Classic Poem

CCLXXI.

In his absence of mind, he had lighted below
Near a dwelling of man, where the plaining of woe
On the warm spicy wind arose touching and wild, —
'Twas a mother just closing the eyes of her child.

CCLXXII.

First there came o'er his heart a most strange agitation, —
Then it flashed on his mind like a new revelation, —
No love without depth, and no depth without sorrow;
For the tears of to-day are the joys of to-morrow.

CCLXXIII.

'Twas as old as the hills; but it is so with youth, —
It must find out as new the most primary truth:
No wisdom self has not found out is our own;
Truths taken on trust are oft cold as a stone!

CCLXXIV.

He though of the creed of his now sainted mother;
It taught the same lesson; it was based on no other;
How the great God himself, who all beauty had given,
Came on earth to find woe when there was none in heaven.

CCLXXV.

All at once what a change had come over his spirit;
For tho' sorrow be not the whole truth, it is near it.
A thousand false lights were put out on the earth,
For the beauty of things seemed a poor kind of mirth.

CCLXXVI.

It was persons, not things, that the Prince wanted now,
And he welcomed the ache just begun in his brow;
O beautiful sorrow! thy tears how they shine, —
Ah! none can preach God with persuasion like thine!

CCLXXVII.

All wisdom is in thee, O fairy-like sorrow!
The faith of to-day, and the crown of to-morrow,
The love, for God's sake, of these deep human faces,
With their troubles, and joys, and their heart's common-places.

CCLXXVIII.

The sound of the savage in the cocoa-isle weeping
Hath wakened the Prince from the sleep he was sleeping;
To mourn with the sad was his first act of duty,
And at once he found out the imposture of beauty.

CCLXXIX.

He hath shed a man's tear o'er the grief of another;
And lo! earth fell beneath him, and man was his brother;
And a kindhearted soul, with a sad sort of bliss,
In his hoary old age was the Prince Amadis!