ΧΙ.

TRANSUBSTANTIATION.

ENOUGH! for see, with dim association
The tapers burn; the odorous incense feeds
A greedy flame; the pompous mass proceeds;
The Priest bestows the appointed consecration;
And, while the HOST is raised, its elevation
An awe and supernatural horror breeds;
And all the people bow their heads, like reeds
To a soft breeze, in lowly adoration.
This Valdo brooks not. On the banks of Rhone
He taught, till persecution chased him thence,
To adore the Invisible, and Him alone.
Nor are his Followers loth to seek defence,
'Mid woods and wilds, on Nature's craggy
throne,

From rites that trample upon soul and sense.

XII.

THE VAUDOIS.

BUT whence came they who for the Saviour Lord

Have long borne witness as the Scriptures

teach ?

Ages ere Valdo raised his voice to preach
In Gallic ears the unadulterate Word,
Their fugitive Progenitors explored
Subalpine vales, in quest of safe retreats
Where that pure Church survives, though sum-
mer heats

Open a passage to the Romish sword,

Far as it dares to follow. Herbs self-sown, And fruitage gathered from the chesnut wood, Nourish the sufferers then; and mists, that brood D'er chasms with new-fallen obstacles bestrown, Protect them; and the eternal snow that daunts Aliens, is God's good winter for their haunts.

To harassed Piety, "Dismiss thy fear,
And in our caverns smooth thy ruffled wings!"
Nor be unthanked their final lingerings-
Silent, but not to high-souled Passion's ear-
'Mid reedy fens wide-spread and marshes drear,
Their own creation. Such glad welcomings
As Po was heard to give where Venice rose
Hailed from aloft those Heirs of truth divine

Who near his fountains sought obscure repose,
Yet came prepared as glorious lights to shine,
Should that be needed for their sacred Charge;
Blest Prisoners They, whose spirits were at
large!

XIV. WALDENSES.

THOSE had given earliest notice, as the lark
Springs from the ground the morn to gratulate;
Or rather rose the day to antedate,
By striking out a solitary spark,

When all the world with midnight gloom was dark.

Then followed the Waldensian bands, whom
Hate

In vain endeavours to exterminate,
Whom Obloquy pursues with hideous bark:
But they desist not ;-and the sacred fire,

Rekindled thus, from dens and savage woods
Moves, handed on with never-ceasing care,
Through courts, through camps, o'er limitary
floods;

Nor lacks this sea-girt Isle a timely share
Of the new Flame, not suffered to expire.

XV.

ARCHBISHOP CHICHELY TO HENRY V. "WHAT beast in wilderness or cultured field The lively beauty of the leopard shows? What flower in meadow-ground or garden grows

That to the towering lily doth not yield?
Let both meet only on thy royal shield!
Go forth, great King! claim what thy birth
bestows;

Conquer the Gallic lily which thy foes
Dare to usurp ;-thou hast a sword to wield,
And Heaven will crown the right."-The mitred
Sire

Thus spake and lo! a Fleet, for Gaul addrest,
Ploughs her bold course across the wondering

Of victory mounts high, and blood is quaffed
In fields that rival Cressy and Poictiers-
Pride to be washed away by bitter tears!
For deep as hell itself, the avenging draught
Of civil slaughter. Yet, while temporal power
Is by these shocks exhausted, spiritual truth
Proceeds from infancy to lusty youth;
Maintains the else endangered gift of life;
And, under cover of this woeful strife,
Gathers unblighted strength from hour to hour.

XVII. WICLIFFE.

ONCE more the Church is seized with sudden And at her call is Wicliffe disinhumed: fear, Yea, his dry bones to ashes are consumed And flung into the brook that travels near; Forthwith, that ancient Voice which Streams can hear

Thus speaks (that Voice which walks upon the wind,

Though seldom heard by busy human kind)"As thou these ashes, little Brook! wilt bear Into the Avon, Avon to the tide

Of Severn, Severn to the narrow seas,
Into main Ocean they, this deed accurst
An emblem yields to friends and enemies
How the bold Teacher's Doctrine, sanctified
By truth, shall spread, throughout the world
dispersed.'

R

XVIII.

CORRUPTIONS OF THE HIGHER CLERGY.

