Classic Poem

As one who meditates at evening tide,
Wandering alone by voiceless solitudes,
And flies in fancy, far beyond the bounds
Of visible and vulgar things, and things
Discovered hitherto, pursuing tracts
As yet untravelled and unknown, through vast
Of new and sweet imaginings; if chance
Some airy harp, waked by the gentle sprites
Of twllight, or light touch of sylvan maid,
In soft succession fall upon his ear,
And fill the desert with its heavenly tones;
He listens intense, and pleased exceedingly,
And wishes it may never stop; yet when
It stops, grieves not; but to his former thoughts
With fondest haste returns: so did the Seer,
So did his audience, after worship passed,
And praise in heaven, return to sing, to hear
Of man, not worthy less the sacred lvre,
Or the attentive ear; and thus the bard,
Not unbesought, again resumed his song.
In customed glory bright, that morn, the Sun
Rose, visiting the earth with light, and heat,
And joy; and seemed as full of youth and strong
To mount the steep of heaven, as when the Stars
Of morning sung to his first dawn, and night
Fled from his face; the spacious sky received
Him, blushing as a bride, when on her looked
The bridegroom; and, spread out beneath his eye,
Earth smiled. Up to his warm embrace, the Dews,
That all night long had wept his absence, flew
The herbs and flowers their fragrant stores unlocked,
And gave the wanton breeze that, newly woke,
Revelled in sweets, and from its wings shook health,
A thousand grateful smells; the joyous woods
Dried in his beams their locks, wet with the drops
Of night; and all the sons of music sung
Their matin song—from arboured bower, the thrush,
Concerting with the lark that hymned on high.
On the green hill the flocks, and in the vale
The herds, rejoiced; and, light of heart, the hind
Eyed amorously the milk-maid as she passed,
Not heedless, though she looked another way.
No sign was there of change. All nature moved
In wonted harmony. Men, as they met,
In morning salutation, praised the day,
And talked of common things. The husbandman
Prepared the soil, and silver-tongued Hope
Promised another harvest. In the streets,
Each wishing to make profit of his neighbour,
Merchants, assembling, spoke of trying times,
Of bankruptcies, and markets glutted full;
Or, crowding to the beach, where, to their ear,
The oath of foreign accent, and the noise
Uncouth of trade's rough sons, made music sweet,
Elate with certain gain,—beheld the bark,
Expected long, enriched with other climes,
Into the harbour safely steer; or saw,
Parting with many a weeping farewell sad,
And blessing uttered rude, and sacred pledge,
The rich laden carack, bound to distant shore,
And hopefully talked of her coming back,
With richer fraught; or sitting at the desk,
In calculation deep and intricate
Of loss and profit balancing, relieved,
At intervals, the irksome task, with thought
Of future ease, retired in villa snug.
With subtle look, amid his parchments, sat
The lawyer, weaving his sophistries for court
To meet at mid day. On his weary couch,
Fat Luxury, sick of the night's debauch,
Lay groaning, fretful at the obstrusive beam,
That through his lattice peeped derisively.
The restless miser had begun again
To count his heaps. Before her toilet stood
The fair, and, as with guileful skill she decked
Her loveliness, thought of the coming ball,
New lovers, or the sweeter nuptial night.
And evil men, of desperate, lawless life,
By oath of deep damnation leagued to ill
Remorselessly, fled from the face of day,
Against the innocent their counsel held,
Plotting unpardonable deeds of blood,
And vallanies of fearful magnitude.
Despots, secured behind a thousand bolts;
The workmanship of fear, forged chains for man.
Senates were meeting, statesmen loudly talked
Of national resources, war and peace,
And sagely balanced empires soon to end;
And faction's jaded minions, by the page
Paid for abuse and oft-repeated lies,
In daily prints, the thorough-fare of news,
For party schemes made interest, under cloak
Of liberty, and right, and public weal.
In holy conclave, bishops spoke of tithes,
And of the awful wickedness of men.
Intoxicate with sceptres, diadeins,
And universal rule, and panting hard
For fame, heroes were leading on the brave
To battle. Men, in science deeply read,
And academic theory, foretold
Improvements vast; and learned sceptics proved
That earth should with eternity endure—
Concluding madly, that there was no God.
No sign of change appeared: to every man
That day seemed as the past. From noontide path
The sun looked gloriously on earth, and all
Her scenes of giddy folly smiled secure,
When suddenly, alas, fair Earth! the sun
Was wrapt in darkness, and his beams returned
Up to the throne of God, and over all
The earth came night, moonless and starless night,
Nature stood still. The seas and rivers stood,
And all the winds, and every living thing.
The cataract, that, like a giant wroth,
Rushed down impetuously, as seized, at once,
By sudden frost, with all his heary locks,
Stood still; and beasts of every kind stood still.
A deep and dreadful silence reigned alone!
Hope died in every breast, and on all men
Came fear and trembling. None to his neighbour spoke.
