VI.

"I walked through the great City then, but free
From shame or fear; those toil-worn Mariners
And happy Maidens did encompass me ;
And like a subterranean wind that stirs
Some forest among caves, the hopes and fears
From every human soul, a murmur strange
Made as I past; and many wept, with tears
Of joy and awe, and winged thoughts did range,
And half-extinguished words, which prophesied of
change.

VII.

"For, with strong speech I tore the veil that hid Nature, and Truth, and Liberty, and Love,As one who from some mountain's pyramid, Points to the unrisen sun!-the shades approve His truth, and flee from every stream and grove.

Thus, gentle thoughts did many a bosom fill,Wisdom the mail of tried affections wove For many a heart, and tameless scorn of ill Thrice steeped in molten steel the unconquerable will.

VIII.

"Some said I was a maniac wild and lost;
Some, that I scarce had risen from the grave
The Prophet's virgin bride, a heavenly ghost :-
Some said I was a fiend from my weird cave,
Who had stolen human shape, and o'er the wave,
The forest, and the mountain, came ;-some said
I was the child of God, sent down to save
Women from bonds and death, and on my head
The burthen of their sins would frightfully be laid.

IX.

"But soon my human words found sympathy
In human hearts: the purest and the best,
As friend with friend made common cause with me,
And they were few, but resolute;-the rest,
Ere yet success the enterprise had blest,
Leagued with me in their hearts; their meals, their
Their hourly occupations, were possest [slumber,
By hopes which I had armed to overnumber
Those hosts of meaner cares, which life's strong
wings encumber.

X.

"But chiefly women, whom my voice did waken From their cold, careless, willing slavery, Sought me one truth their dreary prison has shaken,

They looked around, and lo! they became free! Their many tyrants sitting desolately In slave-deserted halls, could none restrain; For wrath's red fire had withered in the eye, Whose lightning once was death,-nor fear, nor gain Could tempt one captive now to lock another's chain.

XI.

"Those who were sent to bind me, wept, and felt Their minds outsoar the bonds which clasped them Even as a waxen shape may waste and melt [round, In the white furnace; and a visioned swound, A pause of hope and awe, the City bound, Which, like the silence of a tempest's birth, When in its awful shadow it has wound The sun, the wind, the ocean, and the earth, Hung terrible, ere yet the lightnings have leapt forth.

XXIV.

"The seeds are sleeping in the soil: meanwhile The tyrant peoples dungeons with his prey; Pale victims on the guarded scaffold smile Because they cannot speak; and, day by day, The moon of wasting Science wanes away Among her stars, and in that darkness vast The sons of earth to their foul idols pray, And grey Priests triumph, and like blight or blast A shade of selfish care o'er human looks is cast.

XXV.

"This is the Winter of the world;-and here We die, even as the winds of Autumn fade, Expiring in the frore and foggy air.- [made Behold! Spring comes, though we must pass, who The promise of its birth,-even as the shade Which from our death, as from a mountain, flings The future, a broad sunrise; thus arrayed As with the plumes of overshadowing wings, From its dark gulf of chains, Earth like an eagle springs.

XXVI.

"O dearest love! we shall be dead and cold
Before this morn may on the world arise:
Wouldst thou the glory of its dawn behold?
Alas! gaze not on me, but turn thine eyes
On thine own heart-it is a paradise

Which everlasting spring has made its own,
And while drear Winter fills the naked skies,
Sweet streams of sunny thought, and flowers fresh
blown

Are there, and weave their sounds and odours into

one.

XXVII.

"In their own hearts the earnest of the hope Which made them great, the good will ever find; And though some envious shade may interlope Between the effect and it, one comes behind, Who aye the future to the past will bindNecessity, whose sightless strength for ever Evil with evil, good with good, must wind In bands of union, which no power may sever: They must bring forth their kind, and be divided never!

XXVIII.

"The good and mighty of departed ages Are in their graves, the innocent and free, Heroes, and Poets, and prevailing Sages, Who leave the vesture of their majesty To adorn and clothe this naked world;-and we Are like to them-such perish, but they leave All hope, or love, or truth, or liberty, Whose forms their mighty spirits could conceive To be a rule and law to ages that survive.

XXIX.

"So be the turf heaped over our remains Even in our happy youth, and that strange lot Whate'er it be, when in these mingling veins The blood is still, be ours; let sense and thought

Pass from our being, or be numbered not Among the things that are; let those who come Behind, for whom our stedfast will has bought A calm inheritance, a glorious doom, Insult with careless tread our undivided tomb.

These are blind fancies. Reason cannot know
What sense can neither feel, nor thought conceive;
There is delusion in the world-and woe,
And fear, and pain-we know not whence we live,
Or why, or how, or what mute Power may give
Their being to each plant, and star, and beast,
Or even these thoughts.-Come near me! I do
A chain I cannot break-I am possest [weave
With thoughts too swift and strong for one lone
human breast.

XXXVI.

Though she had ceased, her countenance, uplifted To heaven, still spake, with solemn glory bright; Her dark deep eyes, her lips, whose motions gifted The air they breathed with love, her locks undight; "Fairstar of life and love," I cried," my soul's deWhy lookest thou on the crystalline skies? [light, O that my spirit were yon Heaven of night, Which gazes on thee with its thousand eyes!" She turned to me and smiled-that smile was Paradise!