1 10 11 https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/43173c56bac3c794f90b4854cd1e634b.pdf?Expires=1779926400&Signature=JC07LWSaJIhnuOBTA9ScKuvEMoav2G-EYRsWbSPpfaV5KyeQau0SItqtBC21tc0cMp92yAW6Shigt2ru-GkE5JN7-Zo40JqMbgXLnDuuGgmLxQ3aRwM6Z56F3yJMoEdiaKBw81U1q6u8elba1qttdof%7E0jUdtAURt9aHgbMVDZakfeqmdoaQOqksCQHRkp-xdWZnoIighsd3DpnA2I1cHkc3bsjZltqja3PwF31uKLUaxtI0ZKYusvEVTPu9VRVVsMghgrG1H9pPQWS%7EvoS-D-ztwEAYuGI2JWRmfa4J3rcQoBp911%7EIU6nTgIvDGiPUfOw6duj7-is5B34vlMqw9w__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 4208d40eea5f0c4944796b7dda96e5ee PDF Text Text LAUREATE DESPAIR A DISCOURSE GIVEN AT SOUTH PLACE CHAPEL DECEMBER nth 1SS1. BY Moncure D. Conway, M.A. LONDON II, SOUTH PLACE FINSBURY. PRICE TWOPENCE. �FREDERICK G. HICKSON & Co. 257, High Holborn, London, W.c. �LAUREATE DESPAIR. T ET me say at once that I am glad the Poet Laureate J—4 has written the poem called “ Despair/’ which I propose to criticise. It is a cry out of the heart of an earnest man; it utters the sorrow with which many people in our time see their old dreams fading, and no new ones rising in their place; and it reminds free­ thinkers that theirs is a heavy responsibility and duty. They have to meet and respond to that need and pain ■which thousands feel where one can give it expression. Men of science and philosophers do not always under­ stand this. The most eminent of them are pursuing ndeals far more beautiful to them than those that have set. They have special knowledge, or special aims, which Kindle into pillars of fire before their enthusiasm, and can Inot see how to those of other studies and pursuits their guiding splendour is a pillar of smoke rising from a fair world slowly consumed. The 'man of science, hourly joccupied with discoveries which blaze upon him, star by fetar, till his reason is as a vault sown with eternal lights, feels that he is in the presence of conceptions beside Which the visions of Dante and Milton are frescoes of a �( 4 ) in his eye a latter-day glory of which history is the pro­ phecy and developed man the fulfilment. Such enthu­ siasms imply continual studies, occupations, duties, which, leave little room for attention to the shadows these lights cast upon the old world of dreams—each shadow a dogma or its phantom. Nevertheless, that world of dreams,, shades, phantoms, is still real to many. It is real not only to the ignorant, whom it terrifies, and to the selfish, whose power rests on it, but to spiritual invalids, whoneed sympathy. And, beyond this reality, the phantasmson which religion and society were'lfounded possess a quasi-reality even for robust minds. You may recall the saying of Madame de Stael, that “ she did not believe in ghosts, but was afraid of them.” After dogmas are dead their ghosts walk the earth; and even some who no longer believe in the ghosts are still afraid of them. When their intellects are no longer haunted their nerves are. There are others, again, for whose vision’or nerves the pleasant dogmas alone survive in this attenuated, ghostly form. They no longer believe in the ghosts, but still love them. Of this class is the literary artist. To the pictorial artist a ruin is more picturesque than the most comfort­ able dwelling. ’Tis said of an eminent art-critic that, being invited to visit America, he replied that he could not think of visiting a country where'there were no ruins. Alfred Tennyson is the consummate artist in poetry. We all know with what tender sentiment Tennyson has �( 5 ) ■' painted the scenery of Arthur’s time, with what felicity described many other reliques of human antiquity. “ His eye will not look upon a bad colour.” He sees ■'® the mouldering ruins in their picturesque aspects, leaving lout of sight the noxious weeds and vermin that infest Anthem. Where these loathsome things appear no man more recoils from them. If the White Ladies of Superstition haunt them, these he admires ; but he impales the gnomes and vampyres. j In this, his latest poem, “ Despair,” he shows a childlike lil simplicity of desire to retain all the pleasant and reject all -f| the unpleasant consequences of the same principles. His Jl attitude is indeed kindlier to the agnostic than to the -J orthodox ; for the first he has lamentation, for the other His denunciation of orthodoxy is bitter. The Tf anathema. r poem is the supposed utterance of a man to his former ffi ■ minister. “ A man and his wife, having lost faith in God u and hope of a life to come, and being utterly miserable in this, resolve to end themselves by drowning. The woman is drowned, but the man is saved by the minister of the sect he had attended.” He has no gratitude for the rf! minister who rescued him, only a curse, attributing to him [fi the first cause of the hopeless horrors amid which the two 01 found themselves. He tells the minister they broke away 111 from Christ because Christ seemed to speak of hell, and 331 so they passed from a cheerless night to a drearier day— rt from horrible belief to total unbelief. Where you bawl'd the dark side of your faith, and a God of eternal rage �( 6 ) Till you flung us back on ourselves, and the human heart, and the Age. But pity that Pagan held it a vice—was in her and in me, Helpless, taking the place of the pitying God that should be I Pity for all that aches in the grasp of an idiot power, And pity for our own selves on an earth that bore not a flower. Again he says : Were there a God, as you say, His Love would have power over hell till it utterly vanish’d away. Ah, yet—I have had some glimmer at times, in my gloomiest woe, Of a God behind all—after all—the Great God, for aught that I know : But the God of Love and of Hell together-they cannot;be™ Jhou?ht: , It there be such a God, may the Great God curse him and bring him to nought! This is what the Poet Laureate thinks of the God of every creed in Christendom, for every creed maintains an eternal hell. But the agnostic, the know-nothing sceptic, is summoned to bear his share in this tragedy of hopelessness and suicide, fl he poet does not suggest that disbelief in a future life or in a Deity would alone lead to suicide. In his imaginary case unbelief is only a factor. The man and wife were in terrible trouble. One of their two sons had died ; the eldest had fled after committing forgery on his own father, bringing him to ruin. It is under such fearful circumstances that, without faith or hope, they sink into despair. The man says : Why should we bear with an hour of torture, a moment of pain, If every man die for ever, if all his griefs are in vain, �( 7 ) And the homeless planet at length will be wheeled thro’ the silence of space, Motherless evermore of an ever-vanishing race ? * * * * * * For these are the new dark ages, you see, of the popular press, When the bat comes out of his cave, and the owls are whooping at noon, And Doubt is the lord of this dunghill, and crows to the sun and moon, Till the Sun and Moon of our science are both of them turned to blood, And Hope will have broken her heart, running after a shadow of good. It is a striking fact, in our sceptical age, that such lamentations as these are not heard from among the poor and the drudges of society. They who are asking whether life be worth living without the old faith in immortality, and they who say it is not, are persons of position and wealth. Any one who has taken the pains to observe the crowds of working people who attend the lectures of secularists, or to read their journals, will know they are cheery enough. We never hear any of them bemoaning the vanished faith. In truth the more important fact is not that the belief in immortality is gone, or the belief in Deity, but that belief in a desirable immortality and a desirable Deity has gone out of the hearts of many. In one of his humourous pieces Lucian, describing his ima­ ginary journey through Hades, says he could recognise those who had been kings or rich people on earth by theii loud lamentations. They had parted with so much. Those who on earth had been poor and wretched were quiet enough. "We may observe similai phenomena in �( 8 ) this psychological Hades, or realm of the Unseen and Unknown, into which modern thought has entered. Those to whom God has allotted palaces, plenty, culture, beauty, can eas ly believe Him a God of Love ,• and it were to them heaven enough to wake from the grave to a continu­ ance of the same. But they who have known hunger, cold, drudgery, ignorance, have no such reason to say God is Love. Such may naturally say, “ If we have waked up in this world in dens of misery, why, under the same providence, may we not wake up to a future of misery ?” The old creeds met that difficulty. They showed a miraculous revelation on the subject, by which God had established an insurance against future misery, an assurance of future luxury. It was all to be super­ natural. By miraculous might poverty was to be changed to wealth, the hovel to a palace, rags to fine raiment, ignorance to knowledge, folly to wisdom, and scarlet sin to snow-pure virtue. Without such tremendous trans­ formations the masses of the miserable could have no interest in immortality. But gradually the comfortable scholarship and theology of our time, in trying to prove a God of nature, have done away with the God of super­ nature. Their deity of design is loaded with all the bad designs under which men suffer. Fifty years ago Carlyle groaned because he could not believe in a Devil any more. Philosophy had reasoned a Devil out of existence. The result was to make the remaining power responsible for all the evils in the world, and ultimately bling him into �( 9 X J loubt and disgrace too. Dismssing the Devil out of faith alias not dismissed evil, the mad work of earthquake, hurriiAane and fire. As we think of the shores with their wrecks, $.s we think of those people in Vienna gathered around the ^harre 1 remains of their families and friends, must we not z.iisk if this is providential work what would be diabolical oivork ? Reason says to Theology, “ At least you can be QKilent, and not malign the spirit of good within us by z'asking us to call that without good which we know to be JIDad ! ” . . P| Similarly theologians in trying to rationalise the idea of S They have tacked it on 1®immortality have naturalised it. ;o evolution. But what the miserable suffer by is evolu­ tion : unless they can be assured of a supernatural change, pf a heaven, they do not want to be evolved any more. . Only a miraculous revelation could promise them that ijBniraculous heaven; and the. only alleged revelation is . Rejected by the culture and the charity of our age. It is n&enied by Culture, because it reveals some impossibilities ; Xy Charity, because it reveals a God capable of torturing Q|Deople more than they are tortured here. What are eight .lihundred people burned swiftly in a theatre compared to ijlnillions burning in hell for ages, if not for ever, as Revelaidkon declares ? Our ?oet Laureate is a man of both iXulture and charity ; he cannot sing pf a revelation which ^Includes Hell, however he may cling to hopes that came Xy the sanae revelation, or mourn at thought of pai ting icKrom a world so fair. �( 10 ) Candour compels us to admit that there is as yet no certainty of a future life for the individual consciousness. The surviving seed of the human organism if it exist has not been discovered. There is nothing unnatural in the theory. It would not be more miraculous to find our­ selves in another world than to find ourselves in this. If two atoms of the primeval nebula, thrown together, had been for one instant capable of speculation, how little could they have imagined a company of men and women gathered to meditate on life and eternity 1 All this is very marvellous if we conceive it contemplated from a point of non-existence. For all we know there are more marvels beyond. But suppose there are none ; suppose death be the end of us; is there any reason for despair ? Even for the man and woman on whom life had brought dire calamities, was there any reason for suicide ? Just the reverse, I should say. Belief that this life was all were reason for making the most of it. Belief that their ruin would not be repaired hereafter were reason for trying torepair it here, as well as they could. Has Tennyson evolved his man and woman out of his inner con­ sciousness ? It is doubtful if in the annals of freethought such a case can be pointed out; though many instances may be shown where believers in a future world slew themselves to get there. Suicide was a mania in some old convents until the church fixed its ' canon 'gainst self­ slaughter.’ �( II ) • However, it may be that instances ofthe kind Tennyson ■describes may occur. We are but on the threshold ofthe age when men are to live and work without certainty of future rewards and payments. The doubts now in the head must presently reach the heart, then influence the hand ; if people have built their houses on the sand of mythology, and they fall, it may be that some will not have the heart to begin new buildings on the rock. What then ? It will be only the continuation of the old law—survival of the fittest. Suicides at least do not live to increase their race. Only those tend to prevail in nature who can 'adapt themselves to the conditions ofnature. If nature has arrived at a period of culture when •supernaturalism passes out of the human faith, then they "who sink into despair or death, on that account, show themselves no longer adapted to nature. There will be a ■survival of those more adapted to the new ideas ; who prefer them ; who do not aspire to live for ever, but have .a heart for any fate, and a religion whose forces and joys are concentrated in the life that now is. If natuie and humanity need such a race for their furtherance, such a race will be produced ; and they will read poems like this “ Despair,” with a curiosity mixed with compassion, wondering how their ancestors could have been troubled, about such a matter. . Something like this has occurred in the past in several instances. While Christians find fullest expression of their joyful emotions in the psalmody and prophecy ofthe �( I2 ) Hebrews they often forget that those glowing hymns say no word about a future life. There is no clear affirmation of immortality in the Old Testament, but much to the contrary. Buddhism also, which has awakened the enthusiasm of a third of a human race, arose as a protest against theism and immortality. In such instances therewould appear to have been reactions against previous, theologies, which had so absorbed mankind in metaphysics and' speculations about the future as to belittle this life and cause neglect of this world. Despised and degraded nature avenged this wrong by making asceticism its own destruction, and worldliness a source of strength and * survival. Some such Nemesis seems to be following the extreme other-worldliness which, for so many Christian centuries, has bestowed the fruits of human toil upon supposed supernatural interests. This earthward swing of the slow pendulum of faith is not likely to be arrested until religion has been thoroughly humanised. As a brave clergyman (Rev. Harry Jones) warned the Church Congress at York, the Church will never conquer Secularism, except by doing more for mankind than Secularism does. We must almost remember that no oscillations of the pendulum between theology and humanity, no reactions, determine the question. As Old Testament Secularism * As it is said in Ecclesiasticus : “ He has also, set worldli­ ness in their heart, which man cannot understand the works that God does, from beginning to end.”—Dr. Kalisch’s Translation. �s i: fi r 'I followed Egyptian Mysticism, Talmudic visions of heaven succeeded. Every ebb alternates with a flow in the tides of human feeling; and these tides are the generations which nature successively creates to fufil successive conditions, and to find their joy in such fufilment, whatever be the despair of the ebbing at faith of the flowing tide. | But, no doubt, these rising and falling ages of speculation :j and religion will show calmer and happier phenomena in h] the future than in the past. There are traces in the earth '>j of tremendous operations in the past, which geology was unable to account for by any forces now acting, i| until Astronomy discovered that the Moon had been steadily receding from the earth, its mother. The moon is now 240,000 miles away, but is proved to have b^en o once only 40,000 miles distant. At that period the tides were to the tides of our time as 216 to 1. This country r 4 and many others must then have been flooded with every if tide, and the enormous geologic results are now understood. There would appear to be some correspondence in id all this with mental and moral phenomena. In religious ‘31 geology also there are traces of convulsions and huge 511 formations which it has been difficult to account for,— at mighty religious wars, massacres, whole races committing I?) slow suicide for the sake of their Gods. Comparative. studies now show that the lunar theology was much nearer of to mankind then than now, and the tides more furious. T1 The extraneous influence is withdrawing more and more. Where theologians used to burn each other they now fight o| combats with pens. Where heretics were massacred they �( U ) are now only visited with dislike. Instead of crusades,, with Richard and Saladin, we have young poets singing on the crest of a sparkling tide, and their elder, from refluent waves, murmuring rhythmic Despair. There isa vast difference between the emotions awakened by belief in a deity near at hand, pressing down upon the life, and those awakened by a hypothetical deity of philosophy or ethics. When men attributed their every hourly hap, good or bad, to the personal favour or to the anger of their deity, their feeling at any supposed affront to their deity, mingled with selfishness and terror, rose to a pitch very different from any now known when few men refer any event to supernatural intervention. Yet do the great movements of the universe go on, the cycles and the periods fufil themselves, the planets roll on new orbits with changed revolutions; and, whatever be the corresponding changes in human opinion, they cannot alter the eternal fact. If immortality be the law of the universe, it will be reached by believers and disbelievers alike. But, could the world be made absolutely certain of it beforehand, by the only means of certainty—scientific proof—what were the advantage ? It would no longer be a miraculous thing promising all a leap from earthly sorrow to heavenly bliss, but merely a law of nature—mere continuance—the millions rising from their graves to go on with existence, just as they will rise from their beds to-morrow. There would be no further note of despair from the Laureates ; but how would it be with the general world ? One of the �! L i s j f ft i 1 > i [• i j t j ! 7 ■ E 3 j el it } a fl a J I most powerful poems of our time has been written by a. French lady, Louise Ackermann. It is entitled “LesMalheueux”—the Unhappy. The last day has come ; the trumpet has sounded. A great angel descends ; uncovers all the graves of the dead, and bids them come forth for everlasting life. Some eagerly come forth, but a large number refuse. To the divine command that they shall emerge, their voice is heard in one utterance. They tell him they have had enough of life in His creation ; they have passed through thorns, and over flinty paths—from agony to agony. To such an existence He called them— they suffered it; and now they will forgive Him only if He will let them rest, and forget that they have lived, Such is the despair with which one half of the world might answer the joy of the other should a mere natural immortality be proved. A great deal of the poetry of the world has invested with glory man’s visions of heaven and heavenly beings. The very greatest poets have invested nature and theearth with glory, and set the pulses of the human heart to music. This has been the greatness of Homer, Shakespeare, Goethe. But the majority have given the world visions of heaven, divine dramas, and hymns of immortality ; and it is these that have been taught to earth’s millions in their infancy. These happy hymns have for ages soothed sorrowing hearts, and helped the masses of mankind to bear the burthens of life—this not only in Christendom, but in so-called Pagan lands and ages.. These have been as the songs of Israfel in Eastern faith. �They said a sweet singer among the angels left heaven to go forth over the suffering world and soothe mortals with his heavenly lyre and his hymns, until all were able to Tear the griefs of life because of the joys beyond, rehearsed by Israfel. But once—while this angel was ^singing with his celestial seven-stringed lyre—one string of it snapped. No one could be found to mend the string -or supply its place; and, every time Israfel tried to make music, it was all jangling discords, through that broken ■string. So Israfel took his flight, and never returned to the world. The tale sounds like a foreboding of what has in these last days befallen the sacred poetry which so long made the world forget its griefs. The lyre of Israfel is the human heart, and the snapped string is its faith in a supernatural heaven. It has been snapped by the development of nature ; it therefore cannot be restored unless by a further development: and so Sacred Poetry has taken its flight from the world—its last great song being of a Paradise Lost. In other words, the hope of immortality has ceased to have power to soothe and uplift those who most needed it, because the recognized reign of law forbids belief that such life—should it come —would be very different from the life that uow is. ■» But there is another story of a broken string, with a •different ending. It comes from Greece (Browning has finely told it in The Two Poets of Croisic), the land of Art and of the Beauty that adorns the earth. It is of a bard who came with his lyre to sing for a prize. He •came with other competitors before the solemn judges. �The others had all sung their poems ; now came our youth, with his. His theme rose high and higher, till at length he came to the great theme of his song—Love. Just then, he felt beneath his finger that one string of his lyre had snapt, a string that presently must do its part, or else his song be put to shame. On, on, his strain went, as if to its death ; but just as he drew near his note’ of Despair, lo, a cricket chirped loud, chimed in with just that needed note ! Saved, he went on, and ever as he returned to this broken string the cricket duly made good the snapt string, and thus the judges missed no note of the music, which won the crown. On the poet’s statue was carved the cricket which contributed from the lowly hearth the needed note in that hymn of Love, when the old string had broken. That tale too, I doubt not, came out of that truest of all poets, the human heart. For the heart of our race is aged in such experiences as those which elicit rhymes of Despair. It has seen beautiful symbols fade in myriads ; symbols of heavens innumerable, every one clung to by suffering Egyptians, Persians, Greeks, as much as any Christian clings to their successors. It has seen troops of bright gods and goddesses perish, nymphs and fairies leaving wood and vale desolate ; and yet, just as its gladdest heart-string has snapt, its faith in heaven given way, some cheery note from the earth has come to remind it of the love near at hand, of the divine joy van­ ished from its ancient heavens only to be revealed at the hearth. A cricket-chirp ! That is all. While our great Laureate �( i8 ) is employing his art to sing of despair, and other poets aspire to ambitious themes, the notes are as yet but few and humble, which cheer man with a trust in the love that is near him. But there are such notes making up for the ■creed’s snapt string. Nor are they near only the happy. The cricket sings from many an overshadowed hearth. It tells the heart to be brave, and never count life lost so long as courage remain. It bids man cease thinking so much about himself—whether he be likely to die next year, or die for ever—and go fall in love with something, an out-self; to dispel morbid meditations. It warns us not to worry over what may never happen, or, if it happen, may be for the best, but turn to make what paradise we can on •earth ; nor admit into it the destroyer of every paradise, ■care about the morrow, or about the far future. All these spiritual despairs are diseases of the imagination. In a sense, it is hereditary disease. For many generations our ancestors employed their imaginations for little else than to realise the charnal-house and picture happiness or horrors beyond it. So their children have inherited a morbid tendency of imagination, whereby they may turn from the happiness they have and make themselves miserable with dreams about its vanishing. Such work of the imagination is illegitimate. Imagination is the brightest angel of the head, as Love is of the heart; they are twin angels and their office is to make life rich and beautiful. And they can so enrich and adorn life, though passed in a hovel, though amid pain, though destined to end for ever, provided they be not dismissed from their �( W ) post of present duty and sent wandering through clouds | to find love’s objects, or digging into graves to find life’s i fountain. I love and admire our Laureate for his great ; heart and his beautiful art, but will not follow his muse, I singing of Despaii, except with a hope that it is his way I of writing its epitaph. I will follow the happy minstrel. [ That poet who shows life to be environed with beauty, I makes deserts blossom in his song, whose poem is a ! fountain of joy for all the living, bringing forgetfulness [to pain, and a sweet lullaby for the dying—that shall be I my poet. And if, among the minstrels of our time, such [happy ones connot be found, because some string of faith [or heart is snapped, then let us listen to the cheery [ cricket, to the voices of children, to the gentle words of affection, to the unbroken song of the merry hearts in nature that remember only its loveliness. We will listen Ito these until the new Poetry shall arise—as arise it will |—with fresh songs, to bid all spirits rejoice in that which to the old brought despair. That is the task of Poetry and Art. Every new thing destroying the old brings (despair; none brought more than Christianity—shatter­ ing the fair gods, and Protestantism—over whose havoc of prayers and pieties Luther’s poor wife wept; but Poetry (and Art did their work, and none now long for restoration |of Aphrodite or Madonna. So also shall our age of iscience find its poets and artists, and our children shall no snore long for a buried faith than we for the holy dolls of jcrumbled altars, whose power to charm has fled. �SOUTH PLACE CHAPEL WORKS TO BE OBTAINED IN THE LIBRARY. BY M. D. CONWAY, M.A. Prices. Demonology and Devil-lore................ .............................£1 3 The Wandering Jew ... ............................. 5 Thomas Carlyle ............................. ............................. 5 The Sacred Anthology : A Book of Ethnical Scriptures ... IO Idols and Ideals ............................ 6 The Earthward Pilgrimage ... ............................ 5 Republican Superstitions ................ ............................ 2 Christianity .... ............................ 1 Human Sacrifices in England ............................ 1 Sterling and Maurice... ............................ 0 Intellectual Suicide ... ................ ............................ 0 The First Love Again ............................ 0 Entering Society ............................. ............................. 0 The Religion of Children ............................. 0 The Criminal’s Ascension ............................ 0 The Religion of Humanity ... ............................ 0 The Rising Generation ............................. 0 A Last Word ............................. 0 Thomas Carlyle ............................ 0 The Oath and its Ethics ................ ............................ .02 BY Mr. FREDERIC “ Pantheism and Cosmic Emotion ”... 4 0 0 0 0 0 6 6 0 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 HARRISON. ............................. 0 2 BY Dr. ANDREW WILSON. The Religious Aspects of Health ............................ 0 2 BY A J. ELLIS, B.A., F.R.S., &c., &c. Salvation ......................................... Truth...................................................... Speculation ......................................... Duty...................................................... The Dyer’s Hand ............................. Comte’s Religion of Humanity ............................ ............................ ............................ ............................ ............................ ............................ 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 2 2 2 2 4 BY W. C. COUPLAND, M.A. ............................. The Conduct of Life ... Hymns and Anthems ................ ................ 0 2 Is., 2s., 3s- REPORT OF THE CONFERENCE OF LIBERAL THINKERS, 1878 ............................................................................... 1 0 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Victorian Blogging Description An account of the resource A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library &amp; Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span> Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Conway Hall Library & Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Conway Hall Ethical Society Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data Pamphlet Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Laureate despair: a discourse given at South Place Chapel December 11th 1881 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Conway, Moncure Daniel [1832-1907.] Description An account of the resource Place of publication: London Collation: 20, [1] p. ; 15 cm. Notes: Part of Morris Miscellaneous Tracts 2. A list of works available from the South Place Chapel Library on back page. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available South Place Chapel Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [1881] Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context G3352 Subject The topic of the resource Poetry Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Laureate despair: a discourse given at South Place Chapel December 11th 1881), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English Alfred Tennyson Belief and Doubt Free Thought Morris Tracts Poetry https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/61c225f14db7d69c523e41b0b2f14833.pdf?Expires=1779926400&Signature=YdT%7ElVfglnnsgLdnFncTiE2bF%7ErTToDf8cqAO%7Ewo-TSRP50iR0LZdAQ1beyAaVH8G8YVYsapSzPChqrXRRRRwnV782TYz3uvIlqR3tnoq5R%7E3F78hwB--3q6o50m2IkzR2cR0EOYv6Rt%7ElcDRUoho-Hu8G1CdDxArkJMulpVGDHqHG-tfD4ODbGCzBnCU31xdy8%7EVoeFIkHAzba17hJf4B4E1gfSAKs0raFjw33mZ2BXUCv4kjRySMcb00rVHHdJcol2Lc5EuMGHl6hNQhImRK4Kz13OHaa5J6%7EBVtYKN6wEtxpi9lqFDZtz%7ERFwyylaNFVMofuh41F6sBhcg6zugw__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM b5c740f851e9acafa466370cdee2723d PDF Text Text ������������������������������������ Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Victorian Blogging Description An account of the resource A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library &amp; Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span> Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Conway Hall Library & Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Conway Hall Ethical Society Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data Pamphlet Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Keble and "The Christian year" Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Shairp, J.C. Description An account of the resource Place of publication: [s.l.] Collation: p. 229-264 ; 22 cm. Notes: Attribution of author and journal title from Wellesley Guide to Victorian Periodicals, 1824-1900. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. From North British Review, no. 6 (September, 1866). The North British Review was a Scottish periodical founded in 1844 to act as the organ of the new Free Church of Scotland. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available [s.n.] Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [1866] Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context CT30 Subject The topic of the resource Poetry Christianity Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Keble and "The Christian year"), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English Christianity Conway Tracts John Keble Poetry https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/995cfdef9fff98f3139dcecedb8abee6.pdf?Expires=1779926400&Signature=XYZDKW16g9UO3V7N9QQ0DBSxt-rul1-SHvlYTny7FQxgJ0ShZr3t%7E%7EWI4pqOY5mukJNRZOz3qWQZ6CC4GrSYrP2%7EtAGwdVFx9uYhxDVqlhBeJTwhn3iguPnPwD%7EpMkHR2pOGl0VLIxfOTYUmInnAq3XcR7hOiyXVpL62vYF98ldwiey20Uc6SXAZopT7LyiuIqfnheKziatNI8bH2n142dB63Bm4QId%7Ee4vj-DHHp-cnCvjj9kAHWoU59VQHtcC3vJGpyeqochs2fVQM2YALZzGf2EldwtWp2oOjsjvSoC99TRLGQ6z0MTT-lD0%7EpxKRYKZN7rx6%7EIUuJvPcr%7EgOuA__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 540dcab72c2b71e6941c9af1d2f09421 PDF Text Text NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY Spoken on Memorable ©ccaoíono W JOHN HEYWOOD, RIDGEFIELD & DEANSGATE, MANCHESTER ii Paternoster Buildings, London. Price Twopence. �The Destroyer of Weeds, Thistles, and Thorns is a Benefactor, 'whether he soweth grain or not. Interpolations are the foundation Stones of every orthodox church. let the Ghosts go. We will worship them no more. Let them cover their eyeless sockets with theirfleshlcss hands, andfade forever from the imaginations of men. Liberty sustains the same relation to Mind that Space does to Matter. To Plough is to Pray, to Plant is to Prophesy, and the Harvest answers andfulfils. �Zbc Ipaet rises before me like a Dream, EXTRACT FROM A SPEECH DELIVERED AT TIIE SOLDIERS’ REUNION AT INDIANAPOLIS, 1876, HE past rises before me like a dream. Again we •L are in the great struggle for national life. We hear the sounds of preparation—the music of boisterous drums—the silver voices of heroic bugles. We see thousands of assemblages, and hear the appeals of orators ; we see the pale cheeks of women, and the flushed faces of men ; and in those assemblages we see all the dead whose dust we have covered with flowers. We lose sight of them no more. We are with them when they enlist in the great army of freedom. We see them part with those they love. Some are walk­ ing for the last time in quiet, woody places, with the maidens they adore. We hear the whisperings and the sweet vows of eternal love as they lingeringly part forever. Others are bending over cradles, kissing babes that are asleep. Some are receiving the bless­ ings of old men. Some are parting with mothers who hold them and press them to their hearts again and again, and say nothing. Kisses and tears, tears and kisses—divine mingling of agony and love ! And �(4) some are talking with wives, and endeavoring with brave words, spoken in the old tones, to drive from their hearts the awful fear. We see them part. We ee the wife standing in the door with the babe in her arms—standing in the sunlight sobbing—at the turn of the road a hand waves—she answers by holding high in her loving arms the child. He is gone, and forever. We see them all as they march away under the flaunting flags, keeping time to the grand, wild music of war—marching down the streets of the great cities— through the towns and across the prairies—down to the fields of glory, to do and to die for the eternal right. We go with them, one and all. We are by their side on all the gory fields—in all the hospitals of pain —on all the weary marches. We stand guard with them in the wild storm and under the quiet stars. We are with them in ravines running with blood—in the furrows of old fields. We are with them between contending hosts, unable to move, wild with thirst, the life ebbing slowly away among the withered leaves. We see them pierced by balls and torn with shells, in the trenches, by forts, and in the whirlwind of the charge, where men become iron, with nerves of steel. We are with them in the prisons of hatred and famine; but human speech can never tell us what they endured. We are at home when the news comes that they are dead. We see the maiden in the shadow of her first sorrow. We see the silvered head of the old man bowed with the last grief. The past rises before us, and we see four millions of human beings governed by the lash—we see them bound hand and foot—we hear the strokes of cruel whips—we see the hounds tracking women through �(5) tangled swamps. We see babes sold from the breasts of mothers. Cruelty unspeakable ! Outrage infinite ! Four million bodies in chains—four million souls in fetters. All the sacred relations of wife, mother, father and child are trampled beneath the brutal feet of might. And all this was done under our own beautiful banner of the free. The past rises before us. We hear the roar and shriek of the bursting shell. The broken fetters fall. These heroes died. We look. Instead of slaves we see men and women and children. The wand of progress touches the auction-block, the slave-pen, the whipping-post, and we see homes and firesides and school-houses and books, and where all was want and crime and cruelty and fear we see the faces of the free. These heroes are dead. They died for liberty— they died for us. They are at rest. They sleep in the land they made free, under the flag they made stainless, under the solemn pines, the sad hemlocks, the tearful willows, and the embracing vines. They sleep beneath the shadows of the clouds, careless alike of sunshine or of storm, each in the windowless palace of Rest. Earth may run red with other wars—they are at peace. In the midst of battle, in the roar of con­ flict, they found the serenity of death. I have one sentiment for soldiers living and dead : Cheers for the living ; tears for the dead. �Ube Volunteer Soldiers of tbe Union Hrmp; “ I ¡’hose Valour and Patriotism gave to the world a Government of the people, by the people, for the people. ” RESPONSE TO THE TOAST AT THE GRAND BANQUET OE THE RE-UNION OF THE ARMY OF THE TENNESSEE, CHICAGO, NOV, I3TH, 1878. HEN the savagery of the lash, the barbarism of the chain, and the insanity of secession con­ fronted the civilisation of our century, the question, “ Will the great Republic defend itself?” trembled on tlie lips of every lover of mankind. The North, filled with intelligence and wealth, products of liberty, mar­ shalled her hosts and asked only for a leader. From civil life a man, silent, thoughtful, poised, and calm, stepped forth, and with the lips of victory voiced the nation’s first and last demand : “ Unconditional and immediate surrender. ” From that moment the end was known. That utterance was the real declaration of real war, and in accordance with the dramatic unities of mighty events, the great soldier who made it received the final sword of the rebellion. The soldiers of therepublic were not seekers after vulgar glory ; they were W �(7) not animated by the hope of plunder or the love of conquest. They fought to preserve the homestead of liberty, and that their children might have peace. They were the defenders of humanity, the destroyers of pre­ judice, the breakers of chains, and in the name of the future they saluted the monsters of their time. They finished what the soldiers of the Revolution commenced. They relighted the torch that fell from their august hands, and filled the world again with light. They blotted from the statute-books the laws that had been passed by hypocrites at the instigation of robbers, and tore with indignant hands from the Constitution that infamous clause that made men the catchers of their fellow-men. They made it possible for judges to be just and statesmen to be human. They broke the shackles from the limbs of slaves, from the souls of masters, and from the Northern brain. They kept our country on the map of the world and our flag in heaven. They rolled the stone from the sepulchre of progress, and found therein two angels clad in shining gar­ ments—nationality and liberty. The soldiers were the saviours of the nation. They were the liberators of man. In writing the proclama­ tion of emancipation, Lincoln, greatest of our mighty dead, whose memory is as gentle as the summer air when reapers sing ’mid gathered sheaves, copied with the pen what Grant and his brave comrades wrote with swords. Grander than the Greek, nobler than the Roman, the soldiers of the Republic, with patriotism as shore­ less as the air, battled for the rights of others, for the nobility of labour; fought that mothers might own their babes, that arrogant idleness should not scar the back of patient toil, that our country should not be a �(8) many-headed monster, made of warring States, but a nation—sovereign, great and free. Blood was water, money was leaves, and life was only common air, until one flag floated over the Repub­ lic without a master and without a slave. Then was asked the question: Will a free people tax themselves to pay the nation’s debt ? The soldiers went home to their waiting wives, to their glad children, and to the girls they loved. They went back to the fields, the shops, and mines. They had not been demoralized. They had been ennobled. They were as honest in peace as they were brave in war. Mocking at poverty, laughing at reverses, they made a friend of toil. They said, “We saved the nation’s life, and what is life with­ out honour ? ” They worked and wrought with all of labour’s royal sons that every pledge the nation gave might be redeemed. And their great leader, having put a shining band of friendship, a girdle of clasped and happy hands around the globe, comes home and finds that every promise made in war has now the ring and gleam of gold. And now let us drink to the volunteers. To those who sleep in unknown, sunken graves ; whose names are only in the hearts of those they loved and left, of those who often hear in happy dreams the footsteps of return. Let us drink to those who died while lipless famine mocked. One to all the maimed whose scars give modesty a tongue, and all who dared and gave to chance the care, the keeping of their lives ; to all the dead ; to Sherman, to Sheridan, and to Grant, the foremost soldier of the world ; and last, to Lincoln, whose loving life, like a bow of peace, spans and arches all the clouds of war. �1776. ^Declaration of Jnbepenbence. ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO OUR FATHERS RETIRED THE GODS FROM POLITICS. T has been a favourite idea with me that our fore­ fathers were educated by Nature; that they grew grand as the continent upon which they landed ; that the great rivers—the wide plains—the splendid lakes —the lonely forests—the sublime mountains—that all these things stole into and became a part of their be­ ing, and they grew great as the country in which they lived. - They began to hate the narrow, contracted views of Europe. They were educated by their sur­ roundings, and every little colony had to be, to a cer­ tain extent, a republic. The kings of the old world endeavoured to parcel out this land to their favourites. But there were too many Indians. There was too much courage required for them to take and keep it, and so men had to come here who were dissatisfied with the old country—who were dissatisfied with Eng­ land, dissatisfied with France, with Germany, with Ireland, and Holland. The king’s favourites stayed at home. Men came here for liberty, and on account of certain principles they entertained and held dearer than life. And they were willing to work, willing to fell the forests, to fight the savages, willing to go through all I �10) the hardships, perils and dangers of a new country, of a new land; and the consequence was that our country was settled by brave and adventurous spirits, by men who had opinions of their own and were willing to live in the wild forests for the sake of expressing those opinions, even if they expressed them only to trees, rocks, and savage men. The best blood of the old world came to the new. These grand men were enthusiasts ; and the world has only been raised by enthusiasts. In every country there have been a few who have given a national aspir­ ation to the people. The enthusiasts of 1776 were the builders and framers of this great and splendid govern­ ment ; and they were the men who saw, although others did not, the golden fringe of the mantle of glory that will finally cover this world. They knew, they felt, they believed that they would give a new constel­ lation to the political heavens—that they would make the Americans a grand people—grand as the continent on which they lived. . Only a few days ago I stood in Independence Hall —in that little room where was signed the immortal paper, A little room, like any other; and it did not seem possible that from that room went forth ideas, like cherubim and seraphim, spreading their wings over a continent, and touching as with holy fire, the hearts of men. In a few minutes I was in the park, where are gath­ ered the accomplishments of a century. Our fathers never dreamed of the things I saw. There were hun­ dreds of locomotives, with their nerves of steel and breath of flame—every kind of machine, with whirling wheels and curious cogs and cranks, and the myriad thoughts of men that have been wrought in iron, brass �(11) and steel. And going out from- one little building were wires in the air, stretching to every civilized na­ tion, and they could send a shining messenger in a moment to any part of the world, and it would go sweeping under the waves of the sea with thoughts and words within its glowing heart. I saw all that had been achieved by this nation, and I wished that the signers of the Declaration—the soldiers of the revolution—could see what a century of freedom has produced. I wished they could see the fields we culti­ vate—the rivers we navigate—the railroads running over the Alleghanies, far into what was then the un­ known forest—on over the broad prairies—on over the vast plains—away over the mountains of the W est, to the Golden Gate of the Pacific. What has made this country- ? I say again, liberty and labour. What would we be without labour ? I want every farmer, when ploughing the rustling corn of June—while mowing in the perfumed fields—to feel that he is adding to the wealth and glory of the United States. I want every mechanic—every man of toil, to know and feel that he is keeping the cars running, the telegraph wires in the air; that he is making the statues and painting the pictures; that he is writing and print­ ing the books ; that he is helping to fill the world with honour, with happiness, with love and law. Our country is founded upon the dignity of labour— upon the equality of man. Ours is the first real repub­ lic in the history of the world. Beneath our flag the people are free. We have retired the gods from po­ litics. We have found that man is the only source of political power, and that the governed should govern. We have disfranchised the aristocrats of the air, and have given one country to mankind. �Ht a brother's (Brave» HON. EBON C. INGERSOLL, DIED AT WASHINGTON, JUNE 2ND, 1879. Y FRIENDS : I am going to do that which the dead often promised he would do for me. The loved and loving brother, husband, father, friend, died where manhood’s morning almost touches noon, and while the shadows still were falling toward the West. He had not passed on life’s highway the stone that marks the highest point, but being weary for a moment he laid down by the wayside, and, using his burden for a pillow, fell into that dreamless sleep that kisses down his eyelids still. While yet in love with life and raptured with the world, he passed to silence and pathetic dust. Yet, after all, it may be best; just in the happiest, sunniest hour of all the voyage, while eager winds are kissing every sail, to dash against the unseen rock, and in an instant hear the billows roar— a sunken ship. For, whether in mid-sea or among the breakers of the farther shore, a wreck must mark at last the end of each and all. And every life, no matter if its every hour is rich with love, and every moment jewelled with a joy, will, at its close, become a tragedy, as sad, and deep, and dark as can be woven of the warp and woof of mystery and death. This brave and tender man in every storm of life was oak and rock, but in the sunshine he was vine and flower. M �(13) He was the friend of all heroic souls. He climbed the heights and left all superstitions far below, while on his forehead fell the golden dawning of a grander day. He loved the beautiful, and was with colour, form and music touched to tears. He sided with the weak, and with a willing hand gave alms ; with loyal heart and with the purest mind he faithfully discharged all public trusts. He was a worshipper of liberty and a friend of the oppressed. A thousand times I have heard him quote the words : “ For justice all place a temple, and all season summer.” He believed that happiness was the only good, reason the only torch, justice the only worshipper, humanity the only religion, and love the priest. He added to the sum of human joy; and were every one for whom he did some loving service to bring a blossom to his grave, he would sleep to-night beneath a wilderness of flowers. Life is a narrow vale between the cold and barren peaks of two eternities. We strive in vain to look beyond the heights. We cry aloud, and the only answer is the echo of our wailing cry. From the voiceless lips of the unreplying dead there comes no word ; but in the night of death hope sees a star, and listening love hears the rustle of a wing. He who sleeps here, when dying, mistaking the ap­ proach of death for the return of health, whispered’with his latest breath, “ I am better now.” Let us believe, in spite of doubts and dogmas and fears and tears, that these dear words are true of all the countless dead. And now, to you, who have been chosen from among the many men he loved to do the last sad office for the dead, we give his sacred dust. Speech cannot contain our love. There was—there is—no gentler, stronger, manlier man. �Whence and Whither, SPOKEN AT THE GRAVE OF A CHILD. JAN. 1882. /T Y FRIENDS : I know how vain it is to gild a ' X grief with words, and yet I wish to take from every grave its fear. Here, in this world, where life and death' are equal kings, all should be brave enough to meet what all the dead have met. The future has been filled with fear, stained and polluted by the heart­ less past. From the wondrous tree of life the buds fall with ripened fruit, and in the common bed of earth the patriarchs and babes sleep side by side. Why should we fear that which will come to all that is ? We cannot tell; we do not know which is the greater bless­ ing—life or death. We cannot say that death is not a good. We do not know whether the grave is the end of this life or the door of another, or whether the night here is not somewhere else a dawn. Neither can we tell which is the more fortunate—the child dying in its mother’s arms, before its lips have learned to form a word, or he who journeys all the length of life’s uneven road, painfully taking the last slow steps with staff and crutch. Every cradle asks us, “ Whence ? ” and every coffin, “ Whither ? ” The poor barbarian, weeping above his dead, can answer these questions as intelligently and K �(15) satisfactorily as the robed priest of the most authentic creed. The tearful ignorance of the one is just as con­ soling as the learned and unmeaning words of the other. No man, standing where the horizon of life has touched a grave, has any right to prophesy a future filled with pain and tears. It may be that death gives all there is of worth to life. If those we press and strain against our hearts could never die, perhaps that love would wither from the earth. May be this com­ mon fate treads from out the paths between our hearts the weeds of selfishness and hate, and I had rather live and love where death is king than have eternal life where love is not. Another life is naught unless we know and love again the ones who love us here. They who’stand here with breaking hearts around this little grave need have no fear. The larger and nobler faith in all that is and is to be, tells us that death, even at its worst, is only perfect rest. We know that through the common wants of life—the needs and duties of each hour—their grief will lessen day by day, until this grave will be to them a place of rest and peace—almost of joy. There is for them this consolation: the dead do not suffer. If they live again, their lives will surely be as good as ours. We have no fear. We are all children of the same mother, and the same fate awaits us all. We, too, have our religion, and it is this: Help for the living— Hope for the dead. �Ube ZJlbost IRematbable discourses ot tbe da&. BY COL. ROBERT G. INGERSOLL, America's Greatest Orator. MISTAKES OF MOSES....................................... 3^ GODS; PAST AND PRESENT........................... id GREAT INFIDELS..................................................id SALVATION; HERE AND HEREAFTER....id SPIRIT OF THE AGE, or, modern thinkers...id COL. INGERSOLL AT HOME........................... id REPLY TO TALMAGE......................................... 2d PROSE POEMS......................................................... 2d HELL........................................................................... 2d ------------------ —COO----------------— Also a limited number of Copies, Handsome Edition, 64 pages, Price Sixpence. Ube (Sboets, FUwo studies in ^Biblical Rumour, BY D. M. BENNETT, Editor of the New-York “ Truthseeker.” THE GREAT WRESTLING MATCH.............. id DIVINE PYROTECHNY...................................... id '• fo. TRADE SUPPLIED BY JOHN KEYWOOD, Ridgefield & Deansgate, Manchester. 11 Paternoster Buildpngs, London. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Victorian Blogging Description An account of the resource A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library &amp; Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span> Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Conway Hall Library & Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Conway Hall Ethical Society Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data Pamphlet Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Prose poems : spoken on memorable occasions Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Ingersoll, Robert Green [1833-1899] Description An account of the resource Place of publication: Manchester; London Collation: 15 p. ; 18 cm. Notes: This ed. not listed by Stein, but cf his Item 314. Contents: The past rises before me like a dream (extract from a speech delivered at the Soldiers' Reunion at Indianapolis, 1876) -- The Volunteer soldiers of the Union army (response to the toast at the grand banquet of the re-union of the Army of the Tennessee, Chicago, Nov. 13th, 1878) -- 1776 Declaration of Independence --At a brother's grave (Hon. Eron C. Ingersoll. Died at Washington, June 2nd, 1879) -- Whence and whither (spoken at the grave of a child. Jan. 1882). Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available John Heywood, Ridgefield & Deansgate Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [n.d.] Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context N386 Subject The topic of the resource Poetry Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Prose poems : spoken on memorable occasions), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English NSS Poetry Speeches https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/16d13d808ea179b946d3f78bf31c91f1.pdf?Expires=1779926400&Signature=QSdmMV4ai%7Eam9xFNZo20Z8tuhkWIc9ixJycPMKWZpcNR2%7EEGuXHhIQ1c9L%7Ea6IPx9iKdvSWW2-BxFUGeR-A1EqrUhTNncDbGeJQIO0kGnggQntK8RQHjHzZdT%7EB8wWb8LvwQ6UqghJ%7EOtUAv6YZmH5wKj04B58wUhoBRdwAEBzmbXEzgrC1ECL7ZZRpSb9z4q51R5y3I1inezgQp8VCY8OaWb%7EAl25Chrx8aFf5rBjZaCt1SYac9hAiuEKdGcT4CkXvEFDzGm-ChCRqd4gihanqnpdCWznxVKxlp7U5WWLuyrUHN4c5oBljHAAZE5b0A4mI9-NPIfka4-7sOFMdhpw__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 165988dbce21eb09b628c864420be1bd PDF Text Text NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY “_________________ -^££0 I WREATHE THE LIVING BROWS. I ORATION ON BY COL. ROBERT G. INGERSOLL. Price Threepence. ■ * ^onbon: i PROGRESSIVE PUBLISHING COMPANY,! 28 Stonecutter Street, E.C. OL 1890. 2 ��# i2 I Hi'S 8*2 WREATHE THE LIVING- BROWS. AN ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN BY COL. ROBERT G. INGERSOLL. LONDON: PROGRESSIVE PUBLISHING COMPANY, 28 Stonecutter Street, E.O. 1890. �INTRODUCTION. The following oration by Colonel Ingersoll was delivered in the Horticultural Hall, New York, on October 21, 1890. Although the object of the meeting was to raise a testimonial for Walt Whitman in his old age, several halls had been refused, the proprietors and lessees being too bigoted to allow the greatest orator in the United States to enter their doors. Walt Whatman sat in an easy wheeled chair on the platform. Before the crowded assembly broke up he spoke the following characteristic words :— “ Only a word, my friends, only a word. After all, the main factor, my friends, is in meeting, being face to face and meeting like this. I thought I would like to come forward with my living voice and thank you for coming and thank Robert Ingersoll for speaking, and that is about all. With such brief thanks to you and him and showing myself to bear testimony—I think that is the Quaker term—face to face, I bid you all hail and farewell.” �AN ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. I. In the year 1855 the American people knew but little of books. Their ideals, their models, were English. Young and Pollok, Addison and Watts were regarded as great poets. Some of the more reckless read Thom­ son’ s Seasons and the poems and novels of Sir Walter Scott. A few, not quite orthodox, delighted in the mechanical monotony of Pope, and the really wicked __those lost to all religious shame—were worshippers of Shakespeare. The really orthodox Protestant, un­ troubled by doubts, considered Milton the greatest poet of them all. Byron and Shelley were hardly respect­ able—not to be read by young persons. It was admitted on all hands that Burns was a child of nature of whom his mother was ashamed and proud. In the blessed year aforesaid, candor, free and sincere speech, were under the ban. Creeds at that time were entrenched behind statutes, prejudice, custom, ignor­ ance, stupidity, Puritanism and slavery ; that is to say, slavery of mind and body. Of course it always has been, and for ever, will be, impossible for slavery, or any kind or form of injustice, to produce a great poet. There are hundreds of verse makers and writers on the side of wrong—enemies of progress—-but they are not poets, they are not men of genius. ,. At this time a young man—he to whom tins testi­ monial is given—he upon whose head have fallen the snows of more than seventy winters—this man, born within the sound of the sea, gave to the world a book, Leaves of Grass. This book was, and is, the true transcript of a soul. The man is unmasked. No drapery of hypocrisy, no pretence, no fear. The book was as original in form as in thought. All customs �4 ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. were forgotten or disregarded, all rules broken—nothing mechanical—no imitation—spontaneous, running and winding like a river, multitudinous in its thoughts as the waves of the sea—nothing mathematical or measured. In everything a touch of chaos—lacking what is called form as clouds lack form, but not lacking the splendor of sunrise or the glory of sunset. It was a marvellous collection and aggregation of fragments, hints, suggestions, memories and prophecies, weeds and flowers, clouds and clods, sights and sounds, emotions and passions, waves, shadows and constellations. His book was received by many with disdain, with horror, with indignation and protest—by the few as a marvellous, almost miraculous, message to the world— full of thought, philosophy, poetry and music. In the republic of mediocrity genius is dangerous. A great soul appears and fills the world with new and marvellous harmonies. In his words is the old Pro­ methean flame. The heart of nature beats and throbs in his line. The respectable prudes and pedagogues sound the alarm, and cry, or rather screech : “ Is this a book for a young person ?” A poem true to life as a Greek statue—candid as nature—fills these barren souls with fear. Drapery about the perfect was suggested by im­ modesty. The provincial prudes, and others of like mould, pretend that love is a duty rather than a passion—a kind of self-denial—not an overmastering joy. They preach the gospel of pretence and pantalettes. In the presence of sincerity, of truth, they cast down their eyes and endeavor to feel immodest. To them the most beautiful thing is hypocrisy adorned with a blush. . They have no idea of an honest, pure passion, glorying in its strength—intense, intoxicated with the beautiful—giving even to inanimate things pulse and motion, and that transfigures, ennobles and idealises the object of its adoration. They do not walk the streets of the city of life— they explore the sewers ; they stand in the gutters and cry “ Unclean !” They pretend that beauty is a snare ; that love is a Delilah ; that the highway of joy is the �ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. 5 broad road, lined with flowers and filled with perfume, leading to the city of eternal sorrow. Since the year 1855 the American people have de­ veloped ; they are somewhat acquainted with the litera­ ture of the world. They have witnessed the most tremendous of revolutions, not only upon the fields of battle, but in the world of thought. The American citizen has concluded that it is hardly worth while being a sovereign unless he has the right to think for himself. And now, from this height, with the vantage-ground of to-day, I propose to examine this book and to state, in a general way, what Walt Whitman has done, what he has accomplished, and the place he has won in the world of thought. II. THE RELIGION OF THE BODY. Walt Whitman stood, when he published his book, where all stand to-night—on the perpetually moving line where history ends and prophecy begins. He was full of life to the very tips of his fingers—brave, eager, candid, joyous with health. He was acquainted with the past. He knew something of song and story, of philosophy and art—much of the heroic dead, of brave suffering, of the thoughts of men, the habits of the peOple_rich as well as poor—familiar with labor, a friend of wind and wave, touched by love and friend­ ship—liking the open road, enjoying the fields and paths, the crags—friend of the forest—feeling that he was free—neither master nor slave—willing that all should know his thoughts—open as the sky, candid as nature—and he gave his thoughts, his dreams, his con­ clusions, his hopes, and his mental portrait to his fellow-men. Walt Whitman announced the gospel of the body. He confronted the people. He denied the depravity of man. He insisted that love is not a crime ; that men and women should be proudly natural; that they need not grovel on the earth and cover their faces for shame. �6 ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. He taught the dignity and glory of the father and mother ; the sacredness of maternity. Maternity, tender and pure as the tear of pity, holy as suffering—the crown, the flower, the ecstasy of love. People had been taught from Bibles and from creeds that maternity was a kind of crime ; that the woman should be purified by some ceremony in some temple built in honor of some god. This barbarism was attacked in Leaves of Grass. The glory of simple life was sung ; a declaration of independence was made for each and all. And yet this appeal to manhood and to womanhood was misunderstood. It was denounced simply because it was in harmony with the great trend of nature. To me, the most obscene word in our language is celibacy. It was not the fashion for people to speak or write their thoughts. We were flooded with the literature of hypocrisy. The writers did not faithfully describe the worlds in which they lived. They endeavored to make a fashionable world. They pretended that the cottage or the hut in which they dwelt was a palace, and they called the little area in which they threw their slops their domain, their realm, their empire. They were ashamed of the real, of what their world actually was. They imitated ; that is to say, they told lies, and these lies filled the literature of most lands. Walt Whitman defended the sacredness of love, the purity of passion—the passion that builds every home and fills the world with art and song. They cried out: “ He is a defender of passion— he is a libertine ! He lives in the mire. He lacks spirituality !” Whoever differs with the multitude, especially with a led multitude—that is to say, with a multitude of taggers—will find out from their leaders that he has committed an unpardonable sin. It is a crime to travel a road of your own, especially if you put up guide-boards for the information of others. Many centuries ago Epicurus, the greatest man of his century, and of many centuries before and after, said : “ Happiness is the only good : happiness is the �ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. 7 supreme end.” This man was temperate, frugal, generous, noble—and yet through all these years he has been denounced by the hypocrites of the world as a mere eater and drinker. It was said that Whitman had exaggerated the importance of love—that he had made too much of this passion. Let me say that no poet—not excepting Shakespeare—has had imagination enough to exagge­ rate the importance of human love—a passion that contains all heights and all depths—ample as space, with a sky in which glitter all constellations, and that has within it all storms, all lightnings, all wrecks and ruins, all griefs, all sorrows, all shadows, and all the joy and sunshine of which the heart and brain are capable. No writer must be measured by a word or line or paragraph. He is to be measured by his work—by the tendency, not of one line, but by the tendency of all. Which way does the great stream tend ? Is it for good or evil ? Are the motives high and noble, or low and infamous ? We cannot measure Shakespeare by a few lines, neither can we measure the Bible by a few chapters, nor Leaves of Grass by a few paragraphs. In each there are many things that I neither approve nor believe—but in all books you will find a mingling of wisdom and foolishness, of prophecies and mistakes— in other words, among the excellencies there will be defects. The mine is not all gold, or all silver, or all diamonds—there are baser metals. The trees of the forest are not all of one size. On some of the highest there are dead and useless limbs, and and there may be growing beneath the bushes, weeds, and now and then a poisonous vine. If I were to edit the great books of the world, I might leave out some lines and I might leave out the best. I have no right to make of my brain a sieve and say that only that which passes through belongs to the rest of the human race. I claim the right to choose. I give that right to all. Walt Whitman had the courage to express his �8 OKATION ON WALT WHITMAN. thought—the candor to tell the truth. And here let me say it gives me joy—a kind of perfect satisfaction —to look above the bigoted bats, the satisfied owls and wrens and chickadees, and see the great eagle poised, circling higher and higher, unconscious of their exist­ ence. And it gives me joy, a kind of perfect satisfaction, to look above the petty passions and jealousies of small and respectable people—above the considerations of place and power and reputation, and see a brave, intrepid man. It must be remembered that the American people had separated from the Old World—that we had declared not only the independence of colonies, but the independence of the individual. We had done more—we had declared that the State could no longer be ruled by the Church, and that the Church could not be ruled by the State, and that the individual could not be ruled by the Church. These declarations were in danger of being forgotten. We needed a new voice, sonorous, loud, and clear, a new poet for America for the new epoch, somebody to chant the morning song of the new day. The great man who gives a true transcript of his mind, fascinates and instructs. Most writers suppress individuality. They wish to please the public. They flatter the stupid and pander to the prejudice of their readers. They write for the market—making books as other mechanics make shoes. They have no message—they bear no torch—they are simply the slaves of customers. The books they manufacture are handled by “ the trade ” ; they are regarded as harmless. The pulpit does not object ; the young person can read the monotonous pages without a blush—or a thought. On the title-pages of these books you will find the im­ print of the great publishers—on the rest of the pages, nothing. These books might be prescribed for insomnia. III. Men of talent, men of business, touch life upon few sides. They travel but the beaten path. The creative spirit is not in them. They regard with suspicion a poet who touches life on every side. They have little �ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. 9 confidence in that divine thing called sympathy, and they do not and cannot understand the man who enters into the hopes, the aims, and the feelings of all others. In all genius there is the touch of chaos—a little of the vagabond ; and the successful tradesman, the man who buys and sells, or manages a bank, does not care to deal with a person who has only poems for collaterals —they have a little fear of such people, and _ regard them as the awkward country man does a sleight-ofhand performer. In every age in which books have been produced the governing class, the respectable, have been opposed to the works of real genius. If what are known as. the best people could have their way, if the pulpit had been consulted—the provincial moralists — the works . of Shakespeare would have been suppressed. Not a line would have reached our time. And the same may be said of every dramatist of his age. If the Scotch Kirk could have decided, nothing would have been known of Robert Burns. If the good people, the orthodox, could have had their say, not one line of Voltaire would now be known. All the plates of the French Encyclopedia would have been destroyed with the thousands that were destroyed. Nothing would have been known of D’Alembert, Grimm, Diderot, or any of the Titans who warred against the thrones and altars and laid the foundation of modern literature not only, but what is of far greater moment, universal education. It is not too much to say that every book now held in high esteem would have been destroyed, if those in authority could have had their will. Every book of modern times, that has a real value, that has enlarged the intellectual horizon of mankind, that has de­ veloped the brain, that has furnished real food for thought, can be found in the Index Expurgatorius of the Papacy, and nearly every one has been commended to the free minds of men by the denunciations of Protestants. If the guardians of society, the protectors of “ young persons,” could have had their way, we should have known nothing of Byron or Shelley. The voices that �10 ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. thrill the world would now be silent. If authority could have had its way, the world would have been as ignorant now as it was when our ancestors lived in holes or hung from dead limbs by their prehensile tails. But we are not forced to go very far back. If Shake­ speare had been published for the first time now, those divine plays, greater than continents and seas, greater even than the constellations of the midnight sky— would be excluded from the mails by the decision of the present enlightened postmaster-general. The poets have always lived in an ideal world, and that ideal world has always been far better than the real world. As a consequence, they have forever roused, not simply the imagination, but the energies— the enthusiasm of the human race. The great poets have been on the side of the oppressed —of the downtrodden. They have suffered with the imprisoned and the enslaved, and whenever and wherever man has suffered for the right, wherever the hero has been stricken down—whether on field or scaffold—some man of genius has walked by his side, and some poet has given form and expression, not simply to his deeds, but to his aspirations. From the Greek and Roman world we still hear the voices of a few. The poets, the philosophers, the artists, and the orators still speak. Countless millions have been covered by the waves of oblivion, but the few who uttered the elemental truths, who had sympathy for the whole human race, and who were great enough to prophesy a grander day, are as alive to-night as when they roused, by their bodily presence, by their living voices, by their works of art, the enthusiasm of their fellow men. Think of the respectable people, of the men of wealth and position, those who dwelt in mansions, children of success, who went down to the grave voiceless, and whose names we do not know. Think of the vast multitudes, the endless processions, that entered the caverns of eternal light—leaving no thought—no truth as a legacy to mankind ! The great poets have| sympathised; with the people. �ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN, 11 They have uttered in all ages the human cry. Un­ bought by gold, unawed by power, they have lifted high the torch that illuminates the world'. IV. Walt Whitman is in the highest sense a believer in democracy. He knows that there is but one excuse for government—the preservation of liberty ; to the end that man may be happy. He knows that there is but one excuse for any institution, secular and religious —the preservation of liberty ; and there is but one ex­ cuse for schools, for universal education, for the ascer­ tainment of facts, namely, the preservation of liberty. He resents the arrogance and cruelty of power. He has sworn never to be tyrant or slave. He has solemnly declared : I speak the password primeval—I give the’sign of democracy. By God! I will accept nothing which all cannot have their counterpart of on the same terms. This one declaration covers the entire ground. It is a declaration of independence, and it is also a declara­ tion of justice, that is to say, a declaration of the independence of the individual, and a declaration that all shall be free. The man who has this spirit can truthfully say : I have taken off my hat to nothing known or unknown, I swear I am for those that have never been mastered. There is in Whitman what he calls “ The boundless impatience of restraint ”—together with that sense of justice which compelled him to say “Neithera servant nor a master, am I.” He was wise enough to know that giving others the same rights that he claims for himself could not harm him, and he was great enough to say: “ As if it were not indispensable to my own rights that others possess the same.” He felt as all should feel, that the liberty of no man is safe unless the liberty of each is safe. There is in our country a little of the old servile spirit a little of the bowing and cringing to others. Many �12 ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. Americans do not understand that the officers of the government are simply the servants of the people. Nothing is so demoralising as the worship of place. Whitman has reminded the people of this countay that they are supreme, and he has said to them : The President is there in the White House for you—it is not you who are here for him. The Secretaries act in their bureaus for you—not you here for them. All doctrines, all politics and civilisation exurge from you. All sculpture and monuments and anything inscribed any­ where are tallied in you. He describes the ideal American citizen—the one Who says, indifferently and alike, “ How are you friend?” to the President at his levee. And he says, “ Good day, my brother,” to the slave that hoes in the sugar field. Long ago, when the politicians were wrong, when the judges were subservient, when the pulpit was coward, Walt Whitman shouted: Man shall not hold property in man. The least developed person on earth is just as important and to himself or herself as the most developed person is to himself or herself. • This is the very soul of true democracy. Beauty is not all there is of poetry. It must contain the truth. It is not simply an oak, rude and grand, neither is it simply a vine. It is both. Around the oak of truth runs the vine of beauty. Walt Whitman utters the elemental truths and is the poet of democracy. He is also the poet of individuality. V. INDIVIDUALITY. In order to protect the liberties of a nation, we must protect the individual. A democracy is a nation of free individuals. The individuals are not to be sacri­ ficed to the nation. The nation exists only for the pur­ �ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. 13 pose of guarding and protecting the individuality of men and women. Walt Whitman has told us that : » The whole theory of the universe is directed to one single individual—namely to you.” And he has also told us that the greatest city—the greatest nation—is “ where the citizen is the head and the ideal.” And that The greatest city is that which has the greatest man. or woman. ... . . If it be but a few ragged huts, it is still the greatest city m the whole world. By this test, maybe the greatest city on the continent to-night is Camden. This poet has asked of us this question : What do you suppose will satisfy the soul, except to walk free and own no superior ? The man who asks this question has leftyio impress of his lips in the dust, and has no dirt upon his knees. He carries the idea of individuality to its utmost height: What do you suppose I have intimated to you in a hundred ways But that man or woman is as good as God ? And that there is no God any more divine than yourself ? Glorying in individuality, in the freedom of the soul, he cries out: Oh, the joy of suffering ! To struggle against great odds ; To meet enemies undaunted ; To be entirely alone with them—to find out how much I can stand; To look strife, torture, prison, popular odium, death, face to face; £ •,, To mount the scaffold—to advance to the muzzle of guns with perfect nonchalance— To be indeed a god. Walt Whitman is willing to stand alone. sufficient unto himself, and he says : He is �14 ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. Henceforth I ask not good fortune—I am good fortune. Strong and content I travel the open road. I am one of those who look carelessly into faces of Presidents and Governors as to say, “ Who are you P” And not only this, but he has the courage to say, “ Nothing—not God—is greater to one than oneself.’’’ Walt Whitman is the poet of Individuality, the defender of the rights of each for the sake of all—and his sympathies are as wide as the world. He is the defender of the whole race. VI. HUMANITY. The great poet is intensely human—infinitely sym­ pathetic-entering into the joys and griefs of others, bearing their burdens, knowing their sorrows. Brain without heart is not much; they must act together. When the respectable people of the North, the rich, the successful, were willing to carry out the Fugitive Slave Law, Walt Whitman said : I am the wounded slave—I wince at the bite of the dogs. Hell and despair are upon me—“ Crack,” and again “ crack ” the marksmen; ’ I clutch the rails of the fence—my blood drips, thinned with the ooze of my skin ; I fall on the weeds and stones; The riders spur their unwilling horses—haul close ; Taunt my dizzy ears and beat me with the butts of their whips. Agonies are one of my changes of garment. I do not ask the wounded person how he feels. I, myself, become the wounded person. ’ I see myself in prison shaped like another man ; And feel the dull unintermitted pain. For me the keepers of convicts shoulder their carbines and keep watch. It is I, let out in the morning and barred at night Not a prisoner walks handcuffed to the jail but I am hand­ cuffed to him and walk by his side. Judge not as the judge judges, but as the sun falling upon a helpless thing. �ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. 15 Of the very worst he had the infinite tenderness to say : “ Not until the sun excludes you will I exclude In this age of greed, when houses and lands, and stocks and bonds, outrank human life ; when gold is more of value than blood, these words should be read by all : When, the psalm sings, instead of the singer; When the script preaches, instead of the preacher; When the pulpit descends and goes, instead of the carver that carved the supporting desk; When I can touch the body of books, by night or by day, and when they touch my body back again; When the holy vessels, or the bits of Eucharist, or lath and plast procreate as effectually as the young silversmiths or bakers or the masons in their overalls; When the university convinces like a slumbering woman and child convince; When the minted gold in the vault smiles like the night watchman’s daughter; When warranty deeds loaf in chairs opposite, and are my friendly companions; I intend to reach them my hand and make as much of them as I do of men and women like you! VII. The poet is also a painter, a sculptor—he, too, deals in form and color. The great poet is of necessity a great artist. With a few words he creates pictures, filling his canvas with living men and women—with those who feel and speak. Have you ever read the account of the stage driver’s funeral ? Let me. read it: Cold dash of waves at the ferry wharf—posh of ice in the river—half-frozen mud in the street—a gray discouraged sky overhead—short-lasting daylight of twelfth month. A hearse and stages—other vehicles give place—the funeral of an old Broadway stage-driver—the cortege mostly drivers. Steady the trot to the cemetery—duly rattles the deathbell—the gate is passed—the new-dug grave is hollowed out —the living alight—the hearse uncloses. The coffin is passed out—lowered and settled—the whip is laid on the coffin—the earth is softly shoveled in. The mound above is flattened with the spades. �16 ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. Silence : and among them no one moves or speaks. It is done. He is decently laid away. Is there anything more ? He was a good fellow—free mouthed—quick tempered— not bad looking—able to take his own part—witty—sensitive to a slight—ready with life or death foi’ a friend—fond of women—gambled—ate hearty—drank hearty—had known what it was to be flush—grew low spirited toward the lastsickened—was helped by a contribution—died aged forty-one years—and that was his funeral. Let me read you another description—one of a woman: Behold a woman ! She looks out from her Quaker cap, her face is clear and. more beautiful than the sky. She sits in an arm-chair under the shaded porch of the farm-house. The sun just shines on her old, white head. Her ample gown is of cream-hued linen. Her grandsons raised the flax and her granddaughters spun, it with the distaff and the wheel. The melodious charactei’ of the earth. The finished—beyond which philosophy cannot go and does not wish to go. The justified mother of men. Would you hear of an old-time sea fight ? Would you learn who won by the light of the moon and stars ? List to the yarn as my grandmother’s father, the sailor, told it to me : Our foe was no skulk in his ship, I tell you, said he. His was the surly English pluck, and there is no tougher or truer, and never was and never will be. Long the lower eve he came, horribly raking us. We closed with him; the yards entangled, the cannon touched. My captain lashed fast with his own hands. We had received some eighteen pound shots under the water, and on our lower gun deck two large pieces had burst at the first fire, killing all around and blowing up overhead. Fighting at sundown; fighting at dark. Ten o’clock at night; the full moon well up; our leaks on the gain; five feet of water reported. The master-at-arms loosing the prisoners confined in the hold to give them a chance for themselves. �17 ORATION WALT WHITMAN. The transit to and from the magazine is now stopped by the sentinels. They see so many strange faces they do not know whom to trust. Our frigate takes fire. The other asks if we demand quarter, If our colors are struck and the fighting done. Now I laugh content, for I hear the voice of my little Captain, “ We have not struck,” he composedly cries, “ we have just begun our part of the fighting.” Only three guns in use. One is directed by the Captain himself against the enemy’s mainmast. Two, well served with grape and canister, silences his mus­ ketry and clears his decks. The taps alone second the fire of his little battery, especially the maintop. They hold out bravely during the whole of the action, Not a moment’s cease. The leaks gain fast on the pumps, the fire eats toward the powder magazine; one of the pumps has been shot away; it is thought we are sinking. Serene stands the little Captain, He is not hurried; his voice neither high nor low. His eyes give more light to us than our battle lanterns. Toward twelve, there in the beams of the moon, they sur­ render to us. Stretched and still lies the midnight, Two great hulks motionless on the breast of the darkness, Our vessel riddled and slowly sinking, preparations to pass to the one we have conquered. The captain on the quarter-deck coolly giving his orders through a countenance white as a sheet; Near by, the corpse of the child that served in the cabin; The dead face of an old salt, with long white hair and care­ fully curled whiskers. The flames, spite of all that can be done, flecked aloft and below, The husky voices of the two officers yet fit for duty. Formless stacks of bodies and bodies by themselves, dabs of flesh upon the masts and spars; Cut of cordage, tangle of rigging, slight shock of the sooth of waves; Black and impassive guns, litter of powder parcels, strong scent. A few large stars overhead, silent and mournful, shining; delicate sniffs of sea breeze, smells of sedge grass and fields by the shore; death messages given in charge to survivors. B �18 ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. The hiss of the surgeon’s knife, the gnawing teeth of his saw, Wheeze, cluck, swash of falling blood, short, wild scream, long, dull, tapering groan. Some people say that this is not poetry—that it lacks measure and rhyme. VIII. WHAT IS POETRY ? The whole world is engaged in the invisible com­ merce of thought. That is to say, in the exchange of thoughts by words, symbols, sounds, colors and forms. The motions of the silent, invisible world, where feeling glows and thought flames—that contains all seeds of action—are made known only by sounds and colors, forms, objects, relations, uses and qualities—so that the visible universe is a dictionary, an aggregation of symbols, by which and through which is carried on the invisible commerce of thought. Each object is capable of many meanings, or of being used in many ways to convey ideas or states of feeling or of facts that take place in the world of the brain. The greatest poet is the one who selects the best, the most appropriate symbols to convey the best, the highest, the sublimest thoughts. Each man occupies a world of his own. He is the only citizen of his world. He is subject and sovereign, and the best he can do is to give the facts concerning the world in which he lives to the citizens of other worlds. No two of these worlds are alike. They are of all kinds, from the flat, barren and uninteresting—from the small and shrivelled and worthless—to those whose rivers and mountains and seas and constellations belittle and cheapen the visible world. The inhabitants of these marvellous worlds have been the singers of songs, utterers of great speech—the creators of art. And here lies the difference between creators and imitators : the creator tells what passes in his own world—thé imitator does not. The imitator abdicates, and by the fact of imitation falls upon his knees. He is like one who, hearing a traveller talk, pretends to others that he has travelled. �ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. 19 In nearly all lands, the poet has been privileged—for the sake of beanty, they have allowed him to speak, and for that reason he has told the story of the oppressed, and has excited the indignation of honest men and even the pity of tyrants. He, above all others, has added to the intellectual beauty of the world. He has been the true creator of language, and has left his impress on mankind. What I have said is not only true of poetry—it is true of all speech. All are compelled to use the visible world as a dictionary. Words have been invented and are being invented—for the reason that new powers are found in the old symbols, new qualities, relations, uses, and meanings. The growth of language is necessary on account of the development of the human mind. The savage needs but few symbols—the civil­ ised many—the poet most of all. The old idea was, however, that the poet must be a rhymer. Before printing was known, it was said : the rhyme assists the memory. That excuse no longer exists. Is rhyme a necessary part of poetry ? In my judgment, rhyme is a hindrance to expression. The rhymer is compelled to wander from his subject—to say more or less than hemeans—to introduce irrelevant matter that interferes continually with the dramatic action and is a perpetual obstruction to sincere utterance. All poems, of necessity, must be short. The highly and purely poetic is the sudden bursting into blossom of a great and tender thought. The planting of the seed, the growth, the bud and flower must be rapid. The spring must be quick and warm—the soil perfect, the sunshine and rain enough—everything should tend to hasten, nothing to delay. In poetry, as in wit, the crystallisation must be sudden. , The greatest poems are rhythmical. While rhyme is a hindrance, rhythm seems to be the comrade of the poetic. Rhythm has a natural foundation. Under emotion, the blood rises and falls, the muscles contract and relax, and this action of the blood is as rhythmical as the rise and fall of the sea. In the highest form of expression, the thought should be in harmony with this natural ebb and flow. �20 ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. The highest poetic truth is expressed in rhythmical form. I have sometimes thought that an idea selects its own words, chooses its own garments, and that when the thought has possession, absolutely, of the speaker or writer, he unconsciously allows the thought to clothe itself. The great poetry of the world keeps time with the winds and the waves. I do not mean by rhythm a recurring accent at accurately measured intervals. Perfect time is the death of music. There should always be room for eager haste and delicious delay, and whatever change there may be in the rhythm or time, the action itself should suggest perfect freedom. A word more about rhythm. I believe that certain feelings and passions—joy, grief, emulation, revenge, produce certain molecular movements in the brain—• that every thought is accompanied by certain physical phenomena. Now it may be that certain sounds, colors, and forms produce the same molecular action in the brain that accompanies certain feelings, and that these sounds, colors, and forms produce first, the molecular movements, and these in their turn reproduce the feel­ ings in motions and states of mind capable of producing the same or like molecular movements. So that what we call heroic music, produces the same molecular action in the brain — the same physical changes — that are produced by the real feeling of heroism ; that the sounds we call plaintive produce the same molecular movement in the brain that grief, or the twilight of grief, actually produces. There may be a rhythmical molecular movement belonging to each state of mind, that accompanies each thought or passion, and it may be that music, or paint­ ing, or sculpture, produces the same state of mind or feeling that produces the music or painting or sculp­ ture, by producing the same molecular movements. All arts are born of the same spirit, and express like thoughts in different ways—that is to say, they produce like states of mind and feeling. The sculptor, the painter, the composer, the poet, the orator, work to the same end, with different materials. The painter �ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. 