The Revelations of Devout and Learned
Who rose before us, and as Prophets burned,

Are all but stories, which, awoke from Sleep They told their comrades, and to Sleep returned.

I sent my Soul through the Invisible,
Some letter of that After-life to spell :

And by and by my Soul returned to me,
And answered "I myself am Heaven and Hell":

Heaven but the vision of fulfilled Desire,
And Hell the Shadow from a Soul on fire,
Cast on the Darkness into which Ourselves,
So late emerged from, shall so soon expire.

We are no other than a moving row
Of Magic Shadow-shapes that come and go
Round with the Sun-illumined Lantern held
In Midnight by the Master of the Show;

But helpless pieces of the Game He plays
Upon this Chequer-board of Nights and Days;
Hither and thither moves, and checks, and slays,
And one by one back in the Closet lays.

The Ball no question makes of Ayes and Noes, But here and there as strikes the Player goes; And He that tossed you down into the Field, He knows about it all-He knows-HE knows!

The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on; nor all your Piety nor Wit

Shall lure it back to cancel half a line,
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it.

FitzGerald.

quidquid enim docto cecinere pioque priores
ore sacerdotes, novimus esse nihil.
somnia sic narrat paulum experrectus amicis,
qui rursus somno mox redeunte silet.

misi animam vitae rerum per inane petentem
visibus humanis signa negata novae;
it, redit, et narrat, "Caelestia gaudia, poenas
Tartareas, alibi quas petis, intus habes."

illa exauditi tibi sunt imitamina voti,

haec animam urentis sunt velut umbra metus, quae tremula insignit tenebras, unde exitus olim, et quo mox nobis, crede, regressus erit.

ceu varias vitro tibi lux inclusa figuras

ostendit, media quam maga nocte rotat, non aliter domini nos fingimur arte potentis quos solis circum mota lucerna movet.

ponimur in mundo vitreorum more latronum, dant tabulae varias noxque diesque vices; Ille movet, revocat, cohibet, mox mactat inertes, ordine quos, actis lusibus, arca teget.

ius habet in sese nullum pila, missa feretur
huc illuc, domina quo iacis ipsa manu;
sic te qui quondam campum deiecit in istum,
quid velit, huic soli, nec tibi, nosse datur.

fata notat non fessa manus, fatisque notatis pergit: quid pietas ingeniumque valent? scripta manent, precibus non haec revocaveris ullis, nulla erit e lacrimis facta litura tuis.

CXXVIII

APHRODITE

For against all men from of old
Thou hast set thine hand as a curse,
And cast out gods from their places;
These things are spoken of thee.
Strong kings and goodly with gold
Thou hast found out arrows to pierce,
And made their kingdoms and races
As dust and surf of the sea.
All these, overburdened with woes

And with length of their days waxen weak,
Thou slewest; and sentest moreover

Upon Tyro an evil thing,

Rent hair and a fetter and blows

Making bloody the flower of the cheek,
Though she lay by a god as a lover,
Though fair, and the seed of a king.

Swinburne.

CXXIX

THE RHODORA

ON BEING ASKED, WHENCE IS THE FLOWER?

In May, when sea-winds pierced our solitudes,
I found the fresh Rhodora in the woods,
Spreading its leafless blooms in a damp nook,
To please the desert and the sluggish brook.
The purple petals, fallen in the pool,
Made the black water with their beauty gay;
Here might the red-bird come his plumes to cool,
And court the flower that cheapens his array.
Rhodora! if the sages ask thee why

This charm is wasted on the earth and sky,

Tell them, dear, that if eyes were made for seeing,

Then Beauty is its own excuse for being:

Why thou wert there, O rival of the rose!

I never thought to ask, I never knew:

But, in my simple ignorance, suppose

The self-same Power that brought me there brought you.

R. W. Emerson.

CXXVIII

Αφροδίτη

Nempe ex vetustis tu truce saeculis
mortale vexas pernicie genus,
turbasse, sic fama est, Olympi
ausa deos eadem potentes;
auroque reges conspicuos novis
sollers sagittis figere, tu decus
in pulverem et gentes superbas
laeta ruis pelagique rorem.
sera his gravatis sollicitudine
pressis vel aevi pondere tu necem
sortita; te Tyro fatetur

exitio male destinata.

scissique crines et fera vincula,
plagisque foedae sanguineis genae;
nec forma et amplexus deorum
regibus eripuit creatam.

7. R

CXXIX

RHODORA

Maius erat: penetrant aurae loca sola marinae oblata est oculis verna Rhodora meis.

explicat et madido gemmas sine fronde recessu deserti stagnis ceu placitura soli.

nam quacunque cadunt, segnesque feruntur in undas.
ardet purpureis floribus atra palus.

rubraque te veneratur avis, dum temperat alam,
quae minimo constat murice victa tuo.
quod si forte roget sapiens, cur non nisi caelo
terrisque effundas tale, Rhodora, decus.

dic age; cernendi causa si lumina fiunt,

pulchra etiam fiunt, pulchra quod esse decet. ignorabam equidem, neque enim mihi quaerere visum est, cur ibi floreres aemula dicta rosae.

cor simplex et agreste mihi: me scilicet illuc

numen idem magnum teque tulisse reor.

CXXX

A SONG OF THE FOUR SEASONS

When Spring comes laughing by vale and hill,
By wind-flower walking and daffodil,—
Sing stars of morning, sing morning skies,
Sing blue of speedwell,—and my Love's eyes!
When comes the Summer full-leaved and strong,
And gay birds gossip the orchard long,—
Sing hid, sweet honey that no bee sips,
Sing red, red roses,—and my Love's lips.

When Autumn scatters the leaves again,
And piled sheaves bury the broad-wheeled wain,—
Sing flutes of harvest where men rejoice;
Sing rounds of reapers,—and my Love's voice.

But when comes Winter with hail and storm,
And red fire roaring and ingle warm,-
Sing first sad going of friends that part;

Then sing glad meeting,—and my Love's heart.
Austin Dobson.

CXXXI

ESSE QUID HOC DICAM

Looking on a page where stood

Graven of old on old-world wood

Death, and by the grave's edge grim
Pale the young man facing him,

Asked my well-beloved of me

Once what strange thing this might be

Gaunt and great of limb.

Death, I told him; and, surprise

Deepening more his wild-wood eyes

(Like some sweet fleet thing's whose breath
Speaks all spring, though nought he saith)
Up he turned his rose-bright face

Glorious with its seven years' grace
Asking,-What is death?

Swinburne.