Less credulous than Greeks to-day.
Now worldlings in their worldliness
Enjoin upon us, Never retract:
With ignorant folk, think you, no less
Of policy priestcraft may exact?
But Luther’s clergy: though their deeds
Take not imposture, yet ’tis seen
That, in some matters more abstract,
These, too, may be impeached herein.
While, as each plain observer heeds,
Some doctrines fall away from creeds,
And therewith, hopes, which scarce again,
In those same forms, shall solace men—
Perchance, suspended and inert
May hang, with few to controvert,
For ages; does the Lutheran,
To such disciples as may sit
Receptive of his sanctioned wit,
In candor own the dubious weather
And lengthen out the cable’s tether?—
You catch my drift?”
“I do. But, nay,
Some ease the cable.”
“Derwent, pray?
Ah, he—he is a generous wight,
And lets it slip, yes, run out quite.
Whether now in his priestly state
He seek indeed to mediate
’Tween faith and science (which still slight
Each truce deceptive) or discreet
Would kindly cover faith’s retreat,
Alike he labors vainly. Nay,
And, since I think it, why not say—
Things all diverse he would unite:
His idol’s an hermaphrodite.”
The student shrank. Again he knew
Return for Rolfe of quick distaste;
But mastered it; for still the hue
Rolfe kept of candor undefaced,
Quoting pure nature at his need,
As ’twere the Venerable Bede:
An Adam in his natural ways.
But scrupulous lest any phrase
Through inference might seem unjust
Unto the friend they here discussed;
Rolfe supplements: “Derwent but errs—
No, buoyantly but overstates
In much his genial heart avers:
I cannot dream he simulates.
For pulpiteers which make their mart—
Who, in the Truth not for a day,
Debarred from growth as from decay,
Truth one forever, Scriptures say,
Do yet the fine progressive part
So jauntily maintain; these find
(For sciolists abound) a kind
And favoring audience. But none
Exceed in flushed repute the one
Who bold can harmonize for all
Moses and Comte, Renan and Paul:
’Tis the robustious circus-man:
With legs astride the dappled span
Elate he drives white, black, before:
The small apprentices adore.
Astute ones be though, staid and grave
Who in the wars of Faith and Science
Remind one of old tactics brave—
Imposing front of false defiance:
The King a corpse in armor led
On a live horse.—You turn your head:
You hardly like that. Woe is me:
What would you have? For one to hold
That he must still trim down, and cold
Dissemble—this were coxcombry!
Indulgence should with frankness mate:
Fraternal be: Ah, tolerate!”
The modulated voice here won
Ingress where scarce the plea alone
Had entrance gained. But—to forget
Allusions which no welcome met
In him who heard—Rolfe thus went on:
“Never I’ve seen it; but they claim
That the Greek prelate’s artifice
Comes as a tragic after-piece
To farce, or rather prank and game;
Racers and tumblers round the Tomb:
Sports such as might the mound confront,
The funeral mound, by Hellespont,
Of slain Patroclus. Linger still
Such games beneath some groves of bloom
In mid Pacific, where life’s thrill
Is primal—Pagan; and fauns deck
Green theatres for that tattooed Greek
The Polynesian.—Who will say
These Syrians are more wise than they,
Or more humane? not those, believe,
Who may the narrative receive
Of lbrahim the conqueror, borne
Dead-faint, by soldiers red with gore
Over slippery corses heaped forlorn
Out from splashed Calvary through the door
Into heaven’s light. Urged to ordain
That nevermore the frenzying ray
Should issue—‘That would but sustain
The cry of persecution; nay,
Let Allah, if he will, remand
These sects to reason. Let it stand.’—
Cynical Moslem! but didst err,
Arch-Captain of the Sepulcher?”—
He stayed: and Clarel knew decline
Of all his spirits, as may one
Who hears some story of his line
Which shows him half his house undone.
Revulsion came: with lifted brows
He gazed on Rolfe: Is this the man
Whom Jordan heard in part espouse
The appeal of that Dominican
And Rome? and here, all sects, behold,
All creeds involving in one fold
Of doubt? Better a partisan!
