What strain o' the stuff, what warpings past the aim ! My times be in Thy hand! Perfect the cup as planned! Let age approve of youth, and death complete the same! A GRAMMARIAN'S FUNERAL. SHORTLY AFTER THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING IN EUROPE. LET us begin and carry up this corpse, Leave we the common crofts, the vulgar thorpes, Sleeping safe in the bosom of the plain, Look out if yonder be not day again Rimming the rock-row ! That's the appropriate country; there, man's thought, Rarer, intenser, Self-gathered for an outbreak, as it ought, Chafes in the censer. Leave we the unlettered plain its herd and crop ; Seek we sepulture On a tall mountain, citied to the top, Crowded with culture ! All the peaks soar, but one the rest excels; Clouds overcome it; No, yonder sparkle is the citadel's Circling its summit. Thither our path lies; wind we up the heights! Wait ye the warning? 18. overcome: pass over, overhang, overshadow; used as in Macbeth III ΤΟ 20 Our low life was the level's and the night's: Step to a tune, square chests, erect each head, This is our master, famous, calm, and dead, Sleep, crop and herd! sleep, darkling thorpe and croft He, whom we convoy to his grave aloft, Singing together, He was a man born with thy face and throat, Long he lived nameless: how should spring take note Till lo, the little touch, and youth was gone! Cramped and diminished, Moaned he, "New measures, other feet anon! No, that's the world's way; (keep the mountain-side, Make for the city!) He knew the signal, and stepped on with pride Left play for work, and grappled with the world Bent on escaping: "What's in the scroll," quoth he, "thou keepest furled? Theirs who most studied man, the bard and sage, Give !" So, he gowned him, Straight got by heart that book to its last page: 39. New measures, finished? do you say? not at all. ... 30 40 50 42. All in parentheses, throughout the poem, is addressed by the speaker directly to his companions. Yea, but we found him bald too, eyes like lead, "Time to taste life," another would have said, This man said rather, "Actual life comes next? Grant I have mastered learning's crabbed text, Let me know all ! Prate not of most or least, Even to the crumbs I'd fain eat up the feast, Oh, such a life as he resolved to live, When he had learned it, When he had gathered all books had to give! Image the whole, then execute the parts— Fancy the fabric Quite, ere you build, ere steel strike fire from quartz, (Here's the town-gate reached; there's the market-place Yea, this in him was the peculiar grace (Hearten our chorus!) That before living he'd learn how to live — No end to learning : Earn the means first- God surely will contrive Use for our earning. Others mistrust and say, "But time escapes! Live now or never!" He said, "What's time? Leave Now for dogs and apes! 57. Actual life comes next: do you say? No. I have more to do first. Back to his book then: deeper drooped his head : Leaden before, his eyes grew dross of lead: "Now, master, take a little rest!"-not he! Step two abreast, the way winds narrowly!) Back to his studies, fresher than at first, He (soul-hydroptic with a sacred thirst) Oh, if we draw a circle premature, Heedless of far gain, Greedy for quick returns of profit, sure Bad is our bargain! Was it not great? did not he throw on God (He loves the burthen) God's task to make the heavenly period Did not he magnify the mind, show clear He would not discount life, as fools do here, He ventured neck or nothing-heaven's success Found, or earth's failure : "Wilt thou trust death or not?" He answered, "Yes! Hence with life's pale lure!" That low man seeks a little thing to do, Sees it and does it: This high man, with a great thing to pursue, 86. Calculus: the stone. 88. Tussis: a cough. 95. hydroptic: hydropic, dropsical. That low man goes on adding one to one, His hundred's soon hit: This high man, aiming at a million, Misses an unit. That, has the world here should he need the next, Let the world mind him! This, throws himself on God, and unperplexed So, with the throttling hands of death at strife, Still, through the rattle, parts of speech were rife: He settled Hoti's business — let it be ! Properly based Oun Gave us the doctrine of the enclitic De, Dead from the waist down. Well, here's the platform, here's the proper place: All ye highfliers of the feathered race, Swallows and curlews! Here's the top-peak; the multitude below This man decided not to Live but Know Bury this man there? Here - here's his place, where meteors shoot, clouds form, 129. Hoti: the Greek particle "Ori, conj. that, etc. 130. Oun: Greek particle Ovv, then, now then, etc. 120 130 140 131. the enclitic De: Greek Ae; in regard to this, the following letter by Browning appeared in the London Daily News of Nov. 21, 1874: "To the Editor of The Daily News. Sir,- In a clever article this morning you speak of 'the doctrine of the enclitic De'-'which, with all deference to Mr. Browning, in point of fact does not exist.' No, not to Mr. Browning: but pray defer to Herr Buttmann, whose fifth list of 'enclitics' ends 'with the inseparable De'- or to Curtius, whose fifth list ends also with 'De (meaning 'towards' and as a demonstrative appendage).' That this is not to be confounded with the accentuated 'De, meaning but,' was the 'doctrine' which the Grammarian bequeathed to those capable of receiving it. I am, sir, yours obediently, R. B." ― Browning Soc. Papers, Part I., p. 56. |