21 expresses through form and color and relation ; the sculptor through form and relation. The poet also paints and chisels—his words give form, relation, and color. His statues and his paintings do not crumble, neither do they fade, nor will they as long as language endures. The composer touches the passions, produces the very states of feeling produced by the painter and' sculptor, and poet and orator. In all these there must be rhythm—that is to say, proportion—that is to say, harmony, melody. So that the greatest poet is the one who idealizes the common, who gives new meanings to old symbols, who transfigures the ordinary things of life. He must deal with the hopes and fears, and with the experiences of the people. The poetic is not the exceptional. A perfect poem, is like a perfect day. It has the undefinable charm of naturalness and ease. It must not appear to be the result of great labor. We feel, in spite of ourselves, that man does best that which he does easiest. The great poet is the instrumentality, not always of his time, but of the best of his time, and he must be in. unison and accord with the ideals of his race. The sublimer he is the simpler he is. The thoughts of the people must be clad in the garments of feeling—the words must be known, apt, familiar. The height must be in the thought, in the sympathy. In the olden time they used to have May day parties, and the prettiest child was crowned Queen of May. Imagine an old blacksmith and his wife looking at their little daughter clad in white and crowned with roses. They would wonder while they looked at her, how they ever came to have so beautiful a child. It is thus that the poet clothes the intellectual children or ideals of the people. They must not be gemmed and garlanded beyond the recognition of their parents. Out from all the flowers and beauty must look the eyes of the child they know. We have grown tired of gods and goddesses in art. Milton’s heavenly militia excites our laughter. Light­ houses have driven sirens from the dangerous coasts. We have found that we do not depend on the imagina­ �22 ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. tion for wonders—there are millions of miracles under our feet. Nothing can be more marvellous than the common and every day facts of life. The phantoms have been cast aside. Men and women are enough for men and women. In their lives is all the tragedy and all the comedy that they can comprehend. The painter no longer crowds his canvas with the ■winged and impossible —he paints life as he sees it, people as he knows them, and in whom he is interested. “ The Angelus,” the perfection of pathos, is nothing but two peasants bending their heads in thankfulness as they hear the solemn sound of the distant* bell—two peasants, who have nothing to be thankful for—nothing but weariness and want, nothing but the crusts that they soften with their tears—nothing. And yet as you look at that picture you feel that they have something besides to be thankful for—that they have life, love and hope—and so th.e distant bell makes music in their simple hearts. IX. The attitude of Whitman toward religion has not been understood. Towards all forms of worship, towards all creeds, he has maintained the attitude of absolute fairness. He does not believe that nature has given her last message to man. He does not believe that all has been ascertained/ He denies that any sect has written down the entire truth. He believes in progress, and, so believing, he says : We can consider bibles and religions divine. I do not say they are not divine. I say they have all grown out of us and may grow out of us still. It is not they who give the life. It is you who give the life. My thoughts are hymns of the praise of things ; In the dispute on God and eternity I am silent. Have you thought there could be but a single Supreme ? There can be any number of Supremes. One does not countervail another any more than one eyesight countervails another. �ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. 23 Upon the great questions, as to the great problems, he feels only the serenity of a great and well-poised soul. No array of terms can. say how much I am at peace about God and about death. I hear and behold God in every object, not understanding God, not in the least. Nor do I understand who there can be more wonderful than myself. In the faces of men and women I see God, and in my face in the glass. I find letters from God dropped in the street and every one is signed by God’s name. The whole visible world is regarded by him as a revelation, and so is the invisible world, and with this feeling he writes : Not objecting to special revelations—considering a curl of smoke or a hair on the back of my hand just as curious as any revelation. The creeds do not satisfy, the old mythologies are not enough ; they are too narrow at best, giving only hints and suggestions ; and feeling this lack in that which has been written and preached, Whitman says : Magnifying and applying come I; Outbidding at the start the old cautious hucksters ; Taking myself the exact dimensions of Jehovah; Lithographing Kronos, Zeus his son and Herkules his grand­ son ; Buying drafts of Osiris, Isis, Belus, Brahm, and Buddha; In my portfolio placing Manito alone—Alah on a leaf—the crucifix engraved x With Odin and the hideous face of Mexitli and every ido 1 and image— Taking them all for what they are worth, and not a cent more. Whitman keeps open house. He is intellectually hospitable. He extends his hand to a new idea. He does not accept a creed because it is wrinkled and old and has a long white beard. He knows that hypocrisy has a venerable look, and that it relies on looks and masks— on stupidity—and fear. Neither does h e rej ect �24 ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN, or accept the new because it is new. He wants the truth, and so he welcomes all until he knows just who and what they are. PHILOSOPHY. Walt Whitman is a philosopher. The more a man has thought, the more he has studied, the more he has travelled intellectually, the less certain he is. Only the very ignorant are perfectly satisfied that they know, To the common man the great problems are easy, He has no trouble in accounting for the universe. He can tell you the origin and destiny of man and the why and the wherefore of things. As a rule, he is a believer in special providence, and is egoistic enough to suppose that everything that happens in the universe happens in reference to him. A colony of red ants lived at the foot of the Alps. It happened one day, that an avalanche destroyed the hill; and one of the ants was heard to remark : “ Who could have taken so much trouble to destroy our home ? ” Walt Whitman walked by the side of the sea “ where the fierce old mother endlessly cries for her castaways,” and endeavoured to think out, to fathom the mystery of being ? and he says : I too, but signify, at the utmost, a little washed up drift, A few sands and dead leaves gathered together—merging myself as part of the sands and drift. Aware, now, that amid all the blab whose echoes recoil upon me, I have not once had the least idea of who or what I am. But that for all my insolent poems, the real me still stands untouched, untold, altogether unreached, Withdrawn afar, mocking me with mock congratulatory signs and voices, With peals of distant ironical laughter at every word I have written or shall write, Striking me with insults as I fall helpless on the sand. I perceive I have not understood anything, not a single object; and that no man ever can. �ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. 25 There is in our language no profounder poem than the one entitled “ Elemental Drifts.'’ The effort to find the origin of things has ever been, and will forever be, fruitless. Those who endeavour to find the secret of life resemble a man looking in the mirror, who thinks that if he only could be quick enough he could grasp the image that he sees behind the glass. The latest word of this poet upon this subject is as follows : (e To me this life with all its realities and functions is finally a mystery, the real something yet to be evolved, and the stamp and shape and life here some­ how given an important, perhaps the main, outline to something further. Somehow this hangs over every­ thing else, and stands behind it, is inside of all facts, and the concrete and material and the worldly affairs of life and sense. That is the purport and meaning behind all the other meanings, of Leaves of Grass’' As a matter of fact the questions of origin and destiny are beyond the grasp of the human mind. We can see a certain distance ; beyond that everything is only indistinct; and beyond the indistinct is the unseen. In the presence of these mysteries—and everything is a mystery so far as origin, destiny, and nature are con­ cerned—the intelligent, honest man is compelled to say, “ I do not know.” In the great midnight a few truths like stars shine on forever—and from the brain of man come a few struggling gleams of light—a few momentary sparks. Some have contended that everything is spirit; others that everything is matter ; and again, others who maintained that a part is matter and 9. part is spirit; some that spirit was first and matter after; others that matter was first and spirit after ; and others that matter and spirit have existed together. But none of these people can by any possibility tell what matter is, or what spirit is, or what the difference is between spirit and matter. The materialists look upon the spiritualists as sub­ stantially crazy ; and the spiritualists regard the materialists as low and groveling. These spiritualistic �26 ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. people hold matter in contempt ; but, after all, matter is quite a mystery. You take in your hand a little earth—a little dust. Do you know what it is ? In this dust you put a seed ; the rain falls upon it; the light strikes it; the seed grows ; it bursts into blossom ; it produces fruit. What is this dust—this womb ? Do you understand it? Is there anything in the wide universe more wonderful than this ? Take a grain of sand, reduce it to powder, take the smallest possible particle, look at it with a microscope, contemplate its every part for days, and it remains the citadel of a secret—an impregnable fortress. Bring all the theologians, philosophers, and scientists in serried ranks against it; let them attack on every side with all the arts and arms of thought and force. The citadel does not fall. Over the battlements floats the flag and the victorious secret smiles at the baffled hosts. Walt Whitman did not and does not imagine that he has reached the limit—the end of the road travelled by the human race. He knows that every victory over nature is but the preparation for another battle. This truth was in his mind when he said : “ Understand me well; it is provided in the essence of things, that from any fruition of success, no matter what, shall come forth something to make a greater struggle necessary.” This is the generalisation of all history. XI. THE TWO POEMS. There are two of these poems to which I have time to call special attention. The first is entitled, “ A Word Out of the Sea.” The boy, coming out of the rocked cradle, wandering over the sands and fields, up from the mystic play of shadows, out of the patches of briers and blackberries —from the memories of birds—from the thousand responses of his heart—goes back to the sea and his childhood, and sings a reminiscence. �ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. 27 Two guests from Alabama—two birds—build their nest, and there were four light green eggs, spotted with brown, and the two birds sang for joy : Shine, shine, Pour down your warmth together, great sun! While we bask, we two together. Two together—< Windsblow south, or winds blow north, Day come white, or night come black, Home, or rivers and mountains from home, Singing all time, minding no time, If we two but keep together. In a little while one of the birds is missed and never appeared again, and all through the summer the mate, the solitary guest, was singing of the lost: Blow, blow, Blow up, sea winds, along Paumanok’s shore; I wait and I wait till you blow my mate to me. And the boy that night, blending himself with the shadows, with bare feet, went down to the sea, where the white arms out in the breakers were tirelessly tossing ; listening to the songs and translating the notes. And the singing bird called loud and high for the mate, wondering what the dusky spot was in the brown and yellow, seeing the mate whichever way he looked, piercing the woods and the earth with his song, hoping that the mate might hear his cry ; stopping that he might not lose her answer ; waiting and then •crying again : “Here I am!” And this gentle call is for you. Do not be deceived by the whistle of the wind ; those are the shadows ; and at last crying : 0 past, 0 joy ! In the air, in the woods, over fields, Loved! loved! loved ! Loved—but no more with me— We two togethei* no more. And then the boy, understanding the song that had awakened in his breast a thousand songs clearer and louder and more sorrowful than the bird’s, knowing �28 ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. that the cry of unsatisfied love would never again be absent from him; thinking then of the destiny of all, and asking of the sea the final word, and the sea answering, delaying not and hurrying not, spoke the low delicious word “ Death !” “ ever Death !” The next poem, one that will live as long as our language, entitled, “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloomed,” is on the death of Lincoln. The sweetest, wisest soul of all my days and lands. . One who reads this will never forget the odor of the lilac, “lustrous western star” and “the grey-brown bird singing in the pines and cedars.” In this poem the dramatic unities are perfectly pre­ served, the atmosphere and climate in harmony with every event. Never will he forget the solemn journey of the coffin through day and night, with the great cloud darkening the land, nor the pomp of inlooped flags, the procession long and winding, the flambeaus of night, the torches’ flames, the silent sea of faces, the unbared heads, the thousand voices, rising strong and solemn, the dirges, the shuddering organs, the tolling bells—and the sprig of lilac. And then for a moment they will hear the grey­ brown bird singing in the cedars, bashful and tender, while the lustrous star lingers in the West, and they will remember the pictures hung on the chamber walls to adorn the burial house—pictures of spring and farms and homes and the grey smoke, lucid and bright, and the floods of yellow gold—of the gorgeous indolent sinking sun—the sweet herbage under foot— the green leaves of the trees prolific—the breast of the river with the wind-dapple here and there, and the varied and ample land—and the most excellent sun so calm and haughty—the violet and purple morn with just felt breezes. The gentle, soft-born measureless light—the miracle spreading, bathing all—the fulfilled noon—the coming eve delicious and the welcome night and the stars. �ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. 29 And then again they will hear the song of the grey­ brown bird in the limitless dusk amid the cedars and pines. Again they will remember the star and again the odor of the lilac. But most of all, the song of the bird translated and becoming the chant for death: THE CHANT FOE DEATH. Come lovely and soothing death, Undulate ’round the world, serenely arriving, arriving, In the day, in the night, to all, to each, Sooner or later delicate death. Praised be the fathomless universe, Por life and joy, and for objects and knowledge curious, And for love, sweet love—but praise ! praise! praise ! For the sure enwinding arms of cool enfolding death. Dark mother always gliding near with soft feet, Have none chanted for thee a chant of fullest welcome p Then I chant it for thee, I glorify thee above all, I bring thee a song that when thou must indeed come, come unfalteringly. Approach, strong deliveress, When it is so, when thou hast taken them I joyously sing the dead, Lost in the loving floating ocean of thee, Laved in the flood of thy bliss, 0 death. From me to thee glad serenades, Dances for thee I propose saluting thee, adornments and feastings for thee, And the sights of the open landscape and the high-spread sky are flitting. And life and the fields, and the bright and thoughtful night. The night in silence under many a star, The ocean shore and the husky whispering wave whose voice I know, And the soul turning to thee, O vast and well-veiled death," And the body gratefully nestling close to thee. Over the tree-tops I float thee a song, Over the rising and sinking waves, over the myriad fields and I ■«. the prairies wide, Over the dense-packed cities all—and the teeming wharves and waves, I float this carol to thee, with joy to thee, 0 death. �30 ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN, This poem, in memory of “ the sweetest, wisest soul of all our days and lands,” and for whose sake lilac and star and bird were entwined, will last as long as the memory of Lincoln. XII. OLD AGE. Walt Whitman- is not only the poet of childhood, of youth, of manhood, but, above all, of old age. He has not been soured by slander or petrified by preju­ dice ; neither calumny nor flattery has made him re­ vengeful or arrogant. Now sitting by the fireside, in the winter of life, His jocund heart still beating in his breast, he is just as brave and calm and kind as in his man­ hood’s proudest days, when roses blossomed in his cheeks. He has taken life’s seven steps. Now, as the gamester might say, “ on velvet.” He is enjoying “ old age expanded, broad, with the haughty breadth of the universe ; old age, flowing free, with the delicious, near-by freedom of death ; old age, superbly rising, welcoming the ineffable aggregation of dying days.” He is taking the “ loftiest look at last,” and before he goes he utters thanks “ for health, the midday sun, the impalpable air—for life, mere life ; for precious ever lingering memories of mother, father, brothers, sisters, friends ; for all his days, for gentle words, carresses, gifts from foreign lands, for shelter, wine and meat, for sweet appreciation, for beings, groups, love, deeds, words, books ; for colors, forms ; for all the brave, strong men who forward sprung in freedom’s help—all years—in all lands ; the cannoneers of song and thought—the great artillerists, the foremost leaders, captains of the soul.” It is a great thing to preach philosophy—far greater to live it. The highest philosophy accepts the inevit­ able with a smile, and greets it as though it were desired. To be satisfied : This is wealth—success. �ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. 31 The real philosopher knows that everything has hap­ pened that could have happened—consequently he accepts. He is glad that he has lived—glad that he has had his moment on the stage. In this spirit Whitman has accepted life. I shall go forth; I shall traverse these states, but I cannot tell whither or how iong. Perhaps soon, some day or night, while I am singing, my voice will suddenly cease, O soul! Then all may arrive but to this : The glances of my eyes that swept the daylight, The unspeakable love I interchanged with women, My joys in the open air, My walks in the Mannahatta, The continual good will I have met, The curious attachments of young men to me, My reflections alone—the absorption into me from the land­ scape, stars, animals, thunder, rain, and snow in my interviews alone; The words of my mouth—rude, ignorant—my many faults and derelictions; The light touches on my lips of the lips of my comrades at parting, The tracks which I leave on the sidewalks and fields— May all arrive at but this beginning of me; This beginning of me—and yet it is enough, 0, soul! 0, soul, we have positively appeared; that is enough. Yes, Walt Whitman has appeared. He has his place upon the stage. The drama is not ended. His voice is still heard. He is the Poet of Democracy—of all people. He is the poet of the body and soul. He has sounded the note of Individuality. He has given the pass-word primeval. He is the Poet of Humanity—of Intellectual Hospitality. He has voiced the aspirations of America—and, above all, he is the poet of Love and Death. How grandly, how bravely he has given his thought, and how superb is his farewell—his leave-taking : After the supper and talk ; after the day is done. As a friend from friends his final withdrawal prolonging. Good-bye and good-bye with emotional lips repeating. �32 ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. So hard for his hand to release those hands—no more will they meet— No more for.communion of sorrow and joy of old and young, A far-stretching journey awaits him to return no more. Shunning postponing severance, seeking to ward off the last word ever so little, Even at the exit dooi’ turning—charges superfluous calling back—even as he descends the steps, Something to eke out a minute additional—shadows of night­ fall deepening, Farewell messages lessening, dimmer the forthgoer’s visage and form, Soon to be lost for aye in the darkness; loth, oh, so loth to depart! And is this all ? Will the forthgoer be lost, and for ever ? Is death the end ? Over the grave bends Love sobbing, and by her side stands Hope and whispers : We shall meet again. Before all life is death, and after all death is life. The falling leaf, touched with the hectic flush, that testifies of autumn’s death, is, in a subtler sense, a prophecy of spring. Walt Whitman has dreamed great dreams, told great truths and uttered sublime thoughts. He has held aloft the torch and bravely led the way. As you read the marvellous book, or the person, called Leaves of Grass, you feel the freedom of the antique world ; you hear the voices of the morning, of the first great singers—voices elemental as those of sea and storm. The horizon enlarges, the heavens grow ample, limitations are forgotten —the realisation of the will, the accomplishment of the ideal, seem to be within your power. Obstructions become petty and disappear. The chains and bars are broken, and the distinctions of caste are lost. The soul is in the open air, under the blue and stars —the flag of Nature. Creeds, theories, and philosophies ask to be examined, contradicted, reconstructed. Pre­ judices disappear, superstitions vanish, and custom abdicates. The sacred places become highways, duties and desires clasp hands and become comrades and friends. Authority drops the sceptre, the priest the mitre, and the purple falls from kings. The inanimate �ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. 33 becomes articulate, the meanest and humblest things utter speech, and the dumb and voiceless burst into song. A feeling of independence takes possession of the soul, the body expands, the blood flows full and free, superiors vanish, flattery is a lost art, and life becomes rich, royal and superb. The world becomes a personal possession, and the oceans, the continents and constellations belong to you. You are in the centre, everything radiates from you, and in your veins beats and throbs the pulse of all life. You become a rover, careless and free. You wander by the shores of all seas and hear the eternal psalm. You feel the silence of the wide forest, and stand beneath the intertwined and over-arching boughs, entranced with symphonies of winds and woods. You are borne on the tides of eager and swift rivers, hear the rush and roar of cataracts as they fall beneath the seven-hued arch, and watch the eagles as they circling soar. You traverse gorges dark and dim, and climb the scarred and threa­ tening cliffs. You stand in orchards where the blossoms fall like snow, where the birds nest and sing, and painted moths make aimless journeys through the happy air. You live the lives of those who till the earth, and walk amid the perfumed fields, hear the reapers’ song, and feel the breadth and scope of earth and sky. You are in the great cities, in the midst of multitudes, of the endless processions. You are on the wide plains—the prairies—with hunter and trapper, with savage and pioneer, and you feel the soft grass yielding under your feet. You sail in many ships, and breathe the free air of the sea. You travel many roads, and countless paths. You visit palaces and prisons, hospitals and courts ; you pity kings and convicts, and your sympathy goes out to all the suffering and insane, the oppressed and enslaved, and even to the infamous. You hear the din of labor, all sounds of factory, field, and forest, of all tools, instruments, and machines. You become familiar with men and women of all employments, trades, and professions—with birth and burial, with wedding feast and funeral chant. You see the cloud and flame of war, and you enjoy the ineffable perfect days of peace. �34 ORATION ON WALT WHITMAN. In?hls°ne book’ in these wondrous Leaves of Grass yi>n1r?.d hmts and suggestions, touches and fragments’ of all there is of life, that lies between the babe, whose rounded cheeks dimple beneath his mother’s laughing oving eyes, and the old man, snow-crowned, who, with a smile, extends his hand to death. And we have met to-night to honor ourselves by honoring the author of Leaves of Grass. Printed and Published by G. W. Foote, at 28 Stonecutter Street London, E.O. ’ �WORKS BY COLONEL R. G. INGERSOLL s. d. x 0 j g MISTAKES OF MOSES ... ... ... Superior edition, in cloth ... ... ... Only Complete Edition published in England.* DEFENCE OF FREETHOUGHT ... ... q g Five Hours’ Speech at the Trial of C. B. Reynolds for Blasphemy. REPLY TO GLADSTONE ... ... With a Biography by J. M. Wheeler. ' ROME OR REASON ? ... 0 Reply to Cardinal Manning CRIMES AGAINST CRIMINALS ... FAITH AND FACT. Reply to Rev. Dr. Field Second Reply to Dr. Field 4 0 4 ... 0 3 ... 0 2 ... 0 0 2 ... 0 2 THE LIMITS OF TOLERATION ......................... 0 A Discussion with Hon. F. D. Coudert and Gov. S. L. Woodford 2 GOD AND MAN. ... ... THE HOUSEHOLD OF FAITH ... THE DYING CREED ... DO I BLASPHEME ? 2 0 THE CLERGY AND COMMON SENSE ... 2 o 2 THE GREAT MISTAKE LIVE TOPICS ... ... ... ... .01 0 1 MYTH AND MIRACLE ... ... 0 1 REAL BLASPHEMY ... ... 0 x ..................... 0 2 SOCIAL SALVATION MARRIAGE AND DIVORCE ... ... 0 2 ... GOD AND THE STATE ... WHY AM I AN AGNOSTIC? WHY AM I AN AGNOSTIC ? Part II. .. ... 0 0 2 2 ... 0 2 Progressive Publishing Co, 28 Stonecutter Street, E.O. �“THE FREETHINKER” Edited by G. W. FOOTE. The Only Penny Freethought Paper in England. Circulates throughout the World. Published every Thursday. �THE PROGRESSIVE PUBLISHING COMPANY’S C ATALOG U E. ■ ---- 0--------All orders to be sent, with remittwnce, to K. Forder, 88 Stonecutter Street, London, E.C. Rate of postage—Orders under 3d., one halfpenny orders under 6d. one penny. Orders over 6d. post free. SEPTEMBER, 1890. AVELING, DR. E. B. Darwin. Made Easy. Cloth ... ... ... 10 Dr. Aveling is a Fellow of the London University, and this is the best popular exposition of Darwinism extant. BENTHAM, JEREMY The Church of England. Catechism Examined. A tren­ chant analysis, in Bentham’s best manner, showing how the Catechism is calculated to make children hypocrites or fools, if not worse. Sir Samuel Romilly was of opinion that the work would be prosecuted for blasphemy, though it escaped that fate in consequence of the writer’s eminence. With a Biographical Preface by J. M. Wheeler ... Utilitarianism... ... ... ... ... “A place must be assigned to Bentham among the masters of wisdom.”—John Stuart Mill. “ A man of first-rate genius.”—Edward Dicey. “It is impossible to know Bentham without admiring and revering him ”—Sir Samuel Romilly. “ Everything that comes from the pen or from the mind of Mr. Bentham is entitled to profound regard.”—James Mill. “He found jurisprudence a gibberish and left it a science.”—Macaulay. 10 0 3 �(2) COLLINS, ANTHONY Free Will and Necessity. A Philosophical Inquiry concerning Human Liberty. First published in 1715. Now reprinted with Preface and Annota­ tions by G. W. Foote, and a Biographical Intro­ duction by J. M. Wheeler ... ... ... Superior Edition, on superfine paper, bound in cloth 10 2 0 “ I do not know of anything that has been advanced by later writers in support of the scheme of Necessity, of which the germ is not to be found in the Inquiry of Collins.”—Prof. Dugald Stewart. “ Collins states the arguments against human freedom with a logical force unsurpassed by any Necessitarian.” —Prof. A. C. Fraser. “ Collins writes with wonderful power and closeness of reasoning.”—Prof. Huxley. “ Collins was one of the most terrible enemies of the Christian religion.”—Voltaire. FEUERBACH, LUDWIG The Essence of Religion. God the Image of Man, Man s Dependence upon Nature the Last and Only Source of Religion ... ... ... ... i o “ No one has demonstrated and explained the purely human origin of the idea of God better than Ludwig Feuerbach. ’ ’—Bachner. “ I confess that to Feuerbach I owe a debt of inesti­ mable gratitude. _ Feeling about in uncertainty for the ground, and finding everywhere shifting sands, Feuer­ bach cast a sudden blaze in the darkness and disclosed to me the way.”—Rev. S. Baring Gould. FOOTE, G. W. Is Socialism Sound ? Four Nights’ Public Debate with Annie Besant ... ... ... ... Superior Edition, in cloth ... ... Christianity and Secularism. Four Nights’ Public Debate with the Rev. Dr. James McGann ... Superior Edition, in cloth ... ... ... Darwin on God ... Superior Edition, in cloth ... ... ... ... ... ... Contents :—Darwin’s Grandfather—Darwin’s Father— Darwin’s Early Piety—Almost a Clergyman—On Board the “ Beagle ”—Settling at Down—Death and Burial— Purpose of Pamphlet—Some Objections—Darwin Abair- i o 2 0 1 o i g o 6 j q �( 3 ) dons Christianity—Deism—Creation—Origin of Life— Origin of Man— Animism—A Personal Creator Design _ Divine Beneficence—Religion and Morality—.Agnos­ ticism and Atheism. Infidel Death-Beds. Second edition, much enlarged Superior Edition, on superfine paper, bound in cloth 0 8 1 3 List of Freethinkers dealt with :—Lord Amberley, Baskerville, Bayle, Bentham, Bert, Lord .golingbroke, Broussais, Bruno, Buckle, Byron, Carlile Clifiord, Clootz, Collins, Comte, Condorcet, Cooper, D Alembert, Danton, Charles and Erasmus Darwin, Delambre, Diderot, Bolet, Geo. Eliot, Frederick the Great, Gambetta, Garabaldi, Gendre, Gibbon, Godwin, Gœthe, Grote, Helvetiua, Hetherington, Hobbes, Austin Holyoake, iHago, Hume, Littré, Harriet Martineau, Jean Mealier, «Tames ana J onn Stuart Mill, Mirabeau, Robt. Owen, Paine, Palmer, Rabelais, Reade, Mdme. Roland, George Sand, Schiller, Shelley, Spinoza, Strauss, Toland, Vanini, Voltaire, Volney, Watson, John Watts, Woolston. Letters to the Clergy. First Series. 128pp. ... 1, Creation, to the Bishop of Carlisle; 2, The Believing Thief, to the Rev. C. H. Spurgeon; 3, The Atonement, to the Bishop of Peter­ borough; 4, Old Testament Morality, to the Rev. E. Conder, D.D.; 5, Inspiration, to the Rev. R. F. Horton, M.A.; 6, Credentials of the Gospel, to the Rev. Prof. J. A. Beet; 7, Miracles, to the Rev. Brownlow Maitland; 8, Prayer, to the Rev. T. Teignmouth Shore, M.A. Defence of Free Speech. Three Hours’ Address to the Jury before Lord Coleridge. With a Special Preface and many Footnotes ... Letters to Jesus Christ Philosophy of Secularism The Bible God... The Folly of Prayer The Impossible Creed. An Open Letter to the Bishop of Peterborough on the Sermon on the Mount ... Christianity and Progress. Reply to Mr. Gladstone Mrs. Besant’s Theosophy. A Candid Criticism ... Theosophy and Secularism. A Rejoinder to Mrs. Besant The New Cagliostro. An Open Letter to Madame Blavatsky ... 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 4 4 3 2 2 0 2 0 2 0 2 0 2 0 2 �( * ) What Was Christ ? A Reply to J. s. Mill 0 2 ^tl-aU ,Ev,lden1c.e writers make the passage on Ghust their stock reliance, and Mr. Foote thoroughly dissects and analyses it, and denounces it as valueless.’’ —2Vational Reformer. The Shadow of the Sword. A moral and statistical -Essay on War 0 2 war^ndbth Pamphlet, exposing the horrors of wai and the burden imposed upon the people by the war systems of Europe.”—Echo. “A trenchant exposure of the folly of war, which everyone should read.”—Rimes. Eoy,11 ^auP®rsa Showing what Royalty does for the People, and what the People do for Royalty The Dying Atheist. A Story ... 0 2 0 1 Was Jesus Insane? A searching inquiry into the mental condition of the Prophet of Nazareth 0 1 Is the Bible Inspired ? A Criticism on “ Lux Mundi.” 0 1 The Rev. Hugh Price Hughes’s Converted Atheist A Lie m Five Chapters 0 1 Bible Heroes—First Series, in elegant wrapper (1) Mr. Adam, (2) Captain Noah, (3) Father Abraham, (4) Juggling Jacob, (5) Master Joseph, (6) Joseph’s Brethren, (7) Holy Moses I., (8) Holy Moses II., (9) Parson Aaron, (10) General Joshua, (11) Jephthah and Co., (12) Professor Samson. One Penny each singly. 1 0 Bible Heroes—Series, in elegant wrapper (13) Prophet Samuel, (14) King Saul, (15) Saint David I., (16) Saint David II., (17) Sultan Solomon, (18) Poor Job, (19) Hairy Elijah, (20) Bald Elisha, (21) General Jehu, (22) Doctor Daniel, (23) The Prophets (Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Hosea, (24) St. Peter, (25) St. Paul. Bible Romances. New Edition. Revised and largely rewritten.—(1) The Creation Story, 2d.; (2) Eve and the Apple, Id.; (3), Cain and Abel, Id.; (4) Noah’s Flood, 2d. (5) The Tower of Babel, Id; (6) Lot’s Wife, Id. Other numbers following on the first of each month. 1 0 �( 5 ) G. W. FOOTE & W. P. BALL Bible Handbook for Freethinkers and Inquiring Christians. Complete, paper covers ... ... Superior Edition, on superfine paper, bound in cloth Sold also in separate Parts as follows— The Contradictions are printed in parallel columns . . ... ... 2. Bible Absurdities. All the chief Absurdities from Genesis to Revelation, conveniently and strikingly arranged, with appropriate headlines, giving the point of each absurdity in a sentence 3. Bible Atrocities. Containing all the godly wicked­ ness from Genesis to Revelation. Each infamy has a separate headline for easy reference ... 4. Bible Immoralities, Indecencies, Obscenities, Broken Promises, and Unfulfilled Prophecies ... 1. Bible Contradictions. 1 4 2 0 0 4 0 4 0 4 0 4 G. W. FOOTE & J. M. WHEELER The Jewish Life of Christ. Being the Sepher Toldoth Jeshu, or Bookof the Generation of Jesus, With an Historical Preface and Voluminous Notes Superior Edition, on superfine paper, bound in cloth ’ 0 6 1 0 “Messrs. G. W. Foote and J. M. Wheeler have laid the Freethought party under great obligation by the careful manner in which they have collected and stated the information on a very doubtful and difficult subject...... We have no hesitation in giving unqualified praise to the voluminous and sometimes very erudite notes.”— National Reformer. Crimes of Christianity. Vol. I., cloth gilt, 216 pp. Hundreds of exact References to Standard Autho­ rities. No pains spared to make it a complete, trustworthy, final, unanswerable Indictment of Christianity... ... ... ... ... Chapters (1) Christ to Constantine; (2) Con­ stantine to Hypatia; (3) Monkery; (4) Pious Forgeries; (5) Pious Frauds; (6) Rise of the Papacy; (7) Crimes of the Popes; (8) Perse­ cution of the Jews ; (9) The Crusades. “The book is very carefully compiled, the references are given with exactitude, and the 2 6 �( 6 ) work is calculated to be of the greatest use to the opponents of Christianity.”—National Reformer. “ The book is worth reading. It is fair, and on the whole correct.”—Weekly Times. “The book has a purpose, and is entitled to a fair hearing.”—Huddersfield Examiner. “ The work should be scattered like autumn leaves.”—Ironclad Age (U.S.A.) HUME, DAVID The Mortality Of the Soul With an Introduction by G. W. Foote. This essay was first published after IIume’< death. It is not included in the ordinary editions of the Essays. Prof. Huxley calls it “ A remarkable essay ” and “ a model of clear and vigorous statement.” ... ... Liberty and. Necessity. An argument against Free Will and in favor of Moral Causation ... ... 0 2 0 4 COL. ROBERT G. INGERSOLL. Some Mistakes of Moses. With an Introduction by G. W. Foote. The only complete edition in England. Accurate as Colenso, and fascinating as a novel. 132pp. ... ... ... ... Superior Edition, on superfinepaper, bound in cloth Defence of Freethought. A five hours’ speech at the Trial of C. B. Reynolds for Blasphemy ... Reply to Gladstone. With a Biography by J. M. Wheeler ... ... ... ... ... Rome or Reason? A Reply to Cardinal Manning ... Crimes against Criminals ... ... ... Why am I an Agnostic ? Parts I. and II., each ... Faith and. Fact. Reply to Rev. Dr. Field ... God. and. Man. Second Reply to Dr. Field ... The Dying Creed. ... ... ... •• The Household, of Faith ... ... ... The Limits of Toleration. A Discussion with the Hon. F. D. Oourdert and Gov. S. L. Woodford ... Art and. Morality ... ... ... ••• Do I Blaspheme? ... ... ... ••• The Clergy and Common Sense... ... 1 0 1 6 0 6' 0 4 0 4 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 2 2 2 2 2 0 0 0 0 2 2 2 2 �( 7 ) 'X Social Salvation ... ... ... ... God and the State ... ... ... ... Marriage and Divorce. An Agnostic’s View ... The Great Mistake ... ... ... ... Live Topics ... ... ... ... ... Myth and Miracle ... ... ... ... Real Blasphemy ... ... ... ... Repairing the Idols ... ... ... ... Whole of the above TPor7iS of Ingersoll bound in two o o 0 o o o o o 2 2 2 1 1 1 1 1 volumes, cloth, 7s. SHELLE? A Refutation of Deism. In a Dialogue. With an Introduction by G. W. Foote ... ... ... 0 4 THOMSON JAMES (B.V) Satires and Profanites. New Edition ... ... Contents :—The Story of a Famous Old Jewish Firm (Jehovah, Son & Co)—The Devil in the Church of England — Religion in the Rocky Mountains—ChristiwrEve in the Upper Circles —A Commission of Inquiry on Royalty—A Bible Lesson on Monarchy—The One Thing Needful. 1 o “ It cannot be neglected by any who are interested in one of the most pathetic personages of our time.”— Academy. “As clever as they are often profane.”—Christian World. “Well worth preserving.”—Weekly Dispatch. “Reminds one of the genius of Swift.”— Oldham Chronicle. J. M. WHEELER Biographical Dictionary of Freethinkers of all Ages and Nations. Handsomely bound in cloth “ The Dictionary wJrnvolved enormous labor, and the compiler deserves the thanks of the Ereethought party.” —National Reformer. “ The work will be of the greatest value.”—Freethought “ At last we have the long-wanted means of silencing those Christians who are continually inquiring for our great men, asserting that all great men have been on the side of Christianity.”—Truthseeker (New York). “The most important Freethought work published this year.”—De Dageraad (Amsterdam). “ A good and useful work that was much needed.”— Commonweal. 7 6 �( 8 ) Letters from Heaven Letters from Hell ... ... ... ... o o ... 02 ... Post free 7d. One Thousand carriage free. Sample packet of 20 (one of each tract) post free 1. Salvation by Faith (Ingersoll); 2, Death of Adam (Nelson); 3, Bible Blunders (Foote); 4, The Bible and Teetotalism (Wheeler); 5, Bible Harmony (Holy Ghost); 6, Which is the Safe Side? 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Foote, at 28 Stonecutter Street, London, E.C. ��FREETROUGHT PUBLICATIONS. THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND CATECHISM EXAMINED By Jeremy Bentham. With a Biographical Preface by J. M. Wheeler _ _ . . _ 10 FREE WILL AND NECESSITY. By Anthony Collins 1 0 Reprinted from 17)5 ed., with Preface and Annotations by G. W. Foote, and a Biographical Introduction by J. M. Wheeler. Superior edition, on superfine paper, bound in cloth 2 0 THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION. By Ludwig Feuerbach 1 0 IS SOCIALISM SOUND i Four Nights’Public Debate between Annie Besant and G. W. Foote ----1 0 Superior edition, in cloth ----2 '0 CHRISTIANITY AND SECULARISM. Four Nights’ Public Debate between G. W. Foote and the Rev. Dr. J. McCann 10 ^Superior edition, in cloth ------1 6 DARWIN ON GOD. By G. W. Foote .-.-06 Superior edition, in cloth - .10 INFIDEL DEATH BEDS. By G. W. Foote. Second edition. Much enlarged ----08 Superior edition, on superfine paper, bound in cloth 13 LETTERS TO THE CLERGY. By G. W. 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FORDER, 28 Stonecutter Street, London, E.C. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Victorian Blogging Description An account of the resource A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library &amp; Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span> Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Conway Hall Library & Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Conway Hall Ethical Society Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data Pamphlet Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource An oration on Walt Whitman Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Ingersoll, Robert Green [1833-1899] Description An account of the resource Place of publication: London Collation: 34, 8 p. ; 18 cm. Notes: Printed and published by G.W. Foote. Publisher's catalogue (8 p.), dated September 1890, at end. No. 45g in Stein checklist. "The following oration by Colonel Ingersoll was delivered in the Horticultural Hall, New York, on October 21, 1890". Essays previously published in a variety of journals and books, which are listed in the Acknowledgements section. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Progressive Publishing Company Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1890 Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context N382 Subject The topic of the resource Poetry Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (An oration on Walt Whitman), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English American Poetry NSS Poetry Poetry in English Walt Whitman https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/3c56fc70fd8ac14b59855418a176ba0d.pdf?Expires=1779926400&Signature=VB6rxKH02oBC-WO8KwLzF1FJAnatLExfA2gyKesAb8H9%7EGruLyimXb2%7EJ0%7EPgR1PC2Uy6o-chUq3ab9Kt3j6KSh9kuRpJ6kE1apRpftavtqc5JodocNYXGha7IQ1qfwQYdzyBme-J1OzngEVbpsBMvEHu-x0wLhCboDGTNmhgGwQS0rjtFcg4BVjEuv6HE6IxVgQJbh-kgXZejAUw2Bz2ZzzjpxJgIEQDL1QtyN0qwPqDubeEB23FUXI2QPcdY8gmpzXpESE8w%7ESet9EUTuapfcg-6VxMOsqFaf9FmIy3Ufxnc6KiIxD4jagIidunlE193T1ckfAyKvUiXsoSIJ8qw__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM be492c371e2fa2bc39236dc4a1a14006 PDF Text Text PSYCHE TO THE NINETEENTH CENTURY. A CHANT OF LOVE AND FREEDOM. BY FRANCES ROSE MACKINLEY. Arise ! my soul, thou breath of God ! Awake, to a full sense of thine all-coinprising consciousness To hymn the praise of Love-Creative— And Freedom-Regenerative of Humanity. Disrupt the tyrannic bonds ; That have held captive thy sex for ages ! Recklessly speak thy thought; Mindful only of allegiance to Truth ! O for a voice ! That could resound throughout the universe. A voice ! Not pitifully plaintive, like wailing Philomel’s ; “'Tor calling aloud for relief, Ake Israel in bondage; Nor yet a voice, shrill and sharp, Jenetrating the spheres Like that of the soaring skylark— 3ut a voice, new made, Louder, clearer, sweeter, fuller, than any voice yet heard— An archangelic breath ! a voice divine ! Wherewith I could arouse Humanity from its lethargy, And make lovers and freed of all women and men. A voice to chant a Pean of Freedom, boundless as space ; And love infinite and all embracing. A voice, to stir in woman Some inspiration of her coming destiny, �2 That she may know that, in the future, She is to lead the van of the Army of Progress, Now advancing with victorious strides. This age asks for new women— Women, untrammeled by the temporary and stationary, .Not stunted or warped by prejudgment or bias : No more bigotries! no more prejudices' For the woman who is to come— The true woman, the pure woman. I would sing the glory of the sexual act; The most ecstatic bliss of the body ! I would sing the praise of creative copulation ! The act generative of an immortal soul; Wherein, God as man, and Nature as woman, Blend their essences. 