Classic Poem

Reanimated, now, and dressed in robes
Of everlasting wear, in the last pause
Of expectation, stood the human race,
Buoyant in air, or covering shore and sea,
From east to west, thick as the eared grain,
In golden autumn waved, from field to field,
Profuse, by Nilus' fertile wave, while yet
Earth was, and men were in her valleys seen.
Still, all was calm in heaven. Nor yet appeared
The judge, nor aught appeared, save here and there
On wing of golden plumage borne at will,
A curious angel, that from out the skies
Now glanced a look on man, and then retired.
As calm was all on earth. The ministers
Of God's unsparing vengeance, waited, still
Unbid. No sun, no moon, no star, gave light.
A blessed and holy radiance, travelled far
From day original, fell on the face
Of men, and every countenance revealed;
Unpleasant to the bad, whose visages
Had lost all guise of seeming happiness,
With which on earth such pains they took to hide
Their misery in. On their grim features, now
The plain, unvisored index of the soul,
The true, untampered witness of the heart,
No smile of hope, no look of vanity
Beseeching for applause, was seen; no scowl
Of self-important, all-despising pride,
That once upon the poor and needy fell,
Like winter on the unprotected flower,
Withering their very being to decay.
No jesting mirth, no wanton leer, was seen,
No sullen lower of braggart fortitude
Defying pain, nor anger, nor revenge;
But fear instead, and terror, and remorse;
And chief, one passion, to its answering, shaped
The features of the damned, and in itself
Summed all the rest,—unutterable despair.
What on the righteous shone of foreign light,
Was all redundant day, they needed not.
For as, by nature, Sin is dark, and loves
The dark, still hiding from itself in gloom,
And in the darkest hell is still itself
The darkest hell, and the severest wo,
Where all is wo; so Virtue, ever fair!
Doth by a sympathy as strong as binds
Two equal hearts, well pleased in wedded love,
For ever seek the light, for ever seek
All fair and lovely things, all beauteous forms,
All images of excellence and truth;
And from her own essential being, pure
As flows the fount of life that spirits drink,
Doth to herself give light, nor from her beams,
As native to her as her own existence,
Can be divorced, nor of her glory shorn,—
Which now, from every feature of the just,
Divinely rayed, yet not from all alike;
In measure, equal to the soul's advance
In virtue, was the lustre of the face.
It was a strange assembly: none, of all
That congregation vast, could recollect
Aught like it in the history of man.
No badge of outward state was seen, no mark
Of age, or rank, or national attire,
Or robe professional, or air of trade.
Untitled, stood the man that once was called
My lord, unserved, unfollowed; and the man
Of tithes, right reverend in the dialect
Of Time addressed, ungowned, unbeneficed,
Uncorpulent; nor now, from him who bore,
With ceremonious gravity of step,
And face of borrowed holiness o'erlaid,
The ponderous book before the awful priest,
And opened and shut the pulpit's sacred gates
In style of wonderful observancy
And reverence excessive, in the beams
Of sacerdotal splendour lost, or if
Observed, comparison ridiculous scarce
Could save the little, pompous, humble man
From laughter of the people,—not from him
Could be distinguished then the priest untithed.
None levees held, those marts where princely smiles
Were sold for flattery, and obeisance mean.
Unfit from man to man; none came or went,
None wished to draw attention, none was poor,
None rich, none young, none old, deformed none;
None sought for place or favour, none had aught
To give, none could receive, none ruled, none served;
No king, no subject was; unscutcheoned all,
Uncrowned, unplumed, unhelmed, unpedigreed.
Unlaced, uncoroneted, unbestarred.
Nor countryman was seen, nor citizen;
Republican, nor humble advocate
Of monarchy; nor idol worshipper,
Nor beaded papist, nor Mahometan;
Episcopalian none, nor presbyter;
Nor Lutheran, nor Calvinist, nor Jew,
Nor Greek, nor sectary of any name.
Nor, of those persons, that loud title bore,
Most high and mighty, most magnificent,
Most potent, most august, most worshipful,
Most eminent, words of great pomp, that pleased
The ear of vanity, and made the worms
Of earth mistake themselves for gods,—could one
Be seen, to claim these phrases absolete.
It was a congregation vast of men,
Of unappendaged and unvarnished men,
Of plain, unceremonious human beings,
Of all but moral character bereaved.
His vice or virtue, now, to each remained,
Alone. All else, with their grave-clothes, men had
Put off, as badges worn by mortal, not
Immortal man; alloy that could not pass
The scrutiny of Death's refining fires;
Dust of Time's wheels, by multitudes pursued
Of fools that shouted—Gold! fair painted fruit,
At which the ambitious idiot jumped, while men
Of wiser mood immortal harvest reaped;
Weeds of the human garden, sprung from earth's
Adulterate soil, unfit to be transplanted,
Though by the moral botanist, too oft,
For plants of heavenly seed mistaken and nursed;
Mere chaff, that Virtue, when she rose from earth,
And waved her wings to gain her native heights,
Drove from the verge of being, leaving Vice
No mask to hide her in; base born of Time,
In which God claimed no property, nor had
Prepared for them a place in heaven or hell.
