It is not that I may not have incurr'd To thee I do devote it-thou shalt take The vengeance, which shall yet be sought and found, Which if I have not taken for the sakeBut let that pass-I sleep, but thou shalt yet awake. And if my voice break forth, 'tis not that now I shrink from what is suffer'd : let him speak Who hath beheld decline upon my brow, Or seen my mind's convulsion leave it weak; But in this page a record will I seek. Not in the air shall these my words disperse, Though I be ashes; a far hour shall wreak The deep prophetic fulness of this verse, And pile on human heads the mountain of my curse! That curse shall be Forgiveness.—Have I not Hear me, my mother Earth! behold it, Heaven! Have I not had to wrestle with my lot? Have I not suffer'd things to be forgiven? Have I not had my brain sear'd, my heart riven, Hopes sapp'd, name blighted, Life's life lied away? And only not to desperation driven, The seal is set.-Now welcome, thou dread power! Nameless, yet thus omnipotent, which here Walk'st in the shadow of the midnight-hour With a deep awe, yet all distinct from fear; Thy haunts are ever where the dead walls I see before me the Gladiator lie: From the red gash, fall heavy, one by one, He heard it, but he heeded not-his eyes He reck'd not of the life he lost nor prize, sire, Butcher'd to make a Roman holiday- And unavenged?-Arise! ye Goths, and But here, where Murder breathed her bloody steam; And here, where buzzing nations choked the ways, stream Dashing or winding as its torrent strays; Here, where the Roman million's blame or praise Was death or life, the playthings of a crowd, My voice sounds much—and fall the stars' faint rays Heroes have trod this spot—'tis on their Then in this magic circle raise the dead: dust ye tread. "While stands the Coliseum, Rome shall stand; "When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall; "And when Rome falls-the World." From Thus spake the pilgrims o'er this mighty our own land wall In Saxon times, which we are wont to call Rome and her Ruin past Redemption's skill, Simple, erect, severe, austere, sublime— And roar'd or murmur'd like a mountain-Shiver upon thee-sanctuary and home On the arena void-seats crush'd-walls bow'd And galleries, where my steps seem echoes A rain-yet what ruin! from its mass Hath it indeed been plunder'd,or but clear'd? There is a dungeon, in whose dim drear light Two insulated phantoms of the brain : With her unmantled neck, and bosom white young Full swells the deep pare fountain of y Our first and sweetest nurture, when the No pain and small suspense, a joy perceives Of a sublimer aspect? Majesty, nook She sees her little bud put forth its leaves- But lo! the dome-the vast and wondrous dome, To which Diana's marvel was a cell- I have beheld the Ephesian's miracle— Its sanctuary the while the usurping Moslem But thou, of temples old, or altars new, are aisled advance, All musical in its immensities; where flame their frame In air with Earth's chief structures, though Sits on the firm-set ground—and this the clouds must claim. Not by its fault-but thine: Our outward sense Is but of gradual grasp and as it is Then pause, and be enlighten'd; there is more The fountain of sublimity displays Its depth, and thence may draw the mind of man Its golden sands, and learn what great conceptions can. Or, turning to the Vatican, go see The struggle; vain,against the coiling strain And gripe, and deepening of the dragon's grasp, The old man's clench; the long envenom'd chain Rivets the living links,-the enormous asp Enforces pang on pang, and stifles gasp on gasp. Which gathers shadow, substance, life, and all That we inherit in its mortal shroud, And send us prying into the abyss, the same; Or view the Lord of the unerring bow, bright With an immortal's vengeance; in his eye And nostril beautiful disdain, and might, And majesty, flash their full lightnings by, Developing in that one glance the Deity. But in his delicate form-a dream of Love, Shaped by some solitary nymph, whose breast Long'd for a deathless lover from above, A ray of immortality-and stood, And if it be Prometheus stole from heaven But where is he; the Pilgrim of my song, The being who upheld it through the past? Methinks he cometh late and tarries long. He is no more these breathings are his last; His wanderings done, his visions ebbing fast, And he himself as nothing:-if he was Aught but a phantasy, and could be class'd With forms which live and suffer let that pass Hark! forth from the abyss a voice proceeds, The gulf is thick with phantoms, but the chief Seems royal still, though with her head discrown'd, And pale, but lovely, with maternal grief She clasps a babe, to whom her breast yields no relief. His shadow fades away into Destruction's The husband of a year! the father of the Of sackcloth was thy wedding-garment made; Thy bridal's fruit is ashes: in the dust The fair-hair'd Daughter of the Isles is laid, The love of millions! How we did entrust Futurity to her! and, though it must Darken above our bones, yet fondly deem'd Our children should obey her child,and bless'd Her and her hoped-for seed, whose promise seem'd Like stars to shepherds' eyes:-'twas but a meteor beam'd. Woe unto us, not her; for she sleeps well: The fickle reek of popular breath, the tongue Of hollow counsel, the false oracle, Which from the birth of monarchy hath rung Its knell in princely ears, till the o'erstung Nations have arm'd in madness, the strange fate Which tumbles mightiest sovereigns, and hath flung Against their blind omnipotence a weight Within the opposing scale, which crushes soon or late, These might have been her destiny; but no, Our hearts deny it: and so young, so fair, Good without effort, great without a foe; But now a bride and mother—and now there! How many ties did that stern moment tear! From thy Sire's to his humblest subject's breast Is link'd the electric chain of that despair, Whose shock was as an earthquake's, and opprest The land which loved thee so that none could love thee best. Lo, Nemi! navell'd in the woody hills And near Albano's scarce divided waves Of girdling mountains intercepts the sight The Sabine farm was till'd, the weary bard's delight. But I forget. My pilgrim's shrine is won, And he and I must part, so let it be,His task and mine alike are nearly done; Yet once more let us look upon the sea; The midland ocean breaks on him and me, And from the Alban Mount we now behold Our friend of youth, that ocean, which when we Beheld it last by Calpe's rock unfold Those waves, we follow'd on till the dark Euxine roll'd Upon the blue Symplegades: long years— Long, though not very many, since have done Their work on both; some suffering and some tears Have left us nearly where we had begun: Oh! that the Desert were my dwelling-place, There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, Roll on,thou deep and dark blue ocean-roll! Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain ; Man marks the earth with ruin-his control Stops with the shore;-upon the watery plain The wrecks are all thy deed,nor doth remain A shadow of man's ravage, save his own, When, for a moment, like a drop of rain, He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan, Without a grave, unknell'd, uncoffin'd, and unknown. His steps are not upon thy paths,-thy fields Are not a spoil for him,-thou dost arise And shake him from thee; the vile strength he wields For earth's destruction thou dost all despise, Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies, And send'st him, shivering in thy playful spray And howling, to his Gods, where haply lies His petty hope in some near port or bay, And dashest him again to earth:—there let him lay. |