1 would sing, of the coming woman— Moulder of a new race; Made perfect by her recognition Of the goodness and purity of nature’s laws; Of the woman who prides herself On every particle of her delicious and sublime body, The habitation and sanctuary of the Eternal Spirit. The woman—slave of the Time Being— Who is ashamed of herself—ashamed of Nature— Will be ashamed of me. Let the good and perfect woman Have compassion on the woman Who is ashamed of herself! Who invented this trick electric, of nature—this Eroto mania— Whereby immortal consciousness is forced into entity ? Was it invented ? No ! it is coeval with existence ! Invention and conception are forms of the same process; And this material feat of concentrated sensuousness Symbolizes the creation of intuitive and inventive thought. �3 Eternal Coition is, then, the will automatic of the universe; O ¡Nature's cunning method of causation; Tnat.inct working itself up, forever, into reason; By the principle of ceaseless and inexorable evolution. The idea of one supreme is but a thought-limit; Or the swell of presumptuous vanity, in the mere male mind. The Elohim, that spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, Proclaimed his Godhood bi-sexual: So, God and Nature—male and female—are perpetually be­ getting ; And the lustful Jove is but Jehovah in another character. Into this instantial moment of transcendent felicity, Nature concentrates every possibility of pleasure. Science has exhausted the study Of the outward, unconscious universe. In this causal deed of the energy of nature, Science must find the true origin of all things. To study, know and apply its highest laws, Will be to people the planet with gods, And bring about the Millennium. In the antique time, * They consecrated temples to the Gods of Love: To Venus, lascivious and free— To Eros, hot and ardent— To Lamps icus of the garden, fierce and lusty— To the goatish Pan, chasing wood nymphs. These deities are spiritual symbols Of qualities of the soul. Build anew to-day These Fanes embalmed in poesy! Science now knows these ancient'cults To have been the worship of truth, not myths. Build them! Tokens of our return to the ecstacies of nature; From the cold mathematics of Mammon, Into which we have fallen. �4 Crown with a wreath of lilies, emblems of purity, The men and women—angels of love and freedom— Who will offer, at the shrine of these attributes of Divinity, Incense of honor and adoration ! Confess the sanctity of your natures ! Declare How sweet, to man'or woman, Is the tremulous and tingling titillation of nature’s battery. Evolving a conscious soul-spark out of chaos ! Earth holds, for me, no more beautiful picture, Tuan the nude bodies of a man and woman, Clean, fresh and white (or be it brown or black), United in amorous fondness, As before they were severed by Jupiter. The quivering lips, red cheek, bright eyes and palpitating form, Aie but the shadows of the convulsive throes of nature. O for Venus-loving women ! for Sapphic souls ! And Lesbian natures ! I had a dream, Aphrodite, the Celestial Goddess, appeared to me, More radiant, more glowing, more interfused with love, Than when first she sprang from the foamy sea.' “ Daughter,” she said, “ Repair to Cyprus ! Thence to all corners of the globe, send bidding, Announcing that my worship is to be renewed. Grecians loved me in lascivious wiles; And in licentious rites. This was a true tribute to my power. Too much of love, too much of freedom, Too much of delight, thou canst not have. But I am to be worshiped, in the future, As I have never been in the history of the earth : With all the voluptuous imagination of the past, And all the light of the science of to-day. �5 In Olympus, The fulfillment of an olden prophecy is expected : Astrea returns to earth Whence she fled, ages agone, from the cruelty of men, The Goddesses sit in council and co-operate, Hoping that the gentle and feminine virtues Are about to replace the cruel reign of male force. Minerva, Psyche and myself clasp hands in heaven, As knowledge, soul, and love, must conjoin on earth. And thus am I Venus ! To be venerated in reason and principle, As well as adored in love. Because my name has been mentioned with blushes ; Because the arts I taught humanity Have been practiced in secret and in shame, Men have been converted into monsters of absurdity, Instead of monuments of grace; And penury and misery reign Where art and plenty should.” So spake the Goddess. Join with me, O women, In this song of love and freedom ! And, by the truth and beauty of your lives, Inaugurate the reign of Psyche, Minerva and Venus '. �� Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Victorian Blogging Description An account of the resource A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library &amp; Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span> Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Conway Hall Library & Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Conway Hall Ethical Society Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data Pamphlet Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Psyche to the nineteenth century: a chant of love and freedom Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Macinley, Frances Rose Description An account of the resource Place of publication: {s.l.] Collation: 5 p. ; 18 cm. Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. A poem. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available [s.n.] Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [187-?] Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context G5309 Subject The topic of the resource Poetry Women's rights Sexuality Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Psyche to the nineteenth century: a chant of love and freedom), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English Conway Tracts Free Love Poetry Poetry in English Sexual Relationships Women's Rights Women's Rights-United States https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/2ab260f3d4bae53a5437586eebef32bf.pdf?Expires=1779926400&Signature=sERb0t4-zSgTVv8TKCcR73rYYUDGvnNjmq00XseYhMLgE-MnBV3eDHpRrzKYPMiy31LWsXrW1-aLAz93fPCj9mYlYI4Fi13UQrfH6WagS2ywEHq3sHhod6Mz6FtFtqgMpAZzYUieaq1MjQglwWgXAft26opjkxLdjEbAdn49NxfdlwehQweyv0vHrVdl0CsXoK%7E0XscY-gRGonMsNyTKk2ctgDSJu7TPBeM92tGl%7EBOlZjv7cif13XYJNrs6DySIMQAU7yhcBm-gYcANVwg-iVFw0dvGcV%7EYdqOZr6NYAS7JophhjdZAjakJRTIJ0aJnJHoVLVS8min35LdIWsy0cQ__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 5216a45ccfd779b4d55b10b6c67b7a4c PDF Text Text 32 The Chanson de Roland. been accidental, while both are really inaccurate. Our object will be attained, however, if, in consequence of what we have written, the necessity of a joint employment of the two processes of observation and a priori reasoning, is more clearly kept in view in future discussions of the subject. What educational system will prove itself the best, it is impossible to predict; but that the best will ultimately prevail, when the “struggle for life” between the various kinds of schools is ended, does not admit of a doubt. Meanwhile we protest against a resuscitation of the policy of “levelling-up,” which has been finally exploded in reference to ecclesiastical establishments, and its application to education. We claim for private schools no State support obtained by fresh taxation, nor a share in endowments already existing, but simply that recognition of their importance which they justly demand as their due. Art. II.—The Chanson de Roland. Le Chanson de Roland, texte critique accompagne d’une tra­ duction nouvelle et precede d’une Introduction Historique. Par L£on Gautier. Tours. 1872. N quo proelio Eggihardus, regiae mensae praepositus, Anselmus comes palatii, et Hruodlandus Britannici limitis praefectus, cum aliis compluribus interficiuntur.” This sentence of Eginhard, the courtier and chronicler of Charles the Great, is the only line in all history that contains the name of Roland. Yet a later writer of the next reign, known as “ L’Astronome,” might well say of the hero and his peers, “ quorum quia nomina vulgata sunt, dicere supersedi.” Legend is capricious and has her favourites, who are not those of history ; phantoms that have secured a renown as real and as immortal as the real men among whom posterity sees them move. Thus, three centuries after his death at Roncevaux, it was the song and the name of Roland that were chanted at Hastings, when Taillefer rode out before the Norman line. He has become the mediaeval Achilles, “ risen invulnerable from the stream of Lethe, not of Styx,” a figure at which Time can throw no dart. Even the glory of Charles pales before that of the Warden of the March of Britanny ; the great Emperor becomes like Arthur or Agamemnon, a crowned shadow, remote, withdrawn, while the epic of the heroic age of the West is “ La Mort Roland.” His name has gone out to the ends of the earth, and wherever he passes, he leaves traces of sword-blows,like thunder-strokes; and footsteps more than human. I �The Chanson de Roland. 33 The immense gorge that splits the Pyrenees under the towers of Marbore was cloven at one blow of Roland’s blade Durandal ; Francis I. lifted the stone of his sepulchre at Blayes, and mar­ velled, like Virgil’s labourer, at those mighty bones of ancient men. Italy is full of relics of his renown, his time-worn statue guards the gate of the Cathedral at Verona ; Pavia shows his lance, and at Rome Durandal is carven on a wall of the street Spada d’Orlando. In Germany he rides through the forests, melancholy as Diirer’s mysterious knight; on the Rhine he built the tower of Rolandseck, and distant echoes of him are heard in vaguest tradition through India to the snows of Tartary. In Paradise Dante beholds his soul, with that of Charles, pass, “a double star, among the central splendours of the Blessed/’* How did so wide and permanent a glory gather round this figure ? what portion of his legend is historical, what mere fan­ tasy ; what the shreds of old mythology, fallen from the limbs of forgotten gods of the North, and woven into a garment whereby we see this forgotten man ? M. Ldon Gautier has done much to present clearly and so far to solve, the difficulties of these questions, in his new and splendid edition and transla­ tion of the Chanson de Roland. M. Gautier’s task has been a long one, fulfilled with a conscientious love of the Iliad of the warlike West. But before the poem itself can be epjoyed, there is much to be done : an iron and rugged language to be mas­ tered, a history of the growth of the epic to be studied, a con­ ception of the society whereof it is the one literary charm and treasure to be attained to. The first part of this labour M. Gautier has made light enough. He furnishes a text, based on that of the oldest, the Bodleian MS., which is not earlier than the middle of the eleventh, nor later than the first part of the twelfth century. This text is aided by collations of the Venice and Paris MSS., and is printed more in accordance with the best grammar of the period than that which the careless scribe of the Oxford version chose to employ. Further, M. Gautier has filled up the lacunae of the Oxford text with remaniements from the foreign sources, trans­ lated back into the earlier style of the Bodleian copy ; but these hazardous emendations are confined among the notes. In the translation he has avoided the pedantry of M. Genin, who turned the style of the eleventh into that of the sixteenth cen­ tury—and has given a line for line version in modern French prose. Thus the epic can be read, but scarcely as yet appreciated. * Paul de S. Victor, “ Hommes et Dieux.” [Vol. C. No. CXCVII.}—New Seeies, Vol. XLIV. No. I. D �34 The Chanson de Roland. There are works of art, masterpieces in their way, which ap­ peal in vain to unaccustomed eyes or ears. The impassive atti­ tude of an Egyptian Sphinx, the archaic lines of 2Eginetan sculpture, the low relief of early Italian marbles, the thin luxuriance and artifice of the age of the Pompadour, are enigmas to all who cannot see in these the forces of society, of thought, of life, of which they were the fruit, the ultimate ex­ pression. We must have lived in imagination with the old Egyptians, in a changeless land of peoples obedient to the dead ; we must have felt the struggle in the Greek or Florentine heart, between a keen new sense of the grace of things, and a sense, not less constraining, of the religious traditions in art; we must have fleeted the time carelessly with Manon Lescaut, passing delicately over the volcanic crust of society, before certain lovely creations of art can yield the intimate secret of their love­ liness. Indeed, of what art is this not true, save of the mirror which the Academy or the Salon holds up to the dress and manners of the day ? And even this in a hundred years will require a historical attitude, of a mind as keen as that of Charles Baudelaire, to see the beauty of artifice and decadence, before it will find an admirer. The Frankish epic of Roland is the only beautiful thing in literature that survives from an age that, save to one or two historians, seems to have only the darkness, and none of the fruitfulness, of Chaos and of Night. We can only admire it, when we find that that epoch was indeed heroic, and not the scene of a “ mere fighting and flocking of kites and crows.” Here then is a poem of more than four thousand lines in length, telling of the events of two or three days, and giving to these events colossal proportions altogether unwarranted by history. How far is the action historical ? Was there ever a battle with the Saracens, a heavy discouragement for Charles, fought in the passes of the Pyrenees ? Are the Paladins mere fictitious and gigantic ancestors of the later feudal houses, or exaggerated pictures of real peers ; or have the stories of old gods been attached to new names, and is Roland with his sword of sharpness and wondrous horn, the Norse Hrodo, or a myth of the Sun ; is his love, Lady Aide, one of the maidens of the Dawn ? Next, how did the epic come to have the shape it has, rough indeed, yet massive, in verse too ponderous to be lyrical. It cannot be a mere collection of people’s songs, it has not the light measure of the Kalevala, or of the Romaic Tragoudia, or of the Scotch or Provencal ballad. Is it then the work of some monk, who in that grey dawn of the first Renaissance may have tasted of the stolen waters of the Magician Virgilius ? Or is it the soDg of a wandering jongleur, chanted in village streets ? Or is it only one out of the countless crowd of feudal romances, composed �The Chanson de Roland. 35 by known authors, for a kind of literary public, between the eleventh and the fourteenth centuries? Probably it falls under none of these descriptions. Not lyrical, with no touch of clas­ sical influence, not vulgar in tone, the poem is a true chanson de geste, a family lay, grown together under the hands of a succession of the minstrels nurtured by a noble house, and ultimately it has received written form at the hands of one of these. Again, what manner of men were they who found in the Paladins their heroes, and in this poem their epic ? How much memory had they of the Roman culture, and of the Olympian gods ? what did they know of the new monotheism of Arabia, what survivals of heathenism did they retain ? What beginnings of chivalry were there among them, what remains of barbarism ? In what were they like, and in what unlike the sons of the Achaeans, among whom the older and lovelier epics came into existence ? Some of these questions need to be considered before the poem is approached, some of them the poem itself answers. First, with regard to what Mr. Max Muller calls the “ grits of local history,” which sometimes exist at the centre of a myth, and refuse to yield to the keenest instruments of the mythologist. Here there rises one form, as later another, of the endless Homeric question. In the case of Homer no one can doubt that there was a great empire at Argos, a great capital at Mycenae, and few can refuse to see in the Iliad traces of a war more human than the struggle between light and darkness. Yet it is only here and there a student of Professor Blackie’s type who believes in a real Achilles, a real Helen ; and most readers must rest in the opinion that the prehistoric civilization of Argos left a genuine though vague memory, which became a nucleus for myth and tradition of various date and origin, and scarcely of estimable historical value. Just so it is with the historical part of the Frankish epic. We know that in 778 the rear-guard of Charles’s army was cut off by mountaineers in the Pyrenees, as it returned from an unsuccessful attempt on Saragossa. But we have no reason to believe that the Saracens aided in the attack, and we are certain that the prodigious feats of Roland and his companions, the echoes of the “dread horn/’ the edge of Durandal, the angelic apparition, are as unhistorical as the vision of Pallas to Achilles. Ganelon too, the traitor, is of the race of JEgistheus, and the whole epic is full of the common­ places and stock characters of primitive imagination. Yet it does not follow that because much is impossible and super­ natural, and the tale one of defeat and death, the poem is a mere version of a Solar myth. The school of mythologists who see all tradition in the sun �36 The Chanson de Roland. as Malebranche saw all things in God, have not spared the glory of Roland. There are two attacks, one scientific and one popular, on the hero’s identity. The first is the theory of Dr. Hugo’ Meyer, according to whom the Chanson sets forth a myth blended of memories of the twilight of the gods, and of the real disaster at Roncevaux. Thus the name of the traitor Ganelon is resolved into Gamal, gamal is translated old, Old is an epithet of the mythical Wolf of the Edda, the Wolf is Twilight, for Twilight is grey and swallows the light. This equation worked out, it is plain to any unbiassed mind that Roland, the foe of Ganelon, must be the God Hrodo fighting the Wolf Fenris. In point of fact, Roland does not fight Ganelon, who is his stepfather, and certainly regards him in a stepfatherly way. The only real refutation of the solar theory, as M. Gaston Paris has observed, is a parody, or a sneer. Any battle, the life of any hero, may be twisted into a parable of day and night. But M. Paris has proved that in this case Ganelon is saved from being the wolf by the laws of language, which do not permit the conversion of Gamal into Guenes, or Ganelon. Besides, there is no d priori reason why a Christian and Frankish aristocracy of the ninth century should desert their own stock of Christian mythology for that of Scandinavia. Mr. Cox, another advocate of the Sun, has nothing to say of Hrodo, or Gamal, but thinks that Roland’s sword of sharpness, his invulnerable strength, his horn, and his lady Aide, who dies at the tidings of his death, identify him with Herakles, Achilles, Sigurd, Arthur, all the heroes who are absorbed in the centre of our system. Perhaps the super­ natural element in the epic is more easily accounted for by the usual, and apparently necessary forces of the primitive imagina­ tion. Whatever the will may be, in primitive man the imagi­ nation is bond, and the seemingly wildest fancies of remote races go an unvarying round of events, characters, very often of verbal formulae. As to the supernatural occurrences, Guibert de Nogent, or any chronicler of the eleventh century, tells stranger marvels. Roland’s arms are not those of the Sun/the lucida tela diei, they are gifts of no god more celestial than Wiinsch or Wish, the old German God of Desire. Whatever the childlike imagination craves, caps of darkness, nebel-cappe, shoes of swift­ ness, swords of sharpness—with these it equips its favourite heroes. The Chanson is just as historic as the Iliad ; it tells of a war in which little is certain save that the contending parties were great hostile races. Supposing that three centuries were enough for the one tragic incident in Charles’s career to bear fruit in the popular imagina­ tion, it would certainly be sung of in the ballads of the people, and the question occurs, Is the Chanson a pastiche of popular �The Chanson de Roland. 37 songs ? And here the likeness to the Homeric controversy recurs, for the Homeric epics, too, are felt to have some relation to the ballad style. That ballads existed among the Franks there can be no doubt at all. Charles himself is known to have collected the ancient volks-lieder of Germany. In the biography of S. Faro, a work of the ninth century, mention is made of a ballad on one of Clotaire’s victories—a ballad sung by girls in the dance. The biographer of S. William of Gellone, too, writing in the eleventh century, talks of the chori juvenum who sung of his hero. A yet earlier, and still extant ballad, is that of Donna Lombarda, Rosamond, the wife of Alboin. These ballads were contemporary with the events they recorded, and no doubt such ballads must have contained the popular view of the disaster at Roncevaux. These would be portions of truly popular poetry, of that spontaneous song which in Corsica and Modern Greece, and Russia still—as of old all over Europe—formed the culture of the * people. These songs in all lands express delight at the return of spring, or record the aspect in which, as through deeps of still water, some tragical event of the moving world of men appears to the indolent eyes of peasants; or they give voice to joy or sorrow at bridal or burial, or weave into melody some one of the primitive stock of folk-stories. These are all of the nature of true popular poetry, but these must not be confused with epic. It is this mistake which has led to attempts at Homeric transla­ tion in ballad metre and ballad commonplace. The epic is of its nature not popular, but aristocratic and artistic, and sings of the ancestors of a settled aristocracy. Thus in Greece the Lityerses song, or the Rhodian song of the swallow, was popular; the aristeia of Diomede, or of Achilles, were primarily the property (the chansons de geste'), of the houses of Crete or Larissa. How, then, was the epic formed ? how was the advance made from the lyric versicle to the ornate chronicle in verse ? Looking at the epics either of Greece or France, it is plain that they contain survivals of the characteristic formulae of ballads. These are textual repetitions of speeches, recurring epithets, as “ the green grass,” “ the salt sea foam in Homer, opta aKiotvra; in Roland, coupes d’or cler, L’Emperes d la barbe chenue ; also the curious practice of lavishing gold and silver on common articles of everyday use. One might say, then, that artistic poetry grew like the manor out of the folk-land, like religion out of the worship of recognised ancestral spirits, instead of strange objects at large ; that even so in art, an aristocracy found popular poetry a * Cf. Mr. Ralston’s “ Songs of the Russian PeopleM. Rathery’s article in the Revue des Deux Mondes ; M. Nigra’s and M. Pitre’s “ Popular Songs of Italy.” �38 The Chanson de Roland. field unenclosed, and employed ministers of its own—retainers, who became a profession, with a hereditary collection of artistic rules, to perpetuate the memory of forefathers. These minstrels would naturally retain much of the simple formulae of the folk­ song ; but with practice, with an audience that had plenty of leisure, would add to the early simplicity the length, fire, con­ tinued majesty of the epic. This would, lastly, be written out, and become a model, from which a later class of singers degenerated. If this account of the growth of a chanson de geste be a correct one, we need not look, like M. Gautier, for fragments of ballads in the separate stanzas. M. Gautier, like many Homeric critics, thinks he can discern various short lays in the Dream of Charles, the Death of Aide, the battle-scene, and so on. But these, with their dramatic propriety, as necessary links in the poem, cannot have been composed as chance snatches of song. The girls of Lorraine in the present century still sung of Ogier, but the ancient ballad was a light lyric, in nothing like the stanza of Roland. * Who then may have been the genius, the Homeros, who gave unity to the traditions of Roncevaux ? Two answers at least may be rejected. He was not one of the lower jongleurs, who got his living by singing through villages. A village audience could have neither time nor appreciation to give to such a poem ; though in Finland, through the enforced idleness of the long winter nights, the peasantry have developed the Kalevala, an epic of their own. Lastly, the composer of the “ Chanson de Roland ” can scarcely, as a writer in the Quarterly Review supposes, “ have been acquainted with the great models of Roman literature.” t Where the feudal approaches the classic epic, it is by virtue of its native force and heroic quality, not by the patches of mythological allusion and faded rhetoric with which the contemporary, Abbo, garnishes his verses on the siege of Paris by the Normans. Nor is the religious tone at all that of the learned monk. What monks made of Roland we see in the chronicle of the Pseudo Turpin, where the hero is a military pietist, not the Baron who holds up in death his gauntlet to God. We may set aside, then, the village jongleur, and the monk of letters, and consider “ Roland” a real “ family song,” chanson de geste. Looking further down history, we find a school of cyclic poets in France, occupied with glorifying the heroic houses of Lorrain, of Rousillon, at the expense of Charles, the ancestor of the royal line, and the typical enemy of the feudal revolt. * “ Romancero Champenois.” f Quarterly Review, vol. cxx., p. 287. �The Chanson de Roland. 39 In the hands of this school Charles is degraded, just as the characters of Menelaus and Odysseus were by the poets of republican Greece. “ Roland ” is to such a poem as “les fils d’Aymon,” as the “Iliad” is to the “ Orestes ” of Euripides. Even in Roland the king is not the most prominent figure; but as the influence of the leudes of the later Carlovingdans grew stronger, he becomes the faineant that even the latest of his race in Laon never were. Later still, the cyclic epics lost all hold on history, became poems of fantasy, like “ Huon of Bordeaux,” the mediaeval Odyssey. Still later came Celtic and Provencal influences, the chivalry and faerie of the court of Arthur, and Roland was only remem­ bered in the chap books of peasants, and the burlesque of Ariosto. Other poems of the early date must have existed, for they are referred to in the “ Chanson” just as the “ Iliad ” refers to lost songs ; but of this class, the great Chanson alone remains tn testify to a heroic age and an epic genius among the Franks. So far, there is a tolerably complete parallel between the Homeric and the mediaeval epopee. Both retain traces and survivals of an earlier genre of poetry, the folk-song ; of both, the ultimate composer is unknown, both glorify an aristocracy co-existing with a heroic kingship. In the epic the strange identity of human nature is once more revealed. Here, after the ages of classic civilization and of Christian faith, an epoch as simple and hardy, noble and child­ like as the Greek heroic age, is reborn, under changed stars indeed, and on ground strewn with the ruins of empires, and amid confusion of broken lights. This recurrence of the past is the beauty of the poem, “all of iron” as it is, as the King Didier said of the hosts of Charles. Here once more is the Homeric king, “ here are the Franks of France,” like the sons of the Achaeans, here are quarrels like those in the leaguer of Troy, and the wrath of Ganelon sends many souls of heroes to be among “ the holy flowers of Paradise.” God is the spectator of this fight, and angels and devils take sides with Franks and Saracens, for the war had a sacred character reflected on it from the religious indignation that caused the first crusade. Yet, sacred as is the war, the military character is the more promi­ nent, the song is the voice of the free life of the Franks, who have changed Odin for Christ, without any of the fear or ecstasy of the monk, but simply as men recognising a higher form of the God of battles. The courtesy of the North is here with all its gravity, not even Ganelon returns a railing answer; but this courtesy is the natural growth of reverence from freeman to freeman, and has none of the later refinement of chivalry. �40 The Chanson de Roland. Love, too, so soon to be the god of Western poetry, is kept out of view—a power unthought of in time of war—and though the lady Aide dies at the news of Roland’s death, he wears in battle no favours of hers, or of any lady’s. The artistic form of the epic is a series of laisses, or stanzas of varying length ; of lines of five feet, each laisse having but one rhyme or assonance throughout. M. Littrd has translated a book of Homer into this metre, not without success ; and an idea of its value for Homeric imitation may be gathered from this fragment by M. L. Gautier:— “ Oiez chanson plus bele n’iert chantee Ce est d’Achille a la chiere membree Qui tant duel fist en Grece la loee Par qui tant atnne en enter fust logee Tant corps es chiens gite comme cuiree.” The poet starts at once in medias res, there is no invocation of any muse. Charles is sitting on his golden throne, judging his host, under a pine-tree; around the warriors are playing chess or draughts, like the suitors on the threshold of Odysseus. Then comes Blancandrin to the Emperor of “ the long beard in white flower,” with offers of peace and treaty from Marsile, sultan of the miscreants. Marsile will give hostages, and follow the Emperor to Aachen. Here Roland speaks out, and would have Charles refuse all parley with heathens who once already had slain his envoys. This is enough to make Ganelon, Roland’s stepfather, reply moult jierement on the other side. From this quarrel, the /bthvig of Ganelon takes occasion. As the barons wrangle Charles speaks, the Emperor is still lord of his warring knights, Franceis si taisent at his word. He decides to send an envoy to Marsile, and the choice falls on the re­ luctant Ganelon, who now thinks himself but a slain man. As he mounts to ride away with Blancandrin, he already meditates treason. , “ Seigneurs,” he says, “ ye shall have news of this sending.’ Yet his heart is softened a moment, thinking of la belle France, and of his son at home. “ Baldewin mon filz que vous savez E lui aidez, e pur seignior le tenez.” There is even something noble and admirable in Ganelon's bearing. He scarcely disguises his intention to play the traitor, a part fatal in his house, as other crimes in the house of Thyestes. “ In hell we are a great house,” says a traitor of his line, in a later epic, and in the hostile camp Ganelon acts like one who is treacherous through no coward fear. He cries aloud to Marsile, “ Be thou baptized, oh king, to Aachen shalt thou be haled, �The Chanson de Roland. 41 and there receive judgment, and there shalt thou die in shame and mean estate?’ Marsile laid his hand on his spear, it seemed as if the envoy were to be slain with his missive unread. Then Ganelon having been as insulting as his code required, produced Charles’s letter, and as Marsile read it, set his back against a pine, and half drew his sword. Even the ranks of miscreants could scarce forbear to cheer : Noble Barun ad ci, they said. He is indeed a fair knight, broken loose from the central duty, the necessary loyalty of feudalism. Marsile found the letter less fiery than the manner of its delivery; he spoke softly to Ganelon, and offered him a present of sable skins, a Homeric rather than a chivalrous form of satisfac­ tion. “ When will Charles the Old be weary of war ?” “Never while his nephew Roland and the Peers are on ground,” says Ganelon ; and he advises the Sultan to send tribute and hostages, but withal to lay a great ambush in the passes of the Pyrenees. Then Ganelon swears to treason on the relics of his sword, and returns to camp “en l’albe, si cum li jurz esclairet,” bringing the keys of Saragossa, hostages and treasures. Before the army sets out for home, Charles has an evil dream, that Ganelon seized his spear in the pass of the hills. The king ■wakes, and weeps like Agamemnon or Achilles, the ready heroic tears. “ Charles ne poet muer que de ses oilz ne plurt.” By Ganelon’s advice he assigns the rearguard to Roland, with Evrard de Rousillon, Turpin, and Oliver. Then the army broke up camp. “ Black rocks they crossed, and dark valleys,” till they came within sight of Gascony. Then again broke out the ready heroic tears, “ at memory of their fiefs and fields and of their little ones, and gentle wives none was there who did not weep.” There was forethought of evil in the hearts of the vanguard ; in the rear, Oliver heard the footsteps of the gathering Pagans. “We shall have battle,” he says. “ God grant it,” says Roland, “ que malvais chant de nus chantet ne seit.” Never let bad ballad be sang of us. Then Oliver would have spoken evil of Ganelon, but Roland would not hear it; “ mis parastre ist, ne voeill que mot en suns.” Nor will Roland listen to Oliver when he bids him blow his magic horn, for aid against miscreants. “ In sweet France I would lose my fame.” The heathen approach, Turpin absolves the army; no ele­ ments of sacrament are there but grass and leaves. So in Threnakia the doomed company of Odysseus made hapless sacri­ fice, QvXXa ^peipafitvoi rtptva 8pvoc vxpiKopoto. Then the Franks cried “ Mount Joieand Aelroth, the nephew of Marsile, rode along the heathen line shouting taunts, and the melde began. Through all the scene of battle, the Frankish singer, like Scott �42 The Chanson de Roland. in the song of Flodden, “ never stoops his wing?’ In this Homeric battle Roland drives his lance through breastplate and breast of Aelroth, Oliver casts down Fausseron, “ Seigneur of the land of Dathan and Abiron,” Turpin slays King Corsablyx. Spears and axes sound like hammers on heroic mails; the fight goes well for the Franks. “ Gente est nostre battaille,” cries Oliver. Siglorel falls, the “ enchanter whom Jupiter had led through bell.” Sathan hath his soul. Lances are broken and thrown away. Oliver draws his sword Haute claire—it is no battle to smite in with a spear truncheon. Roland draws Durandal; the peers cut their way through the Saracens, as Cortez’s men through the white clouds of Aztec spearmen. But the innume­ rable hosts of the miscreants close in, the heathen reserves come up, the ranks of the barons are thinned. And now would Roland fain sound his horn, but Oliver mocks him. “ Wilt thou not lose thy fame in sweet France? Ah, never now shalt thou lie in the arms of Aide my sister.” “Nay, sound,” said Turpin, “ we shall have burial at our friends’ hands, and be no wolves’ spoil.” Then the hero blew till blood started from his mouth, and the echo of that dread horn wound through the passes of the hills, and rang above the tempest of wind, and the thunder, the wailing of nature, la granz dulurs pur la mort de Roland. Surely if there is anything of mythology in the legend of Roland it is here, where the heaven is darkened, and the veil of the heaven is rent, and the blind powers of the world cry, as for Baldur or Adonis. Charles heard the horn, and knew his nephew was in extremity, and knew the treason of Ganelon. So Ganelon was given to the cooks and campfollowers, to bind him and torment him. Meanwhile the battle raged on the Spanish side of the hills, “ the black folk that had nothing white save the teeth,” fell on the weary knights. Never shall they see tere de France, mult dulz pais. The Califf wounds Oliver to death, and is slain by the Paladin, whose eyes are now dimmed by blood and heat, and who strikes blindly, like John of Bohemia at Cre^y. A blow even falls on Roland’s crest, “Sire cumpain faites le vos de gred,” he asks, “ did you strike me wilfully?” “Nay, for I hear thee, but see thee not, friend Roland, God help thee.” Then Roland pardoned him before God, “ d icel mot Vun a Valtre ad clinet.” With this courtesy they parted that had in life been true companions in arms, and in death were not long divided. Now Roland’s horse was slain, and himself foredone with battle, and he gathered the corpses of the peers in a circle about the dying Bishop Turpin. The bishop crosses his hands, “ ses beles mams les blanches,” his fair white hands, that shine out in the rough poem like a delicate jleur de Paradis from hewn Gothic work. They shall �The Chansen de Roland. 43 all meet soon, he says, among the Holy Innocents. So Roland spoke his praise over Oliver, as Borsover the dead Sir Launcelot. But Oliver is honoured, not as “ the curtiest knight that ever in hall did eat with ladies/’ but “ Pur Osbercs rompre et desmailler, Epur proz domes tenir e cunseiller .... En multe tere n’ot meillur chevaler.” Last, Roland lays himself down “ sur l’erbe verte,” and seeks to break the blade of Durandal lest it fall into the hands of un­ believers. Ten blows on the hard rock and on the Sardonyx stone fail to splinter the steel. “ Ah, Durandal, how clear thou art and bright that shinest as the sun ; with thee have I con­ quered lands and domains for Charles of the white beard. Yea, now for thee have I sorrow and heaviness, and would die sooner than see thee in pagan hands. Holy thou art, and lovely; in thy golden hilt is store of relics. How many kingdoms have I taken with thee, wherein Charles now rules !” Then he lay down on the green grass beneath a pine, and cast his sword and horn beneath his body. His face was turned to Spain, and many things came into his mind—sweet France, and the Barons of his house, and Charles his lord. He might not endure, but wept and groaned heavily. He stretched out to God the glove of his right hand ; S. Gabriel took it from his grasp. Roland is dead ; God have his soul in heaven. S. Michael of the Sea bare his spirit to Paradise. The poem might well end with Roland’s, as the Iliad with Hector’s, death. But national pride requires that the Paynim should not triumph, and poetical justice demands the punish­ ment of Ganelon. The sun stood still for Charles, as of old on Gilboah, and the heathen, calling on Termagaunt their god, were driven to Saragossa. They pass like a mist into the dark ; the tired horses lie down and feed as they lie. Charles finds Roland’s body with its face to the foe. In Saragossa, Marsile beats his image of Apollo, and casts the idol of Mahomet into a ditch. Clearly the poet’s notion of the Arab monotheism was gathered previous to the Crusades, from some alien fetichism, and from memoirs of the degraded rulers of Olympus. Next day was a day of battle. The king fought well in his place, dient Franceis, Icist Reis ist Vassals, Mult bien i fieri Charles li Reis, an angel stood by him. Night fell softly. Clere est la lune, et les esteiles flambiert, when Charles marched into Saragossa. His second return was unmolested ; but in Aachen the beloved of Roland waited for news of her lord. Aide “of the golden hair and the bright face,” fell dead at Charles’s feet. He would have given her rough comfort, and his �An Early French Economist. 44 son for husband. Here only love enters the poem, “vierge comme la Mort.” The part of woman in the Western world is not yet come. With Aide’s death all the interest of the Chanson ceases. Yet the last lines are dramatic. The grey king is musing alone ; he says, Deus, si peneuse est ma vie, a vista opens of future wars without Roland’s sword, of a hard end to a hard life, of Norman invaders and a tarnished fame, to the eyes of the weary emperor. Ci fait le Geste que Turoldus declinet. So ends the epic which Theroualde, whoever he was, wrote, or composed, or recited. New themes, chivalry, Arthur’s Table, faerie, came in, “ the newest songs are sweetest to men.” When Ronsard and Voltaire sought subjects for epics they found them in a fictitious Francus, and that dubious hero, Henri IV. The later writer might well say that the French have not la tele e pique. What­ ever the conquering Franks possessed of weighty language, of simple heroism and grave imagination, they lost as they became one with the subject Celts and Latins. The Chanson de Roland will probably always be for France, not a source of new and lofty poetry, but a rough literary curi­ osity, a thing to admire by practice and with reservations. The nation, like Sainte-Beuve, is more at home with the polished arti­ fice of the Renaissance, or the passion of the Romantic school. Art. III.—An Early French Economist. IERRE LE PESANT DE BOISGUILBERT, or Boisguillebert, was the Civil and Criminal Lieutenant of the Balliage of Rouen towards the end of the seventeenth century, a rank about equivalent to that of President of the Civil Tribunal at the pre­ sent day. Beyond the fact that he was a grand-nephew of the great Corneille, and that he was a native of Normandy, presumably of a poor gentleman’s family of Rouen, scarcely anything is known of his birth and parentage. The Due de St. Simon, in his well-known Memoirs, tells us that Boisguilbert, inspired with the profoundest sympathy for the woes of his country, and deeply disgusted with the incapacity and dishonesty of the officials who preyed upon her, resolved to wait upon Pontchartrain, the Controller General of Finance, in the hope of inducing him to listen to his plans of reform. P � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Victorian Blogging Description An account of the resource A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library &amp; Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span> Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Conway Hall Library & Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Conway Hall Ethical Society Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data Pamphlet Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource The Chanson de Roland Description An account of the resource Place of publication: [London] Collation: p. 32-44 ; 22 cm. Notes: Includes bibliographical references. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. From Westminster Review 44 (July 1973). Review of Les Chansons de Roland, texte critique accompagne d'une traduction nouvelle et precede d'une introduction historique par Leon Gautier. Tours 1872. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available [s.n.] Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [n.d.] Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context CT40 Subject The topic of the resource Book reviews Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource [Unknown] Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The Chanson de Roland), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English French Book Reviews Conway Tracts Legends Poetry Song of Roland https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/e4143934c957822b6e4787a76ff8b640.pdf?Expires=1779926400&Signature=GFbuHDZuC9f-Hy2otMxdirunn%7ELZuDsCv6ijmfmIGJJnhsZvyzih3e0F0sOzb2hqdZvAuuqVuISNZn7BjG7kAcDw996X6vUZjvQ9GkoxUId36BbAXhs3OKnV0iz1Tn9qZ%7EvNWBJZlCkRkdp9P4YqEWlTRUKu6260toS7NcLV6mElnQZzL4Jo1CTLBmrCVfGuz2wjRz7ZgCaGti7sRPM-jyETkzN61po11kIoKS1dFOHh%7EoroqQPnA9syeMVvht3vqjltvu6JpxKmktNx8v1X71xR3-xmXeYIP7yGE12kwX7ZdKXF6UeB7J3CvENDFOROF2Ajdl9vsl%7EbRr40%7ENCLWg__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 99d43b758acc90c6c18b7c0cb1f1a9f0 PDF Text Text PRICE PART 5. FREETHOUBHT AND Secular Songs COMPILED BY J. M. WHEELER. J, Xonöon : R. FORDER, 28 STONECUTTER STREET, E.C. ��NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY Freethought Readings AND Secular Songs. COMPILED BY J. M. WHEELER. London: R. FORDER, 28 STONECUTTER STREET, E.C. �LONDON : A. BONNER, PRINTER, 34 BOUVERIE STREET, FLEET STREET, E.C. �i I I ��SECULAR SONGS. 