The monarch saw, and shook,
And bade no more rejoice;
All bloodless wax'd his look,
And tremulous his voice.
"Let the men of lore appear,
The wisest of the earth,
And expound the words of fear,
Which mar our royal mirth."
4.
Chaldea's seers are good,
But here they have no skill;
And the unknown letters stood
Untold and awful still.
And Babel's men of age
Are wise and deep in lore
But now they were not sage,
They saw-but knew no more.
5.
A captive in the land,
A stranger and a youth,
He heard the king's command,
He saw that writing's truth.
The lamps around were bright,
The prophecy in view;
He read it on that night,-
The morrow proved it true.
6.
"Belshazzar's grave is made,
His Kingdom pass'd away,
He, in the balance weigh'd,
Is light and worthless clay.
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And is she dead?-and did they dare
Obey my phrenzy's jealous raving?
My wrath but doom'd my own despair:
The sword that smote her's o'er me waving.-
But thou art cold, my murder'd love!
And this dark heart is vainly craving
For her who soars alone above,
And leaves my soul unworthy saving. 3.
She' gone, who shared my diadem;
She sunk, with her my joys entombing;
I swept that flower from Judah's stem
Whose leaves for me alone were blooming,
And mine's the guilt and mine the hell,
This bosom's desolation dooming;
And I have earn'd those tortures well,
Which unconsumed are still consuming'
ON THE DAY OF THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM BY TITUS.
From the last hill that looks on thy once holy dome
I beheld thee, Oh Sion! when render'd to Rome :
"T was the last sun went down, and the flames of the fall
Flash'd back on the last glance I gave to thy wall.
THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIR. 1.
I look'd for thy temple, I look'd for my home,
And forgot for a moment my bondage to come;
I beheld but the death-fire that fed on thy fane,
The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold,
And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;
And the fast-fetter'd hands that made vengeance in vain. And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,
On many an eve, the high spot whence I gazed
Had reflected the last beam of day as it blazed;
While I stood on the height, and beheld the decline
Of the rays from the mountain that shone on thy shrine.
And now on that mountain I stood on that day,
But I mark'd not the twilight beam melting away;
Oh! would that the lightning had glared in its stead,
And the thunderbolt burst on the conqueror's head!
5.
But the Gods of the Pagan shall never profane
The shrine where Jehovah disdain'd not to reign;
And scatter'd and scorn'd as thy people may be,
Jur worship, oh Father! is only for thee.
When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.
Like the leaves of the forest when Summer is green,
That host with their banners at sunset were seen :
Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn hath blown,
That host on the morrow lay wither'd and strown.
For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,
And breathed in the face of the foe as he pass'd;
And the eyes of the sleepers wax'd deadly and chill,
And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still.
4.
And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide,
But through it there roll'd not the breath of his pride:
And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf,
And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf.
5.
And there lay the rider distorted and pale,
With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his mail;
BY THE RIVERS OF BABYLON WE SAT And the tents were all silent, the banners alone,
We sat down and wept by the waters
Of Babel, and thought of the day
When our foe, in the hue of his slaughters,
Made Salem's high places his prey;
And ye, oh her desolate daughters!
Were scatter'd all weeping away.
2.
While sadly we gazed on the river
Which roll'd on in freedom below,
They demanded the song; but, oh never
That triumph the stranger shall know!
May this right hand be wither'd for ever,
Ere it string our high harp for the foe!
On the willow that harp is suspended,
Oh Salem! its sound should be free;
And the hour when thy glories were ended
But left me that token of thee:
And ne'er shall its soft tones be blended
With the voice of the spoiler by me!
The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown.
And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail,
And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal;
And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword,
Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord!
A spirit pass'd before me: I beheld
The face of Immortality unveiľ'd—
Deep sleep came down on every eye save mine--
And there it stood,-all formless—but divine;
Along my bones the creeping flesh did quake;
And as my damp hair stiffen'd, thus it spake :
2.
"Is man more just than God? Is man more pure
Than he who deems even Seraphs insecure?
Creatures of clay-vain dwellers in the dust!
The moth survives you, and are ye more just?
Things of a day! you wither ere the night,
Heedless and blind to Wisdom's wasted light!
By gazing on thyself grown blind,
Thou taught'st the rest to see. With might unquestion'd,-power to save Thine only gift hath been the grave
To those that worshipp'd thee; Nor till thy fall could mortals guess Ambition's less than littleness!
Thanks for that lesson-it will teach
To after-warriors more
Than high Philosophy can preach,
And vainly preach'd before.
That spell upon the minds of men
Breaks never to unite again,
That led them to adore
Those Pagod things of sabre-sway,
With fronts of brass, and feet of clay.
The triumph, and the vanity,
The rapture of the strife
The earthquake voice of Victory,
To thee the breath of life;
The sword, the sceptre, and that sway
Which man seem'd made but to obey,
Wherewith renown was rife-
All quell'd!-Dark Spirit! what must be
The madness of thy memory!