"WOE to you, Prelates! rioting in ease And cumbrous wealth-the shame of your

estate;

You, on whose progress dazzling trains await
Of pompous horses; whom vain titles please;
Who will be served by others on their knees,
Yet will yourselves to God no service pay;
Pastors who neither take nor point the way
To Heaven; for, either lost in vanities
Ye have no skill to teach, or if ye know
And speak the word-" Alas! of fearful
things

'Tis the most fearful when the people's eye
Abuse hath cleared from vain imaginings;
And taught the general voice to prophesy
Of Justice armed, and Pride to be laid low.

XIX.

ABUSE OF MONASTIC POWER.

AND what is Penance with her knotted thong ;
Mortification with the shirt of hair,
Wan cheek, and knees indúrated with prayer,
Vigils, and fastings rigorous as long ;
If cloistered Avarice scruple not to wrong
The pious, humble, useful Secular,
And rob the people of his daily care,
Scorning that world whose blindness makes her
strong?

Inversion strange! that, unto One who lives
For self, and struggles with himself alone,
The amplest share of heavenly favour gives;
That to a Monk allots, both in the esteem
Of God and man, place higher than to him
Who on the good of others builds his own!

For their abode the shrines of Waltham choose:
Proud Glastonbury can no more refuse
To stoop her head before these desperate
shocks-

She whose high pomp displaced, as story tells,
Arimathean Joseph's wattled cells.

XXII.

THE SAME SUBJECT.

THE lovely Nun (submissive, but more meek
Through saintly habit than from effort due
To unrelenting mandates that pursue
With equal wrath the steps of strong and weak)
Goes forth-unveiling timidly a cheek
Suffused with blushes of celestial hue,
While through the Convent's gate to open view
Softly she glides, another home to seek.
Not Iris, issuing from her cloudy shrine,
An Apparition more divinely bright!
Not more attractive to the dazzled sight
Those watery glories, on the stormy brine
Poured forth, while summer suns at distance
shine,

And the green vales lie hushed in sober light!

The Dragon quelled; and valiant Margaret
Whose rival sword a like Opponent slew:
And rapt Cecilia, seraph-haunted Queen
Of harmony; and weeping Magdalene,
Who in the penitential desert met

suage,

No sacrifice avert, no power dispute;
The tapers shall be quenched, the belfries mute,
And, 'mid their choirs unroofed by selfish rage,
The warbling wren shall find a leafy cage;
The gadding bramble hang her purple fruit;
And the green lizard and the gilded newt
Lead unmolested lives, and die of age.
The owl of evening and the woodland fox

XXV.

THE VIRGIN.

MOTHER! whose virgin bosom was uncrost
With the least shade of thought to sin allied;
Woman! above all women glorified,
Our tainted nature's solitary boast;
Purer than foam on central ocean tost;
Brighter than eastern skies at daybreak strewn

With fancied roses, than the unblemished moon
Before her wane begins on heaven's blue coast;
Thy Image falls to earth. Yet some, I ween,
Not unforgiven the suppliant knee might bend,
As to a visible Power, in which did blend
All that was mixed and reconciled in Thee
Of mother's love with maiden purity,
Of high with low, celestial with terrene!

XXVI.

APOLOGY.

NOT utterly unworthy to endure
Was the supremacy of crafty Rome;
Age after age to the arch of Christendom
Aerial keystone haughtily secure ;

Supremacy from Heaven transmitted pure,
As many hold; and, therefore, to the tomb
Pass, some through fire-and by the scaffold

some

Like saintly Fisher, and unbending More.
"Lightly for both the bosom's lord did sit
Upon his throne;"unsoftened, undismayed
By aught that mingled with the tragic scene
Of pity or fear; and More's gay genius played
With the inoffensive sword of native wit,
Than the bare axe more luminous and keen.

XXVII.

IMAGINATIVE REGRETS.

DEEP is the lamentation! Not alone
From Sages justly honoured by mankind;
But from the ghostly tenants of the wind,
Demons and Spirits, many a dolorous groan
Issues for that dominion overthrown:
Proud Tiber grieves, and far-off Ganges, blind
As his own worshippers: and Nile, reclined
Upon his monstrous urn, the farewell moan
Renews. Through every forest, cave, and den,
Where frauds were hatched of old, hath sorrow
past--

Hangs o'er the Arabian Prophet's native Waste, Where once his airy helpers schemed and planned

'Mid spectral lakes bemocking thirsty men, And stalking pillars built of fiery sand.