193 WISDOM. ------------ C.M. Happy the man whose cautious steps Still keep the golden mean ; Whose life, to wisdom’s rules conform’d Preserves a conscience clean. Not of himself too highly thinks, Nor acts the boaster’s part; His modest tongue the language speaks Spontaneous from his heart. Not in low scandal’s arts he deals, For truth dwells in his breast; With grief he sees his neighbors’ faults, And thinks and hopes the best. To sect or party his large soul Disdains to be confin’d ; He loves the good of every name ’Mong all the human kind. STAND UP FOR FREEDOM. Air—Sankey’s Solos, No. 15. Stand up ! Stand up for freedom, Ye soldiers of Freethought; Raise high the noble banner, ’Neath which our fathers fought. From victory unto victory— The people we will lead, Till every wrong is righted And Justice reigns indeed. Stand up ! Stand up for freedom Against the fierce array Of Ignorance and Bigotry, Which strive the Truth to slay. o �194 SECULAR SONGS. No frowning gods fill us with awe, Our minds are free as air ; The terrors of the Christian law, For freedom’s cause we dare. Stand up ! Stand up for freedom, Till we remove the stain Of the blood of noble martyrs, Whom Bigotry has slain ; Till kings and priests shall lose the power Our leaders to consign To scaffold, or to dungeon tower, Or dark Siberian mine. Stand up ! Stand up for freedom, ’Tis the noblest cause to serve ; The music of our onward march, Our arts and arms shall nerve 1 To raise Truth’s spotless banner, And keep it still unfurled— Emblazoned with the hallowed names Of the saviours of the world. Stand up ! Stand up for freedom, We know our cause is just; And clothed in Reason’s armor, We smile at every thrust, Which Falsehood aims against the life Of our humanity; And onward press thro’ all the strife, Till all mankind are free. REAL LOSS. Something is lost when your possessions perish, When fortune pitiless for ever frowns, But still a dream of better days you cherish, Of days which fortune, changed, with rapture crowns. �SECULAR SONGS. I95 How much is lost when tarnished is your glory, When you are cursed by a dishonored name ? But combat, bear, and toil, you live in story ; Atonement gains a new unsullied fame. All, all, is lost, when noble valor leaves you, When craven terrors bring profound despair, Nothing on earth more gladdens now or grieves you : Then seek the grave, your home is only there. True life is in true courage; sternly, boldly, The true man welcomes grand the dreadest doom ; Fiery in his heroic deeds, he coldly And unrepining sinks into the tomb. After Gothe, by W. Maccall. BETTER RUB THAN RUST. Idler ! why lie down to die ? Better rub than rust; Hark ! the lark sings in the sky— “ Die when die thou must 1 Day is waking, leaves are shaking, Better rub than rust.” In the grave there’s sleep enough— “ Better rub than rust; Death, perhaps, is hunger-proof, Die when die thou must; Men are mowing, breezes blowing, Better rub than rust.” He who will not work shall want; Nought for nought is just— Won’t do, must do, when he can’t; “ Better rub than rust. Bees are flying, sloth is dying, Better rub than rust.” E. Elliott. �SECULAR SONGS. ig6 COURAGEThe world was ne’er improved By timid, fearful men ; Nor mighty wrongs removed By slavish tongue or pen. Our noble sires of old Were dauntless and were brave , Their hearts to truth not cold, Dared prison-cell and grave. They suffered for the right, They won the martyr-crown, They fought the noble fight, Tfey braved the priesthood s frow . Help on what they began. And strive for objects great, Let us their errors shun, Their virtues imitate. the better E. L.. creed. lH-theeSCl:fXB-eZdght. instead Mother, O where is t is Is it richly endowed, and upheld by state, An a nt- rulers are monkish knaves, Whose despot ruler wretched slaves ? And the priest-ridden people wretched CanitbefcoIntheha1WiheVaticanan? That truth and science^are^^ �197 •SECULAR SONGS. Is it nearer home, when on Sabbath days The hearers yawn while the minister prays, Or nod assent while he dares to tell That honest sceptics are doomed to hell ? Is it truth, they teach, dear mother, say, From the Protestant pulpits on Sabbath day ? Not so, not so, my child. Eye would not see it, could they prevent, Ear would not hear with their consent, The little band still struggles away, Waiting the dawn of a brighter day ; When the hoary fabric of error shall fall Then shall flourish the Freethought Hall. It is there, it is there, my child. J. Wilson. HEAVEN ON EARTH. When kings are forgotten and priests are no more, When royal and righteous mean truth at the core, When work stands for worship, and worship is worth, The kingdom of heaven will come on the earth. When valor is noble, when toil is secure, When hope may be cheerful, and sacrifice sure, When service shrinks not from its glorious girth, The kingdom of heaven will come on the earth, When honor means duty, when duty is known, When faith dwells no more in her closet alone, When conscience to consequent action gives birth, The kingdom of heaven will come on the earth. When love liketh wisdom, and worshippeth right, When peace kisseth him who has fought the good fight, When virtue is mother of beauty and worth, The kingdom of heaven will come on the earth. W. J. Linton. �SECULAR SONGS. VICTORY. Work can never miss its wages, One wide song rings through the ages “ Ever loss true gain presages.” Not alone that flowers are blowing Over graves; that bread is growing In warm tears from heaven flowing. Let the conquerer blush for winning Little worth his conquest sinning: They who lose are so beginning. Through the years one chorus ringeth The death-chant the martyr singeth Is the root whence vidtory springeth. Ever through the book of ages The same echoes close the pages : “ Ever loss true gain presages.” W. J. Linton. THE TRUE EDEN. All before us lies the way: Give the past unto the wind : All before us is the day : Night and darkness are behind. Not where long-past ages sleep Seek we Eden’s golden trees ; In the future, folded deep, Are its mystic harmonies. Eden, with its angels bold, Trees, and flowers, and coolest sea, Is less an ancient story told Than a glowing prophecy. �I99 SECULAR SONGS. In the spirit’s perfect air, In the passions tame and kind, Innocence from selfish care, The true Eden shall we find. It is coming, it shall come To the patient and the striving; To the quiet heart at home Thinking wise, and faithful living. When the soul to sin hath died, True and beautiful and sound; Then all earth is sanctified Up springs Paradise around. Emerson. TRUTH. -------- 8's. A conscious fortitude sustains The heart of him who guile disdains; Firm as a rock his faith he builds, Which to no storm or tempest yields: He builds on truth, whence ev’ry joy Is lasting, free from all alloy. Shall servile imitation’s smile, Us of this fortitude beguile; And, led by custom, visions prize, While truth seems little in our eyes ? It must not be; vain dreams begone ! Oh ! give us truth, and truth alone. ’Tis truth from error purifies, While vice but borrows error’s guise, With dazzling show to lure the sight, And make what’s wrong seem what is right; But truth and virtue seek no aid, Both best in native worth array’d. z �200 SECULAR SONGS. THE DAWN OF FREETHOUGHT. •------------ L.M. A glorious day at length is breaking, When Freethought shall triumphant reign; The world from slumber is awaking-,y o In error ne’er to sleep again. The gloomy night of Superstition Flies before the approaching day : Religious fraud and imposition Can our minds no longer sway. As the hazy mists of morning Fly before the sun’s bright beams, So let Truth, our path adorning, Scatter all those foolish dreams. Though long by priestly lore confounded, Let us seek a better way, And with joy and peace surrounded, Hail with triumph Freedom’s day. Anon. TRUTH. ------ *----- All nature speaks ! let men give ear, And stand erect, attentive, free; The voice of nature they shall hear, The works of nature they shall see. Behold the stars with sparkling light, And planets which in order move ; They mount in ether’s tow’ring height, And raise our thoughts to orbs above. The glorious sun, whose gentle beams Enliven all things here below, And lucid moon, with paler gleams, Does nature’s power in grandeur show. L. M. �201 SECULAR SONGS. Survey the whole capacious earth, The sea and land, rocks, hills, and plains; The power of nature gave them birth, And by one law the whole maintains. Behold the trees in verdure rise, What beauty shines in all their leaves ! Behold the birds that mount the skies, And fish that fill the mighty seas: In them is seen the matchless power, From which all living beings came; Then let us all the truth adore, And bow before her mighty name. EDUCATION. There is in every human heart Some not completely barren part, Where seeds of love and truth might grow, And flowers of generous virtue blow ; To plant, to watch, to water there, This be our duty, this our care. And sweet it is the growth to .trace Of worth, of intellect, of grace, In bosoms where our labors first Bid the young seed-time burst, And lead it on from hour to hour To ripen into perfect flower. The heart of man’s a soil which breeds Or sweetest flowers or vilest weeds : Flowers, lovely as the morning’s light : Weeds, deadly as the aconite ; Just as his heart is trained to bear The poisonous weed or flow’ret fair. Bowring. �202 SECULAR SONGS. THE NEW BORN LIGHT. L.M. ------------- The day is here, the dawn of hope, The light of some new life supreme, For which in sadness we did grope, Of which in gladness we did dream. Clear reason, steadfast love and faith, In greater deeds and purer joy— These take the misery from death, These all our mocking doubts destroy. We lose the fear which once enthralled, We hold the hope which once we lost; Our souls no longer move appalled O’er some dark ocean, tempest-tost. But alway with the new-born light, And alway toward the far-off peace, With faith in truth and trust in right, Move onward till their flight shall cease. PRESENT TIME. ------------- C. M. D. [From “ Gems of Moral Song,'* by permission of Mr. F. Pitman, London.] There’s no time like the present time, The future is not ours, If we would make our lives sublime, Improve the present hours. For oh, how little can we tell What future hours may bring, So if we use the present well, Our past will bear no sting. There’s no time like the present time, The deeds we do to-day May make our memories sublime When we have passed away; �203, SECULAR SONGS. The present is the time to build The structure of our past; Let every stone and tile be made, Of thoughts and deeds to last. There’s no time like the present time, For doing kindly deeds, And gathering in a generous store To serve our future needs; To-day we write a page of life The future shall unfold ; But let there be no tale of strife, No dross among the gold. NEW YEAR’S EVE. -----Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky; The flying cloud, the frosty light; The year is dying in the night; Ring out, wild bells, and let him die. L.M. Ring out the old, ring in the new, Ring, happy bells, across the snow; The year is going, let him go; Ring out the false, ring in the true. Ring out the grief that saps the mind For those that here we see no more; Ring out the feud of rich and poor, Ring in redress for all mankind. Ring out the slowly dying cause, And ancient forms of party strife; Ring in the nobler modes of life, With sweeter manners, purer laws. Ring out false pride in place and blood, The civic slander and the spite, Ring in the love of truth and right, Ring in the common love of good. Tennysonl * �204 SECULAR SONGS. EARTHLY PARADISE. Tell me not of climes celestial, Mansions furnished in the skies, Whither souls from earth disjointed, Shall take airy wing and rise. Tell me not of endless pleasures, For a life of toil and pain, ' When awak’ning from death’s slumber, Men shall rise and live again. Sure this earth, a hell sufficient, Might a paradise be made, Were not keeping it so wretched A commodity in trade. Dream no longer, wake to action, And bid grief give place to mirth ; Let each man be deemed a brother— Make a heaven upon earth. THE VOICE AND PEN. Oh ! the Orator’s voice is a mighty power, As it echoes from shore to shore, And the fearless pen has more sway o’er men, Than the murderous cannon’s roar ! What bursts the chain far over the main, And brightens the captives den ? Tis the fearless pen and the voice of power, Hurrah ! for the Voice and Pen ! < Hurrah! Hurrah for the Voice and Pen ! The tyrant knaves who deny Man’s rights, And the cowards who blanch with fear, �SECULAR SONGS. Exclaim with glee—“ No arms have ye, Nor cannon, nor sword, nor spear, Your hills are ours, with our forts and towers We are masters of mount and glen.” Tyrants beware ! for the arms we bear Are the Voice and the fearless Pen! Oh ! these are the swords with which we fight, The arms in which we trust; Which no tyrant hand will dare to brand Which time cannot dim or rust. When these we bore we triumphed before, With these we’ll triumph again, And the world will say no power can stay The Voice and the fearless Pen ! TRUTH. ■------------ L. M. Be error known on earth no more, But truth displayed from shore to shore, Till men of every land shall see, That it alone shall make them free. Truth makes our way both clear and bright, As sunbeams from the source of light ; Its glorious rays will never fail, But will through endless time prevail. Through earth its glory be displayed, As one bright day without a shade, Where all may in its beauty find Love, to improve the human mind. Hail, Truth ! our friend, assist our cause ; Inspire our hearts, teach us thy laws ; From ignorance our minds set free, Let wisdom our instructor be. �2o6 SECULAR SONGS. NOBILITY. True worth is in being, not seeming— In doing, each day that goes by, Some little good—not in the dreaming Of great things to do by and by ; For whatever men say in blindness, And spite of the fancies of youth, There’s nothing so kingly as kindness, And nothing so royal as truth. We get back our mete as we measure— We cannot do wrong and feel right, Nor can we give pain and gain pleasure, For justice avenges each slight. The air for the wing of the sparrow. The bush for the robin and wren, But always the path that is narrow And straight for the children of men. ’Tis not in the pages of story The heart of its ills to beguile, Though he who makes courtship to Glory Gives all that he hath for her smile ; For when from her heights he hath won her Alas ! it is only to prove That nothing’s so sacred as honor, And nothing so loyal as love! We cannot make bargains for blisses, Nor catch them like fishes in nets; And sometimes the thing our life misses Helps more than the thing which it gets ; For good lieth not in pursuing, Nor gaining of great nor of small, ¿But just in the doing, and doing As we would be done by, is all. �SECULAR SONGS. 2G7 Through envy, through malice, and hating, Against the world early and late, No jot of our courage abating, Our part is to work and to wait. And slight is the sting of his troubles Whose winnings are less than his worth ; For he who is honest is noble, Whatever his fortune or birth. Alice Cary. THE TRUE PATRIOT. Is there a thought can fill the human mind, More pure, more vast, more generous, more refined, Than that which guides the enlightened patriot’s toil ? Not he whose view is bounded by his soul— Not he whose narrow heart can only shrine The land—the people that he calleth mine; Not he who to set up that land on high, Will make whole nations bleed, whole nations die ; Not he who calling that land’s rights his pride, Tramples the rights of all the earth beside— No ! He it is, the just, the generous soul Who owneth brotherhood with either pole, Stretches from realm to realm his spacious mind, And guards the weal of all the human kind, Holds Freedom’s banner o’er the earth unfurled, And stands the guardian patriot of a world ! TRUTH. Think truly, and thy thoughts Shall the world’s famine feed ; Speak truly, and each word of thine Shall be a fruitful seed ; Live truly, and thy life shall be A great and noble creed. �2o8 SECULAR SONGS. HUMANITY. Hush the loud cannon’s roar, The frantic warrior's call ! Why should the earth be drenched with gore, Are we not brothers all ? Want, from the wretch depart, Chains, from the captive fall! Sweet Mercy, melt the oppressor’s heart; Sufferers are brothers all. Churches and sedts, strike down Each mean partition-wall! Let Love each harsher feeling drown ; For men are brothers all. Let Love and Truth alone Hold human hearts in thrall, That Heaven its work at length may own, And men be brothers all. J. Johns. HUMBLE INFLUENCE. a little streamlet flow Along a peaceful vale : A thread of silver, soft and slow, It wandered down the vale; Just to do good it seemed to move, Directed by the hand of love. I saw The valley smiled in living green; A tree, which near it gave From noontide heat a friendly screen, Drank from its limpid wave. The swallow brushed it with his wing, And followed its meandering. �SECULAR SONGS. 209 But not alone to plant and bird That little stream was known; Its gentle murmur far was heard, A friend’s familiar tone ! It glided by the cotter’s door, It bless’d the labor of the poor. And would that I could thus be found, While travelling life’s brief way, A humble friend to all around, Where’er my footsteps stray; Like that pure stream with tranquil breast, Like it, still blessing, and still blest. Stoddart. A BRAVE HEART. Let the world scorn, Fortune make jest of me, Fling its worst venom to sully my name, Mock and deride, or flout and despise me, Thousands of others have known just the same. Now ’tis for me, now p’rhaps some other wight [Repeat]. Surely will feel all its sting and its smart. So the world wags, so the world wags, Well, let it please itself; well, let it please itself— Fortune will come, if you bear a stout heart 1 [Repeat.] Let the world scorn, I’ll be no sychophant, Creeping and crawling to woo its false smile, Bowing and cringing to sinister influence, Seeking reward thro’ some treacherous wile. No ! not for me, spite of adversity [Repeat.] Mid life’s stern fray I’ll yet bear my part, Helping myself, helping myself, And my neighbour if needing it, my neighbour if needing it, Fortune will come, only bear a stout heart I [Repeat.] Charles J. Rowe. Music by Godfrey Marks, from E. Donajowski, 1 Little Marlborough Street, W. 5 �21.0 SECULAR SONGS. BE UP AND DOING. Long hath the world in darkness lain, And languished long in grief and pain; And still the night broods sad and drear, And still men sigh in want and fear. When shall this darkness pass away, When shall the night be turned to day ? And when shall want and sorrow cease And all be calm and joy and peace ? ’Tis vain to seek for help from prayer, For work alone relieves from care; In vain, in vain, men look above For what must spring from human love. To us, to us, the power is given To soothe the souls with anguish riven : To banish want and vice and woe, And make a heaven on earth below. HOPE. Hope, though slow she be, and late, Yet outruns swift time and fate ; And aforehand loves to be With most remote futurity. Hope is comfort in distress, Hope is in misfortune bliss, Hope, in sorrow, is delight, Hope is day in darkest night. Hope casts anchor upward, where Storms durst never domineer; Trust; and Hope will welcome thee From storms to full security. Beaumont. �SECULAR SONGS. 2II CHARITY. Let us all help one another, And a heart of kindness show, As down time’s stream, my brother! In the boat of Life we row ; For when rough may be the weather, And the skies are overcast, If we only pull together We shall brave the storm at last! Let us all help one another, In the springtide’s sunny ray, And the bonds of friendship, brother 1 Strengthen still from day to day ; When there’s bright hope of the morrow, Hollow hearts will fawn and cling, But when comes the night of sorrow, Only true ones comfort bring! G. L. Banks. AGE THE OF REASON. ------------- S.M. Dark superstition’s veil No more men’s eyes shall blind; But truth unsullied will display Her charms to all mankind. Then shall the time arrive, The long expected time, When peace, good-will, and social love Will reign in every clime. On parent knees, a naked new-born child, Weeping thou sat’st while all around thee smiled; So live that, sinking in thy long last sleep, Calm thou mayst smile while all around thee weep. i’wiiiPTO ‘ Sir W. Jones, 1746-1794. p2 �212 SECULAR SONGS. AS YE SOW, SO SHALL YE REAP. The bud will soon become a flower, The flower become a seed; Then seize, O youth, the present hour, Of that thou hast most need. Do thy best always, do it now,— For in the present time, As in the furrows of a plough Fall seeds of good or crime. The sun and rain will ripen fast Each seed that thou hast sown; And every act and word at last By its own fruit be known. And soon the harvest of thy toil Rejoicing thou shalt reap ; Or o’er thy wild neglected soil Go forth in shame to weep. Jones Very (1813-1880). PSALM OF LIFE. -------- 8.7.8.7. Tell me not in mournful numbers, “ Life is but an empty dream ! ” For the soul is dead that slumbers, And things are not what they seem. Not enjoyment, and not sorrow., Is our destined end or way ; But to act, that each to-morrow Finds us farther than to-day. Art is long, and time is fleeting, And our hearts, tho’ stout and brave, Still like muffled drums are beating Funeral marches to the grave. �SECULAR SONGS. 213 In the world’s broad field of battle, In the bivouac of life, Be not like dumb driven cattle, Be a hero in the strife. Lives of great men all remind us We can make our lives sublime ; And departing leave behind us Footprints on the sands of time. Footprints that perhaps another Sailing o’er life’s solemn main, A forlorn and shipwrecked brother, Seeing, shall take heart again. Let us then be up and doing, With a heart for any fate ; Still achieving, still pursuing, Learn to labor and to wait. H. W. Longfellow (1807-82). FLOWERS OR THORNS ! We must not hope to be mowers, And to gather the ripe gold ears, Until we have first been sowers, And water’d the furrows with tears. It is not just as we take it— This mystical world of ours : Life’s field will yield, as we make it, A harvest of thorns or flowers 1 A. Cary. Blest be the man who gives us peace, Who bids the trumpet hush its horrid clang ; And, every vigor from the work of death To grateful industry converting, makes The city flourish and the country smile ! J. Thomson, 1700-1748. �214 SECULAR SONGS. “ VANITY.” Through wildwood valleys roaming, A maiden by my side, I vowed to love her evermore, My beautiful, my bride. “ All is vanity, vanity,” A wise man said to me, I pressed my true love’s yielding hand, And answered, frank and free. “ If this be vanity, who’d be wise, Vanity let it be.” I sat with boon companions, We quaffed the joyous wine, We drank to worth with three times three, To love with nine times nine. “ All is vanity, vanity,” Said wisdom, scorning me, We filled our goblets once again, And sang with hearty glee. “ If this be vanity, Hip, Hurrah, Vanity let it be.” Chas. Mackay. HAPPINESS WITHIN. It surely is a wasted heart It is a wasted mind, That seeks not in the inner world Its happiness to find: For happiness is like the bird That broods above its nest And finds beneath its folded wings Life’s dearest and its best. Letitia E. Landon, 1802-1838. �215 SECULAR SONGS. REASON. Joy to the world the light is come, The only lawful king ; Let every heart prepare it room, And moral nature sing. Joy to the earth ! now reason reigns; Let men their songs employ ; While fields and floods, rocks, hills, and plains, Repeat the sounding joy. No more let superstition grow, No thorns infest the ground ; This light will make its blessings flow To earth’s remotest bound. SCATTER SEEDS OF KINDNESS. Let us gather up the sunbeams Lying all around our path ; Let us keep the wheat and roses, Casting out the thorns and chaff; Let us find our sweetest comfort In the blessings of to-day, With a patient hand removing All the briers from the way. Then scatter seeds of kindness, Then scatter seeds of kindness, Then scatter seeds of kindness, For our reaping by-and-by. Strange we never prize the music Till the sweet-voiced bird has flown ! Strange that we should slighc the violets Till the lovely flowers are gone! �2l6 SECULAR SONGS. Strange that summer skies and sunshine Never seem one-half so fair, As when winter’s snowy pinions Shake the white down in the air. Then scatter, etc. If we knew the baby fingers, Pressed upon the window-pane, Would be cold and stiff to-morrow:— Never trouble us again— Would the bright eyes of our darling Catch the frown upon our brow ? Would the prints of rosy fingers Vex us then as they do now ? Then scatter, etc. Ah ! those little ice-cold fingers, How they point our memories back To the hasty words and actions Strewn along our backward track ! How those little hands remind us, As in snowy grace they lie, Not to scatter thorns—but roses, For our reaping by-and-by. Then scatter, etc. HOME SWEET HOME. ’Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam, Be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home. A charm from the skies seems to hallow us there, Which seek through the world, is ne’er met with elsewhere. Home! home ! sweet, sweet home ! There’s no place like home! there’s no place like home ! An exile from home splendor dazzles in vain— Oh ! give me my lowly thatch’d cottage again ; The birds singing gaily, that came at my call; Give me them, witn the peace of mind, dearer than all. Home, home, ere. H. Payne. �SECULAR SONGS. WORDS AND ACTS OF KINDNESS. Little words of kindness, How they cheer the heart1 What a world of gladness Will a smile impart ! How a gentle accent Calms the troubled soul, When the waves of passion O’er it wildly roll ! Little acts of kindness, Nothing do they cost; Yet, when they are wanting, Life’s best charm is lost. Little acts of kindness, Richest gems of earth, Though they seem but trifles, Priceless is their worth. IT CAN’T BE ALWAYS SUNSHINE. It can’t be always sunshine, For, since the world was made, By turns has man been walking In sunshine and in shade. Then why should care oppress us, When clouds obscure the day ? Through ev’ry doubt and danger, We’ve hope to lead the way ! There’s sunlight in the distance, Wherever we may be, Which they who are in earnest Can never fail to see. It can't be always sunshine : Should we the gloom despise ? 217 �2l8 SECULAR SONGS. If we saw not our errors, We never should be wise. The race crowns not the fleetest, Nor vict’ry oft the strong ; And truth can only triumph By grappling with the wrong. Then onward for the future, Nor heed the present gloom ; When wintry clouds o’ershade us, We know the rose will bloom. It can’t be always sunshine : Look back to history’s page, And think upon the darkness Of many a by-gone age, The light is round us breaking, But we must do our part To clear the weeds of error, From every canker’d heart. And still we must remember, When doubts our task assail, Though ’tis not always sunshine, ~ That light and truth prevail. J. E. Carpenter^ “ HAPPY DAY.” All in love with one another ! What a world this world would be ! Each so kind to every other ! How 'twould seem one scarce can see. For in caverns dark and dreary, Jealousy is deeply hid ; Forced Labour, worn and weary, Sleeps, his rusting chains amid. Anxious Fear, and all the Terrors, Banished ever from the earth, �SECULAR SONGS. 219 Followed off by stupid Errors, Seen no more in all its girth. Suffering with pallid features, Sorrow with sad eyes of woe, Can no longer press earth’s creatures Down to earth, back-burdened so. Faces bright and voices cheery, Joy the sunny hours away, Show in contrast to the teary Lives before this happy day Honest, just, and good, and truthful Lives with beauty are aglow. Work is sweet, for souls are youthful— And all because man wills it so. B. Arnetta., LOVE. If love with other graces reign, The mind is truly blest; For love, the noblest of the train, Aids and exalts the rest. She suffers long with patient eye, Her kindness still will last' She lets the present injury die, And soon forgets the past. 1 Meekness and peace her bosom fill, From wrath and malice pure ; She hopes, believes, and thinks no ill, And all things will endure. With pitying heart and willing hand, The needy she supplies ; And, if her enemy demand Her help, she ne’er denies. �220 SECULAR SONGS. BENEVOLENCE. Bless’d is the man whose soft’ning heart Feels for his neighbor’s pain ; To whom the supplicating eye Is never raised in vain. With generous zeal he flies to help The stranger in distress; And mourns the wrongs which from his aid Admit not of redress. He lends a kind supporting arm To ev’ry child of grief; His secret bounty largely flows, And yields a prompt relief. To gentle offices of love His feet are never slow ; He views, through mercy’s melting eye, A brother in a foe. BE TRUE. Be true, be true ! whate’er beside Of wit, or wealth, or rank be thine; Unless with simple truth allied The gold that glitters in thy mine Is but dross—the brass of pride Or vainer tinsel—made to shine. Be true, be true! to nerve your arm For any good ye wish to do; To save yourselves from sin and harm, And win all honors, old and new; To work in hearts as with a charm, The maxim is, Be true, be true. �SECULAR SONGS. KIND WORDS. Deal gently with the erring one, You may not know the power With which the first temptation came In some unguarded hour. You may not know how earnestly He struggled, or how well, Until the hour of weakness came, And sadly thus he fell. Speak gently to the erring one ! O do not thou forget, However deeply stained by sin, He is thy brother yet. Speak gently to the erring one, For is it not enough That peace and innocence are gone, Without thy censure rough ? O, sure it is a weary lot That sin-crushed heart to bear, And they who have a happier lot May well their chidings spare. KINDNESS. Air—“ Won’t You Buy My Pretty Flowers.” There’s a charm too often wanted, There’s a power not understood ; Seeds spring upward as they’re planted, Or for evil, or for good ! We forget that charm beguiling Which the voice of sorrow drowns; Smiles can oft elicit smiling ! Frowning can engender frowns. 221 �22-2 SECULAR SONGS. There s a temper quick in sowing Care and grief and discontent! Ever first and last in showing More in words than language meant: Ever restless in its nature Until sorrows set their seal On each pale and fretful feature, And the hidden depths reveal. If a smile engender smiling, ' If a frown produce a frown, If our lips—the truth defiling— Can the rose of life cast down 1 Let us learn, ere grief hath bound us, Useless anger to forego ; And bring smiles like flowers around us From which other smiles may grow. C. Swain. I ASK NOT FOR HIS LINEAGE. Air—“Tara’s Halls.” -------- not for his lineage, I ask not for his name, If manliness be in his heart, He noble birth may claim : I care not though of this world’s wealth But slender be his part, If “yes”, you answer when I ask, “ Hath he a noble heart ? ” I ask I ask not from what land he came, Or where his youth was nursed, If pure the stream, it matters not The spot from whence it burst: The palace or the hovel low Where first his life began, I seek not of, but answer this, “ Is he an honest man ? ” c. M. �223 SE0ULAR SONGS. WHAT MAKES A NOBLEMAN? Air—“Partant pour la Syrie.” I deem the man a nobleman, who acts a noble part, Who shows alike by word and deed he hath a true man’s heart; Who Eves not for himself alone, nor joins the selfish few, But prizes more than all things else, the good that he can do. I deem the man a nobleman, who stands up for the right, And in the work of charity finds pleasure and delight; Who bears the stamp of manliness upon his open brow, And never yet was known to do an action mean and low. I deem the man a nobleman, who strives to aid the weak, And sooner than revenge a wrong, would kind forgiveness speak; Who sees a brother in all men, from peasant unto king, Yet would not crush the meanest worm, nor harm the weakest thing. I deem the man ahiobleman—yea, noblest of his kind, Who shows by moral excellence his purity of mind, Who lives alike, through good and ill, the firm unflinching man, Who loves the cause of brotherhood, and aids it all he can. HOPE. Air—“ In a Cottage Near a Wood.” (Song.) Hard is now the constant woe, Bitter is the long despair, Casting doubt on all we know, Blotting out our visions fair, Weakly strain we after truth, Slowly mount we toward the good, Searching long in gloom and ruth For the soul’s sustaining food. �224 SECULAR SONGS. Man’s immortal task is great, Greatly must it be achieved ; And his doom is still to wait, Hoping still, though still deceived. Hoping for the greater day, Hoping for the larger light,— Day that shall endure for aye, Light that yieldeth not to might. OUR ANSWER. Thou say’st it will never be, This unity and love ; This peace, this joy without alloy, Till one comes from above. Thou say’st alack ! and then, alas ! You weep, and groan, and pray; But we begin to sow the grass, And later comes the hay. Thou say’st, ah 1 we remember, lord, Thy mercy and thy love ; We worship thee and trust to see Thy Regent from above. O lord his coming hasten—speed— O haste his advent. Pray 1 But we will work till darkness lead To dawning of the day. Thou say’st, “ Poor sinner fear not thee, Thy faith will bear thee through ; Thy murders, thefts, forgiven be, A crown, a throne for you. Thou say’st that we may join them there For ‘ god ’ is good and just ” ; But we will stay, contented, where Those are we love and trust. �SECULAR SONGS. '1 225 Thou say’st our work is work in vain, Our hope, our trust in man ; That sin and strife, and grief and pain, Are borne till heaven’s ban Is lifted, and his majesty May move the upas root; But we will watch and trim the tree Until the time for fruit. Thou say’st, “ Poor sinner see the fold And enter it in peace ; And wear a crown of gems and gold, Eternity thy lease. And those who trust in ‘ god ’ may play On harps with golden strings ”— But we have love and joy to-day, We want no crown—no wings. We’ll work and watch, and onward go, No fear, no dread can stay Our loving hearts and hands, although We may not win to-day. The morn is nigh ; we see afar The daybreak glimmer bright; Ah, see ! behold ! that morning star Foretells the coming light. Edgar T. Benton. GENTLE WORDS. Air—-“Tara’s Halls’’. ------------- C. M. D. Roses in the summer-time Are beautiful to me, And glorious are the many stars That glimmer on the sea : But gentle words, and loving hearts, And hands to clasp my own, Are better than the fairest flowers, Or stars that ever shone. p �226 SECULAR SONGS. The sun may warm the grass to life, The dew the drooping flower, And eyes grow bright and watch the light Of Autumn’s opening hour : But words that breathe of tenderness, And smiles we know are true, Are'warmer than the summer-time, And brighter than the dew. It is not much the world can give With all its subtle art, And gold and gems are noi the things To satisfy the heart ; But oh ! if those who cluster round The sunny home and hearth, Have gentle words and loving smiles, How beautiful is earth. BE KIND TO EACH OTHER. Air—“ Ring the Bell, Watchman ------ii’s. Be kind to each other, through weal and through woe, For sorrows are many for hearts here below; The storms of this life beat around us in vain, If kindness controls us in pleasure and pain. Be kind to each other in sorrow and grief, ’Tis sympathy only can give us relief; Dividing our sorrow but lessens our pain— Be kind to each other—affliction is vain. Be kind to each other when sickness has come, Let nothing but smiles ever dwell in your home ; Encourage and succour, and soothe the distress’d, Be kind to each other, and thou shalt be bless’d. Be kind to each other through life to its close, And when thou art freed from its pleasures and woes, Though absent, thy friends in their hearts shall enshrine, The mem’ry of deeds which like beacons shall shine. �227 SECULAR SONGS. FRIENDSHIP. Air—“ Auld Lang Syne”. [From “ Hymns of Life ”, published by Thomas Laurie, London.] -------c. M. D. The kindest, most endearing thing That human hearts can woo ; The fount whence truest blessings spring, And richest comforts too ; A priceless gem irradiate With beams of love divine : A refuge from the storms of fate, When suns no longer shine. Its language is a kindly word Proceeding from the heart: Its smiles a ready balm afford To those who deeply smart. It scatters flow’rs in every state, And weaves a charm for all; But often leaves the rich and great At cottage doors to call. Give me the friend that varies not— Or else no friend at all— Who owns me in my straw-thatched cot, As in my marble hall; Who’ll chide me when I do amiss, And praise when praise is- due ; And help me on in righteousness, And be for ever true. FUNERAL HYMN. •Calmly, calmly lay him down ! He hath fought a noble fight, He hath battled for the right; He hath won the fadeless crown! p2 �228 SECULAR SONGS. Memories, all too bright for tears, Crowd around us from the past; He was faithful to the last— Faithful through long toilsome years. All that makes for human good, Freedom, righteousness, and truth— These, the objects of his youth, Unto age he still pursued. Kind and gentle was his soul, Yet it glowed with glorious might; Filling clouded minds with light, Making wounded spirits whole. Dying, he can never die ! To the dust his dust we give ; In our hearts his heart shall live ; Moving, guiding, working aye. W. Gaskell. T O-M O R R O W. High hopes that burned like stars sublime Go down the heavens of freedom, And true hearts perish in the time We bitterliest need them. But never sit we down and say, There’s nothing left but sorrow ; We walk the wilderness to-day, The promised land to-morrow. Our hearts brood o’er the past, our eyes With smiling futures glisten ; Lo! now its dawn bursts up the skies— Lean out your souls and listen. The earth rolls Freedom’s radiant way, And ripens with our sorrow ; And ’tis the martyrdom to-day Brings victory to-morrow. �229 SECULAR SONGS. ’Tis weary watching wave by wave, And yet the tide heaves onward; We climb like corals, grave by grave, And beat a pathway sunward. We’re beaten back in many a fray, Yet newer strength we borrow ; And where our vanguard rests to-day Our rear shall rest to-morrow. Through all the long, dark night of years The people’s cry ascended ; The earth was wet with blood and tears Ere their weak suffering ended. The few shall not forever sway, The many toil in sorrow ; The bars of hell are strong to-day, But right shall rule to-morrow. Gerald Massey. JUDGE NOT A MAN. Judge not a man by the cost of his clothing, Unheeding the life-path that he may pursue, Or oft you’ll admire a heart that needs loathing, And fail to give honor where honor is due. The palm may be hard and the fingers stiff-jointed, The coat may be tattered, the cheek worn with tears, But greater than kings are labor’s anointed; You can’t judge a man by the coat that he wears. You can’t judge a man by the coat that he wears, You can’t judge a man by the coat that he wears! For greater than kings are labor’s anointed; You can’t judge a man by the coat that he wears. Give me the man, as a friend and a neighbour, Who toils at the loom, at the spade, or the plough ; Who wins his diploma of manhood by labor, And purchases wealth by the sweat of his brow. �230 SECULAR SONGS. Why should the broadcloth alone be respected ? The man be despised who in fustian appears ? There are many that have their limbs unprotected_ Then why judge a man by the coat that he wears ? Judge of a man by the work he is doing—■ Speak of a man as his actions demand ! W atch well the life that each is pursuing, And let the most worthy be chief of the land. That man shall be found ’midst the close ranks of labor, Be known by the work that his industry rears; His chiefdom, when won, shall be dear to his neighbour— We’ll honor the man ! whatever he wears. John Bedford Leno. TRIUMPH OF FRATERNITY. 'Tis coming up the steep of time, And this old world is growing brighter; We may not see its dawn sublime, Yet high hopes make the heart throb lighter.. We may be sleeping in the ground When it awakes the world in wonder ; But we have felt it gathering round, And heard its voice in living thunder— ’Tis coming ! yes, ’tis coming ! ’Tis coming now, the glorious time Foretold by seers and sung in story : For which, when thinking was a crime, Souls leapt to heaven from scaffolds gory 1 They passed, nor see the work they wrought; Now the crown’d hopes of centuries blossom I. But the live lightning of their thought And daring deeds doth pulse earth’s bosom— ’Tis coming! yes, ’tis coming! �SECULAR SONGS. 231 Creeds, empires, systems rot with age, But the great people’s ever youthful! And it shall write the future’s page To our humanity more truthful! The gnarliest heart hath tender chords, To waken at the name of “brother,” And time comes when brain-scorpion words We shall not speak to sting each other. ’Tis coming ! yes, ’tis coming ! Ay, it must come ! The tyrant’s throne Is crumbling, with our hot tears rusted : The sword earth’s mighty ones have leant on Is cankered, with our heart’s blood crusted, Room ! for the men of mind make way ! Ye robber rulers, pause no longer, The world rolls on, the light grows stronger— The people’s advent coming ! Gerald Massey. SECULARISM. Sing with joy, for a good time is dawning upon us, The fire has been kindled, long may it be fanned; Then farewell to all falsehood, deceit, and imposture, When Secularism shall spread o’er the land. Then farewell to the clergy, and State aid to priestcraft; Farewell all whose mansions are built on the sand ; On the firm rock of truth man shall build in the future, When Secularism shall spread o’er the land. Then farewell to the ermines, the gowns, and the candles, The meaningless mummeries that none understand ; Theology’s corpse shall be buried unmourned for, When Secularism shall spread o’er the land. �232 SECULAR SONGS. Farewell, war and murder, farewell inquisitions, Religions of hate that mankind shall not stand ; Insure your lives, oh, ye strife-making creeds for When Secularism shall spread o’er the land. Then all hail to the true, to the just, and the honest, The kind loving heart and the welcoming hand, And closely-kmt love through our country, the wide world, When Secularism shall spread o’er the land. D. A. Andrade. MORAL WORTH. the man who scorns to be, To name or sect, a slave; Whose heart is like the' sunshine—free— Free as the ocean wave ; Who, when he sees oppression, wrong, Speaks out in thunder tones; Who feels with truth that he is strong To grapple e’en with thrones. I love I love the man who scorns to do An action mean or low ; Who will a nobler course pursue, To stranger, friend, or foe; Who seeks for justice, good to gain, Is merciful and kind ; Who will not cause a needless pain In body or in mind. �I INDEX OF READINGS. A Clerical Performance .. A Fable .. .. A Kind of Preac.bg E. Fawcett A Recusant .. 7Ao*sa* A Wish .. .. M. Arnold Abou Ben Adhem and the Angel .. .. L. Htmi Address to the Unco Guid .. R. Burns An Atheist’s Thoughts H’. P. Ball Aquinas’s Prayer for the Devil W. M. W. Call Atheist, The Dying .. .. At the Church .. R. M. IF. 85 103 71 133 137 Ghost Story .. .. ,. Giordano Bruno .. God Willing .. J, M. Peacock Gold .. .. T. Hood Grease the Fat Sow J. B. Leno FAGS. 9a 5 118 29 104 15 88 Holy Willie’s Prayer 2?. Burns Honor .. .. Wordsworth Hymn to Death .. P, Greg 72 75 69 Be Content .. T. Maguire Beldagon Church Ernest Jones Beyond the Grave A. P. Martin Blind Men and Elephant .. J. G. Saxe Bruno (Giordano) Swinburne Burial Service Austin Holyoake 28 34 91 7 FAGS 127 78 12 59 5 141 Careless Gods .. W. Forster 54 Christian Superstition Emeritus 121 Clear the Way .. C. Mackay 122 Confucius, A Saying of Schiller 11 Course of Time .. Shakespeare 98 Cremation v. Corruption .. 76 C. C. Dick Crucifixion of Manhood .. 29 G. Barlow Death .. .. Shakespeare Death, Hymn to .. P. Greg Death, Pomp of .. V. Lee Deathward Ways P. B. Marston Death of the Devil Beranger Devil Went a Fishing .. .. Dying Atheist .. ... .. 25 69 136 136 16 14 I2 Euthanasia .. E. W. Gosse Everlasting Memorial .. Bonar 98 106 Fable .... Emerson 103 Fortitude .. .. W.E. Henley 112 Funeral Hymn .. W. J. Linton 140 Icarus .. .. G. Bruno 5 Iconoclast .. C. T. Rooke 92 If .. “ Boston Investigator" 53 Immortality .. 2?. 21. Horne 112 In Memory of Charles Brad­ laugh .. .. G. Anderson 124 Lay MeLow "All the YearRound” Let us all be Unhappy on Sun­ day .. .. Lord Heaves Life .. .. E.T. Benton 138 24 30 Mimnermus in Church .. 99 TP. J. Cory Miracles .. Walt Whitman 107 Mr. Save-His-Soul-Alive-O ! .. 9 J. Thomson Mr. Smith .. .. ,. 60 Natural Piety .. Nebuchadonozar Never Despair .. Wordsworth 97 Patroclus 54 .. .. 103 On the Portrait of Miss Peel .. J. M. Robertson Orthodoxy .. W. Blake Outlook .. .. E. Fawcett Ozymandias of Egypt .. Shelley 134 70 9 32 Patience, or the Ale in the Par­ son’s Cellar .. .. .. 66 Persian Epicurns.. Omar Khayyan 21 Persuasion .. Ben Jonson 105 Prophecy of the Galilean's De­ thronement .. .. .. 101 Religion .. .. .. Shelley 83 �234 _ INDEX OF READINGS. r Song of the Sabbatarian .. Sonnet .. ..J .A. Symonds Strange Story of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram .. T. Paine Superstition .. S. Rogers Suppressed Poem R. Burns Tardy Retribution M. J. Savage Three Chinese Sects .. .. Three Voices Norman Britton The Aristocrat’s Dream .. The Babe .. .. Sir W. Jones The Church Christ E. Fawcett The Contrast .. Ex-Ritualist The Devil is Dead W. Denton The Doubter .. E. Fawcett The Eclipse of the Gods .. C. Bright The Equality of Death J. Shirley The Fountain .. J. R. Lowell The Free Spirit .. G. Chapman The Hours .. H. Martineau The Iconoclast .. R.F.Tooke The Law of Death J. Hay rALrü.. 87 go 79 133 115 15 8 33 124 121 135 120 nj 125 139 132 58 68 91 49 T Ji • rACrE.. 1 he Lord s Loving Kindness .. 26 F. Felt The Noble Nature B. Jonson 52 The Papist and the Jew T. Paine 113, The Perfect Crowning Sleep .. iooJ. L. Warren The Priest and Jack Ass .. 102 The World and I T. Paine 69 The Universe Void W. B. Scott 20Time’s Remedy .. .. .. 48 To the Front .. W. S. Landor 65. T ribute to Bruno G.E. Macdonald 30 True Nobility .. .. .. 