And things provided came without the sweet sense of providing,

He testified this solemn truth, while phrenzy desolated, -Nor man nor nature satisfies whom only God created.

IX

Like a sick child that knoweth not his mother while she blesses,

And drops upon his burning brow the coolness of her kisses,

That turns his fevered eyes around "My mother ! where's my mother ?”

As if such tender words and deeds could come from any other!

X

The fever gone, with leaps of heart he sees her bending o'er him,

Her face all pale from watchful love, the unweary love she bore him!

Thus woke the poet from the dream his life's long fever gave him,

Beneath those deep pathetic Eyes which closed in death to save him.

XI

Thus? oh, not thus! no type of earth can image that awaking,

Wherein he scarcely heard the chant of seraphs, round him breaking,

Or felt the new immortal throb of soul from body parted, But felt these eyes alone, and knew-"My Saviour! not deserted!"

XII

Deserted! Who hath dreamt that when the cross in darkness rested,

Upon the Victim's hidden face no love was manifested?

What frantic hands outstretched have e'er the atoning drops averted?

What tears have washed them from the soul, that one should be deserted?

XIII

Deserted! God could separate from His own essence

rather;

And Adam's sins have swept between the righteous Son and Father:

Yea, once Immanuel's orphaned cry His universe hath shaken

It went up single, echoless, "My God, I am forsaken!"

XIV

It went up from the Holy's lips amid His lost creation, That, of the lost, no son should use those words of desolation!

That earth's worst phrenzies, marring hope, should mar not hope's fruition,

And I, on Cowper's grave, should see his rapture in a vision.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning, 1806-1861.

ON THE DEATH OF MR CRASHAW

[First printed in the folio" Poems" of 1656.]

Poet and Saint! to thee alone are given

The two most sacred names of Earth and Heaven,
The hard and rarest union which can be,

Next that of Godhead with Humanity.
Long did the Muses banish'd slaves abide,

And built vain pyramids to mortal pride;

Like Moses thou (though spells and charms withstand) Hast brought them nobly home back to their Holy Land.

Ah wretched we, poets of earth! but thou
Wert living the same poet which thou'rt now;
Whilst angels sing to thee their airs divine,
And joy in an applause so great as thine;
Equal society with them to hold,

Thou need'st not make new songs, but say the old;
And they (kind spirits!) shall all rejoice to see
How little less than they exalted man may be.
Still the old Heathen gods in Numbers dwell;
The heavenliest thing on earth still keeps up hell!
Nor have we yet quite purged the Christian land;
Still idols here, like calves at Bethel, stand.

And, though Pan's death long since all oracles breaks,
Yet still in rhyme the fiend Apollo speaks:
Nay, with the worst of heathen dotage, we
(Vain men!) the monster Woman deify;
Find stars, and tie our fates there in a face,

And paradise in them, by whom we lost it, place.
What different faults corrupt our Muses thus ?
Wanton as girls, as old wives fabulous!

Thy spotless Muse, like Mary, did contain
The boundless Godhead; she did well disdain
That her eternal verse employed should be
On a less subject than eternity;

And for a sacred mistress scorned to take,

But her whom God himself scorned not his spouse to make.

It (in a kind) her miracle did do ;

A fruitful mother was, and virgin too.

How well (blest swan!) did Fate contrive thy death,

And made thee render up thy tuneful breath

In thy great mistress' arms, thou most divine
And richest offering of Loretto's shrine!
Where, like some holy sacrifice t' expire,

A fever burns thee, and Love lights the fire.
Angels (they say) brought the famed chapel there,
And bore the sacred load in triumph through the air:
'Tis surer much they brought thee there, and they,
And thou, their charge, went singing all the way.

Pardon, my Mother-church! if I consent That angels led him when from thee he went; For ev'n in error sure no danger is,

When joined with so much piety as his.

Ah, mighty God! with shame I speak't, and grief,
Ah, that our greatest faults were in belief!
And our weak reason were ev'n weaker yet,
Rather than thus our wills too strong for it!
His faith, perhaps, in some nice tenets might
Be wrong; his life, I'm sure, was in the right;
And I myself a Catholic will be,

So far at least, great Saint! to pray to thee.
Hail, bard triumphant! and some care bestow
On us, the poets militant below!

Opposed by our old enemy, adverse Chance,
Attacked by Envy and by Ignorance;

Enchained by Beauty, tortured by Desires,
Exposed by Tyrant-Love to savage beasts and fires.
Thou from low earth in nobler flames didst rise,
And, like Elijah, mount alive the skies.
Elisha-like (but with a wish much less,
More fit thy greatness and my littleness)
Lo! here I beg (I, whom thou once didst prove
So humble to esteem, so good to love)
Not that thy spirit might on me doubled be,

I ask but half thy mighty spirit for me:

And, when my Muse soars with so strong a wing,

'Twill learn of things divine, and first of thee, to sing.

Abraham Cowley,

1618-1667.

TO SIR PHILIP SIDNEY'S SOUL

Sonnet prefixed to Sidney's Apology for Poetry

[First printed in "An Apologie for Poetrie. Written by the right noble, vertuous, and learned Sir Phillip Sidney, Knight. Odi profanum vulgus et arceo. At London Printed for Henry Olney," etc., 1595.]

Give pardon, blessed soule! to my bold cries,

If they, importune, interrupt thy song,

Which now with joyful notes thou singst among
The angel-quiristers of the heavenly skies.
Give pardon eke, sweet soul! to my slow cries,
That since I saw thee now it is so long;
And yet the tears that unto thee belong,

To thee as yet they did not sacrifice;

I did not know that thou wert dead before,
I did not feel the grief I did sustain;
The greater stroke astonisheth the more,

Astonishment takes from us sense of pain:
I stood amazed when others tears begun

And now begin to weep when they have done.

Henry Constable, 1555-1615,

AN ELEGY, OR FRIEND'S PASSION FOR HIS ASTROPHEL

Written upon the death of the Right Honourable Sir Phillip Sidney, Knight, Lord Governour of Flushing.

[First printed in "The Phoenix Nest. Built up with the most rare and refined workes of Noble men, woorthy Knights, gallant Gentlemen, Masters of Arts and brave Schollers. Full of varietie, excellent invention, and singular delight," etc. 1593. Reprinted with Spenser's Astrophel.]

F

As then, no wind at all there blew,
No swelling cloud accloyed the air,