The Arbiter of others' fate
A Suppliant for his own!
Is it some yet imperial hope
That with such change can calmly cope?
Or dread of death alone?
To die a prince-or live a slaveThy choice is most ignobly brave! 6.
He who of old would rend the oak,
Dream'd not of the rebound;
Chain'd by the trunk he vainly broke-
Alone-how look'd he round?
Thou in the sternness of thy strength
An equal deed has done at length,
And darker fate has found;
He fell, the forest-prowlers' prey,
But thou must eat thy heart away!
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Then haste thee to thy sullen Isle,
And gaze upon the sea;
That element may meet thy smile,
It ne'er was ruled by thee!
Or trace with thine all idle hand
In loitering mood upon the sand
That earth is now as free!
That Corinth's pedagogue hath now
Transferr'd his by-word to thy brow.
15.
Thou Timour! in his captive's cage
What thoughts will there be thine,
While brooding in thy prison'd rage?
But one-"The world was mine!"
Unless, like he of Babylon,
All sense is with thy sceptre gone,
Life will not long confine
That spirit pour'd so widely forth-
So long obey'd-so little worth!
Or like the thief of fire from heaven,"
Wilt thou withstand the shock?
And share with him, the unforgiven,
His vulture and his rock!
Foredoom'd by God by man accurst,
And that last act, though not thy worst,
The very Fiend's arch mock;"
He in his fall preserved his pride,
And, if a mortal, had as proudly died!
DEATH OF THE RIGHT HON. R. B. SHERIDAN.
SPOKEN AT DRURY-LANE THEATRE.
WHEN the last sunsnine of expiring day
In summer's twilight weeps itself away,
Who hath not felt the softness of the hour
Sink on the heart, as dew along the flower?
With a pure feeling which absorbs and awes
While Nature makes that melancholy pause,
Her breathing moment on the bridge where Time
Of light and darkness forms an arch sublime,
Who hath not shared that calm so still and deep,
When the loud cry of trampled Hindostan*
Arose to heaven in her appeal from man,
His was the thunder-his the avenging rod,
The wrath-the delegated voice of G d!
Which shook the nations through his lips-and blazed
Till vanquish'd senates trembled as they praised.
And here, oh! here, where yet all young and warm
The gay creations of his spirit charm,
The voiceless thought which would not speak but weep, The matchless dialogue--the deathless wit,
A holy concord-and a bright regret,
A glorious sympathy with suns that set?
'T is not harsh sorrow - but a tender wo,
Nameless, but dear to gentle hearts below,
Felt without bitterness-but full and clear
A sweet dejection-a transparent tear,
Unmix'd with worldly grief or selfish stain,
Shed without shame-and secret without pain.
Even as the tenderness that hour instills
When Summer's day declines along the hills,
So feels the fullness of our heart and eyes
When all of Genius which can perish dies.
A mighty Spirit is eclips'd-a Power
Hath pass'd from day to darkness-to whose hour
Of light no likeness is bequeath'd-no name,
Focus at once of all the rays of Fame!
The flash of Wit-the bright Intelligence,
The beam of Song-the blaze of Eloquence,
Set with their Sun-but still have left behind
The enduring produce of immortal Mind;
Fruits of a genial morn, and glorious noon,
A deathless part of him who died too soon.
But small that portion of the wondrous whole,
These sparkling segments of that circling soul,
Which all embraced-and lighten'd over all,
To cheer-to pierce-to please-or to appal.
From the charm'd council to the festive board,
Of human feelings the unbounded lord;
In whose acclaim the lofiest voices vied,
Which knew not what it was to intermit;
The glowing portraits, fresh from life, that bring
Home to our hearts the truth from which they spring;
These wondrous beings of his Fancy, wrought
To fulness by the fiat of his thought,
Here in their first abode you still may meet,
Bright with the hues of his Promethean heat,
A halo of the light of other days,
Which still the splendour of its orb betrays.
But should there be to whom the fatal blight,
Of failing Wisdom yields a base delight,
Men who exult when minds of heavenly tone
Jar in the music which was born their own,
Still let them pause-Ah! little do they know
That what to them seem'd Vice might be but Wo.
Ilard is his fate on whom the public gaze
Is fix'd for ever to detract or praise;
Repose denies her requiem to his name,
And folly loves the martyrdom of Fame."
The secret enemy whose sleepless eye
Stands sentinel-accuser--judge-and spy,
The foe-the fool-the jealous-and the vain,
The envious who but breathe in others' pain,
Behold the host! delighting to deprave,
Who track the steps of Glory to the grave,
See Fox, Burke, and Pitt's eulogy on Mr. Sheridan's speech on the charges exhibited against Mr. Hastings in the House of Commons. Mi pride, Pitt entreated the House to adjourn, to give time for a calmer conside
The praised - the proud-who made his praise their
ration of the question than could then our after the immediate 800
Watch every fault that daring Genius owes
Half to the ardour which its birth bestows,
Distort the truth, accumulate the lie,
And wile the Pyramid of Calumny!