82 Beaumont and Fletcher Two Careers Ella Wheeler Wilcox 51 Vision of the Goos S. Britton Voltaire and Gibbon Byron 108 97 Waiting .. J. Burroughs What is God ? A lien Davenport When Womanhood Awakes .. 5. Wixon 125. 82. 17 �INDEX OF SONGS. PAGE PAGE. .. 161, C. Swain .. Reap V. Jones A Brave Heart .. C. J. Rowe Aspirations of Youth 7. Montgomery .. A New Faith 211 162 200 166, 183, Benevolence Be Kind to Each Other Better Rub than Rust E. Elliott .. Be True .. .. Be Up and Doing 220 226 T95 220 210 Age of Reason Aladdin’s Lamp .. All Nature Speaks As ye Sow, so shall ye 212 209 178 170 .. G . L. Banks 211 R. Nicoll Earth’s Heroes .. .. •. Earthly Paradise Education Sir J. Bowring Eternity of Nature W. C. Sturoc 154 204 201 166 Charity .. Flowers or Thorns Freedom .. Friendship Funeral Hymn .. Gentle Words Good Will to All 212 174, 191 227 TP.GasÄ^ 227 .. .. .. 225 190 B. Arnetta Happy Day Happiness Within L. E. Landon H. Payne Home, Sweet Home J. Lawson Honest Doubt C. Mackay Hope of the World .. 210, Hope .. 172, Humanity Stoddart Humble Influence 218 214 216 188 155 223 207 208 Incitement to Perseverance Clough It Can’t be Always Sunshine J. E. Carpenter 151 217 Judge Not a Man John Bedford Leno 229 Kind Words Kindness .. 221 201 .. .. Laws of Nature .. R. Nicholl Learn to Labor .. Liberty 175 T. Fownes Life is Onward .. Light .. F. W. Bourdillon Live by Nature’s Laws .. .. Live for Something .............. Love .. Love at Home 165 149 iSS 192 160 164 167 219 T5& G. TV. Fox Marriage .. .. Moral Worth .. My Freedom My Task .. L. S. Guggenberger 176 232 168 176 •• Nature .. Never Say Fail .. C. K. Laporte New Version Tennyson New Year’s Eve .. .. N oble Purpose .. Alice Cary Nobility .. 181 161 157 203 185 20& E. T. Benton 224 .. Longfellow 186. 202 212 Our Answer Present Joys Present Time Psalm of Life Real Loss.. Reason Religion .. Maccall .. 194 . 215 179 Scatter Seeds of Kindness 215 149 Science and Superstition Secularism D . A. A ndrade 231 Secularism (Aims of) E. Ring 184 Service of Man E . B. Harrison 172 Speak Gently G. TP. Hangford 163 Stand Up for Freedom .. 193 The The The The Actual .. H. Reese Better Land S. Johnson City of Man Dawn of Freethought 164 17& 171 200 �236 INDEX OF SONGS. The Freeman’s Resolution W. Denton The Happy Life Sir H. Wotton The Ladder of Life Longfellow The Living to the Dead C. W. Beckett The Newborn Light The Pride of Worth Burns The True Eden .. Emerson The True Freeman Lowell The True Patriot The Voice and the Pen The World and the World C. G. Leland This Life is What we Make it.. PAGE. 147 159 165 158 202 150 198 T74 207 204 148 154 Tis Time .. .. .. .. To-morrow . .Gerald Massey Triumph of Fraternity Gerald Massey True Worth .. .. .. Truth .. 189, 199, 200, 205, 148 228 Vanity Victory 214 198 .. C. Mackay W. J. Linton Wheat and Tares L. Houghton Wisdom .. .. .. .. Words and Acts of Kindness .. Work .......................... 180, 230 222 207 173 193 217 189 �INDEX FIRST OF PAGE. A conscious fortitude sustains.. A glorious day at length is breaking .. .. .. A glory gilds the ample page .. All are architects of Fate .. All before us lies the way .. All in love with one another .. All Nature speaks! let man give ear .. .. .. .. All things good for good unite.. As ships becalmed at eve that lay A storm sped over sea and land Augustine well and truly said .. Base oppressors, leave your slumbers .. .. •• Be error known on earth no more .. .. .. •• Be kind to each other .. .. Be true, be true! whate’er beside .. .. .. •• Better to know the truth that maketh free .. .. •• Blest be the man who gives us peace .. .. .. .. Blest is the man whose generous heart .. .. .. .. 199 200 177 183 198 218 200 160 180 187 165 182 203 226 220 *53 213 166 Calmly, calmly, lay him down! 227 City of Man! how broad and fair .......................................... 171 Dark superstition’s veil.. .. Deal gently with the erring one 211 221 Earth of man the bounteous mother.......................................... 152 Freedom’s charms alike engage From Greenland’s icy mountains 191 157 Goodwill to all the watchword be 190 Great source of being! fount of life .. .. •• • • 181 Happy the man whose cautious steps .. .. .. • • 193 LINES. PAGE. Happy they who are not weary Hard is now the constant woe.. High hopes that burned like stars sublime .. Higher, higher, will we climb .. Hope, though slow she be and late How happy is he born and taught .. Hush the loud cannon’s roar .. 185 223 I ask not for his lineage I deem that man a nobleman .. Idler ! why lie down to die If all the world must see the world I love the man who scorns to be If love with other graces reign.. I hear thee speak of a better creed I saw a little streamlet flow Is there a thought can fill the human mind ? .. Is there for honest poverty It can’t be always sunshine It surely is a wasted heart 222 169 195 228 178 210 159 208 148 232 219 196 208 207 150 217 214 Joy to the world the light is come 215 Judge not a man by the cost of 229 his clothing Keep striving! ’tis wiser .. 161 Let exiled Reason be restored .. 161 Let’s oft’ner talk of noble deeds 154 Let superstition be destroyed .. 170 Let the world scorn, Fortune make jest of me .. .. 209 Let us all help one another .. 211 Let us gather up the sunbeams 215 Life is onward—-use it .. .. 192 Life may change, but it may fly not .......................................... 175 Little words of kindness .. 217 Live for something; be not idle 167 Lo ! here hath been dawning .. 159 �INDEX TO FIRST LINES. Lo! when we wade the tangled wood •• •• .. .. 160 Long hath the world in darkness iain •• •• ... .. 210 Man is his own star .. .. 175 May every year but draw more near .. .. .. .. %55 May I possess an honest heart 183 Men ! whose boast it is that ye 174 Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam .. .. .. 2i6 Now for all new day is dawning 172 O dumb forgotten ones .. .. 158 Oh had I but Aladdin’s lamp .. 162 Oh the orator’s voice is a mighty Power.......................................... 204 O joy 1 at last my mind is free 168 O thou fair Truth, for thee alone we seek .. .. .. ,e Our sister and our brother .. 176 Praise to the martyrs .. .. 186 Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky .................................................. 203 Roses in the summer time .. 225 Say not the struggle nought availeth .. .. .. Sing with joy, for a good time is dawning upon us .. .. 231 Something is lost .. .. So should we live that every Speak gently, it is better far ’163 Stand up ! stand up for freedom 193 Superstition, deeply rooted .. 149 Tell me not in mournful numbers 212 Tell me not of climes celestial 204 The bud will soon become a flower .. .. .. .. 2I2 The day is here, the dawn of hope .. .; .. .. 202 rpi i PAGE, lhe kindest, most endearing thing.......................................... 227 The laws of Nature, they are sure........................................... 165 The night has a thousand eyes 160 1 here are brighter things in this world than gold .. .. ^7 There is a song now singing .. 178 There is beauty all around .. 156 There’s a charm too often wasted 221 There’s a song the rills are singing.......................................... 68 There’s no time like the present time ..................................... ...... Think not that martyrs die in vain .......................................... 149 Think truly, and thy thoughts 207 Thou, Nature, grandest theme of all .. _ ........................... l66 Thou sayest it will never be .. 224 Through wild wood-valleys roaming ..........................214 ’Tis coming up the steep of time 230 ’Tis time that kings were taught to know.. .. .. .. ^8 To all earth’s blessings .. .. 164 To Mercy, Pity, Peace and Love 172 True worth is in being, not seem­ ing .......................................... 206 Truth and goodness .. .. 179 Truth is great and must prevail 191 We all must work with head or hand .. ., ,, # 1-73 We must not hope to be mowers 213 Were once this maxim deeply iix’d •• .. .. .. 189 What, with this fenced human mind.......................................... I?6 When kings are forgotten and . priests are no more .. .. 197 Why should the man of honest doubt ? .. .. .. .. j88 Why should we ever seek to know ? .. .. .. .. j64 Work can never miss its wages 198 Work, for the night is coming.. 189 Work ! it is thy highest mission 180 ��il � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Victorian Blogging Description An account of the resource A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library &amp; Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span> Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Conway Hall Library & Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Conway Hall Ethical Society Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data Pamphlet Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Freethought readings and secular songs Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Wheeler, J. M. (Joseph Mazzini) [1850-1898] Description An account of the resource Place of publication: London Collation: 238 p. ; 22 cm. Notes: Separate indexes of readings, songs and first lines. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available R. Forder Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1892 Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RA1396 N688 Subject The topic of the resource Free thought Secularism Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Freethought readings and secular songs), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English Free Thought NSS Poetry Secularism Songs https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/2085824327f5ff3105605c2b82805a18.pdf?Expires=1779926400&Signature=GktarPbHeeyYTiduV0RMi315-XG0etTu%7EIVInDMMDa88Cp3UQtkxfsYjzc7PjGR3FYU8mVUQhmjiefo6I-osPmFfYNHkkw02L6n4jqUterQMSRffx5J0vhqdFCbDp6j4ZWrbgzPMzdATMS5kcJo6OV0JIbDl0LxKE2sg3Lh1nht-XQs%7Es-byKargzoKa07uArlrQf5ApT3FB-cbH4oHgIJNV4-7ecR8gmmv62IK8PDd40y6ax1cO7OQBHfANC0ZJNrGMFXkJ58mI52ZcOdCXJ9yC6S2yliZV6x%7ECUij6Qr4P5tYVzyC1hDd9v8OrncKtGO6g6B-BnILvDhqx2x9%7ELQ__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 3d5fad3dc37d2c701f1c732bb4934d08 PDF Text Text «rO \ J PSYCHE TO Mother Earth. BY FRANCES ROSE MACKINLEY. ARTH, my BELOVED MOTHER ! Prone upon you I prostrate myself; I imprint you with earnest kisses ; With awful wonder, I love, revere, adore you. How beholden am I to your spirit, That you enable me to apprehend your entity ; You, so near, so familiar to me ; That with my psychic vision clarified, Looking lucidly through my physical eyes, You empower me to recognize you ; Presential, breathing, palpitating, living ! You, the concrete, primogenial source of life. �PSYCHE TO MOTHER EARTH. What delight to hear your mystic voice, To catch with clairaudient sense the latency Of your multisonous mobility, Your myriad and varied tones Reverberating musically in my ears ! What boundless satisfaction To cognize the subjective analogies Of your elemental language ! (I am one of your living ideographic words.) What spontaneous delight To be able to respond to you, In all your diversified forms of expression, To your repercussive intonations, Or your mellifluous whisperings— Mother, I understand ! flow beautiful you are, O mother ! Every day I gaze fascinated and enraptured On your athletic, brunonian body, Outstretched, nude and lethargic ; Your legs, massive, plump, symmetrical ; Your bosoms luxurious, redundant; Your wistful, luscious face, With pensive, languishing, hazel eyne. Ever serenely, quiescently you repose, Basking bewitchingly your bared charms In the searching and amative regards �3 PSYCHE TO MOTHER EARTH. Of your transcendent lover, the Sun. How resplendently your flesh glistens, Bathed in the dazzling scintillations Of his sensuous, magnetic presence ! The beauty of your sons and daughters Is but a faint similitude Of your immaculate loveliness. How loving you are, O mother ! My present existence and daily continuance Manifest your provident love ; That you will take this wondrous body You have lent my spirit, to your warm embrace, To more intimately assimilate its particles, What evincement of love ! That you have oft incarnated my spirit, And with, love sent me forth from you, And, with as great love, recalled My material personality to your bosom, To be fondled and afterward resent, What supereminent proofs of love ! I have noted you, endeared mother ! In daily coition with your lover, the Sun. I have watched his gorgeous masculinity, K In lustful intermutation with you ; !........... ——--------------------- �//. PSYCHE TO MOTHER EARTH. Embalming you in the luminous beams Of his effulgent thermodic halo. How much you seemed to glory, To exult and revel in his caress ! I glory with you in your delectation, And in the good he imparts to you. Without his embrace, you would perish, Even as I, your daughter, would expire Without the contactual suscitation of my lovers. I have seen you also, O wanton mother! Surfeited of your lover’s dalliance, Antagonistic, repellant of his desire. O I too have been satiated With the aphrodisaic carnality Of my Priapian paramours ! From gentle encounters with you, And tempered orgasms in your embrace, I have seen his passion rousing Into glowing and rampant salacity ; Till he impended over you exacerbated To the very ultimity of heat. I have seen you shrinkingly recoil, When his vehement afilation, Simoon-like, effumed upon you, And his rapacious arms, Ignifluous annulars, Compressed you impactly �PSYCHE TO MOTHER EARTH. 5 To his lascivient and candescent body; Whilst into your womb he extruded .His ebullient, geyser-jet semen. You were feverous, chafed, wincing, aglow ; Torrified by his scortatory passion. I deemed that you must expire ; ' And should your vitality cease, O mother ! How could your children survive ! One day, in the sultry month of July, As I reclined on your hot breast, Murmuring words of condolence To you, poor suffering mother ! We were startled by thundering rumblings in the West. Looking thitherward, I descried Huge cumuli overtopping the horizon. Instantaneously you exclaimed : “ O rejoice with me, my children ! “ He comes, He, my redemptive lover, “ He, for whom I have been sighing, “ He, whom I now need for rescue, “ He, who only can relieve me ! ” Then, revealed to my wonderment, I beheld your lover, awe-compelling, Black, colossal, cyclopean, vast, �6 PSYCHE TO MOTHER EARTH. Stalking majestically in the heavens, His terrific shadow overdarkening the skies, And tenebrously enveloping you; His frowning browns portentously lowering ; His gigantic bulk equipendent in the mid welkin. Inflated with generant vigor, Dissilient with desire for you, He fulmines thunderous lustful threats. With foretaste of delight, O mother ! You trembled at his lecherous menaces, And with upthrown arms, Enrounding your retroverted head, Anxious, impatient, eager, You slightly disparted your thighs, And gently upraised your abdomen, In longing preparedness to receive him. With thought exceeding instantaneity His phallic lightning strokes Reiteratedly penetrate your genetalia. Negative, receptive mother ! As his invigorating love lymph Emulged upon you in lavish profluence ; Your eyes closed as in serene ectasy. Your countenance exuberated with renewed life, Your quickened orbs ■ looked up lovingly, �PSYCIIE TO MOTHER EARTH. Every freshened pore responsively dilated, Your lips tremulously articulated, thanks. Love-sick, languishing, despairing, I, your daughter, with trepid sighs, Long for a reciprocal love mate, Whose electric influence and embrace .* Will be to me, as was your savior to you, Solace, reviviscence, ecstasy ! With wearied body, o’erspent and drooping, Sore, wounded feet, swollen with travel, From bootless chase of unattainableness, I seek refuge in your maternity. I clasp my arms around your neck. Let me nestle my weighted head Cosily ’twixt your lenitive mammoe ! In this delicious harborage, Let me uninterruptedly repose ! J Let me find there, long enduring rest ; Till, through your kindly assuagement, The perturbation within me is allayed ! Let me subside into sedative slumbers, Calming to my insatiate heart; To waken, comforted, composed, ductile, 7 �g PSYCHE TO MOTHER EARTH. Prompt to obey your dehortations, Assured that to question your teachings, Or ignore your prescient admonitions, Must be to constantly return to you afflicted, To abide in embroilment and inquietude ! Make me Placid, compliant, resigned, passive, As you are, O Infinite Parent ! Animate me with your own essentiality ! Are you thus, Placid, compliant, resigned, passive, Thus beatifically accordant with events ; Since to you belongs the cognition Of the mysterious purpose of all that is ? O let me, thro’ your inspiration, Attain some definite discernment Of the subtle intent of existence ; Some positive hint of certitude, More than the discontinuous clairvoyance, Whereby I glimpse scintillas of truth, With ever intervenient periods Of dubiety, and its consequent despondence ! Your sensuous, voluptuous breath Respiring balmily over me, Convulses me with titillative tremors. The semblance of lascivious abandon, �PSYCHE TO MOTHER EARTH. 9 Ascendant in your mien and bearing, Spells and ecstasizes my spirit. The aroma of your wantonness Materializes into living forms of beauty : Vital, substantive, efflorescent virtues ; Whence in turn exhales a quality Gossamery, subtile, insinuative ; An impalpable emication, Invisible, but sensate to your children, In irresistibly seductive allurements To languor, desire, love, worship, coition. O in this luscious magnetism— The life incitement of your children— Is there not revealed the aim of Being ? O from this mystic adumbration, Have I not apprehended the purport of ex­ istence ? Expand my soul, O mother ! To a lasciviousness akin to yours ; That I also may give exoteric form To the fullness of like voluptuousness, And by a consummate shapeliness Incite, as you do, love, worship, adoration ! Make me, as you are, bold, free, cosmopolite, Accessible, nonchalant, unbosoming ! You, ever love environing your children, �10 PSYCHE TO MOTHER EARTH. Coulcl they but clairvoyantlv see you 1 Make me, as you are, communicant, \ Outspoken, fluent, colloquial, eloquent ! Your voice, ever speaking to your children, Could they but clairaudiently hear you ! Make me just, intrusive, assertive as you ! We, children, your feel this fictile, plastic force ; This charactery, whereby you express yourself, Acting within ourselves and about us, To fashion the physical and metaphysical ; But how few divine in it, your immanent presence ! Make me negative, receptive as you ! Because of these feminine attributes, You are transcendently a divine mother. Promiscuous, all-embracing, all-loving, All-inclusive, universal mother ! Impress me with your catholicness, That I may reimpress all humanity, With such assimilative consciousness Of the opulence and divinity of those attributes, That your sons and daughters will all emulate The similitude of you in me, And with one ecumenic purpose, exclaim : Let us strive to resemble our mother ! ” � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Victorian Blogging Description An account of the resource A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library &amp; Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span> Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Conway Hall Library & Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Conway Hall Ethical Society Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data Pamphlet Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Psyche to mother earth Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Mackinley, Frances Rose Description An account of the resource Place of publication: [s.l.] Collation: 10 p. ; 19 cm. Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. A poem. Text bordered in red. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available [s.n.] Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource {187-?] Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context G5310 Subject The topic of the resource Poetry Spiritualism Women's rights Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Psyche to mother earth), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English American Conway Tracts Mother Goddess Poetry Poetry in English Spiritualism Women's Rights Women's Rights-United States https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/85848668f21060a6531a3ae20c974d33.pdf?Expires=1779926400&Signature=qqY1exdEGobZVclqWgyiwPWzNR-uEbgathhw5L-rmyBYK2WNwATK2KNsboRkZ%7E3hGTeVs05CPFHOR-eCeZNAb%7EYeRRQekqPB52J1kXqQfP5u9lYSC0jmrQkhhHhrIwEj7LHtY3ikBkR2WfqWsCjAAAOnluDPS-byoqk34arFrwJgxk3TtuZAwWYoX6VrnEvSvbEUm-nN1iQj9z9V0sZ9G4ZhIA4x2K3ygR6alEraGMeB03YQ26gMNmvGlOu%7EzIwQIFZCIQArekHU09P4x9xdX5BuRG8DeQOYUWJTo8q1rqYUjfuzcD5rnIsLcry0zpazTESfgXripXXjwYcgX8lYqA__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 95d935f7caa1368b23fd450a98cf54e2 PDF Text Text �Finest Dress Shirts at Moderate Prices. Perfect Fit Guaranteed. Ready-Made or Made to Order. ZP. F- IDpatent PANTALOON DRAWERS, THE MOST PERFECT FITTING BRA WERE IN THE WORLD. ZP. _A_. ZB. I’lVO F ACTION I5IJV(1L THE MOST PERFECT BRACE EVER INVENTED. Combining the qualities of Brace and Suspenders, or either at pleasure. THE LARGEST AND MOST COMPLETE STOCK OF GENTS FURNISHING GOODS, TRUNKS, VALISES, &c. h. J. McLaughlin, 280 Pënnsylvania Avenue, bet. 11th & 12th, Next to Gait’s Jewelry Store. ¿J". ZECZ -A. Jrô , MANUFACTURER AND DEALER IN 348 PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE, Between Metropolitan Hotel and 7th Street, WASHINGTON, ZD. O. Chronometers and Fine Watches repaired and warranted. SOLE AGENT FOR HOWE’S IMPROVED gewing FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA. �T TT Til T=OJS2SÆS OF ) CONTAINING 1 The various Poetical Contributions written. for- theoccasion of Decorating the Graves of our Fallen Heroes, May 29, 1869. Together with the Jnscriftions ON ^NTABLATURES, Erected at Arlington; with description of the touching ceremony at the National Cross, as part of the Memo­ rial Exercises. PUBLISHED BY M. A. C. FINCH. WASHINGTON, D. C. POWELL & GINCK, PBS., 409 F ST. 1869. �- - 7^/^» f ' ■ Entered according to an act of Congress, in the year of our Lora' eighteen hundred and sixty-nine, by M. A. G. FINCH, in the Clerk’s Oifice, in the Supreme Court, of the District of Columbia. O' / «o r) 6v �THE POEMS OF ARLINGTON. j I 1 l ■; Ths Arlington Estate. The Arlington Estate is situated nearly due west « * I; from the Capitol, and is accessible from Long Bridge, > at the foot of Fourteenth street and Maryland avenue, i) Washington, or by the Acqueduct Bridge from George’ ; town. The Estate comprises a large tract of land i < lying between the Georgetown and Alexandria turn! ’ | pike and the canal, of rich, and in times past, highly ¡' cultivated fields, but all fences having been destroyed "i during the war, this portion of late years has been ! abandoned to the freedmen. A spring near the canal, ’ which gave its name to the Estate, where a comfortable house and extensive stables have been built on the ' ) i ; ' ) > j j plantation road leading from the south gate to the river bank, is worthy of mention from the fact, not well-known, that at this place the former owner of the Estate, George Washington Park Custis, in the early dawn of the nineteenth century, used to en*ertain all who came to what was then known as the annual sheep-shearing festival, on which occasion all interested in the improvement of sheep, competed for the prizes offered and bestowed by the liberal owner of Arling- I ' i • ) j < i j q j I J) j j j j j .1 ) 1 �J'he Poems of Arlington. luxuriant growth of natural forest trees, oak predomi­ nating, but cedar and other evergreens intermingling, forming one of the most lovely landscapes, with rich plains, bordering the broad blue Potomac, here over a mile in width, with shipping of all kinds, from the largest ocean steamer to the light sailing yacht, give an ever-changing panorama most pleasing to contem­ plate, and most beautiful to behold. The view from Arlington house is grand. Arlington formed but a small portion of the regal estate belonging to the widow Custis, subsequently known to history as the wife of the father of his country. From Mrs. Washington the estate passed to her son, G. W. P. Custis, and upon his death in 1857, Arlington became the property of his daughter Mary, wife of Robert E. Lee. Arlington Heights was occupied by Federal troops the night of May 23, 1861, and has been in possession by the Government ever since. At present, however, it is not held under any of the confiscation acts of Congr< ss, but by virtue of a tax title, the estate having been sold For taxes, and bid in by the Government of the United States. Only the northwest corner, and the plateau southwest from the mansion, are occupied as a cemetery, the former for colored people, and the latter for Union and rebel soldiers. In all, there are over thirty thousand persons buried at this place; some have been removed, but to no great extent. Every grave has a plain white head-board, with the name, regiment, and date of death, when such was known ; many are marked unknown. The mansion is old style, with massive columns, and large portico. The rooms are good sized, and work nicely done. Marble mantles were in the tv^o principal rooms on either side of the hall. Those in the room now used as an office still remain. The south wing is occupied as a green house, and is well cared for. �JHE pOEMS OF ^RLINGTON- [The following Poems were written for the occasion cf Decorating the Graves at Arlington, but owing to prior arrangements it was found impossible to embiace them in the exercises of the day :] Our Fallen Comrades. BY A. J. FINCH. Comrades in those days of dangers, Brothers by those ties most dear, We have lived too long as strangers, Coine, unite our hearts more near. Mingle now our tears of sorrow For those brave ones gone before, We shall join them on the morrow, As we near that distant shore. Some were stricken in the battle, Where the death-shot felled them low ; When the air was thick with metal, Left them in a ghastly row. When the cannon loudly rattled, Wildly swelled the tumult’s din : Where the surging thousands battled, For the victory to win ; Where the war-clouds thickly hovered, O’er that bloody doubtful plain ; And their mangled corses covered, With its mantle for the slain. ’Mid shrieking shot and bursting shell, And zipping of the rifle’s ball; ’Mid dangers thick and fast they fell, Redeeming there their country’s call. �'J'he Poems of Arlington. But some amidst the gloomynight, Along the lonely picket line ; Where dangers lurked with dreaded might, When God and man it seemed combine, To add with terrors to the land ; To yield them but their bated breath, Still held them to that fatal stand, Denied them yet a glorious death. ’Mid darkness, storm, and hail and harm, ’Mid cold, and sleet, and dangers drear, Sturdy to bear with willing arm, ' The irksome duties so severe. But some upon the daring raid, • When far from friends or comrades riven, Were smitten when the charge was made, As from, their line the foes were driven. And some were taken on the road, The bivouac some laid low ; Death sought them oft in varied mode, Wherever they might go. The wasting pains of dire disease, The sunken eye, the hollow cheek, Speak of death by slow degrees, But far from such as soldiers seek. Oh ! ye who’ve mingled in the fray, And joined the deafening shout, When wavering lines of steel gave way, To one continuous route ! When men on men, and steed on steed, Ne’er checked your fiery zeal ; When sabre strokes could ne’er impede, Nor make their victims feel. I �J'he J?oems of Arlington. ’Mid wreathing smoke and whistling grape, With cannister belched forth— Tho’ wide and quick, the deadly gape Ne’er checked the undaunted North. As swell on swell the ocean’s wave Breaks fierce upon the rock-bound coast, So surged the line of veterans brave Against the works of rebel’s host. Oh ! ye who’ve felt the burning throb Which victory alone can bring, Doth not the sick’ning horror rob Your boasted glory by its sting ? Ah, did you mark the honor then, When gazing on the ghastly plain, Surrounded by these gallant men— Was there no pity for the slain? And is this glory, thus to die ’Mid clouds of smoke and battle’s din ? Shame on the thought, ’tis but a lie, A most degrading type of sin. Give not the laurel wreath to him Who merely yields a noble life; The world before hath often seen Valor displayed in useless strife. ’Tis glory only when the cause Is worthy of a martyr’s death; When justice, truth, and freedom’s laws Are sullied by a traitor’s breath. For liberty they fought and died; To save a nation’s life they bled ; “ God and the right ” was on their side, And nations honor them now dead. �Jhe poEMS of Arlington. In after years, when we are gone— Who shared alike with them the gloom— A grateful people still will come With garlands to bedeck their tomb. When the earth is filled with gladness, In the youthful spring-time come; With our hearts still filled with sadness, As we bear the muffled drum. Then, as we near these hallowed grounds, Made sacred for their resting-place, We gather round these lowly mounds With sad and solemn funeral pace. Wreaths of flowers we will gently Lay upon their narrow bed ; And with tears of sorrow mingling For the brave and noble dead. From the hill-side, from the valley, From the dark and steep ravine, They have come to that last rally, On this peaceful quiet green. From the deadly charge we’ve brought them, Gathered from the lonely shore ; From the dismal swamp we drew them, Ere they struggled bravely o’er. Tho’ many comrades here have met, As their mingling corses lay, Missing lost ones linger yet, Unknown, beneath the unmarked clay. But distant friends who knew their worth Will ne’er forget the bitter day, When treason drew them from the hearth Of dear beloved ones far away. �The Poems of ^rlington- Here they’ve met at their last roll-call, On the calm Potomac’s shore— Oh ! that fatal zipping ball! They shall never dread it more. They have heard the last assembly ; Ne’er again the bugle note Shall awaken in their memory Thoughts of battle, tho’ remote. Tatoo has sounded, taps are blown ; Lights are out, and they are sleeping, All undisturbed, tho’ years have flown ; Angels o’er their camp are weeping. Calmly now the river glides, In its dark unruffled, flow, As it mingles with the tides, Murmuring peace to us below. Who can tell what joys and sorrows Mingle in our hearts to-day, As we think of distant morrows, Ere we pass that vaulted way, To join the comrades gone before us, Where no bugle sounds are heard ; Where no general e’er will chide us ; Ne’er again the armor guard. Guard their honor and their glory, Keep their memory ever near ; Teach our children when we’re hoary, How to drop the silent tear. Teach their children how to love them, While the heart is young and clear, That in age they may revere them, With a memory ever dear. 2 �Jhe P’oems of 2^rl1ngton- Flowers for the Soldiers’ Graves. BY MRS. MARY E. NEALY. Flowers for each hero’s bed ! Bring Roses as red as the blood they shed, And Geraniums rich with their glowing red; Verbenas and Pinks like the sunset skies, And brave Sweet Williams, with scarlet eyes ; Bring the Flos Adonis, with drops of blood— Peonies and Poppies—a crimson flood ! Bring flowers of the rich warm red ) ■j ; i ; j j! ) Flowers for their crowns so brighl Bring guelder roses and snow-drops white And lilies with cups like the morning ligl Bring sweet Mayflowers, with their waxei Syringas and spireas, which eclipse The winter flakes with each pure white g< Each delicate star of Bethlehem. Bring flowers of the purest white, j Flowers for the hearts so truel Bring violets blue as the summer skies, And innocence blossoms, like babies’ eyes Forget-me-nots and the sweet-blue bell, Which grew by the streams they loved so Bring morning glories, and lilacs, too, And each dear home-flower that so well th Bring flowers of the azure blue. ) j ,) ; ) ! Flowers for the soldiers’ graves ! Flowers of the red, the white, the blue; �Jhe Poems qf Arlington. Flowers for the brave, the pure, the true; For the hero souls who offered up Life» love, and hope in the bloody-cup Which was held to their country’s pallid lips. 0, fateful war ! O, dark eclipse! Bring flowers for our fallen braves ! Flowers of the fair young spring ! We bring with their beauty and perfume I To these hallowed grave s one day of bloom— A single day in each rolling year For the blossoming flower and the falling tear To drop from woman’s eye and hand ! For the heroes and saviors of our land— Our gifts of love we bring ! I. Then home to oar daily care ! With deeper feeling and holier thought; With a love and hope which •the day hath wrought. With a grander faith in humanity, And a glimpse of the life that is to be; With a wider vision of earth-born love, And a higher grasp of its home above, We shall bend the knee in prayer­ in prayer and praise to Thee. Prayers for the millions that mourn to-day For these far-off martyred forms of clay ; And praise to the Father that rules above For a land so girded around with love— For the hundreds of thousand precious graves, That broke the bonds of a million slaves, And made our land all free ! Washington, D. C. �Jhe Poems of Arlington, Hymns. rWritten by request for the Floral Memorial, New York, May 31, 1869, by the editor of The Soldier's Friend.\ OPENING HYMN. Tune—Pley el's Hymn. Love unchanging for the dead, Lying here in gloried sleep, Where the angels softly tread, While their holy watch.they keep. Wreaths we bring that ne’er shall fade, Greenei' with the passing years, Brighter for our sorrow’s shade, Jeweled with our falling tears. Dying that the Truth might live, Here they rest in Freedom’s name, Giving all that man can give— Life for Glory’s deathless fame. Bend in love, 0 azure sky ! Shine, 0 stars, at evening-time ! Watch where heroes calmly lie, Clothed with faith and hope sublime. God of nations, bless the land Thou hast saved to make us free ! Guide us with Thy mighty hand Till all lands shall come to Thee.. Wm. Olxnd Bourne. �Jhe Poems of .Arlington. CLOSING HYMN. Tune—Old hundred. Blest are the martyrd dead who lie In holy graves for Freedom won, Whose storied deeds shall never die While coming years their circles run» Blest be the ground where heroes sleep, And blest the flag that o’er them waves, Its radiant stars their watch shall keep, And brightly beam on hallowed graves. While Freedom lives their fame shall live,. In glory on her blazing scroll, And love her sacrifice shall give, While anthems round the altar roll. Year after year our hands shall bear Immortal flowers in vernal bloom, Till God shall call us home to share Immortal life beyond the tomb. Our Father, all the praise be Thine ! Thy grace and goodness we adore; Bless our dear land with love divine, And shed Thy peace from shore to shore. Wm. Oland. Bourne. �The Poems of Arlington. Ode to the Dead. [The following beautiful lines, composed for the occa­ sion by Dr. H. Risler, and set to music by Krentzer, were sung in an eff ctive and harmonious manner by the Washington Saengerbund and Arion Club—in all sixty voices, Messrs. Charles Richter and C. W. Berg­ mann leading:] Sweet be your sleep, who here, though silent,Proclaim our country’s holy rise, That she sliouTd live, your lives were rendered, Iler life was your devotion’s prize. With flo wers sweet your graves we cover, And here renew our sacred vow, That to our country we will render What we to your devotion owe. ----------0---------Our Native Land. [Then followed “Our Native Land,” by theBeetho. ven Club, which was sung with fine taste:] With hearts now touched by tend’rest feelings, Oh ! let us praise our native land; For her we’ll sing our noblest songs, And lavish gifts with open hand. Oh, land 1 with all thy noble forests, Thy plains, where rugged mountains stand, With God’s pure sky, blue mantling o’er them, �Jhe JPoem-s OF ^Arlington, Heaven bless thee, our native land— God bless thee, our native land, our native land. Let every blessing shed its fragrance, And peace and plenty o’er us shower; Let health and happiness attend us, Till all have felt its magic power. Oh ! -may the bond of faith and kindness Forever hold us hand to hand ; While all thy sons shall sing rejoicing, Heaven bless our native land— God blesa thee., our native land, our native land. ------------------------ 0------------------------ Our Martyrs. A POEM Dedicated =to the memory of the Union Soldiers ^ho fell during the -war of the rebellion, and are buried at Arlington, Virginia. By Francis De Haes Janvier. Bring the fairest flowers that bloom, Full of beauty and perfume;— Lay a garland on each tomb. livery sepulchre you see, Is a shrine,—henceforth to be Consecrate to liberty. Here, beneath the earth’s green breast, Loved, lamented, honored, blest— Twice ten thousand martyrs rest ? �Jhe Poems of Arlington. u Twice ten thousand martyrs,—slain Truth and justice to maintain:— Theirs the loss, but ours the gain! When rebellion’s fiery flood • Swept the land, these heroes stood,— Met, and quenched it with their blood ! Can such service be repaid ? Can the record they have made,— Can their glory ever fade ? Bring the fairest flowers that bloom, Full of beauty and perfume ;— Lay a garland on each tomb. Pausing on your silent way, While affection’s vows you pay, Bathe with tears each budding spray. Grateful tears, with blessings fraught, For the deeds these heroes wrought, For the lesson they have taught. Be your blooming garlands strown, Doubly, on the altar stone, Reared to those who rest—“ Unknown.” Here, unrecognized, they lie, But, above the starry sky, Martyrs’ names can never die. Kneeling on this sacred sod, * Swear !—to follow Freedom’s God, In the path these patriots trod ! Swear !—their little ones to bless ; Cherish, shield them from distress ; Unprotected, fatherless ! �Jhe J^oems ') ! of Arlington. Swear! —that this fair land shall be Evermore a legacy,— Precious,—undivided,—free ! Prayer. Sung by Arion Club. the stage : This closed the exercises at In peaceful calming breezes, Through blooming earthly fields, Spread God’s creation blessings, And trusting pleasure yield. Who tearful seeks ’neath heaven, This golden calm of rest ; Finds balm for all his longings, And peace within his breast. --------- 0---------The Hymn of Peace. By Oliver Wendall Holmes. Angel of Peace, thou hast wandered too long 1 Spread thy white wings to the sunshine of love ? Come while our voices are blended in song, Fly to our ark like the storm-beaten dove. Fly to our ark on the wings of the dove ; Speed o’er the far sounding billows of song, 3 �JjIE pOEMS OF ^RLINGTON' Crowned with thine olive-leaf garland of love, Angel of Peace, thou hast waited too long. Brothers, we meet on this alter of thine, Mingling the gifts we have gathered for thee, Sweet with the odors of myrtle and pine, Breeze of the prairie and breath of the sea, Meadow and mouutain and forest and sea, Sweet is the fragrance of myrtle and pine; Sweeter the incense we offer to thee, Brothers, once more round this alter of thine. Angels of Bethlehem, answer the strain! Hark ! a new birth-song is filling the sky, Loud as the storm-wind that tumbles the main. Bid the full breath of the organ reply ; Let the loud tempest of voices reply ; Roll its long surge like the earth shaking main; Swell the vast song till it mounts to the sky. Angels of Bethlehem, echo the strain ! ----------- 0------------ The Tomb of the Unknown Is of plain granite, about five feet in height, sur­ mounted by four three-incli Rodman rifled guns, worn out during the war, nicely mounted on each corner, with. a pyramid of round shot in the centre. A frame work in shape of a Greek cross was built around the tomb, and a canopy of battle flags and silken colors, all of which had been borne by regiments rep­ resented among the dead, was erected over the tomb; wreaths of flowers were looped from opposite corners, and garlands suspended from the centre. The most refined taste was displayed in this beautiful decoration. The tomb bears the following inscription : �Jhe J-’oems of ^Arlington. “ Beneath this stone repose the bones of two thou­ sand one hundred and eleven unknown soldiers, gathered after the war from the fields of Bull Run and the route to the Rappahannock ; their remains could not be identified, but their names and deeds are re­ corded in the archives of their country ; and its grate­ ful citizens honor them as of their noble army of martyrs, May they rest in peace. “ September, A. D. 1866.” --------- o---------Requiem, Sung by Beethoven Club at the tombs of the un­ known : Sigh not, ye winds, as passing o’er The chambers of the dead ye fly; Weep not, ye dews, For these no more shall ever weep—shall ever sigh. Why mourn the throbbing heart at rest ? How still it lies within the breast! Why mourn when death presents its peace, And o’er the grave our sorrows cease ? ------- —0----------- Shall We Know Each Other There? The orphans then sung, while gathered around the tomb of their fathers — W1icn we hear the music ringing �JHE pOEMS OF /tRLINGTON. Through the bright celestial dome, Where sweet angel voices, singing, Gladly bid us welcome home, To the land of ancient story, Where the spirit knows no care, In the land of light and glory, Shall we know each other there? Chorus.—Shall we know each other, Shall we know each other, Shall we know each other, Shall we know each other there ? When the holy angels meet us, As we go to join their band, Shall we know the friends that greet us, I n the glorious spirit land ? Shall we see the same eyes shining On us, as in days of yore ? Shall we feel their dear arms twining Fondly around us, as before ? (Chorus.) Yes ! my earth-worn soul rejoices, And my weary heart grows light; For the thrilling angel voices, And the angel faces bright, That shall welcome us in heaven, Are the loved of long ago. And to them ’tis kindly given, Thus their mortal friends to know. (Chorus.) Oh, ye weary, sad, and tossed ones, Droop not, faint not by the way, Ye shall join the loved and just ones, In the land of perfect day 1 �JHE p0-EMS OF ^RLII^GTON, b Harp strings touched by angel fingers, Murmured in my raptured ear ; Evermore their sweet song lingers ; “ We shall know each other there.” (Chorus.) a v n ( V ----------- 0----------- | x V THE NATIONAL CROSS, At the top bore the inscription: In memory of the heroes op ) P On the upright: Antietam, Gettysburg, Wilderness, Shiloh* } Fair Oaks, Corinth, Bull Run, Stone Riveip '! | Vicksburg, Cedar Creek, Chattanooga, Atlanta* . Cold Harbor, Petersburg. , I; |j Then, upon the arms of the Cross were painted a ® Stock of muskets on the right, a field-gun in the centre, I and ciossed cavalry sabers on the left, emblematic of | the three arms of the service, 111 ) And on the foot-board Fort Fisher, Five Fores. 1 i i (' ( f ; At this Cross the following impressive and touching ? | ceremony took place : !' 