alike in 4 progress and decline.

10

1 1845.

Blighted and scathed tho' many branches be,
Can never cease to bear and ripen fruit
Worthy of Heaven. This law is absolute.
Behold the Church that often with effect

Dear to the Saints doth labouring to eject

2 1845.

{

The Church not seldom surely with effect
Dear to the Saints doth labour to eject
Her bane, her vital energy recruit.

So Providence ordains and why repine

}

C.

If this good work is doomed to be undone,

C.