THE IDEAL AND THE ACTUAL LIFE.
Forever fair, forever calm and bright, Life flies on plumage, zephyr-light, For those who on the Olympian hill rejoice-- Moons wane, and races wither to the tomb, And "mid the universal ruin, bloom The rosy days of G.o.ds--With man, the choice, Timid and anxious, hesitates between The sense"s pleasure and the soul"s content; While on celestial brows, aloft and sheen, The beams of both are blent.
Seekest thou on earth the life of G.o.ds to share, Safe in the realm of death?--beware To pluck the fruits that glitter to thine eye; Content thyself with gazing on their glow-- Short are the joys possession can bestow, And in possession sweet desire will die.
"Twas not the ninefold chain of waves that bound Thy daughter, Ceres, to the Stygian river-- She plucked the fruit of the unholy ground, And so--was h.e.l.l"s forever!
The weavers of the web--the fates--but sway The matter and the things of clay; Safe from change that time to matter gives, Nature"s blest playmate, free at will to stray With G.o.ds a G.o.d, amidst the fields of day, The form, the archetype [39], serenely lives.
Would"st thou soar heavenward on its joyous wing?
Cast from thee, earth, the bitter and the real, High from this cramped and dungeon being, spring Into the realm of the ideal!
Here, bathed, perfection, in thy purest ray, Free from the clogs and taints of clay, Hovers divine the archetypal man!
Dim as those phantom ghosts of life that gleam And wander voiceless by the Stygian stream,-- Fair as it stands in fields Elysian, Ere down to flesh the immortal doth descend:-- If doubtful ever in the actual life Each contest--here a victory crowns the end Of every n.o.bler strife.
Not from the strife itself to set thee free, But more to nerve--doth victory Wave her rich garland from the ideal clime.
Whate"er thy wish, the earth has no repose-- Life still must drag thee onward as it flows, Whirling thee down the dancing surge of time.
But when the courage sinks beneath the dull Sense of its narrow limits--on the soul, Bright from the hill-tops of the beautiful, Bursts the attained goal!
If worth thy while the glory and the strife Which fire the lists of actual life-- The ardent rush to fortune or to fame, In the hot field where strength and valor are, And rolls the whirling thunder of the car, And the world, breathless, eyes the glorious game-- Then dare and strive--the prize can but belong To him whose valor o"er his tribe prevails; In life the victory only crowns the strong-- He who is feeble fails.
But life, whose source, by crags around it piled, Chafed while confined, foams fierce and wild, Glides soft and smooth when once its streams expand, When its waves, gla.s.sing in their silver play, Aurora blent with Hesper"s milder ray, Gain the still beautiful--that shadow-land!
Here, contest grows but interchange of love, All curb is but the bondage of the grace; Gone is each foe,--peace folds her wings above Her native dwelling-place.
When, through dead stone to breathe a soul of light, With the dull matter to unite The kindling genius, some great sculptor glows; Behold him straining, every nerve intent-- Behold how, o"er the subject element, The stately thought its march laborious goes!
For never, save to toil untiring, spoke The unwilling truth from her mysterious well-- The statue only to the chisel"s stroke Wakes from its marble cell.
But onward to the sphere of beauty--go Onward, O child of art! and, lo!
Out of the matter which thy pains control The statue springs!--not as with labor wrung From the hard block, but as from nothing sprung-- Airy and light--the offspring of the soul!
The pangs, the cares, the weary toils it cost Leave not a trace when once the work is done-- The Artist"s human frailty merged and lost In art"s great victory won! [40]
If human sin confronts the rigid law Of perfect truth and virtue [41], awe Seizes and saddens thee to see how far Beyond thy reach, perfection;--if we test By the ideal of the good, the best, How mean our efforts and our actions are!
This s.p.a.ce between the ideal of man"s soul And man"s achievement, who hath ever past?
An ocean spreads between us and that goal, Where anchor ne"er was cast!
But fly the boundary of the senses--live The ideal life free thought can give; And, lo, the gulf shall vanish, and the chill Of the soul"s impotent despair be gone!
And with divinity thou sharest the throne, Let but divinity become thy will!
Scorn not the law--permit its iron band The sense (it cannot chain the soul) to thrall.
Let man no more the will of Jove withstand [42], And Jove the bolt lets fall!
If, in the woes of actual human life-- If thou could"st see the serpent strife Which the Greek art has made divine in stone-- Could"st see the writhing limbs, the livid cheek, Note every pang, and hearken every shriek, Of some despairing lost Laoc.o.o.n, The human nature would thyself subdue To share the human woe before thine eye-- Thy cheek would pale, and all thy soul be true To man"s great sympathy.
But in the ideal realm, aloof and far, Where the calm art"s pure dwellers are, Lo, the Laoc.o.o.n writhes, but does not groan.
Here, no sharp grief the high emotion knows-- Here, suffering"s self is made divine, and shows The brave resolve of the firm soul alone: Here, lovely as the rainbow on the dew Of the spent thunder-cloud, to art is given, Gleaming through grief"s dark veil, the peaceful blue Of the sweet moral heaven.
So, in the glorious parable, behold How, bowed to mortal bonds, of old Life"s dreary path divine Alcides trod: The hydra and the lion were his prey, And to restore the friend he loved to-day, He went undaunted to the black-browed G.o.d; And all the torments and the labors sore Wroth Juno sent--the meek majestic one, With patient spirit and unquailing, bore, Until the course was run--
Until the G.o.d cast down his garb of clay, And rent in hallowing flame away The mortal part from the divine--to soar To the empyreal air! Behold him spring Blithe in the pride of the unwonted wing, And the dull matter that confined before Sinks downward, downward, downward as a dream!
Olympian hymns receive the escaping soul, And smiling Hebe, from the ambrosial stream, Fills for a G.o.d the bowl!
GERMANY AND HER PRINCES.
Thou hast produced mighty monarchs, of whom thou art not unworthy, For the obedient alone make him who governs them great.
But, O Germany, try if thou for thy rulers canst make it Harder as kings to be great,--easier, though, to be men!
DANGEROUS CONSEQUENCES.
Deeper and bolder truths be careful, my friends, of avowing; For as soon as ye do all the world on ye will fall.
THE MAIDEN FROM AFAR.
(OR FROM ABROAD.)
Within a vale, each infant year, When earliest larks first carol free, To humble shepherds cloth appear A wondrous maiden, fair to see.
Not born within that lowly place-- From whence she wandered, none could tell; Her parting footsteps left no trace, When once the maiden sighed farewell.
And blessed was her presence there-- Each heart, expanding, grew more gay; Yet something loftier still than fair Kept man"s familiar looks away.
From fairy gardens, known to none, She brought mysterious fruits and flowers-- The things of some serener sun-- Some Nature more benign than ours.
With each her gifts the maiden shared-- To some the fruits, the flowers to some; Alike the young, the aged fared; Each bore a blessing back to home.
Though every guest was welcome there, Yet some the maiden held more dear, And culled her rarest sweets whene"er She saw two hearts that loved draw near. [43]
THE HONORABLE.
Ever honor the whole; individuals only I honor; In individuals I always discover the whole.
PARABLES AND RIDDLES.
I.
A bridge of pearls its form uprears High o"er a gray and misty sea; E"en in a moment it appears, And rises upwards giddily.
Beneath its arch can find a road The loftiest vessel"s mast most high, Itself hath never borne a load, And seems, when thou draw"st near, to fly.
It comes first with the stream, and goes Soon as the watery flood is dried.
Where may be found this bridge, disclose, And who its beauteous form supplied!