1 The soldiers’ orphans marched to the cross, each ■ ' bearing a floral offering, and there presented it to a widow in deep mourning, she passed it to a soldier in <) full uniform but unarmed, he passed it to two men in | citizens’ dress, one of whom had lost both, and the D other one arm in the army ; the one-armed man laid �C Jhe Poems •4- of ^Arlington. ■ ' •! ri ■ i •> the tribute at the foot of the cross. This was the most touching and affecting ceremony during the day, and so simple, plain, and marked in its signification as to require no explanation: the orphan, the widow, the army, the maimed soldier-, all stood in our presence, and the dread realities of war were but too fully felt by all as the sharp report of the cannon announced the close of the exercises. No person who witnessed the scene will ever forget it while memory remains. It is meet that we should never forget the lessons that this terrible struggle ' have taught us. -0The following beautiful tablets adorn the walls of the office : “ Here sleep the brave, Who sink to rest, By all their country’s Wishes blest.” “ Soldier rest, thy warfare’s o’er Sleep the sleep that knows no waking, Dream of battle-fields no more, Days of toil and nights of watching.” ‘‘ Whether in the tented field, Or in the battle’s van, The greatest place for man to db Is where he dies for man.” The grave should be surrounded by eve might inspire the tenderness and venera; dead, or that might aim the erring to virtu* �Jhe Poems of Arlington. the place of disgust and dismay, but of sorrow and meditation. --------- 0---------- Erected along the main drive : • “ The muffled drum’s sad roll has beat The soldier’s last tatoo, No more on life’s parade shall meet These brave and fallen few. “ On fame’s eternal camping ground, There silent tents are spread, And glory guards, with solemn round, The bivouac of the dead.”' “ Through all rebellion’s horrors>Bright shine our nation’s fame, Our gallant soldiers, perishing, Have won a deathless name.” Erected on each side of the centre walk : “ These faithful herald tablets, With mournful pride shall tell, ( When many a vanished age hath flown,) The story how ye fell. “ Nor wreck, nor change, nor winter’s blight, Nor time’s remorseless doom, Shall mar one ray of glory’s light, That guilds your deathless tomb.” “ The neighing troop, the flashing blade, The bugle’s stirring blast, The charge, the dreadful cannonade, The din and shout are passed. �4 JHE pOEMS OF pRLlNGTON “ Nor war’s wild note, nor glory’s peal, Shall thrill with fierce, delight, Those breasts that never more may feel, The raptures of the fight.” “A thousand battle fields have drunk The blood of warriors brave, And countless homes are dark and drear, Thro' the land they died to save.” “ Now ’neath their parent turf they rest, Far from the gory field ; Born to a Spartan mother’s breast, On many a bloody shield. “ The sunshine of their native sky, Sm les sadly on them here ; And kindred eyes and hearts watch by The soldier’s sepulchre.” “ Ilest on, embalmed and sainted dead, Dear as the blood ye gave 1 No impious footsteps here shall tread • The herbage of your grave ; Nor shall your glory be forgot, While Fame her record keeps, Or honor points the hallowed spot, Where valor proudly sleeps.” The hopes, the fears, the blood, the tears That marked the bitter strife, Are now all crowned by victory, That saved the nation’s life.” �SUCCESSOR TO G. I). WAKELY, STEREOSCOPIC yiEws of the PHOTOGRAPHER. Public JIuildings, IN WASHINGTON. Also interior views of the same. ARLINGTON CEMETERY DECORATION VIEWS, Taken during the Ceremony at the Cemetery. We have on hand a large and extensive Stock of all the Views of Public Interest. Also large size pictures of the United States Capitol, &c., &c. We respectfully solicit the patronage of the traveling public. A liberal deduction made to the trade. OUR MANUFACTURING DEPARTMENT,. WASHINGTON BI ILDING. Cor. Penn. Avenue and 7 th Street. FRANKLIN HOUSE, C0R.8TH AND D STREETS, WzlSWGW. ©• C, The above House is situated in the centre of the City, and withih one square of the Patent and Post Offices, and both lines of the City Railroads. TERMS, $2?QQ PER Strangers visiting Washington will find at this House every convenience. F. BRANDNER, Proprietor. �K. H. MARSH, gitmima guwt,* anti NO. 407 F STREET, NEAR SEVENTH, }VASHINGTON, p Ç. NO. 409 F STREET, NEAR SEVENTH, WASHINGTON, D. 0-, ' Are prepared to execute all kinds of Book and Job Printing, such as: Business, Shipping, Wedding, Visiting, and Ball Cards. Bills of Fare, Billheads, Checks, Letter Heads, Programmes. Lawyers’ Briefs and Blanks, Pamphlets, and Dodgers, "f And all other Printing, either Plain oj- in Colors, equal to any other House in the City, with the utmost neatness, and on most ’“‘reasonable terms. JOHN L. G1NCK. JAMES T. POWELL. FOR MOUNT VERNON. THE STEAMER ARROW, CAPTAIN THOS^ STACKPOLE, Leaves her Wharf, Foot of Seventh street, DAILY at 10 a. m. (Sundays excepted,) FOR MOIVT VERAOA, And Intermediate Landings, returning to the City at 4 p. m. Tickets $1.50, including ADMISSION TO THE MAN­ SION AND GROUNDS. For sale at all the PRINCIPAL HOTELS, and on board of the Steamer. JAMES SYKES, General Superintendent. Office: WILLARD’S HOTEL. ~ � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Victorian Blogging Description An account of the resource A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library &amp; Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span> Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Conway Hall Library & Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Conway Hall Ethical Society Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data Pamphlet Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource The poems of Arlington. Containing the various poetical contributions written for the occasion of decorating the graves of our fallen heroes, May 29 1869. Together with the inscriptions on entablatures, erected at Arlington; with description of the touching ceremony at the national cross, as part of the memorial exercises. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Finch, M.A.C. (ed) Description An account of the resource Place of publication: Washington, D.C. Collation: [26] p. ; 16 p. Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Annotations, difficult to read and mostly pieces of poetry, written in pencil over cover title and final pages. Includes poems by A.J. Finch, Mrs Mary E. Nealy, Dr. H. Risler, Francis de Haes Janvier, Oliver Wendell Holmes; hymn by W. Oland Bourne. Advertisements for services and facilities in the region of Arlington inside and on back cover. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Powell & Ginck Printers Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1869 Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context G5311 Subject The topic of the resource Poetry Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The poems of Arlington. Containing the various poetical contributions written for the occasion of decorating the graves of our fallen heroes, May 29 1869. Together with the inscriptions on entablatures, erected at Arlington; with description of the touching ceremony at the national cross, as part of the memorial exercises.), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English American Arlington Cemetery (Va.) Conway Tracts Memorials Poetry https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/d2ad8b731145bc2996b3733d3d7a0aff.pdf?Expires=1779926400&Signature=vVlO63zY3JHcufpRbGOMlXN5J9zlF9tL7Ee8NL2ReBniekLtvgxYtBMzV4hXaevHC4g47u6MGJ2A2RD8%7EWzPf-fav4l-TDmpTm9RJU0sWw0aSqhV2wX1l03fyC5oA85AEIAj4vGhJB3aVsfBx5dTbuLHkoh8%7Er%7EfU54lD9nASO4DmkH61EJooQsW0aCv52k2BLMYqWLBrxmifoYa29YdBtOml7RPJxKMHewAjRzQI8Poah3hHvUkTPHiGYi8w33yK88vOb5b6SDFfV24uerK1XljQhgJQ-q-FSeIuDpWlVBKlLQBn99KxBvpdX8lR7EynvVLB8cDqKPVlk5SJypqVA__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM e0933e8608f8f50a6388e3e8d90658bf PDF Text Text 97 Art. IV.—Shelley. 1. The Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley. Edited by­ Mrs. Shelley. 1853. 2. Essays; Letters from Abroad; Translations and Frag­ ments. By Percy Bysshe Shelley. Edited bv Mrs. Shelley. 1854. 3. The Life of Percy Bysshe Shelley. By Captain Thomas Medwin. 1847. 4. The Shelley Papers. By Captain Thomas Medwin. 1833. O write well on any theme requires not only a knowledge of the subject, but a deep sympathy with it. The first requisite is more commonly fulfilled than the second. Men can, after a fashion, master a subject—know its bearings and its details—and still have no real attachment for it: men, too, if they are at all suspected of this indifference, will lash themselves into a spurious love, which may be detected by its very absurdity. But true love springs from the heart, can admire the virtues of its friend without exaggeration, and yet not be hoodwinked to his faults ; has the sincerity to praise where praise is deserved, and the courage to reprove where reproof is wanted. Hence is it that true love is the same as thorough knowledge, for it sees both sides of the matter. Shelley’s critics, as well as his biographer, have been of all kinds except the last. Captain Medwin should remember that as it is the fault of a bad logician to prove too much, so it is of an indiscreet friend to praise too much. He has, however, in his “ Life of Shelley” contrived to fall into both mistakes. But he is also wanting in the higher qualifications of a biographer. It has now become, somehow or another, an esta­ blished axiom that nothing is so easy to write as a biography. Jot down a few facts, reckon them up like a schoolboy’s addition sum, and you have a Life ready-made. Nay, perhaps save your­ self even this trouble, and, in these days of mechanical aids, take a “ Ready Reckoner,” and you will find it done for you. An­ other popular receipt is, to sketch in a few lines here and there— never mind if they are a little blurred—paint them in watercolours, and you have a portrait at once : the critics will clean your picture for you gratis. Perhaps nothing is so difficult as a biography; but of all biographies, a poet’s most so. You have in his case not only to trace the mere liver of life, but all those back currents and cross eddies in which his stream of poesy has flowed. Every little action has to be examined to see what effect T [Vol. LXIX. No. CXXXV.J—New Series, Vol. XIII. No. I. II �98 Shelley. it has had upon his life and his poetry, for the two are inter­ woven as w7oof and warp : not only this, hut the biographer must bring a congenial and a poetic spirit to the task—must show in what new realms of poesy our poet has travelled, what new beauties he has discovered, what new Castalian springs he has drunk of; should show, too, what new views of life he has opened up, how these views originated, and what their ultimate aim is—for this is the important point—and what real value they have in their practical bearing upon this earth ; and how far they are likely to affect and improve it. But in Shelley’s case the dif­ ficulty is tenfold increased. His character, in one sense one of the most simple, is in reality one of the most complex. So shy and reserved in many matters, yet speaking forth so boldly and uncompromisingly; so inconsistent at times, yet ever the same in the cause of truth ; so impulsive in most matters, yet so firm in behalf of liberty; so feminine and so susceptible, yet so heroic and resolute, he presents a medley of contradictions. All this must be accounted for by his next biographer. Nevertheless, we are thankful to Captain Medwin for what he has accomplished; he has done it to the best of his endeavours, and with a certain species of enthusiasm which will atone for many defects. But a Life of Shelley is still wanted—so much remains that is still obscure about him. Any little facts, as long as they are genuine and upon undoubted authority, would be welcome; for it is these little facts and traits—little they are wrongly called—which help us to judge of a man’s character, and give us such an insight into his life and poems. “Truth is stranger than fiction,” said Byron; yet, we suspect, without knowing why. The one is Nature’s real infinite order of things; the other, only man’s worldly finite arrangement. We talk of sober truth and wild fiction; but it is truth in reality that is wild, and fiction sober. “ As easy as lying,” says Hamlet, but truth is hard to imitate. Hence to thinking men the romance of history is more exciting than any novel; a biography more inte­ resting than any fiction. Shelley’s life, with all its pathos, is an example. The imagination of no novelist would ever have dared to have drawn such a character. It would have been scouted at once as impossible in the highest degree. Let us endeavour to give some sort of a brief sketch of it, trying to fill in, with what cunning we have, the lights and shades. Percy Bysshe Shelley was born at Field Place, in Sussex, on the 4th of August, 1792, related through his family to Algernon and Sir Philip Sydney, heir to a baronetcy and its rich acres. Novel readers would be delighted in such a promising hero; young ladies would have fallen in love with him at once, or with his ten thousand a year. He was brought up, it appears, with his sisters until he was �At Sion House, Brentford; and at Eton. 99 seven or eight years old, and then sent to an academy at Brent­ ford, and subsequently, at thirteen, to Eton. At neither schools did he mix with the other boys, but like Novalis and many other boy-men, took no part in the sports. This shyness and reserve he never threw off during life. It appears even in his poems; they seem to shun the light of the common world, its din, its noise ; they fly away to the realms of imagination for peace and quietness. We can fancy Shelley walking by himself with that delicate feminine face and quiet dreaming eye, glooming moodily over his supposed wrongs, which, by-the-bye, he might have easily cast away, had he but set to work and bowled round hand, or played at fives with the rest; they would have dropped off, as lightly as the bails, with the first wicket he took. But it was not so, and he ever afterwards looked back with pain upon those early days. Writing of them in the Dedication of the “Revolt of Islam”— “ I wept, I knew not why; until there rose From the near schoolroom, voices that, alas! Were but one echo from a world of woes— The harsh and grating strife of tyrants and of foes.” At Sion House, Brentford, Shelley was a great reader of blue-books,” so called, says Captain Medwin, from their covers, and which, for the moderate sum of sixpence, contained an immense amount of murders, haunted castles, and so forth. When the “ blue-books” were all exhausted, Shelley had recourse to a circulating library at Brentford, where, no doubt, as at all circulating libraries, plenty more “ blue-books” were to be ob­ tained, and where he became enchanted with “ Zofloya, or the Moor,” whose hero appears to have been the Devil himself. No doubt, to this source may we trace Shelley’s love for the morbid and the horrible, which happily, under better influences, disap­ peared from his writings. Here at Sion House, too, was exhi­ bited Walker’s Orrery, which even surpassed “ Zofloya” in its attractions, and which first turned Shelley’s thoughts in a better direction than circulating libraries generally point to. At Eton, an old schoolfellow of Shelley’s gives the following account of him:—“ He was known as ‘ Mad Shelley,’ and many a cruel torture was practised upon him. The‘Shelley! Shelley! Shelley!’ which was thundered in the cloisters, was but too often accom­ panied by practical jokes—such as knocking his books from under his arm, seizing him as he stooped to recover them, pulling and tearing his clothes, or pointing with the finger, as one Nea­ politan maddens another.” We often look upon a school as an epitome of the world—a perfect microcosmos. And the above is as true a picture of the world’s treatment of Shelley, as of Eton. A few more years, and it was the world itself, with stronger lungs h 2 �100 Shelley. and with bitterer tones, crying out “ Mad Shelley;” it was the world, a few years after, that seized his books with Chancery decrees; it was the world, that is to say, these same boys, now “ children of a larger growth,” that pointed at him with its finger. Shelley felt all this in after-life as much as he did now at school; not the mere insults, but that these boys, now men, should never have outgrown their weaknesses. One more point in his Eton career. He was there condemned to that most distasteful of all tasks to true genius, to write Latin verses, that poetry of machinery. Shelley, condemned to the Procrustean bed of longs and shorts, wishing to enter the promised land of science—Shelley, who hereafter should be the true poet, scanning with his fingers dactyles and spondees, asking for a short and a long, that great desideratum to finish a pentameter with, and all the time thirsting to drink from springs that might refresh his mind, is a pitiful spectacle, well worth pondering over. How many promising minds this insane custom, still continued at our schools, has blunted and sickened, cannot well be computed, we should say. We wonder boys have not yet been practically taught the Pyrrhic dance or the evolutions of a Greek chorus; they would be quite as mechanical and far more amusing. In one person alone at Eton did Shelley at all find a congenial spirit, a Dr. Lind, of whom Mrs. Shelley writes, that he supported and befriended * Shelley, and Shelley never mentioned his name without love and reverence, and in after years drew his character as that of the old man who liberates Laon from his tower-prison, and tends on him in sickness. This is touchingly like Shelley’s nobleness, which never forgot a kindness. Most poets have ever looked back upon boyhood with joy; it is the storehouse of many an old affection, full of many dear memories. Shelley’s was blank enough of all such things ; this one old man, a green spot in its sandy wild. And now, since Eton would do nothing for Shelley, he betook himself to reading Pliny’s “Natural History,” puzzling his tutor with some questions on the chapters on astronomy. He next commenced German. The fires of such an ardent spirit could not easily be smothered out. Chemistry and Burgher’s “ Leonora” were now his two engrossing themes; and about this time he wrote, in conjunction with Captain Medwin, “ The Wandering Jew,” the little of which that we have seen is poor enough; but Shelley’s ideas are described by the gallant captain as “images wild, vast, and Titanic in which remark we suspect that Captain Medwin is like the Jew, rather “wandering.” And now we are approach­ ing a great event in Shelley's life. A Miss Grove, a cousin of his, of nearly the same age, who is described as very beautiful, * See Mrs. Shelley’s note on the “Revolt of Islam.” �At Oxford. 101 captivated him. We like to dwell upon these two child-lovers. The frost of the world must have thawed away for the first time to poor Shelley; a spring, full of fresh thoughts and hopes, were springing up in his heart. He had found some one in this wide, wild world to love him, and to love. Upon his dark night now came forth the evening star of love, trembling with beautv and light. Surely it was not the same old world, with its haggard nightmares and its feverish dreams ? The dew of love fell soft upon that wild brain of his. It was the first love—that first iove which comes but once in a man’s life. You may have it again ; but, like many another fever, it is slight and poor in comparison. Of her and himself did he write in after years— “ They were two cousins like to twins, Ancl so they grew together like two flowers Upon one stem, which the same beams and showers Lull or awaken in their purple prime.” To her, too, did he dedicate his “ Queen Mab — “ Thou wast my purer mind, Thou wast the inspiration of my song ; Thine are these early wilding flowers, Though garlanded by me.” And now, in conjunction, these two child-lovers wrote the romance of ‘ Zastrozzi. We would fain linger here on these happy days. But there is already a third party in the number— it is a skeleton. Shelley, now not much more than sixteen, went up to Oxford, engrossed with his chemistry. But Oxford did not, any more than Eton, encourage his pursuits. Acids and Alma Mater did not agree. Galvanic batteries and portly dons were not likely to be on the best of terms. Why, a Head of a College might mistake one for some infernal machine. So Shelley betook himself to philosophy; Locke was his professed guide, but in reality the French exponents of Locke, which is a very different matter. Hume, too, became his text-book ; and the poet, now a convert to Materialism, rushed on to Atheism; and in a moment of enthusiasm conceived the project of con­ verting Alma Mater herself. We don’t well see what other course that venerable lady, with the means she possessed, could pursue but the one she adopted. So Shelley was expelled. It is worth considering, however, that there was no other weapon left against Atheism but the poor and feeble one of expulsion. On Alma Mater we need waste no reflections; but turn to Shelley in his utter desolateness, for unto him it must have been an hour of great darkness. The old traditional guide-posts were gone, and he had to walk the road of life alone. New world-theories he must construct; the old eternal problems he must now solve �102 * Shelley. for himself. Other griefs from -without pressed upon him. His cousin deserted him, or rather, we should suppose, was made to desert him. His treatise on Atheism had deeply offended his relations, though we are surprised at its preventing his marriage. An expected baronetcy in this world, like charity, can hide a multitude of sins. A baronet’s blood-red hand could easily, we should have thought, have covered up even Atheism, since it gene­ rally can conceal so many faults. So Shelley left Alma Mater, and matriculated at the university of the world, where he should some day take honours, though from thence some would have expelled him too. He appears to have gone up to London, living with Captain Medwin, speculating on metaphysics, and writing letters under feigned names to various people, including Mrs. Hernans. To show in what a state of mind he was at this time, we may give the following anecdote in Captain Medwin’s own words :—“Being in Leicester-square one morning at five o’clock, I was attracted by a group of boys standing round a welldressed person lying near the rails. On coming up to them I discovered Shelley, who had unconsciously spent a part of the night sub dio.” We read of him, too, sailing paper boats on the Serpentine, as he did years after on the Serchio, just as he describes Helen’s son— “ In all gentle sports took joy, Oft in a dry leaf for a boat, With a small feather for a sail, His fancy on that spring would float.” (“Rosalind and Helen.”) He returned home, where, however, he did not remain long, in consequence of his falling in love with a Miss M estbrook, a schoolfellow of his sister’s. This was productive of another breach with his family, more serious than that caused by his Atheism. Miss Westbrook, it appears, was the daughter of a retired innkeeper; and Shelley’s father, the baronet, with proper aristocratic notions on all points, had long been accustomed to tell his son that he would provide for any quantity of natural children, but a mesalliance he would never pardon. So when Shelley married the daughter of the retired innkeeper, his father very properly cut off his allowance. Anything in this world, we believe, will be forgiven, except this one thing. You may take a poor girl’s virtue, and it passes for a good joke with the world; but if you make her the only reparation you can, you shall be an out­ cast from society. Such doctrines are a premium upon vice, and do more harm to a nation than Holywell-street: and we are more in­ clined to place many of the griefs of Shelley’s first marriage, with its sad results, at the front door of fashionable society, -than to any other cause. The retired innkeeper and Shelley’s uncle, Captain �His and Schillers Love for the Storm. 103 Pilford, however, found the requisite funds, and Shelley and his young wife went off to live in the Lake District, where Mr. De Quincey gives us the following picture of them :—“ The Shelleys had been induced by some of their new friends (the Southeys) to take part of a house standing about half a mile out of Keswick, on the Penrith road. There was a pretty garden attached to it; and whilst walking in this, one of the Southey party asked Mrs. Shelley if the garden had been let with their part of the house. ‘ Oh, no,’ she replied; ‘the garden is not ours; but then, you know, the people let us run about in it, whenever Percy and I are tired of sitting in the house.’ The naivete of this expression, ‘run about/ contrasting so picturesquely with the intermitting efforts of the girlish wife at supporting a matron-like gravity, now that she was doing the honours of her house to married ladies, caused all the party to smile.”* Ah ! could it, indeed, have been always so; and we think of another poet who says of himself and his wife, “I was a child—she was a child;” and we sigh as we think over their tragic fates. Shelley did not stay here long. We find him flitting, spirit-like, about from place to place. We meet with him at one time at Dublin, which he was obliged to leave on account of a political pamphlet he had published. Soon afterwards we dis­ cover him in North Wales, helping to assist the people to rebuild the sea-wall which had been washed away. All this time, too, was he suffering bitterly in spirit—the struggle was still going on within. In addition to this, his wife was by no means a person suited for him, and after a three years’ union they were separated. In July, 1814, conceiving himself free, we find him travelling abroad with Mary, the future Mrs. Shelley, daughter of Alary Wollstonecraft and William Godwin, well known for their antimatrimonial speculations. They crossed the Channel in an open boat, and were very nearly lost in a gale. Shelley’s chief enjoy­ ment seems to have been on the water; and in this expedition his greatest delight seems to have been in sailing down the rapids of the Rhine on a raft. He is in this particular very like Schiller; in fact, a portion of Schiller’s biography might be applied, word for word, to him :—“At times he might be seen floating on the river in a gondola, feasting himself with the loveliness of earth and sky. He delighted most to be there when tempests were abroad; his unquiet spirit found a solace in the expression of its own unrest on the face of nature; danger lent a charm to his situation; he felt in harmony with the scene, when that rack was sweeping stormfully across the heavens, and the forests were sounding in the breeze, and the river was rolling its chafed waters into wild eddying heaps.”t And we find this love for water and * “Sketches, Critical and Biographic,” p. 18. f "Life of Schiller.” �104 Shelley. the storm in Shelley’s poems. He now returned to London, where he suffered from poverty and absolute want. Nothing daunted him. He now betook himself to the study of medicine, and com­ menced walking the hospitals. Gleams and visions of liberty lighted him upon his path ; but they were all mere will-o’-the-wisps, and went quickly out, leaving him in blacker darkness than before. Doubts still surrounded him on all sides. It is a pic­ ture worth studying—that delicate, womanly face, thoughtful and sad, with its long curling hair, and its genius-lighted eyes, brood­ ing painfully in poverty over its woes. We look on him, and he seems as some flower that has bloomed by mistake in winter-time —too frail to cope with the blasts and the falling sleet, but yet blooms on, prophesying of sunshine and summer days. The year 1815, however, brought him relief. It was discovered that’the fee-simple of the Shelley estates was vested in Shelley, and that he could thus obtain money upon them. The old baronet was furious at the discovery, but was ultimately persuaded to make his son an allowance. Shelley, now freed from his pecuniary difficulties, again went abroad in May, 181G, this time to Secheron, near Geneva, where Byron was living; and here the two poets kept a crank boat on the lake, in which Shelley used “ to brave Bises, which none of the barques could face.” How much Byron profited by his intercourse with Shelley let the third canto of “ Childe Harold,” which was written at this period, testify; and let us at the same time remember Byron’s own words—“You were all mistaken about Shelley, who was, without exception, the best and least selfish man I ever knew.” After an absence of more than a year, Shelley returned to England; and now per­ haps the bitterest trial of all awaited him. His wife had drowned herself. Woe seems to have shrouded him as with a garment. How bitterly he feels it, these and many other verses tell— “ That time is dead for ever, child, Browned, frozen, dead for ever; We look on the past And stare aghast, At the spectres, wailing, pale and ghast, Of hopes that thou and 1 beguiled To death on life’s dark river.” Nay, the strain on his mind was too much, and he became for a time insane, and so describes himself in “Julian and Maddalo.” And now, as if his bitterness were not enough, the Court of Chancery tore his children away from him. “ Misfortune, where goest thou, into the house of the artist ?” saith the Greek pro­ verb. And still the struggle was going on within, embittered by woes from without. Life’s battle-field is never single. We cannot stop to inquire whether trials and struggles may not be �His Friendship with Keats. 105 in some way essential to the education of genius, and whether there may not be some as yet unrecognised law to that end. The old fable is certainly a true one of the swan singing only in its death-agonies. But there must be an end; and now the scorching day was melting into a quiet eve : the stormy waves were subsiding. We have dwelt at some length on the previous details, but must now be more brief. We do not so much regret this. It is in the storm only that we care to see the straining ship brave out the danger—any day we can see plenty of painted toy-boats sailing on the millpond. Shelley now married his second wife, Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, and led a quiet life at Marlowe, writing “ Alastor” and the “Revolt of Islam,” and endearing himself to the villagers by his kindnesses. He here contracted severe ophthalmia, from visiting the poor people in the depth of an un­ usually cold winter. About this time, too, he became acquainted with Keats, and nothing can be finer than the friendship between the two poets—nothing nobler in literature than Shelley taking up the gauntlet for his oppressed brother poet against the re­ viewers, and writing afterwards to his memory the sweetest of all dirges, the “ Adonais.” So dear did he hold his friend, that when Shelley’s body was washed ashore, Keats’ poems were found in his bosom. In 1818, Shelley left England, never to return. Life now was becoming unto him as a summer afternoon with its golden sunshine. He had found a wife whom he could love: that passionate heart, ever seeking some haven, had at last found one—little voices now again called him father. The mists of youth wrere clearing away; gleams of light were breaking in upon him. He had betaken himself to the study of Plato ; and perhaps there was no book in the world that was likely to do him such good. In one of his letters he writes, “ The destiny of man can scarcely be so degraded, that he was born only to die.” But even now he had his troubles, as we all shall have, be the world made ever so perfect. He lost one of his children; was still troubled with a most painful disease; was still the mark for every reviewer’s shaft. And now, when everything promised so fair and bright, on one July afternoon the waves of the Mediter­ ranean closed over that fair form, still young, though his hair was already grey, “ seared with the autumn of strange suffering.” The battle of life was past and over. We have thus given a hurried sketch of Shelley’s life. Impul­ siveness was no doubt the prominent feature of his character. Love for his fellow-men, hatred against all tyranny, whether of government or mere creeds, combined with kis ardent and poetic spirit, hurried at times his as yet undisciplined mind away. No doubt he struck at many things without discretion. But it re­ �106 Shelley. quires older men than Shelley to discriminate what is to be hit. Strike at the immorality of a clergyman, and he screens himself behind the Church, and there is instantly a cry you are assailing Religion itself. Many stalking-horses, some of them with huge ears and broken knees, are there walking about on this earth, which we must worship, even as the ^Egyptians did cats, and the Hindoos cows. Animal worship is not yet extinct. Shelley, too, was one of those whose nature is their own law; who refuse to be cramped up by the arbitrary conventionalities of life which suit ordinary mortals so well, which fact is such a puzzle to commonplace minds that they solve it by setting down the unlucky individual as a madman; an easy solution, in which we cannot acquiesce. One of those few, too, was he “ Whose spirit kindles for a newer virtue, Which, proud and sure, and for itself sufficient, To no faith, goes a begging.” An isolation of spirit, too, he possessed, often peculiar to genius. He found no one to sympathize with him; hence his mind was turned in upon itself, seeking higher principles, newer resolutions than are yet current. He found himself, even when amidst the throng, quite alone; though jostled by the multitude, quite soli­ tary. Society to such a one is pain; the very noise of human voices, misery. Hence, in his despair, he is tempted to exclaim to his wife, “ My greatest content would be utterly to desert all human society. I would retire with you and our child to a soli­ tary island in the sea, would build a boat, and shut upon my retreat the floodgates of the world: I would read no reviews, and talk with no authors. If I dared trust my imagination, it would tell me that there are one or two chosen companions beside myself whom I would desire. But to this I would not listen.” That Shelley should have been misappreciated is only natural. To a proverb, the world likes its own, and Shelley was not amongst that number. High-minded, he despised the inanities of life; sincere and earnest, he hated the hollowness of the day. Too sensitive, he turned away to bye-paths. The flock of sheep herd together; he was sick at heart and wandered by himself. Poetic and ideal, he felt more than most of us the heart-aches and brain-aches of life, and ever seeking, ever hoping, found no cure for them. Speculative and philosophical, he felt the burden of the world-mystery and the world-problem, which he was ever trying to solve, and which every time lay heavier on his soul. Weak and physically frail, he felt life’s pack more than others, and knew not how to carry it without its galling him. A loving, sympathizing soul, he found but little affection, little love in the world ; for the most part a cold response and hard hearts, and so he uttered his wail of misery and then died. �His Critics. 107 He was slain accidentally in the battle of life—a mere stripling fighting manfully in the van. Still the army of life, like a mighty billow, rushes on; still the battle rages, still the desperate charge of the forlorn hope—here it gains, there it wavers, then is swept away—and still fresh ones follow on: the individual fighting in the first place for himself and his own necessities; and then, if a noble soul, doing battle for his fellow-creatures, helping the weak, raising up the down-trodden. The years sweep on like immense caravans, each of them laden with its own multitude, brawling, striving, fighting. We look out from the windows, and see behind us the earth covered with the monuments of mighty men, with nameless mounds where sleep the dead. Let us linger round the grave of him who lies beneath the walls of Rome, near the pyra­ mid of Caius Cestius, “ in a place so sweet that it might make one in love to be buried thereand see what epitaphs have been written over him, and what, too, we have to say. In plainer words, we will proceed to look at Shelley as exhibited by others, glancing at his religion, his politics, and poetry, by all of which we may be enabled to learn something more, and to form a completer estimate of him; and we would here remark that whatever censure or praise we may bestow on him, the one should be laid on, the other doubled by, his youth. We have now passed away from the old reviewing times of Gifford, when difference of opinion was added to the sins usually recognised by the Decalogue, when it actually could taint the rhymes, and make the verses of too many or too few feet, accord­ ing to the critic's orthodox ear. This old leaven has long since died out of all respectable Reviews, and can only be seen in its original bitterness in a few religious publications, where vitupe­ ration so easily supplies the place of argument. The world luckily sees with different eyes to those it did thirty years ago. Most people can now give Shelley credit for his noble qualities of generosity and pureness of moral character; and even those who may differ widely from his opinions, are willing to admit the beauty of his poems. Most people, we said; all certainly except those connected with a few religious publications, and the author of “ Modern Painters.” Mr. Ruskin seems to be seized with some monomania when Shelley’s name is mentioned. In the Appendix to his “ Elements of Drawing,” he calls Shelley “ shallow and verbose.” In a note in the second volume of“ Modem Painters,” part iii. sec. ii. chap. iv. § 6, he speaks of Shelley, “ sickly dreaming over clouds and waves.” As these objections are mere matters of opinion, we shall pass them by; it is hopeless to try to make the wilfully blind see. But in the third volume, part iv. chap. xvi. § 38, he talks of Shelley’s “ troublesome selfishness.” Facts are said to be the best arguments, and we will �108 Shelley. give Mr. Ruskin, as an answer to his libel, the following pathetic story in Leigh Hunt’s own words :— “ Mr. Shelley, in coming to our house at night, had found a woman lying near the top of the hill, in fits. It was a fierce winter’s night, with snow upon the ground—and winter loses nothing of its severity at Hampstead. My friend, always the promptest as well as the most pitying on these occasions, knocked at the first houses he could reach, in order to have the woman taken in. The invariable answer was, they could not do it. He asked for an outhouse to put her in, while he went for the doctor. Impossible. In vain he assured them she was no impostor—an assurance he was able to give, having studied something of medicine, and even walked the hospital, that he might be Useful in this way. They would not dispute the point with him ; but doors were closed, and windows were shut down. Time flies; the poor woman is in convulsions; her son, a young man, lamenting over her. At last my friend sees a carriage driving up to a house at a little distance; the knock is given; the warm door opens; servants and lights put forth. Now, thought he, is the time; he puts on his best address—which anybody might recognise for that of the highest gentle­ man—and plants himself in the way of an elderly person who is step­ ping out of the carriage with his family. He tells him his story. They only press on the faster. ‘ Will you go and see her ?’ ‘ No, sir, there is no necessity for that sort of thing, depend on it—impostors swarm everywhere—the thing cannot be done. Sir, your conduct is extraordinary.’ ‘ Sir,’ cried Mr. Shelley, at last assuming a very diffe­ rent appearance, and forcing the flourishing householder to stop, out of astonishment, ‘ I am sorry to say that your conduct is not extra­ ordinary ; and if my own may seem to amaze you, I will tell you something that may amaze you a little more, and I hope will frighten you. It is such men as you who madden the spirits and the patience of the poor and wretched ; and if ever a convulsion comes in this coun­ try, which is very probable, recollect what I tell you—you will have your house, that you refuse to put this miserable woman into, burnt over your head.’ 4 God bless me, sir! Dear me, sir!’ exclaimed the frightened wretch, and fluttered into his mansion. The woman was then brought to our house, which was at some distance, and down a bleak path; and Mr. Shelley and her son were obliged to hold her till the doctor could arrive. It appeared that she had been attending this son in London, on a criminal charge made against him, the agitation of which had thrown her into fits on their return. The doctor said that she would have inevitably perished had she lain there only a short time longer. The next day my friend sent mother and son comfort­ ably home to Hendon, where they were well known, and whence they returned him thanks full of gratitude.” This was an action worthy of a descendant of Algernon and Sir Philip Sydney, and may perhaps remind Mr. Ruskin of a certain parable of the good Samaritan. Again, in the same volume and part of “Modern Painters,” ch. xvii. § 26, Mr. Ruskin calls Shelley “passionate and unprincipled;” and again, in §41, �Mr. Ruskin on Shelley. 109 lie speaks of his “ morbid temperament.” It is only charitable to suppose that Mr. Ruskin has never read Shelley’s Life ; and, again, in the same volume and part, ch. xvi. § 34, he writes, “ Shelley is sad because he is impious.” This sort of reasoning reminds us of a story told in Rogers’s “ Table Talk,” which, as it affords us some further insight into Shelley’s character, may be given:—“One day, during dinner, at Pisa, where Shelley and Trelawney were with us, Byron chose to run down Shakspeare, for whom he, like Sheridan, either had, or pretended to have, little admiration. I said nothing; but Shelley immediately took up the defence of the great poet, and conducted it with his usual meek yet resolute manner, unmoved with the rude things with which Byron interrupted him—‘ Oh, that’s very zvell for an Atheist,’ ” &c. Byron, however, did not approach Mr. Ruskin’s absurdity. Atheism here did not altogether spoil Shelley’s defence; it only made it pretty good. Orthodoxy, we must suppose, would have rendered it perfect. But Mr. Ruskin boldly asserts, “Shelley is sad because he is impious;” or, in other words, because Shelley happens to differ from Mr. Ruskin’s notions on religion. It is true that Shelley is sad—not, though, because he is “ impious,” but from mourning over the wrongs that he sees hourly committed —the day full of toil, the air thick with groans. A solemn tone of sorrow pervades his poetry, like the dirge of the autumn wind sighing through the woods for the leaves as they keep falling off. We are ashamed and mortified to find Mr. Ruskin using such a coarse and vulgar argument—he who is ever complaining of the unfairness of his critics. But perhaps Mr. Ruskin may find this out, that when he has learnt to respect others, his critics will be in­ clined to treat him more leniently; and, furthermore, whilst he deals so harshly and so uncharitably with Shelley, we would in all kindness remind him of the line, “ who is so blessed fair that fears no blot?” And now for our orthodox reviewers, and their treatment of Shelley. “Queen Mab” is generally selected by them as the piece de resistance. We are far from defending the poem as re­ gards its tone and spirit, nor do we uphold Shelley in any of his attacks upon the personal character of the Founder of Chris­ tianity ; he finds no sympathy with us when he calls Christ “ the Galilean Serpent.” Much more do we agree with the old dra­ matist, Decker, when he writes— “ The best of men That e’er wore earth about him was a sufferer, A soft, meek, patient, humble, tranquil Spirit; The first true gentleman that ever breathed.” Shelley himself afterwards thoroughly disclaimed the opinions �110 Shelley. of this early and crude production. Upon an attempt being made to republish it, he thus wrote to the editor of the Examiner: —“ A poem, entitled ‘ Queen Mab,’ was written by me at the age of eighteen, I dare say in a sufficiently intemperate spirit—but even then was not intended for publication; and a few copies only were struck off, to be distributed among my personal friends. I have not seen this production for several years; I doubt not but that it is perfectly worthless in point of literary composition; and that in all that concerns moral and political speculation, as well as in the subtler discriminations of metaphysical and reli­ gious doctrine, it is still more crude and immature.” And he goes on to say that he has applied for an injunction to stop its * sale. Shelley, in after life, was the last man to speak slightingly of religion or religious matters—no true poet can ever do that; he, above all men, venerates religion. By him, as Shelley says in the Preface to the “ Revolt of Islam,” “ the erroneous and de­ grading idea which men have conceived of a Supreme Being is spoken against, but not the Supreme Being itself.” But why “ Queen Mab” should ever be picked out as so peculiarly blas­ phemous by its assailants, we have ever been surprised. We are, we repeat, far from sympathizing in the least with Shelley’s ex­ pressions; but we equally abhor the tenets of his orthodox reviewers. They are far more open to the charge of blasphemy than Shelley. It is they who degrade God, and God’s creatures, by representing him as the God of vengeance, and all His works vile and filthy; this glorious world as the devil’s world, and all the men and women in it chosen vessels of wrath, unable to do one good deed of themselves. They call Shelley an Atheist, in­ deed ! Rather call all those Atheists who deny liberty and all rights to their poorer brethren; who would trample them still deeper in the mire of ignorance, who would desecrate God’s Sab­ baths with idleness, and who make God in their own images piti­ fully sowing damnation broadcast on his creatures. Call them, too, Atheists, yes, the worst of Atheists, who lead a life of idleness and aimless inactivity; for the denial of God (a personal God, in the common sense of the term) does not constitute Atheism; but spending a life as if there were no God, and no such things as those minor gods—Justice, or Love, or Gratitude. Shelley was, at all events, sincere in his creed, which is more than can be said for most of his opponents. He suffered for it, and suffered bitterly; not, indeed, the tortures of the rack, but those more painful ordeals which we in this nineteenth century are so skilful to inflict. All ages have very properly allotted special punishments to their greatest spirits. The Greeks gave * See also a letter to Mr. John Gisborne—“ Shelley’s Letters and Essays,” vol. ii. p. 239. �Religion at the Present Day. Ill hemlock to Socrates; the Jews rewarded Jesus with a cross. Galileo received a rack for his portion. But we English have found out the greater refinement of cruelty, which may be in­ flicted by hounding a poet down by Reviews and Chancery-suits. Contrast Shelley, and his fervid eloquence, and poetry, and zeal, with his opponents. Go into an English church, and there you shall too often see but an automaton, now in white now in black, grinding old church tunes of which our ears are weary. It—for we cannot call that machine a living human being—finds no re­ sponse in the hearts of its hearers. Notone pulse there is quickened, not one eye grows brighter. If it would but say something to all those men and women, they should be as dancers ready to dance at the sound of music. But no voice comes, unless you call a monotonous drawl a voice. The farce is all the more hitter, because that figure to our knowledge leads a life quite contrary to the words upon his lips. How few of these Automata in white or in black would, in days of darkness and of trouble, stand up for their Bible and their Gospel, and dare to pull off the surplice and gown, and wear the martyr’s fiery shirt! One of them comes into the Church for the family living, and makes God’s house a place for money-changers and traders in simony; the other, because he has not capacity enough for any other pro­ fession. And these are the men that are to lead us in days when science and knowledge are fast advancing in every direction! these the men to sing of God’s wondrous works ! Do they not rather dishonour God, and prostitute religion to the worst form of Atheism ? That Shelley, or any one else, should become wearied with our present religious condition, we are not surprised. Our wonder is, that there are not far more of the same class. We have for years been lying under a tree which is long past bearing—waiting, alas ! for fruits, and not finding even a green branch, or a shady place. The once pure water of baptism is now turbid, the very sacramental bread mouldy. We must sorrowfully say with Jean Paul—“The soul which by nature looks Heavenward, is without a temple in this age.” So the old religious roads of thought are being torn up; the old via sacra being levelled. As it has been said a thousand times, no one need fear that religion will ever die. While there is the blue unfathomable sky above us, in which swim golden sun and moon and stars, and the comets trail along like fiery ships, there will ever arise a sense of mystery and awe in the breast of man; and while the sweet seasons come round, there will spring from his heart, like a fresh gushing fountain, a psalm of thankfulness to the Author of them. The deep spiritual nature of man can never die. And it is no sign of the decay of religion, but quite the reverse, when men refuse to be fed on the �112 Shelley. dry husks and chaff of doctrines. Yes, we will hope that a new and a brighter Reformation is dawning; that fresh Luthers and Melancthons shall arise, and that we shall have a Church wherein Science shall not fear to unfold her New Testament—wherein poets and philosophers, and painters and sculptors, may be its priests, each preaching from his own pulpit—when every day shall be equally holy—when every cottage shall be a temple, and all the earth consecrated ground—consecrated with^ the prayers of love and labour. And now let us turn to Shelley’s politics. Most poets have ever been the supporters of Liberty. And the reason is, as Words­ worth says, “ A poet is a man endowed with more lively sensi­ bility, more enthusiasm and tenderness, and a more comprehen­ sive soul than are supposed to be common among mankind.” They feel “ the sweet sense of kindred” more than others, and cannot bear to see some of their brethren chained like galleyslaves to the oar of labour—earning their bread with tears of blood, without time for leisure, or meditation, or self-improve­ ment ; working like the beasts of the field, with this difference, that they are less cared for by their masters. As Milton says— “ True poets are the objects of my reverence and love, and the constant sources of my delight. I know that most of them, from the earliest times to those of Buchanan, have been the strenuous enemies of despotism.” The remark is true. Tyrtaeus singing war-strains, and the old Hebrew prophets rousing Israel from its sleep of bondage, are instances of what is meant. All poets have felt this love for Liberty. Even Mr. Tennyson can turn at times from his descriptive paintings, and give us such a lyric as “Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,” so full of noble hopes and sympathies. A little time ago we had a novel with a Chartist poet for its hero ; and by-and-bv a living poet, the son of a canal bargeman, risesup among us—no fiction this time—uttering strains of woe to that same often invoked Liberty. But the feeling is most vivid in early youth ; the cares of the world soon grow round us, and many of us find out it is to our apparent advantage to remain silent; and we become to our shame dumb, ignomi­ niously content to accept things as they are. Some even turn renegades, as Southey. But in Shelley the flame every day burnt brighter. Liberty with him was no mere toy to be broken and laid aside, but the end and aim of his life. He kept true to the dream of youth, and the inspiration of early days, when injustice has not yet clouded our vision. But, on the face of it, is there not something supremely ridiculous in the son of a wealthy baronet coming forward to delineate the woes of men about which he could really know nothing ? Why not have written �The Times in which Shelley lived. 