But Truth shall conquer at the last,
For round and round we run;
And ever the Right comes uppermost,
And ever is Justice done.
Pace through thy cell, old Socrates,
Cheerily to and fro;
Trust to the impulse of thy soul,
And let the poison flow.
And ever the wrong is proved to be wrong,
And ever is Justice done.
Keep, Galileo, to thy thought,
And nerve thy soul to bear;
They may gloat o'er the senseless words
they wring
From the pangs of thy despair;
They may shatter to earth the lamp of They may veil their eyes, but they can
That holds a light divine,
But they cannot quench the fire of The heel of a priest may tread thee
By any such deadly wine. They cannot blot thy spoken words From the memory of man By all the poison ever was brew'd Since time its course began. To-day abhorr'd, to-morrow adored, So round and round we run; And ever the Truth comes uppermost, And ever is Justice done.
Plod in thy cave, gray anchorite;
Be wiser than thy peers; Augment the range of human power, And trust to coming years. They may call thee wizard, and monk accursed,
And load thee with dispraise; Thou wert born five hundred years too
For the comfort of thy days; But not too soon for humankind. Time hath reward in store; And the demons of our sires become The saints that we adore. The blind can see, the slave is lord, So round and round we run;
And a tyrant work thee woe;
But never a truth has been destroy'd:
They may curse it and call it crime;
Pervert and betray, or slander and slay,
Its teachers for a time;
But the sunshine aye shall light the sky,
As round and round we run;
And the Truth shall ever come upper-
most,
And Justice shall be done.
And live there now such men as theseWith thoughts like the great of old? Many have died in their misery,
And left their thought untold; And many live, and are rank'd as mad, And placed in the cold world's ban, For sending their bright far-seeing souls Three centuries in the van. They toil in penury and grief, Unknown, if not malign'd; Forlorn, forlorn, hearing the scorn
Of the meanest of mankind! But yet the world goes round and round, And the genial seasons run; And ever the Truth comes uppermost, And ever is Justice done.
WHAT 'BIG BEN'* SAID TO LONDON AT MIDNIGHT.
Ring SEVEN and EIGHT!' 'Oh! sons
That wither, and pine, and die,
Because Good Fortune knows you not,
Or scorns as she passes by;--
Give scorn for scorn! The mind's the man.
The soul, not the flesh, is first.
And self-respect is a kingly crown,
When Fortune does her worst.'
'Ring NINE and TEN!' 'Oh! women and men,
That grovel, and creep, and crawl, Drinking and feeding, wedding breeding,
Think well if this be all!
Think of the heritage of the soul,
Nor quench in low desire,
The light of your higher nature
And the spark of a heavenly fire.
'Ring out ELEVEN! to Earth Heaven!'
WHENE'ER through Gray's Inn porch I
stray,
I meet a spirit by the way,
He wanders with me all alone,
And talks with me in under-tone.
The crowd is busy seeking gold,
It cannot see what I behold;
I and the spirit pass along
Unknown, unnoticed, in the throng.
While on the grass the children run,
And maids go loitering in the sun,
I roam beneath the ancient trees,
And talk with him of mysteries.
The dull brick houses of the square,
The bustle of the thoroughfare,
The sounds, the sights, the crush of men,
Are present but forgotten then.
I see them, but I heed them not;
I hear, but silence clothes the spot;
and All voices die upon my brain
'Hear it, ye brave and true;
Be brave, and true, and good to the end,
Whatever the world may do.
The tears you shed shall be healing balm,
Your wounds shall make you strong,
And the plaint of your lamentation
Grow into heavenly song!'
'Sound forth, oh solemn MIDNIGHT!'
'Sleep, overwearied brain!
Sleep Innocence! sleep Madness!
Sleep Misery and Pain!
In God's great loving-kindness,
So broad, so high, so deep!
Except that spirit's in the lane.
He utters words with wisdom fraught,
He breathes to me his burning thought,
He tells me truly what I am-
I walk with mighty Verulam.
He goes with me through crowded ways,
A friend and mentor in the maze,
Through Chancery Lane to Lincoln's Inn,
To Fleet Street, through the moil and
din.
I meet another spirit there,
A blind old man with forehead fair,
Who ever walks the right-hand side,
Towards the fountain of St Bride.
Nothing's more welcome, nothing's more Amid the peal of jangling bells,
Nothing's so good as sleep!'
Oh! mournful Ben, in thy belfry lone
Toning the Psalm of Life,
Of the good and the bad,--the merry,
the sad,-
And the peace that follows strife.
Thy voice is a voice in deserts,
On the shores of the gloomy river;Time speaks in vain to the busy world For ever and for ever!
Or people's roar that falls and swells,
The whirl of wheels and tramp of steeds,
He talks to me of noble deeds.
I hear his voice above the crush,
Benign and calm upon his face
As to and fro the people rush;
Sits Melancholy, robed in grace.
He hath no need of common eyes,
He sees the fields of Paradise;
He sees and pictures unto mine
A gorgeous vision, most divine,
He tells the story of the Fall,
He names the fiends in battle-call,
And shows my soul, in wonder dumb,
Heaven, Earth, and Pandemonium.
He tells of Lycidas the good,
And the sweet lady in the wood,
And teaches wisdom high and holy,
In mirth and heavenly melancholy.
And oftentimes, with courage high,
He raises Freedom's rallying cry;
And, ancient leader of the van,
Asserts the dignity of man-
Asserts the right with trumpet tongue,
That Justice from Oppression wrung,
And poet, patriot, statesman, sage,
Guides by his own a future age.
With such companions at my side
I float on London's human tide;
An atom on its billows thrown,
But lonely never, nor alone.
LATE or early home returning,
In the starlight or the rain,
I beheld that lonely candle
Shining from his window-pane.
Ever o'er his tatter'd curtain,
Nightly looking, I could scan,
Aye inditing,
Writing-writing,
The pale figure of a man;
Still discern behind him fall
The same shadow on the wall.
Far beyond the murky midnight,
By dim burning of my oil,
Filling aye his rapid leaflets,
I have watch'd him at his toil;
Watch'd his broad and seamy forehead,
Watch'd his white industrious hand,
Ever passing
Watch'd and strove to understand
What impell'd it-gold, or fame-
Bread, or bubble of a name.
Oft I've ask'd, debating vainly
In the silence of my mind,
What the services he render'd
To his country or his kind;
Whether tones of ancient music,
Or the sound of modern gong,
Wisdom holy,
Humours lowly,
Sermon, essay, novel, song,
Or philosophy sublime,
Fill'd the measure of his time.
No one sought him, no one knew him,
Undistinguish'd was his name :
Never had his praise been utter'd
By the oracles of fame.
Scanty fare and decent raiment,
Humble lodging, and a fire-
These he sought for,
These he wrought for,
And he gain'd his meek desire;
Teaching men by written word—-
Clinging to a hope deferr'd.
So he lived. At last I miss'd him ;
Still might evening twilight fall,
But no taper lit his lattice-
Lay no shadow on his wall.
In the winter of his seasons,
In the midnight of his day,
'Mid his writing,
Death had beckon'd him away,
Ere the sentence he had plann'd
Found completion at his hand.
But this man, so old and nameless,
Left behind him projects large,
Schemes of progress undeveloped,
Worthy of a nation's charge;
Noble fancies uncompleted,
Germs of beauty immatured,
Only needing
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