Husband thought not of wife, nor of her child
The mother, nor friend of friend, nor foe of foe,
In horrible suspense all mortals stood;
And, as they stood and listened, chariots were heard,
Rolling in heaven. Revealed in flaming fire,
The angel of God appeared in stature vast,
Blazing, and, lifting up his hand on high,
By Him that lives for ever, swore, that Time
Should be no more. Throughout, creation heard
And sighed; all rivers, lakes, and seas, and woods,
Desponding waste, and cultivated vale,
Wild cave, and ancient hill, and every rock,
Sighed. Earth, arrested in her wonted path,
As ox struck by the lifted axe, when naught
Was feared, in all her entrails deeply groaned.
A universal crash was heard, as if
The ribs of Nature broke, and all her dark
Foundations failed; and deadly paleness sat
On every face of man, and every heart
Grew chill, and every knee his fellow smote.
None spoke, none stirred, none wept; for horror held
All motionless, and fettered every tongue.
Again, o'er all the nations silence fell:
And, in the heavens, robed in excessive light,
That drove the thick of darkness far aside,
And walked with penetration keen, through all
The abodes of men, another angel stood,
And blew the trump of God: Awake, ye dead,
Be changed, ye living, and put on the garb
Of immortality. Awake, arise!—
The God of judgment comes! This said the voice,
And Silence, from eternity that slept
Beyond the sphere of the creating Word,
And all the noise of Time, awakened, heard.
Heaven heard, and earth, and farthest hell, through all
Her regions of despair; the ear of Death
Heard, and the sleep that for so long a night
Pressed on his leaden eyelids, fled; and all
The dead awoke, and all the living changed.
Old men, that on their staff, bending, had leaned.
Crazy and frail, or sat, benumbed with age,
In weary listlessness, ripe for the grave,
Felt through their sluggish veins and withered limbs
New vigour flow; the wrinkled face grew smooth;
Upon the head, that Time had razored bare,
Rose bushy locks; and as his son in prime
Of strength and youth, the aged father stood.
Changing herself, the mother saw her son
Grow up, and suddenly put on the form
Of manhood; and the wretch, that begging sat,
Limbless, deformed, at corner of the way,
Unmindful of his crutch, in joint and limb,
Arose complete; and he, that on the bed
Of mortal sickness, worn with sore distress,
Lay breathing forth his soul to death, felt now
The tide of life and vigour rushing back;
And, looking up, beheld his weeping wife,
And daughter fond, that o'er him, bending, stooped
To close his eyes. The frantic madman, too,
In whose confused brain reason had lost
Her way, long driven at random to and fro,
Grew sober, and his manacles fell off.
The newly-sheeted corpse arose, and stared
On those who dressed it; and the coffined dead,
That men were hearing to the tomb, awoke,
And mingled with their friends; and armies, which
The trump surprised, met in the furious shock
Of battle, saw the bleeding ranks, new fallen,
Rise up at once, and to their ghastly cheeks
Return the stream of life in healthy flow;
And as the anatomist, with all his band
Of rude disciples, o'er the subject hung,
And impolitely hewed his way, through bones
And muscles of the sacred human form,
Exposing barbarously to wanton gaze,
The mysteries of nature, joint embraced
His kindred joint, the wounded flesh grew up,
And suddenly the injured man awoke,
Among their hands, and stood arrayed complete
In immortality—forgiving scarce
The insult offered to his clay in death.
That was the hour, long wished for by the good.
Of universal Jubilee to all
The sons of bondage: from the oppressor's hand
The scourge of violence fell, and from his back.
Healed of its stripes, the burden of the slave.
The youth of great religious soul, who sat
Retired in voluntary loneliness,
In reverie extravagant now wrapped,
Or poring now on book of ancient date,
With filial awe, and dipping oft his pen
To write immortal things; to pleasure deaf,
And joys of common men, working his way
With mighty energy, not uninspired,
Through all the mines of thought; reckless of pain,
And weariness, and wasted health, the scoff
Of pride, or growl of Envy's hellish brood;
While Fancy, voyaged far beyond the bounds
Of years revealed, heard many a future age,
With condemnation loud, repeat his name,—
False prophetess! the day of change was come,—
Behind the shadow of eternity,
He saw his visions set of earthly fame,
For ever set; nor sighed, while through his veins,
In lighter current, ran immortal life;
His form renewed to undecaying health;
To undecaying health, his soul, erewhile
Not tuned amiss to Gods eternal praise.
All men, in field and city, by the way,
On land or sea, lolling in gorgeous hall,
Or plying at the oar; crawling in rags
Obscure, or dazzling in embroidered gold,
Alone, in companies, at home, abroad;
In wanton meriment surprised, and taken,
Or kneeling reverently in act of prayer;
Or cursing recklessly, or uttering lies;
Or lapping greedily, from slander's cup,
The blood of reputation; or between
Friendships and brotherhoods devising strife;
Or plotting to defile a neighbour's bed;
In duel met with dagger of revenge;
Or casting on the widow's heritage,
The eye of covetousness; or, with full hand,
On mercy's noiseless errands, unobserved,
Administering; or meditating fraud
And deeds of horrid barbarous intent;
In full pursuit of unexperienced hope,
Fluttering along the flowery path of youth;
Or steeped in disappointment's bitterness,
The fevered cup that guilt must ever drink,
When parched and fainting on the road of ill;
Beggar and king, the clown and haughty lord;
The venerable sage, and empty fop;
The ancient matron, and the rosy bride;
The virgin chaste, and shrivelled harlot vile;
The savage fierce, and man of science, mild;
The good and evil, in a moment, all
Were changed, corruptible to incorrupt,
And mortal, to immortal, ne'er to change.
