In darkness and in light, from herb and stone,
Spreading itself where'er that Power may move
Which has withdrawn his being to its own;

Which wields the world with never wearied love,
Sustains it from beneath, and kindles it above.

He is a portion of the loveliness

Which once he made more lovely: he doth bear
His part, while the one Spirit's plastic stress
Sweeps through the dull dense world, compelling there
All new successions to the forms they wear;
Torturing th' unwilling dross that checks its flight
To its own likeness, as each mass may bear;
And bursting in its beauty and its might

From trees and beasts and men into the Heaven's light.

The splendours of the firmament of time
May be eclipsed, but are extinguished not;
Like stars to their appointed height they climb
And death is a low mist which cannot blot
The brightness it may veil. When lofty thought
Lifts a young heart above its mortal lair,
And love and life contend in it, for what

Shall be its earthly doom, the dead live there

And move like winds of light on dark and stormy air.

The inheritors of unfulfilled renown

Rose from their thrones, built beyond mortal thought,
Far in the Unapparent. Chatterton

Rose pale, his solemn agony had not
Yet faded from him; Sidney, as he fought
And as he fell and as he lived and loved
Sublimely mild, a Spirit without spot,
Arose; and Lucan, by his death approved:
Oblivion as they rose shrank like a thing reproved.

And many more, whose names on Earth are dark,

But whose transmitted effluence cannot die

So long as fire outlives the parent spark,
Rose, robed in dazzling immortality.

Thou art become as one of us,' they cry,

'It was for thee yon kingless sphere has long

Swung blind in unascended majesty,

Silent alone amid an Heaven of Song.

Assume thy wingèd throne, thou Vesper of our throng!'

Who mourns for Adonais? Oh, come forth, Fond wretch! and know thyself and him aright. Clasp with thy panting soul the pendulous Earth; As from a centre, dart thy spirit's light Beyond all worlds, until its spacious might Satiate the void circumference: then shrink Even to a point within our day and night; And keep thy heart light lest it make thee sink When hope has kindled hope, and lured thee to the brink.

Or go to Rome, which is the sepulchre

Oh, not of him, but of our joy: 'tis nought
That ages, empires, and religions there
Lie buried in the ravage they have wrought;
For such as he can lend,-they borrow not
Glory from those who made the world their prey;
And he is gathered to the kings of thought
Who waged contention with their time's decay,
And of the past are all that cannot pass away.

Go thou to Rome, at once the Paradise,

The grave, the city, and the wilderness;

And where its wrecks like shattered mountains rise,
And flowering weeds, and fragrant copses dress
The bones of Desolation's nakedness,

Pass, till the Spirit of the spot shall lead
Thy footsteps to a slope of green access
Where, like an infant's smile, over the dead

A light of laughing flowers along the grass is spread.

And gray walls moulder round, on which dull Time
Feeds, like slow fire upon a hoary brand;
And one keen pyramid with wedge sublime,
Pavilioning the dust of him who planned

This refuge for his memory, doth stand

Like flame transformed to marble; and beneath,
A field is spread, on which a newer band

Have pitched in Heaven's smile their camp of death, Welcoming him we lose with scarce extinguished breath.

Here pause: these graves are all too young as yet
To have outgrown the sorrow which consigned
Its charge to each; and if the seal is set,
Here, on one fountain of a mourning mind,
Break it not thou! too surely shalt thou find
Thine own well full, if thou returnest home,
Of tears and gall. From the world's bitter wind
Seek shelter in the shadow of the tomb.
What Adonais is, why fear we to become?

The One remains, the many change and pass;
Heaven's light forever shines, Earth's shadows fly;
Life, like a dome of many-coloured glass,
Stains the white radiance of Eternity,

Until Death tramples it to fragments.-Die,

If thou wouldst be with that which thou dost seek!
Follow where all is fled!-Rome's azure sky,
Flowers, ruins, statues, music, words are weak
The glory they transfuse with fitting truth to speak.

Why linger, why turn back, why shrink, my Heart?
Thy hopes are gone before: from all things here
They have departed: thou shouldst now depart!
A light is passed from the revolving year,
And man, and woman; and what still is dear
Attracts to crush, repels to make thee wither.
The soft sky smiles,-the low wind whispers near;
'Tis Adonais calls! oh, hasten thither,

No more let Life divide what Death can join together.

That Light whose smile kindles the Universe,
That Beauty in which all things work and move,
That Benediction which the eclipsing Curse
Of birth can quench not, that sustaining Love

Which through the web of being blindly wove
By man and beast and earth and air and sea,
Burns bright or dim, as each are mirrors of
The fire for which all thirst; now beams on me,
Consuming the last clouds of cold mortality.

The breath whose might I have invoked in song
Descends on me; my spirit's bark is driven,
Far from the shore, far from the trembling throng
Whose sails were never to the tempest given;
The massy earth and spherèd skies are riven!
I am borne darkly, fearfully, afar;

Whilst, burning through the inmost veil of Heaven,
The soul of Adonais, like a star,

Beacons from the abode where the Eternal are.

523

524

JAMES HENRY LEIGH HUNT

[1784-1859]

JENNY KISS'D ME

JENNY kiss'd me when we met,

Jumping from the chair she sat in;

Time, you thief, who love to get

Sweets into your list, put that in!

Say I'm weary, say I'm sad,

Say that health and wealth have miss'd me, Say I'm growing old, but add,

Jenny kiss'd me.

ABOU BEN ADHEM

ABOU BEN ADHEM (may his tribe increase)
Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace,
And saw-within the moonlight in his room,
Making it rich and like a lily in bloom-
An angel, writing in a book of gold.
Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold,

And to the presence in the room he said,

'What writest thou?'-The vision raised its head, And, with a look made of all sweet accord, Answered, 'The names of those who love the Lord.' 'And is mine one?' said Abou. Nay, not so,' Replied the angel. Abou spoke more low, But cheerly still, and said, 'I pray thee, then, Write me as one that loves his fellow men.'

The angel wrote and vanished. The next night It came again with a great wakening light,

And showed the names whom love of God had blessed, And lo! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest.

525

JOHN KEATS
[1795-1821]

THE REALM OF FANCY

EVER let the Fancy roam!

Pleasure never is at home:

At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth,
Like to bubbles when rain pelteth;

Then let wingéd Fancy wander

Through the thought still spread beyond her:

Open wide the mind's cage-door,

She'll dart forth, and cloudward soar.

O sweet Fancy! let her loose;
Summer's joys are spoilt by use,
And the enjoying of the Spring
Fades as does its blossoming:
Autumn's red-lipp'd fruitage too,
Blushing through the mist and dew,
Cloys with tasting: What do then?
Sit thee by the ingle, when
The sear faggot blazes bright,
Spirit of a winter's night;

When the soundless earth is muffled,

And the cakéd snow is shuffled