Earnest he seems: can union be
’Twixt earnestness and levity?
Or need at last in Rolfe confess
Thy hollow, Manysidedness!
But, timely, here diversion fell.
Dawn broke; and from each cliff-hung cell
’Twas hailed with hymns—confusion sweet
As of some aviary’s seat:
Commemorative matin din:
’Tis Saba’s festival they usher in.
17. A CHANT
That day, though to the convent brood
A holiday, was kept in mood
Of serious sort, yet took the tone
And livery of legend grown
Poetical if grave. The fane
Was garnished, and it heard a strain
Reserved for festa. And befell
That now and then at interval
Some, gathered on the cliffs around,
Would sing Saint Cosmas’ canticle;
Some read aloud from book embrowned
While others listened; some prefer
A chant in Scripture character,
Or monkish sort of melodrame.
Upon one group the pilgrims came
In gallery of slender space,
Locked in the echoing embrace
Of crags: a choir of seemly men
Reposed in cirque, nor wanting grace,
Whose tones went eddying down the glen:
First Voice
No more the princes flout the word—
Jeremiah’s in dungeon cast:
The siege is up, the walls give way:
This desolation is the last.
The Chaldee army, pouring in,
Fiercer grown for disarray,
Hunt Zedekiah that fleeth out:
Baal and Assyria win:
Israel’s last ki
ng is shamed in rout,
Taken and blinded, chains put on,
And captive dragged to Babylon.
Second Voice
O daughter of Jerusalem,
Cast up the ashes on the brow!
Nergal and Samgar, Sarsechim
Break down thy towers, abase thee now.
Third Voice
Oh, now each lover leaveth!
Fourth Voice
None comfort me, she saith:
First Voice
Abroad the sword bereaveth:
Second Voice
At home there is as death.
The Four
Behold, behold! the days foretold begin:
A sword without—the pestilence within.
First and Second Voices
But thou that pull’st the city down,
Ah, vauntest thou thy glory so?
Second and Third Voices
God is against thee, haughty one;
His archers roundabout thee go:
The Four
Earth shall be moved, the nations groan
At the jar of Bel and Babylon
In din of overthrow.
First Voice
But Zion shall be built again!
Third and Fourth Voices
Nor shepherd from the flock shall sever;
For lo, his mercy doth remain,
His tender mercy—
Second Voice
And forever!
The Four
Forever and forever!
Choral
Forever and forever
His mercy shall remain:
In rivers flow forever,
Forever fall in rain!
18. THE MINSTER
Huge be the buttresses enmassed
Which shoulder up, like Titan men,
Against the precipices vast
The ancient minster of the glen.
One holds the library four-square,
A study, but with students few:
Books, manuscripts, and—cobwebs too.
Within, the church were rich and rare
But for the time-stain which ye see:
Gilded with venerable gold,
It shows in magnified degree
Much like some tarnished casket old
Which in the dusty place ye view
Through window of the broker Jew.
But Asiatic pomp adheres
To ministry and ministers
Of Basil’s Church; that night ’twas seen
In all that festival confers:
Plate of Byzantium, stones and spars,
Urim and Thummim, gold and green;
Music like cymbals clashed in wars
Of great Semiramis the queen.
And texts sonorous they intone
From parchment, not plebeian print;
From old and golden parchment brown
They voice the old Septuagint,
And Gospels, and Epistles, all
In the same tongue employed by Paul.
Flags, beatific flags they view:
Ascetics which the hair-cloth knew
And wooden pillow, here were seen
Pictured on satin soft—serene
In fair translation. But advanced
Above the others, and enhanced
About the staff with ring and boss,
They mark the standard of the Cross.
That emblem, here, in Eastern form,
For Derwent seemed to have a charm.
“I like this Greek cross, it has grace;”
He whispered Rolfe: “the Greeks eschew
The long limb; beauty must have place—
Attic! I like it. And do you?”
“Better I’d like it, were it true.”
“What mean you there?”
“I do but mean
’Tis not the cross of Calvary’s scene.
The Latin cross (by that name known)
Holds the true semblance; that’s the one
Was lifted up and knew the nail;
’Tis realistic—can avail!”