And now, descending from the powers of heaven,
Soft airs o'er all the earth, spreading, were heard,
And Hallelujahs sweet, the harmony
Of righteous souls that came to repossess
Their long neglected bodies: and anon
Upon the ear fell horribly the sound
Of cursing, and the vells of damned despair,
Uttered by felon spirits, that the trump
Had summoned from the burning glooms of hell
To put their bodies on, reserved for wo.
Now, starting up among the living changed,
Appeared innumerous the risen dead.
Each particle of dust was claimed: the turf,
For ages trod beneath the careless foot
Of men, rose, organized in human form;
The monumental stones were rolled away;
The doors of death were opened; and in the dark
And loathsome vault, and silent charnel house,
Moving, were heard the mouldered bones that sought
Their proper place. Instinctive, every soul
Flew to its clavey part; from grass grown mould,
The nameless spirit took its ashes up,
Reanimate; and, merging from beneath.
The flattered marble, undistinguished rose
The great, nor heeded once the lavish rhyme.
And costly pomp of sculptured garnish vain.
The Memphian mummy, that, from age to age,
Descending, bought and sold a thousand times,
In hall of curious antiquary stowed,
Wrapped in mysterious weeds, the wondrous theme
Of many an erring tale, shook off its rags;
And the brown son of Egypt stood beside
The European, his last purchaser.
In vale remote, the hermit rose, surprised
At crowds that rose around him, where he thought
His slumbers had been single; and the bard,
Who fondly covenanted with his friend,
To lay his bones beneath the sighing bough
Of some old lonely tree, rising, was pressed
By multitudes that claimed their proper dust
From the same spot; and he, that, richly hearsed,
With gloomy garniture of purchased wo,
Embalmed, in princely sepulchre was laid,
Apart from vulgar men, built nicely round
And round by the proud heir, who blushed to think
His father's lordly clay should ever mix
With peasant dust,—saw by his side awake
The clown that long had slumbered in his arms.
The family tomb, to whose devouring mouth
Descended sire and son, age after age,
In long, unbroken, hereditary line,
Poured forth, at once, the ancient father rude,
And all his offspring of a thousand years.
Refreshed from sweet repose, awoke the man
Of charitable life—awoke and sung:
And from his prison house, slowly and sad,
As if unsatisfied with holding near
Communion with the earth, the miser drew
His carcass forth, and gnashed his teeth, and howled.
Unsolaced by his gold and silver then.
From simple stone in lonely wilderness,
That hoary lay, o'er lettered by the hand
Of oft frequenting pilgrim, who had taught
The willow tree to weep, at morn and even,
Over the sacred spot,—the martyr saint,
To song of seraph harp, triumphant, rose,
Well pleased that he had suffered to the death.
“The cloud capped towers, the gorgeous palaces,
As sung the bard by Nature's hand anointed,
In whose capacious giant numbers rolled
The passions of old Time, fell lumbering down.
All cities fell, and every work of man,
And gave their portion forth of human dust,
Touched by the mortal finger of decay.
Tree, herb, and flower, and every fowl of heaven,
And fish, and animal, the wild and tame,
Forthwith dissolving, crumbled into dust.
Alas! ye sons of strength, ye ancient oaks,
Ye holy pines, ye elms, and cedars tall,
Like towers of God, far seen on Carmel mount,
Or Lebanon, that waved your boughs on high,
And laughed at all the winds,—your hour was come!
Ye laurels, ever green, and bays, that wont
To wreath the patriot and the poet's brow;
Ye mvrtle bowers, and groves of sacred shade,
Where Music ever sung, and Zephyr fanned
His airy wing, wet with the dews of life,
And Spring for ever smiled, the fragrant haunt
Of Love, and Health, and ever-dancing Mirth,—
Alas! how suddenly your verdure died,
And ceased your minstrelsy, to sing no more!
Ye flowers of beauty, pencilled by the hand
Of God, who annually renewed your birth,
To gem the virgin robes of Nature chaste,
Ye smiling-featured daughters of the Sun!
Fairer than queenly bride, by Jordan's stream
Leading your gentle lives, retired, unseen;
Or on the sainted cliffs on Zion hill
Wandering, and holding with the heavenly dews,
In holy revelry, your nightly loves,
Watched by the stars, and offering, every morn,
Your incense grateful both to God and man;—
Ye lovely gentle things, alas! no spring
Shall ever wake you now! ye withered all,
All in a moment drooped, and on your roots
The grasp of everlasting winter seized!
Children of song, ye birds that dwelt in air,
And stole your notes from angel's lyres, and first
In levee of the morn, with eulogy
Ascending, nailed the advent of the dawn;
Or, roosted on the pensive evening bough,
In melancholy numbers, sung the day
To rest;—your little wings,