16. Then the truth came upon me. No harp more—no song more! "I have gone the whole round of creation: I saw and I spoke ; I report, as a man may of God's work - all's love, yet all's law. Do I task any faculty highest, to image success? 250 I but open my eyes, — and perfection, no more and no less, 260 Nine-and-ninety flew ope at our touch, should the hundredth appal? In the least things have faith, yet distrust in the greatest of all? Do I find love so full in my nature, God's ultimate gift, That I doubt his own love can compete with it? Here the parts shift? 270 Here, the creature surpass power, To bestow on this Saul what I sang of, the marvellous dower Of the life he was gifted and filled with? to make such a soul, Such a body, and then such an earth for insphering the whole? And doth it not enter my mind (as my warm tears attest) These good things being given, to go on, and give one more, the best? Ay, to save and redeem and restore him, maintain at the height This perfection,—succeed, with life's dayspring, death's minute of night? Interpose at the difficult minute, snatch Saul, the mistake, 280 or endure ! The man taught enough by life's dream, of the rest to make sure; 18. "I believe it! 'Tis thou, God, that givest, 'tis I who receive : In the first is the last, in thy will is my power to believe. All's one gift thou canst grant it moreover, as prompt to my prayer, 290 As I breathe out this breath, as I open these arms to the air. baoth: I will?- the mere atoms despise me! Why am I not loth To look that, even that in the face too? Would do! Why is it I dare What stops my despair? exalts him, but what man See the King-I would help him, but cannot, the wishes fall through. Could I wrestle to raise him from sorrow, grow poor to enrich, thou! so wilt So shall crown thee the topmost, ineffablest, uttermost crown- He who did most, shall bear most; the strongest shall stand the most weak. 310 'Tis the weakness in strength, that I cry for! my flesh, that I seek In the Godhead! I seek and I find it. O Saul, it shall be A Face like my face that receives thee; a Man like to me, Thou shalt love and be loved by, forever: a Hand like this hand Shall throw open the gates of new life to thee! See the Christ stand!" 19. I know not too well how I found my way home in the night. Life or death. The whole earth was awakened, hell loosed with her crews; And the stars of night beat with emotion, and tingled and shot 320 Out in fire the strong pain of pent knowledge: but I fainted not, For the Hand still impelled me at once and supported, suppressed In the shuddering forests' held breath; in the sudden wind-thrills; In the startled wild beasts that bore oft, each with eye sidling still Though averted with wonder and dread; in the birds stiff and chill 330 That rose heavily as I approached them, made stupid with awe : bowers: And the little brooks witnessing murmured, persistent and low, With their obstinate, all but hushed voices-"E'en so, it is so!" 320 et seq.: see note to St. 37, 38, of By the Fireside. A DEATH IN THE DESERT. [SUPPOSED of Pamphylax the Antiochene : Lies second in the surnamed Chosen Chest, I said, "If one should wet his lips with wine, 5 10 15 And cool his forehead just above the eyes, The while a brother, kneeling either side, 20 1-12. The bracketed prefatory lines, explanatory of the parchment on which are recorded the last hours and last talk of St. John with his devoted attendants, purport to have been written by one who was at the time the owner of the parchment. It appears to have come into his possession through his wife, a niece of the Xanthus who, with Pamphylax of Antioch, the supposed author of the narrative (he having told it on the eve of his martyrdom to a certain Phoebas, v. 653), and two others, is represented therein as waiting on the dying apostle, and who afterwards "escaped to Rome, was burned, and could not write the chronicle." (vv. 56, 57.) 4. And goeth from Epsilon down to Mu: the reference is to some numbering on the parchment. 6. terebinth: the turpentine tree. |