These are his portion—but if join'd to these
Gaunt Poverty should league with deep Disease,
the high Spirit must forget to soar,
And stoop to strive with Misery at the door,
To sooth Indignity-and face to face
Meet sordid Rage- and wrestle with Disgrace,
To find in Hope but the renew'd caress,
The serpent-fold of further Faithlessness,—
If such may be the Ills which men assail,
What marvel if at last the nightiest fail?
Breasts to whom all the strength of feeling given
Bear hearts electric-charged with fire from Heaven,
Black with the rude collision, inly torn,
By clouds surrounded, and on whirlwinds borne,
To mourn the vanish'd beam-and add our mite
Of praise in payment of a long delight.
Ye Orators! whom yet our councils yield,
Mourn for the veteran Hero of your field!
The worthy rival of the wondrous Three !*
Whose words were sparks of Immortality!
Ye Bards! to whom the Drama's Muse is dear,
He was your Master-emulate him here!
Ye men of wit and social eloquence!
He was your brother-bear his ashes hence!
While Powers of mind, almost of boundless range,
Complete in kind-as various in their change,
While eloquence-Wit-Poesy-and Mirth,
That humble Harmonist of care on Earth,
Survive within our sculs-while lives our sense
Of pride in Merit's proud pre-eminence,
Long shall we seek his likeness-long in vain,
And turn to all of him which may remain,
Driven o'er the lowering atmosphere that nurst [burst. Sighing that Nature form'd but one such nian, Thoughts which have turn'd to thunder-scorch—and And broke the die—in moulding Sheridan! But far from us and from our mimic scene
Such things should be—if such have ever been; Ours be the gentler wish, the kinder task,
To give the tribute Glory need not ask,
Ar Ferrara (in the library) are preserved the original And revell'd among men and things divine, MSS. of Tasso's Gierusalemme and of Guarini's Pastor And pour'd my spirit over Palestine, Fido, with letters of Tasso, one from Titian to Ariosto; In honour of the sacred war for him, and the inkstand and chair, the tomb and the house of the The God who was on earth and is in heaven, latter. But as misfortune has a greater interest for pos- For he hath strengthen'd me in heart and limb. terity, and little or none for the contemporary, the cell That through this sufferance I might be forgiven, where Tasso was confined in the hospital of St. Anna at-I have employed my penance to record tracts a more fixed attention than the residence or the How Salem's shrine was won, and how adored. momument of Ariosto-at least it had this effect on me.
There are two inscriptions, one on the outer gate, the
second over the cell itself, inviting, unnecessarily, the But this is o'er-my pleasant task is done :wonder and the indignation of the spectator. Ferrara is My long-sustaining friend of many years! much decayed, and depopulated; the castle still exists en-If I do blot thy final page with tears,
tire; and I saw the court where Parisina and Hugo were Know, that my sorrows have wrung from me none beheaded, according to the annal of Gibbon.
LONG years! It tries the thrilling frame to bear
And eagle-spirit of a Child of Song--
Long years of outrage, calumny, and wrong;
Imputed madness, prison'd solitude,
And the mind's canker in its savage mood,
When the impatient thirst of light and air
Parches, the heart; and the abhorred grate,
Marring the sunbeams with its hideous shade,
Works through the throbbing eyeball to the brain
With a hot sense of heaviness and pain;
And bare, at once, Captivity display'd
Stands scoffing through the never-open'd gate,
Which nothing through its bars admits, save day
And tasteless food, which I have eat alone
Till its unsocial bitterness is gone;
And I can banquet like a beast of
prey,
Sullen and lonely, couching in the cave
Which is my lair, and—it may be my grave.
All this hath somewhat worn me, and may wear,
But must be borne. I stoop not to despair;
or I have battled with mine agony,
And made me wings wherewith to overfly
The narrow circus of my dungeon wall,
And freed the Holy Sepulchre from thrall ;
But thou, my young creation! my soul's child!
Which ever playing round me came and smiled,
And woo'd me from myself with thy sweet sight,
Thou too art gone-and so is my delight:
And therefore do I weep and inly bleed
With this last bruise upon a broken reed.
Thou too art ended-what is left me now?
For I have anguish yet to bear—and how?
I know not that-but in the innate force
Of my own spirit shall be found resource.
I have not sunk, for I had no remorse,
Nor cause for such: they call'd me mad-and why 7
Oh Leonora! wilt not thou reply?
I was indeed delirious in my heart
To lift my love so lofty as thou art;
But still my phrensy was not of the mind;
I knew my fault, and feel my punishment
Not less because I suffer it unbent.
That thou wert beautiful, and I not blind,
Hath been the sin which shuts me from mankind;
But let them go, or torture as they will,
My heart can multiply thine image still;
Successful love may sate itself away,
The wretched are the faithful; 't is their fate
To have all feeling save the one decay
And every passion into one dilate,
As rapid rivers into ocean pour;
But ours is fathomless. and hath no shore
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