"SWEET is the holiness of Youth"-so felt Time-honoured Chaucer speaking through that Lay

By which the Prioress beguiled the way,
And many a Pilgrim's rugged heart did melt.
Hadst thou, loved Bard! whose spirit often
dwelt

In the clear land of vision, but foreseen
King, child, and seraph, blended in the mien
Of pious Edward kneeling as he knelt
In meek and simple infancy, what joy
For universal Christendom had thrilled
Thy heart! what hopes inspired thy genius,
skilled

(O great Precursor, genuine morning Star)
The lucid shafts of reason to employ,
Piercing the Papal darkness from afar!

XXXII.

EDWARD SIGNING THE WARRANT FOR THE EXECUTION OF JOAN OF KENT. THE tears of man in various measure gush From various sources; gently overflow From blissful transport some-from clefts of woe Some with ungovernable impulse rush; And some, coëval with the earliest blush Of infant passion, scarcely dare to show Their pearly lustre-coming but to go; And some break forth when others' sorrows crush The sympathising heart. Nor these, nor yet

MEN, who have ceased to reverence, soon defy Their forefathers; lo! sects are formed, and split

With morbid restlessness ;-the ecstatic fit Spreads wide; though special mysteries multiply,

The Saints must govern, is their common cry;
And so they labour, deeming Holy Writ
Disgraced by aught that seems content to sit
Beneath the roof of settled Modesty.
The Romanist exults; fresh hope he draws
From the confusion, craftily incites
The overweening, personates the mad-
To heap disgust upon the worthier Cause:
Totters the Throne; the new-born Church is sad
For every wave against her peace unites.

XLII.

GUNPOWDER PLOT.

FEAR hath a hundred eyes that all agree To plague her beating heart; and there is one (Nor idlest that!) which holds communion With things that were not, yet were meant to be.

Aghast within its gloomy cavity

That eye (which sees as if fulfilled and done
Crimes that might stop the motion of the sun)
Beholds the horrible catastrophe

Of an assembled Senate unredeemed
From subterraneous Treason's darkling power:
Merciless act of sorrow infinite!

Worse than the product of that dismal night,
When gushing, copious as a thunder-shower,
The blood of Huguenots through Paris streamed.

XLIII.

ILLUSTRATION.

THE JUNG-FRAU AND The fall of the
RHINE NEAR SCHAFFHAUSEN.

THE Virgin Mountain,* wearing like a Queen
A brilliant crown of everlasting snow,
Sheds ruin from her sides; and men below
Wonder that aught of aspect so serene
Can link with desolation. Smooth and green,
And seeming, at a little distance, slow,
The waters of the Rhine; but on they go
Fretting and whitening, keener and more keen;
Till madness seizes on the whole wide Flood,
The Jung-frau

Turned to a fearful Thing whose nostrils breathe Blasts of tempestuous smoke-wherewith he tries

To hide himself, but only magnifies;

And doth in more conspicuous torment writhe, Deafening the region in his ireful mood.

XLIV.

TROUBLES OF CHARLES THE FIRST.

EVEN Such the contrast that, where'er we move,
To the mind's eye Religion doth present;
Now with her own deep quietness content;
Then, like the mountain, thundering from above
Against the ancient pine-trees of the grove
And the Land's humblest comforts. Now her
mood

Recals the transformation of the flood,
Whose rage the gentle skies in vain reprove,
Earth cannot check. O terrible excess
Of headstrong will! Can this be Piety?
No-some fierce Maniac hath usurped her

name,

And scourges England struggling to be free: Her peace destroyed! her hopes a wilderness! Her blessings cursed - her glory turned to shame

XLV. LAUD.

PREJUDGED by foes determined not to spare,
An old weak Man for vengeance thrown aside,
Laud, "in the painful art of dying" tried,
(Like a poor bird entangled in a snare
Whose heart still flutters, though his wings for-
bear

To stir in useless struggle) hath relied
On hope that conscious innocence supplied,
And in his prison breathes celestial air.
Why tarries then thy chariot? Wherefore stay.
O Death! the ensanguined yet triumphant
wheels,

Which thou prepar'st, full often, to convey
(What time a State with madding faction reels)
The Saint or Patriot to the world that heals
All wounds, all perturbations doth allay?