Breathed Derwent then, “These arches quite
Set off and aggrandize the rite:
A goodly fane. The incense, though,
Somehow it drugs, makes sleepy so.
They purpose down there in ravine
Having an auto, act, or scene,
Or something. Come, pray, let us go.”
19. THE MASQUE
’Tis night, with silence, save low moan
Of winds. By torches red in glen
A muffled man upon a stone
Sits desolate sole denizen.
Pilgrims and friars on ledge above
Repose. A figure in remove
This prologue renders: “He in view
Is that Cartaphilus, the Jew
Who wanders ever; in low state,
Behold him in Jehoshaphat
The valley, underneath the hem
And towers of gray Jerusalem:
This must ye feign. With quick conceit
Ingenuous, attuned in heart,
Help out the actor in his part,
And gracious be;” and made retreat.
Then slouching rose the muffled man;
Gazed toward the turrets, and began:
“O city yonder,
Exposed in penalty and wonder,
Again thou seest me! Hither I
Still drawn am by the guilty tie
Between us; all the load I bear
As round my heart the phantoms throng
Of tribe and era perished long,
So thou art haunted, sister in wrong!
While ghosts from mounds of recent date
Invest and knock at every gate—
Specters of thirty sieges old
Your outer line of trenches hold:
Egyptian, Mede, Greek, Arab, Turk,
Roman, and Frank, beleaguering lurk.—
“Jerusalem!
Not solely for that bond of doom
Between us, do I frequent come
Hither, and make profound resort
In Shaveh’s dale, in Joel’s court;
But hungering also for the day
Whose dawn these weary feet shall stay,
When Michael’s trump the call shall spread
Through all your warrens of the dead.
“Time, never may I know the calm
Till then? my lull the world’s alarm?
But many mortal fears and feelings
In me, in me here stand reversed:
The unappeased judicial pealings
Wrench me, not wither me, accursed.
‘Just let him live, just let him rove,’
(Pronounced the voice estranged from love)
‘Live—live and rove the sea and land;
Long live, rove far, and understand
And sum all knowledge for his dower;
For he forbid is, he is banned;
His brain shall tingle, but his hand
Shall palsied be in power:
Ruthless, he meriteth no ruth,
On him I imprecate the truth.’ ”
He quailed; then, after little truce,
Moaned querulous:
“My fate!
Cut off I am, made separate;
For man’s embrace I strive no more;
For, would I be
Friendly with one, the mystery
He guesses of that dreadful lore
Which Eld accumulates in me:
He fleeth me.
My face begetteth superstition:
In dungeons of Spain’s Inquisition
Thrice languished I for sorcery,
An Elymas. In Venice, long
Immured beneath the wave I lay
For a conspirator. Some wrong
On me is heaped, go where I may,
Among mankind. Hence solitude
Elect I; in waste places brood
More lonely than an only god;
For, human still, I yearn, I yearn,
Yea, after a millennium, turn
Back to my wife, my wife and boy;
Yet ever I shun the dear abode
Or site thereof, of homely joy.
I fold ye in the watch of night,
Esther! then start. And hast thou been?
And I for ages in this plight?
Caitiff I am; but there’s no sin
Conjecturable, possible,
No crime they expiate in hell
Justly whereto such pangs belong:
The wrongdoer he endureth wrong.
Yea, now the Jew, inhuman erst,
With penal sympathy is cursed—
The burden shares of every crime,
And throttled miseries undirged,
Unchronicled, and guilt submerged
Each moment in the flood of time.
Go mad I can not: I maintain
The perilous outpost of the sane.
Memory could I mitigate,
Or would the long years vary any!
But no, ’tis fate repeating fate:
Banquet and war, bridal and hate,
And tumults of the people many;
And wind, and dust soon laid again:
Vanity, vanity’s endless reign!—
What’s there?”
He paused, and all was hush
Save a wild screech, and hurtling rush
Of wings. An owl—the hermit true
Of grot the eremite once knew
Up in the cleft—alarmed by ray
Of shifted flambeau, burst from cave
On bushy wing, and brushed away
Down the long Kedron gorge and grave.
“It flees, but it will be at rest