Yet did these vain distinctions, now forgot,
Bulk largely in the filmy eye of Time,
And were exceeding fair, and lured to death
Immortal souls. But they were passed, for all
Ideal now was passed; reality
Alone remained; and good and bad, redeemed
And unredeemed, distinguished sole the sons
Of men. Each to his proper self reduced,
And undisguised, was what his seeming showed.
The man of earthly fame, whom common men
Made boast of having seen, who scarce could pass
The ways of Time, for eager crowds that pressed
To do him homage, and pursued his ear
With endless praise, for deeds unpraised above,
And yoked their brutal natures, honoured much
To drag his chariot on,—unnoticed stood,
With none to praise him, none to flatter there.
Blushing and dumb, that morning, too, was seen
The mighty reasoner, he who deeply searched
The origin of things, and talked of good
And evil, much, of causes and effects,
Of mind and matter, contradicting all
That went before him, and himself, the while,
The laughing-stock of angels; diving far
Below his depth, to fetch reluctant proof,
That he himself was mad and wicked too,
When, proud and ignorant man, he meant to prove
That God had made the universe amiss,
And sketched a better plan. Ah! foolish sage:
He could not trust the word of Heaven, nor see
The light which from the Bible blazed,—that lamp
Which God threw from his palace down to earth,
To guide his wandering children home,—yet leaned
His cautious faith on speculations wild,
And visionary theories absurd,
Prodigiously, deliriously absurd,
Compared with which, the most erroneous flight
That poet ever took when warm with wine,
Was moderate conjecturing: he saw,
Weighed in the balance of eternity,
His lore how light, and wished, too late, that he
Had staid at home, and learned to know himself,
And done, what peasants did, disputed less,
And more obeyed. Nor less he grieved his time
Misspent, the man of curious research,
Who travelled far through lands of hostile clime
And dangerous inhabitant, to fix
The bounds of empires passed, and ascertain
The burial-place of heroes, never born;
Despising present things, and future too,
And groping in the dark unsearchable
Of finished years,—by dreary ruins seen,
And dungeons damp, and vaults of ancient waste,
With spade and mattock, delving deep to raise
Old vases and dismembered idols rude;
With matchless perseverance, spelling out
Words without sense. Poor man! he clapped his hands,
Enraptured, when be found a manuscript
That spoke of pagan gods; and yet forgot
The God who made the sea and sky, alas!
Forgot that trifling was a sin; stored much
Of dubious stuff, but laid no treasure up
In heaven; on mouldered columns scratched his name,
But ne'er inscribed it in the book of life.
Unprofitable seemed, and unapproved,
That day, the sullen, self-vindictive life
Of the recluse. With crucifixes hung,
And spells, and rosaries, and wooden saints,
Like one of reason reft, he journeyed forth,
In show of miserable poverty,
And chose to beg,—as if to live on sweat
Of other men, had promised great reward;
On his own flesh inflicted cruel wounds,
With naked foot embraced the ice, by the hour
Said mass, and did most grievous penance vile;
And then retired to drink the filthy cup
Of secret wickedness, and fabricate
All living wonders, by the untaught received
For revelations new. Deluded wretch!
Did he not know, that the most Holy One
Bequired a cheerful life and holy heart?
Most disappointed in that crowd of men,
The man of subtle controversy stood,
The bigot theologian, in minute
Distinctions skilled, and doctrines unreduced
To practice; in debate how loud! how long.
How dexterous! in Christian love how cold!
His vain conceits were orthodox alone.
The immutable and heavenly truth, revealed
By God, was naught to him. He had an art,
A kind of hellish charm, that made the lips
Of truth speak falsehood, to his liking turned
The meaning of the text, made trifles seem
The marrow of salvation; to a word,
A name, a sect, that sounded in the ear,
And to the eye so many letters showed,
But did no more,—gave value infinite;
Proved still his reasoning best, and his belief,
Though propped on fancies wild as madmen's dreams,
Most rational, most scriptural, most sound;
With mortal heresy denouncing all
Who in his arguments could see no force.
On points of faith, too fine for human sight,
And never understood in heaven, he placed
His everlasting hope, undoubting placed,
And died; and, when he opened his ear, prepared
To hear, beyond the grave, the minstrelsy
Of bliss, he heard, alas! the wail of wo.
He proved all creeds false but his own, and found,
At last, his own most false—most false, because
He spent his time to prove all others so.
O love-destroying, cursed Bigotry!
Cursed in heaven, but cursed more in hell,
Where millions curse thee, and must ever curse!
Religion's most abhorred! perdition's most
Forlorn! God's most abandoned! hells most damned!
The infidel, who turned his impious war
Against the walls of Zion, on the rock
Of ages built, and higher than the clouds,
Sinned, and received his due reward; but she
Within her walls sinned more. Of Ignorance
Begot, her daughter, Persecution, walked
The earth from age to age, and drank the blood
Of saints, with horrid relish drank the blood
Of God's peculiar children, and was drunk,
And in her drunkenness dreamed of doing good.
