16.

"Oh that the wise from their bright minds would kindle

Such lamps within the dome of this dim world

That the pale name of Priest might shrink and dwindle

Into the hell from which it first was hurled, A scoff of impious pride from fiends impure! Till human thoughts might kneel alone, Each before the judgment-throne

Of its own aweless soul, or of the Power unknown.

Oh that the words which make the thoughts obscure

From which they spring, as clouds of glimmering dew

From a white lake blot heaven's blue portraiture,

Were stripped of their thin masks and various hue,

And frowns and smiles and splendours not

their own,

Till in the nakedness of false and true They stand before their lord, each to receive

its due!

17.

"He who taught man to vanquish whatsoever Can be between the cradle and the grave

Crowned him the King of Life. Oh vain

endeavour.

If on his own high will, a willing slave, He has enthroned the oppression and the oppressor!

What if earth can clothe and feed
Amplest millions at their need,

And power in thought be as the tree within the seed,—

Or what if Art, an ardent intercessor,

Diving on fiery wings to Nature's throne, Checks the great Mother stooping to caress her,

And cries, 'Give me, thy child, dominion Over all height and depth'—if Life can breed

New wants, and Wealth, from those who toil and groan

Rend, of thy gifts and hers, a thousandfold for one?

18.

"Come Thou! But lead out of the inmost

cave

Of man's deep spirit-as the morning

star

Beckons the Sun from the Eoan waveWisdom. I hear the pennons of her

car,

Self-moving, like cloud charioted by flame!

Comes she not?

And come ye not,

Rulers of eternal thought,

To judge with solemn truth Life's ill-apportioned lot,

Blind Love, and equal justice, and the Fame Of what has been, the Hope of what will be? O Liberty (if such could be thy name

Wert thou disjoined from these, or they from thee)

If thine or theirs were treasures to be bought By blood or tears, have not the wise and free

Wept tears, and blood like tears?"-The solemn harmony

19.

Paused, and the Spirit of that mighty singing To its abyss was suddenly withdrawn. Then, as a wild swan, when sublimely winging

Its path athwart the thunder-smoke of dawn,

Sinks headlong through the aërial golden light

On the heavy-sounding plain,

When the bolt has pierced its brain;

As summer clouds dissolve unburthened of their rain;

As a far taper fades with fading night; As a brief insect dies with dying day; My song, its pinions disarrayed of might, Drooped. O'er it closed the echoes far

away

Of the great voice which did its flight sustain,

As waves which lately paved his watery

way

Hiss round a drowner's head in their tempestu

ous play.

I.

ARETHUSA.

ARETHUSA arose

From her couch of snows

In the Acroceraunian mountains,—
From cloud and from crag,
With many a jag,

Shepherding her bright fountains.

She leapt down the rocks,

With her rainbow locks
Streaming among the streams;
Her steps paved with green
The downward ravine

Which slopes to the western gleams
And gliding and springing

She went, ever singing

2.

In murmurs as soft as sleep.

The Earth seemed to love her, And Heaven smiled above her, As she lingered towards the deep.

Then Alpheus bold,
On his glacier cold,

With his trident the mountains strook,

And opened a chasm

In the rocks :—with the spasm

All Erymanthus shook.

And the black south wind

It concealed behind

The urns of the silent snow,

And earthquake and thunder

Did rend in sunder

The bars of the springs below.
The beard and the hair
Of the River-god were
Seen through the torrent's sweep,
As he followed the light
Of the fleet Nymph's flight

To the brink of the Dorian deep.

3.

"Oh save me!

Oh guide me!

And bid the deep hide me!

For he grasps me now by the hair!"

The loud Ocean heard,

To its blue depth stirred,