The supplicating hand of innocence,
That made the tiger mild, and in his wrath
The lion pause, the groans of suffering most
Severe, were naught to her; she laughed at groans:
No music pleased her more, and no repast
So sweet to her, as blood of men redeemed
By blood of Christ. Ambition's self, though mad,
And nursed on human gore, with her compared,
Was merciful. Nor did she always rage.
She had some hours of meditation, set
Apart, wherein she to her study went,
The Inquisition, model most complete
Of perfect wickedness, where deeds were done,
Deeds! let them ne'er be named,—and sat and planned
Deliberately, and with most musing pains,
How, to extremest thrill of agony,
The flesh, and blood, and souls of holy men,
Her victims might be wrought; and when she saw
New tortures of her labouring fancy born,
She leaped for joy, and made great haste to try
Their force—well pleased to hear a deeper groan.
But now her day of mirth was passed, and come
Her day to weep, her day of bitter groans,
And sorrow unbemoaned, the day of grief
And wrath retributory poured in full
On all that took her part. The man of sin,
The mystery of iniquity, her friend
Sincere, who pardoned sin, unpardoned still,
And in the name of God blasphemed, and did
All wicked, all abominable things,
Most abject stood, that day, by devils hissed,
And by the looks of those he murdered, scorched;
And plagued with inward shame, that on his cheek
Burned, while his votaries, who left the earth,
Secure of bliss, around him, undecelved,
Stood, undeceivable till then; and knew,
Too late, him fallible, themselves accursed,
And all their passports and certificates,
A lie: nor disappointed more, nor more
Ashamed, the Mussujman, when he saw, gnash
His teeth and wail, whom he expected judge.
All these were damned for bigotry, were damned,
Because they thought, that they alone served God,
And served him most, when most they disobeyed.
Of those forlorn and sad, thou mightst have marked,
In number most innumerable, stand
The indolent; too lazy these to make
Inquiry for themselves, they stuck their faith
To some well-fatted priest, with offerings bribed
To bring them oracles of peace, and take
Into his management all the concerns
Of their eternity; managed how well
They knew, that day, and might have sooner known
That the commandment was, Search, and believe
In Me, and not in man; who leans on him
Leans on a broken reed, that will impierce
The trusted side. I am the way, the truth,
The life, alone, and there is none besides.
This did they read, and yet refused to search,
To search what easily was found, and, found,
Of price uncountable. Most foolish, they
Thought God with ignorance pleased, and blinded faith,
That took not root in reason, purified
With holy influence of his Spirit pure.
So, on they walked, and stumbled in the light
Of noon, because they would not open their eyes;
Effect how sad of sloth! that made them risk
Their piloting to the eternal shore,
To one who could mistake the lurid flash
Of hell for heaven's true star, rather than bow
The knee, and by one fervent word obtain
His guidance sure, who calls the stars by name.
They prayed by proxy, and at second hand
Believed, and slept, and put repentance off,
Until the knock of death awoke them, when
They saw their ignorance both, and him they paid
To bargain of their souls 'twixt them and God,
Fled, and began repentance without end.
How did they wish, that morning, as they stood
With blushing covered, they had for themselves
The Scripture searched, had for themselves believed,
And made acquaintance with the Judge ere then!
Great day of termination to the joys
Of sin! to joys that grew on mortal boughs,
On trees whose seed fell not from heaven, whose top
Reached not above the clouds. From such, alone,
The epicure took all his meals. In choice
Of morsels for the body, nice he was,
And scrupulous, and knew all wines by smell
Or taste, and every composition knew
Of cookery; but grossly drank, unskilled,
The cup of spiritual pollution up,
That sickened his soul to death, while yet his eyes
Stood out with fat. His feelings were his guide.
He ate, and drank, and slept, and took all joys,
Forbid and unforbid, as impulse urged
Or appetite, nor asked his reason why.
He said, he followed Nature still, but lied;
For she was temperate and chaste, he full
Of wine and all adultery; her face
Was holy, most unholy his; her eye
Was pure, his shot unhallowed fire; her lips
Sang praise to God, his uttered oaths profane;
Her breath was sweet, his rank with foul debauch:
Yet pleaded he a kind and feeling heart,
Even when he left a neighbour's bed defied.
Like migratory fowis, that flocking sailed
From isle to isle, steering by sense alone,
Whither the clime their liking best beseemed;
So he was guided, so he moved through good
And evil, right and wrong, but, ah! to fate
All different: they slept in dust, unpained;
He rose, that day, to suffer endless pain.
Cured of his unbelief, the sceptic stood,
Who doubted of his being while he breathed,
Than whom glossography itself, that apoke
Huge folios of nonsense every hour,
And left, surrounding every page, its marks
Of prodigal stupidity, scarce more
Of folly raved. The tyrant too, who sat
In grisly council, like a