113 odes of the Minerva-press stamp, which could have been read to aristocratic drawing-rooms ? The answer is, that this thing genius is strong and earnest, and, luckily, will not bend like a reed before any fashionable breeze from Belgravia or St. James’s. Society is a costly porcelain vase, wherein the poor plant genius is cramped and stunted, and artificially watered and heated, in­ stead of living in the free open air, enjoying the breeze and the showers of heaven; it must either break its prison or wither. Shelley adopted the former course. Let us rejoice it was so— that there was one man who, though brought up in luxury, had the heart and the courage to pity the misfortunes of the poor. Let us remember, too, the days Shelley had fallen upon, when the nation was suffering all the distresses a long war could entail; when a Parliament of landlords enacted the Corn-laws for the benefit of their own rents; when prosecutions were rife for the most trifling offences ; when Government actually employed spies to excite starving men to violence; when “ blood was on the grass like dew.” It was the dark night that preceded the dawn of a better day. Since then, schools have sprung up ; free-libraries and museums have grown here and there; parks have been opened; baths and wash-houses built; crowded districts drained and ventilated; cheap and good books diffused. Within the last few months “The National Association for the Advancement of Social Science” has held its first meeting, and there is a general wish, except perhaps amongst a few, to improve the condition of the working classes. A man who, in Shelley’s position, should now write as Shelley did, could simply be regarded as a misguided enthusiast; and we can only pardon Gerald Massey in some of his wild strains, by knowing how galling is the yoke, and how bitter the bread, of poverty. Still much, almost everything, yet remains to be done. The life of the labourer still, as Shelley would sing, “ Is to work, and have such pay As just keeps life from day to day.” Not even that, as the poorhouse in the winter’s night can testify. But, after all, what is this image of Liberty which Shelley has set up for us ? We can answer best in his own words :— “ For the labourer thou art bread, And a comely table spread, From his daily labour come, In a neat and happy home— Thou art clothes, and fire and food For the trampled multitude: No—in countries that are free Such starvation cannot be, As in England now we see.” [Vol. LXIX. No. CXXXV.J—New Series, Vol. XIII. No. I. I �114 Shelley. This surely is rather a material view; no one can well see treason in the loaf, or impiety in the well-filled cupboard; and yet an important one. The soul of man can never be fed, while his body is racked with hunger; his mind can never be warmed with any spark of the higher life, while his limbs shiver with the cold; his spiritual faculties can never be raised, while be is sunk in physical uncleanness. But rising to a higher strain, Shelley proceeds:— “ To the rich thou art a check; When his foot is on the neck Of his victim, thou dost make That he treads upon a snake. Thou art Justice—ne’er for gold May thy righteous laws be sold, As laws are in England:—thou Shieldest alike the high and low. Thou art Wisdom—freemen never Dream that God will doom for ever All who think those things untrue Of which priests make such ado. Thou art Peace—never by thee Would blood and treasure wasted be As tyrants wasted them, when all Leagued to quench thy flame in Gaul. ***** Science, and Poetry, and Thought, Are thy lamps ; they make the lot Of the dwellers in a cot Such, they curse their Maker not. Spirit, Patience, Gentleness, All that can adorn and bless, Art thou; let deeds, not words, express Thine exceeding loveliness.” (“ The Masque of Anarchy.”) This, we must confess, is superior to most of his delineations of Liberty. In a great many places he doubtless runs very wild in the cause of Freedom. He had not yet attained that true calm­ ness which is requisite for any great movement. Youth has it not. The green sapling cracks and explodes in the fire, yet gives no heat; the seasoned log burns bright and quiet. It is not by fiery declamations, by mere impulse, that anything in this world is ever surely gained, but by calmness, clearness of vision, and deep insight. The still small voice makes more impression on us than the loudest shouts, for the latter are, through their very noise, quite inarticulate. Still the question remains to be answered, �Happiness, how obtained. 115 how is this and other visions of Liberty to be realized ? Was Shelley himself in the right way to bring about the desired reform ? Certainly, as far as his hand could reach, he did his utmost. He poured what oil he could on the raging waters round him. But these attempts, and all others like them, are, it is very obvious, only palliatives, not real remedies. Shelley’s views as to Reform and Liberty are very vague. He seems to have had some idea that with a hey presto, everything could be changed. Pantaloon had only to strike the floor three times, and the whole scene vanished; the old witches, who caused all the trouble, were to be changed at once into beautiful sprites; Columbine should come dancing on, and a general return to Fairyland, everybody paying for every one, and nobody taking anything. He himself was willing to make any sacrifice. In this respect he seems to have been like some innocent child, wandering into a garden, singing as he went, plucking with its tiny hands the flowers and fruits, willing to share them with any one—wishing, perhaps, that men could live upon them altogether, and not a. little vexed and surprised when told that they would not bloom in the winter time—wishing, too, that the beds might be kept trim, and the grass might be cut without human labour—and then sitting down, musing, melancholy, and sad, on the first falling leaf. To us it appears that liberty and happiness—if it be liberty and happiness we want—depend upon no legerdemain, no shuffling of cards. Once let us learn that our well-being depends not upon external circumstances, but upon the riches of moral goodness, and that our mind, like a prism, can colour all events, and we shall then be on the true road to a higher reform than our politicians have yet dreamt of. To teach men their duty, and what love and what justice mean, seems to us just now the one thing needful. Gold, perhaps, is the medicine least wanted to cure human ills—the worst salve for human bruises. The mere kind look and the kind action will be treasured up with its own interest, not to be counted at any poor per cent., whilst the money will have been foolishly squandered—how much more the word which shall kindle a new idea, a fresh truth, another life. The mechanic earning his few shillings a week, enough to support himself, may find pleasure, if he has but learnt to take an interest in the few green grass blades beneath his feet, and the few opening flowers in his garden, which no lord in his castle can surpass. Nothing is so cheap as true happiness: and Providence has well arranged that we may be surrounded by ever-flowing springs of it, if we will but choose, in all humility, to drink of them. Shelley, unfortunately, fancied that there was some one specific to be externally applied to the gangrene of wretchedness, i2 �116 Shelley. and cure it at once and for ever; but we must go far beyond the surface, and the application must be made, not to the diseased part only, but to the whole body of society. And as to the sorrows and contradictions of life, we take and accept them, believing that there is a spirit at work for good, which will bring them out to a successful issue. And we are proud to be instru­ ments in working out so grand a principle, believing that the pain and the loss to us will be gain to the human race; that these days of sorrow will be a gain to coming years; that this sadness of a part will be a gain to the whole. In this is our un­ faltering trust; and secure in it we can go joyfully along, enduring patiently whatever sorrow or whatever conflict we may encounter, striving to help our weaker brethren, giving them what aid we can. Painful as it may be to think of a number of fellow-creatures toiling early and late, yet labour has its own claims on our grati­ tude. Labour seems to be man’s appointed lot here, and it is foolish to quarrel with it; still more foolish to call it a curse; the thistles and the thorns have been, perhaps, of more benefit to the human race than all the flowers in the Garden of Eden. They have called forth man’s energies, and developed his resources. All those chimneys in our factory-towns—are they not as steeples, veritable church steeples and towers of the great temple of Labour, pointing, with no dumb stone fingers, up to heaven, saying, by us, by labour, is the road up there ? Does not the flame and the smoke-wreath look as if it came from some vast altar, the incense of sacrifices—yes, of noble human sacrifices, daily offered up; and do not the clank and clash of a thousand hammers and anvils sound sweet upon our ears, as the music of bells calling us to our duty—trumpets sounding us to the battle of life, that battle against evil and wrong ? So it must be: out of darkness cometh light, and from the cold frosts and bitter snows of winter, bloom all the beauteous flowers of spring; and from all this grime, and dirt, and sweat of labour, who shall prophesy the result ? Even now are there giants in the land; even now may we see cranks, and wheels, and iron arms, tethered to their work instead of men; even now do wre hear the music of the electric wires across the fields, telling us other things than the mere message they convey; even now may the hum of the engine, and the breath of its iron lungs, be heard in our old farm-yards, and the reaping-machine seen cutting down the golden wheat, and the steam-plough furrowing up the fields, taking away the heaviest burdens from the backs of men. Shelley would have hailed such a time with delight—when there should be some margin of the day given to the ploughman and the mechanic for rest and recreation—for re­ �The Power of Love and Justice. 117 member, a man is ever worthier than his hire. Had Shelley ever seen a railroad, he would, perhaps, have exclaimed with Dr. Arnott, “Good-night to Feudality.” It is curious to notice what an in­ terest he took in endeavouring to establish a steamer on the Gulf of Genoa. But all the leisure in the world, all the instruction that can be had, will avail us nothing, if we do not build on higher principles than we are at present accustomed to—if we do not rest our foundations upon Love and Justice. “Ah !” sighed Shelley to Leigh Hunt, as the organ was playing in the cathedral at Pisa, “ what a divine religion might be found out, if charity were really made the principle of it instead of faith.” This, then, is a part of Shelley’s creed—a creed which is beginning at length to be felt; the creed of Jesus and of Socrates ; of poets of to-day and of yesterday; the law of laws; the doctrine of charity—that charity which Paul preached as greater than faith. Let our poli­ tics and our religion be built upon love and justice for their foundations, and once more will man live in harmony with the rest of the creation—will smell sweet with “ his fellow-creatures the plants,” and his voice will be attuned with the love-songs of the birds. He will then understand how he was made in God’s image, for God is love; the world will then once more bloom a Garden of Eden, and Selfishness, that evil spirit—call it the devil if you will, for it is this world’s devil—be ousted from our planet. But it requires something more than a poet’s strains to break the spells that bind us—to exhume the people from their present sepulchre of ignorance. A Tyrtaeus is of no use, unless we will fight; his strains of no avail, unless we will work, man to man, shoulder to shoulder. The walls of prejudice and selfishness will not fall down by any mere trumpet-blast. If any one thinks us too ideal, let him know we are purposely so. The ideal is better than the real, and it is something to be ideal in these practical days of ours. “ Equality ” and “ love ” may per­ haps never be known, as they should be, amongst men. Riches have been well compared to snow, which if it fall level to-day, to-morrow will be heaped in drifts. But surely there is an equality apart from money, and a love which knows not bank-notes; we will hope for, and aid forward, too, the day when there may not be the present gulf betwixt the peer and the peasant, and when that simple commandment shall be better observed, “ Do unto others as you would be done by.” In a note to “ The Prometheus Unbound,” Mrs. Shelley thus writes:— “ The prominent feature of Shelley’s theory of the destiny of the human species was, that evil is not inherent in the system of the crea­ �118 Shelley. tion, but an accident that might he expelled. This also forms a portion of Christianity. God made earth and man perfect, till he, by his fall— ‘Brought death into the world, and all our woe.’ Shelley believed that mankind had only to will that there should be no evil, and there would be none. That man could become so perfect as to be able to expel evil from his own nature, and from the greater part of the creation, vras the cardinal point of his system.” There is much truth in this. Our misery arises from the in­ fringement of natural laws; and as long as those laws remain broken, our misery will still continue. But Hope is by our side, and she tells us, with the unmistakeable voice of truth, that men will some day grow wiser and less selfish than at present—when most of the present suffering shall pass away—when none need be long unhappy, except through their own fault—for the earth was created for a good and a happy purpose, though it take myriads of years to accomplish it. And now let us not be one-sided, but view Shelley as a whole —the unripe as well as the sunny side of the fruit—the dark shadow on his orb as well as the sunlight. His impulsive character prevented him from laying enough stress on the grand principle of duty. Its infinite worth we cannot over-estimate. Duty is a pillar firmly fixed in rock of adamant, round which we climb heavenward; round everything else we only twine horizon­ tally, crawling along the ground. How far a stronger sense of duty in Shelley would have saved him from the wretchedness which he suffered, and his first wife from the terrible catastrophe consequent on his leaving her, we shall not attempt to estimate; but certainly it would have impelled him, as it did Milton, to return from Italy when his country was in danger, and like him also, if need were, to support himself even by keeping a school. We have already noticed his want of a due appreciation of the im­ portance of Labour. He forgot also that the energies of man are tempered to an iron hardness by adversity; that our strength springs up fresher and stronger under the clouds of trials and sufferings; that our souls are braced by the keen, cold winds of poverty; our faculties purified by the fire of affliction. Hence was he ever planning Utopias, where the idle should batten upon the earnings of the industrious — cloud-cuckoo-towns, where idleness and the take-no-thought-for-to-morrow principles should become the laws of our being, which are all of them impossibili­ ties on this toiling planet. Again, too, Shelley erred in being too ready to pull down instead of to build up. Greater harm has "been done, both in religion and politics, by men whose capabili­ ties have been of the destructive order, without the constructive �Shelley, and the Arrangements of Society. 119 faculty, than by all tlie bigots that ever breathed. It is worse than cruelty to take away the bread of life and the waters of life, however adulterated they may be, from a man, and offer his hungry and thirsting soul nothing in their place. But the grand mistake of Shelley’s was the idea of revolutionizing the course of things by a simple change of institutions. The best form of government can do but little, unless the reform begins with the individuals themselves. Govern ourselves well, and we need not then talk so much about governing others. It is not the form of government, so much as the men and women, we must care for— not this or that institution, but the first principles of honesty and justice amongst ourselves, which we must regard. That men should be severe upon Shelley we can well under­ stand—good, easy people, whose skins are luckily so tough and insensible that the harness of life can make no raw on them— whose heads are but moulds for so many cast-iron opinions and creeds. That an over-sensitive poet should break away from all the rules of life, and betake himself to the wilderness of his own doubts and speculations, is to them a most incredible, not to say a most wicked thing. To leave a home fireside, with its six o’clock dinner and port wine, in exchange for a doubtful supper on bread and cheese, and a certain one on metaphysics—to form your own world-theory—to found a fresh morality—is to them the height of madness. They forget that the arrangements of society are made, and rightly too, for the mass—that is, for such people as themselves—and that a poet is something very different from themselves, and that these laws which operate so well for them, will in all likelihood work fatally on the poet. So the poor poet must be hooted and brayed at by all the chorus of human owls and quadrupeds. He plunges away madly into the darkness beyond, solitary and sad, endeavouring to steer by the compass of his own thoughts. The world looks on him in his struggles and his toils with the same quiet indifference, not to say pleasure, that a boy does at a cockchafer spinning in agony on a pin’s point. That Shelley’s views were often wild and crude, no one for a moment will deny. Enthusiastic and impulsive, he jumped to all sorts of conclusions on the most important points. The value of a young man’s experience—and Shelley died at nine-and-twenty—is not worth much, and it is only by expe­ rience we can test anything in this practical world. He himself found this out at last. Circumstances also had a great effect in his case, as they have upon all of us. We perhaps can never rightly weigh the balance of any man’s actions, because we never allow enough for the circumstances which should be placed in the other scale. Here was Shelley, the son of a man who was , �120 Shelley. entirely different in his whole nature, sent to school where he * was brutally treated and discouraged in his studies, marrying a peison who was in no respects fitted for him. On the other hand, suppose that he had had a father who could have judi­ ciously sympathized with him, been sent to a school where masters would have encouraged his studies, and have married a suitable wife, who shall say what Shelley might have been ? But we are dealing with things not as they might be, but as they were and are. One small pebble in the way of a stream shall make the river flow in another direction, and water quite other lands and countries to what it does now. Yet man, perhaps, should not be a stream, as weak as water. Be this as it may, it is certain that before Shelley s death the mists that had long obscured the rising of his dawui were already melting, and his day was just breaking, all calm and pure; the bitter juices were all being drawn up, and converted into sweetness and bloom; the fruit of his genius was fast becoming ripe and mellow. We have gone thus far into Shelley’s life and opinions, without touching upon his poetry; for we think that if a person cared nothing at all about poetry in the abstract, he must be struck with that still higher poetry of kindness and generosity which so inspired Shelley. His written poetry, in our mind, is quite a secondary affair to that. There is a poetry of real life which is grander than any yet sung by minstrel. The man is greater than his poems. The critics have plenty of stock objections to find with Shelley’s poetry. The most common complaint is, that he is too metaphy­ sical ; that the air is so rarified in his higher regions of Philoso­ phy, that ordinary beings can’t breathe it; that his verse is like hard granite peaks, brilliant with the lights and the shadows of the changeful clouds, robed with white wreaths of mists, and touched with the splendours of the setting and the rising sun, but not one flower blooms upon it, not one living creature is to be seen there, only ethereal forms flitting fitfully hither and thither; and we must, to a certain extent, admit the truth of the charge. Shelley exhibited to a remarkable degree the union of the metaphysical and the imaginative mind. Philosophy and poetry prevailed over him alternately. For a long time he was doubtful to which he should devote himself, f It is from an overbalance of philosophy that there is such a want of concrete­ ness in his poems. He was for ever looking at things in a meta­ * “As like his father, as I’m unlike mine.”—Letter to Mrs. Gisborne, f See Mrs. Shelley’s note on the “ Revolt of Islam.” �The Cause of Shelley s Poetry. 121 physical point of view, projecting himself into Time and Space; regarding this earth as a ball, with its blue robe of air, “ As she dances about the sun,” instead of parcelled out into rich farms and sprinkled with towns, and solid three and four-storied bouses, and walls fourteen inches thick, tenanted by Kit Slys, Shylocks, Iagos, Falstaffs, and the whole company of humanity, who play on alternate nights and days the tragedy or the comedy of life. That he should have taken this abstract view of life is not at all wonderful. All great minds are ever attracted by the problem of life. This world­ riddle is of all things the most fascinating to the ardent and inquiring spirit. The reason why Shelley sang of the things he did, was simply that they both interested and pained him more than others. Living in an age, which gave birth to the French Revolution, which was agonized with the throes of all sorts of speculative theories, his verse naturally echoed them. Every true artist—whether by poetry, or painting, or architecture, it matters not—gives us the great questions of the day, with his attempted solution of them. Hence is it that Shelley is really a poet, be­ cause in his verse he truly sympathized with the wants of the day. Before a man can write well, he must have felt. It is not fine phrases, or similes, or fine anything else that make a poet, any more than fine clothes make a man. Shelley found out that the old-established customs, the old morals, the old laws, did not suit him. The every-day maxims of low prudence sounded to him very much like baseness; the common religion to him was synonymous with uncommon irreligion, and public morality looked to him merely a mask for private immorality. He felt all this, and felt it bitterly, and sighed after nobler aspirations; hence his poetry. His great failing is a certain amount of queru­ lousness, instead of calmly reposing amidst all his conflicts in an eternal Justice, which, though it may be far from visible to com­ mon eyes, is still the foundation of the world. He had before his death passed through only one stage of the conflict which most great minds undergo. Before belief, there must be doubt; before the fire, the smoke. Shelley never attained that perfect repose which the greatest poets have possessed, and his poetry consequently does not rise to the highest order. Now, Shelley defines poetry as “ the expression of the imagination,”* and he has Shakspeare on his side— “ The lunatic, the lover, and the poet, Are of imagination all compact.” * “ A Defence of Poetry.” �122 Shelley. Strangely does that word “ lunatic” sound now, as we think of that tale of “ Mad Shelley.” But this is exactly what Shelley’s poetry really is—“ the expression of the imagination,” unmodi­ fied by experience, and any knowledge of this world of men and women. Imagination, though doubtless the first requisite of a poet, is far from all. As Novalis would say, “ a poet is a Tnie.rocosmos.” The great poets are all of them many-sided. Their poetry is both /ztjtnjtTtc and 7to' ]<tiq. They illustrate both the u Aristotelian and Baconian theory of poetry, as well as much more. They are like lands which bear crops of all kinds. They possess, in fact, the united faculties of all other men, and these faculties serve to check and balance one another. Every part working in unison, nothing unduly developed at the expense of another, are the characteristics of all great poets, and, in fact, of all great men, who are only poets in another way. Shelley’s imagination, unluckily, galloped away with him, instead of his reining it in. Take some of the most imaginative pieces that have ever been written, and we shall find how they are all of them more or less ballasted. There is that most fairy-like of all things, “ The Birds” of Aristophanes, brilliant with imagination, yet still occupying our interest by its wit and humour. Again, “The Midsummer Night’s Dream” and “ The Tempest,” with all their scenes from Fairyland, and their spirits, are balanced by the human creations, and the interest and incidents that arise from the plots. Shelley seems never to have anchored his imagination to anything. There was no clog to it. Nothing to tie it down. Hence his weak, shadowy drawings, his want of substance, an absence of reality. Hence his characters are too often mere personified abstractions; thoughts which have been only half-clothed in human bodies. For we cannot agree with Lord Macaulay in thinking that they cease to be abstractions, and interest us as human beings; for common experience tells us that they do not. * Shelley had in him none of the elements which made Shakspeare essentially popular. He was a vegetarian, a water-drinker. In philosophical moods he doubted the existence of matter; but then he was always in philosophical moods. He is, in short, too spiritual, too subtle for ordinary men with good appetites, who are not troubled by the theories of Berkeley. We cannot fancy him at one of those “ wit-combats” at The Mermaid, drinking sherrissack, and joining in the chorus of a song. He wanted the faculty of humour, though Captain Medwin assures us he possessed it strongly. We have looked in vain; we cannot find * See some incidental remarks on Shelley, in the Essay upon “ The Pil­ grim’s Progress.” , �if q ja dt <1 His Poems as illustrated by his Life. 123 a spark of it in his letters, which, on the contrary, are marked hy his usual melancholy spirits. He was too metaphysical to he humorous. He had more of the Jaques and the Hamlet vein than Falstaff’s in him. Hence his bitter outbursts of sarcasm. We must, however, turn to his Life to account for the peculiarities of his poetry. We find there that it took him only a few weeks to write “ The Prometheus Unbound,” whilst he laboured at “ The Cenci” for months; that he forsook his drama of “ Charles I.” in disgust, for “ The Triumph of Life,” one of his most abstruse poems. A curious trait, which gives us no little clue in the matter, is mentioned by Captain Medwin, that Shelley was in the habit of noting down his dreams. “ The first day,” he said, “they made a page, the next two, the third several, till at last they constituted far the greater part of his existence, realizing what Calderon says, in his comedy of ‘ La Vida es Sueno’— ‘ Sueno es Sueno.’ ‘ Dreams are but the dreams of other dreams.’ ” What could be expected of a poet to whom dreams were the only realities of life ? And yet there is something peculiarly pathetic in the story; to many of us, as well as to Shelley, probably our sleeping and our waking dreams are the happiest parts of our ex­ istence. We build our air-castles, those dreams of the day, and take refuge in them from the toil and uproar of the world. There are times when all of us become disheartened, when the spirit within us faints, when we sigh in our hearts— “ 0 cease ! must hate and death return ? Cease! must men kill and die ?” Shelley was, notwithstanding his sanguine hopes, subject to such fits of despondency; no wonder that he should write down his dreams. After all, we live far more in our world of thoughts, and fancies, and dreams, and spend a happier existence, too, in them, than on the real material world. Shelley, too, seems to have known that the abstract nature of his poetry would be a bar to his popularity, and says, in a letter to a friend, that there are not five people who will understand his ‘‘Prometheus Unbound;” and in his prefatory lines to his “ Epipsychidion,” he writes:— “ My song, I fear that thou wilt find but few Who shall conceive thy reasoning.” And this might be said, with some limitation, of all his poetry. Again, when his wife complains of his want of human interest and story, he wishes to know if she, too, has become “criticbitten.” As he said of Keats, he himself can never become popular; his effect upon men will be, not to make them applaud, �124 Shelley. but to think. Popularity and fame were not the things Shelley cared for. It would be well if our young poets would remember this. No great thing ever did become popular at once. The fact of its becoming popular at once, shows it is not worth much. If you care for popularity, then write songs which can be played on street-organs, and by sentimental young ladies in drawing­ rooms, and which commonplace critics can understand. But if you respect yourself—and that’s the only respect worth anything —never mind if only five people understand you; these five are worth five millions of others, nay, are worth the whole of the rest of the world. As to Shelley being difficult to understand, we apprehend that this is far more the reader’s fault than the poet’s. Plato, instead of saying “ poets utter wise things which they do not themselves understand,” should have said, “ which their readers do not try to understand.” We are not amongst those who look upon poetry as a mere amusement, as a light recreation. The office of the poet is the highest in the world. As Shelley finely says, “ poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world;” and he himself was the Laureate of Freedom. The poet comes as spokesman between nature and the rest of his fellow-men: he is the true priest—the true prophet; extending the tent of our thoughts, enlarging the horizon of our ideas, teaching whatever is lovely, whatever is holy and pure, revealing the unseen things the common eye cannot see, and the melodies the common ear cannot hear, interpreting the mute symbols of [flower, and cloud, and hill, drawing his inspiration from the depths within his own soul. There is another point in connexion with this want of human interest in his poems—that though Shelley experienced at times all the hardships of poverty, yet he was not born poor. Unlike the Burns and the Shakspeares, he never mingled with the crowd, never learnt human life in that rough, coarse way, which tinges their poetry with common every-day experiences, and invests their characters with a flesh-and-blood reality. At school he was always reserved, and in after-life much the same. Hence it is that Sheliey never draws upon our feelings, like the great masters, in his longer pieces ; there is none of the pathos of life, except, per­ haps, in the “ Cenci.” He is too cold ; his characters are like statues of white marble ; no warm blood flows in their veins, no tears trickle down their cheeks. They might be inhabitants of another planet, for what we know, giving us the benefit of their views on various social problems. Again, as we are criticising, we must find fault with those dulcia vitia of overloaded imagery and similes. His verse too often flows not in a clear, deep, rolling stream, but more like a moun­ tain current, swollen and impetuous from rain, jostling together �The Past, Present, and Future. 125 ■ everything that floats upon it. His imagery is often so rich that, E- like the fruit on too luxuriant branches, it completely weighs k the verse down and requires propping up. A very curious ex|t ample of this may be seen in “ The Skylark,” where, after comk paring the bird to all beautiful things, having said that its song t is sweeter than the sound of showers, he closes by— L r r e “ All that ever was Joyous, and clear, and fresh, thy music doth surpass.” He cannot, in fact, heap simile on simile fast enough, though the verses are even now overflowing with them, like flowers overpowering with their sweetness. Again, we must notice an opposite vice—a love for unpleasant situations and things— “ At whose name the verse feels loath ”— as in “ The Cenciand a disagreeable love for the details of madness and hospital-life, as in “ Julian and Maddaloand we have finished the catalogue of his principal offences. We dare say there are plenty more minor faults, but we wont deprive other critics of the pleasure of exposing them. Shelley’s imagination was both his stepping-stone and his stumbling-block. It unfortunately mars his poems by its over-excess, yet it gave him wings, with which he could soar aloft above the 8 grovelling views of our everyday life. The fault of the literature of E the day is that it is too retrospective ; thinks that the Golden Age « is in the Past, and not in the Future. It has its eyes fixed in the a back of its head, and if it ever attempts to look forward, squints s most abominably. This is the worst sign of the day, or of any fl day. Let us, if we will, praise the dead Past, and crown its grey a temples with a wreath of glory; but let us look forward to the A Future as a happv youth, holding a cornucopia of all good things 9 in his hand. Shelley, at times, when a film came across his w eyes, sank into this wild sea of despair, but his imagination soon m buoyed him up. There is a good Scottish proverb which it • would be well for us to remember—“We maun live with the « present, and no’ with the past.” Our duty lies with the present, m and it is simply by making it as good as possible that we can < mould the future. Shelley’s imagination, too, prevented him from js- sharing in our English insularity. There was nothing local in •H his mind. It was as catholic as the universe. Hence he was w ever looking forward with courageous hope. Golden gleams of -fl the future flashed before him. He could conjure up new Edens, ai and see Liberty again with Justice walking hand in hand upon a i® new earth. Shelley’s poems will not bear studying as a whole, nor will his ar characters bear analysing. They are, in fact, all representations ■ c ij k 8 w V �126 Shelley. of Shelley. The reason of this is that Shelley sought to give his own views to the world, and he had no medium to give it through hut himself. He had no resources from experience 'to draw upon, no character but his own that he really knew. His life was a poem, his poems his life. Alastor sailing in his boat, is Shelley ; Lionel in his dungeon-walls, Shelley; Laon, with his visions of Liberty, Shelley. So his female characters are only Shelley over again with long dresses and short sleeves. In one poem only, “ The Cenci,” does he make any effort to get behind the mask of his creations. But even here Count Cenci is only the reverse of former characters ; he is only their antithesis, as im­ pulsive towards evil as they were towards good. Shelley should have remembered an axiom of his favourite author, Plato—kcckoc JJ£V fytoV OV^UQ. Turning to Shelley’s poems, we perceive at once the instinctive feelings of the true poet. Thus he begins “Alastor” :— “ Earth, ocean, air, beloved brotherhood ! If our great mother have imbued my soul With aught of natural piety to feel Your love, and recompense the boon with mine; If no bright bird, insect, or gentle beast I consciously have injured, but still loved And cherished these my kindred.” Mr. Leigh Hunt, in his “Recollections of Lord Byron and some of his Contemporaries,” speaks thus of Shelley—“ He was pious towards nature, towards his friends, towards the whole human race, towards the meanest insect of the forest.” But he was more than this. He felt that we are all akin, not men alone, but the cloud above our heads, and the flower beneath our feet. He felt that man is related to the world as a Part to the Whole. He felt how all things mysteriously influence us, and how to these influences we are akin. Such natural stepping-stones as these lead us to Heaven, to which also we are allied. This rela­ tionship it is, above all things, the poet’s office to show. Dearly, too, does Shelley love Nature, who gives to us all alike her beau­ ties, trying to read us the lesson— “The simple life wantslittie, and true'taste Hires not the pale drudge Luxury to waste The scene it would adorn.”—(“ Epipsychidion.”) How long it will be before we shall find out that we can live without our present costly tastes, that our food will be as sweet from clean earthenware as from silver dishes (many of them, by the way though, only plated), that our sleep will be quite as re­ freshing from a plain bedstead as one that suffocates us with its unpaid-for hangings, we cannot undertake to say. The sooner, �His Love for Personification. 127 however, the better. Very fine is the old fable of Antaeus, who, when he touched his mother earth, received fresh strength. Nature is the true corrective of the false bias which our minds insensibly contract from the present sordid state of the world. A walk in the woods acts as a tonic. A landscape fills the senses not only with mere material visions of beauty, but these react again upon us with a precious moral spirit. We must not pass over Shelley’s love for personification of in­ animate objects, a result of his strong imagination. Take, for instance— “ Our boat is asleep on Serchio’s stream, Its sails are folded like thoughts in a dream, The helm sways idly, hither and thither; Dominic, the boatman, has brought the mast, And the oars and the sails, but 'tis sleeping fast, Like a beast unconscious of its tether.” (“The Boat on the Serchio.”) There is another well-known example in the “ Cenci,” of the rock hanging over the precipice, clinging for support, as a dying soul clings to life. This propensity it is that leads him to humanize the objects of nature. He cannot see a stream, but he forthwith converts it into a personage, as the old heathen poets would have into a god or a goddess. He gazes upon Arethusa ; it is no longer a stream, but a beautiful nymph with crystal feet leaping from rock to rock, her tresses floating on the wind, and wherever she steps, the turf grows greener and brighter. And then comes Alpheus, no longer a stream but a river-god, with his fierce beard and glaring eyes, chasing the nymph whom the earth tries to rescue from his embrace ; and so they rush along in .their mad pursuit. This is quite in the spirit of the old Greek my­ thology. In these prosaic days we are ever analysing the old Divinities; we put Venus into a crucible and melt her down, and look at Jupiter through a microscope like any other specimen of natural history. We will, however, continue our quotation, as it developes many of Shelley’s characteristics in a few lines :— “ The stars burnt out in the pale blue air, And the thin white moon lay withering there; To tower and cavern, rift and tree, The owl and the bat fled drowsily. Day had kindled the dewy woods, And the rocks above and the stream below, And the vapours in their multitudes, And the Apennine's shroud of summer snow, And clothed with light of airy gold The mists in their eastern caves uprolled,^ �128 Shelley. JShelley’s love for the mountains amounted to a passion. Long before Mr. Ruskin wrote—who seems to arrogate for himself the priority of seeing any real beauty or use in them—had Shelley sung their praises. So fond was he of them, that Captain Medwin tells us he was continually sketching them in his books. A claim, too, has been put in for Wordsworth, that he first gave us the scenery of the sky, and all the glorious cloud-scapes and air tones, which earlier poets had so strangely neglected. Shelley may at least share this glory with him; though the critics have forgotten that Aristophanes has a still prior claim. Shelley is continually alluding to them. His lyric on the “ Cloud” paints them as they move in their huge battalions across the sky, in all their colours, from red sunrise to crimson sunset; or as they come sailing along with their black wings, as if they were Titan ships waging war one with another; or in the night lying as if they were silver sands lippled by the waves of the wind, and lighted by the moon. In all Shelley’s pieces there is a strange melancholy feeling, which we have alluded to before; not the result, as Mr. Ruskin foolishly thinks, of any impiety, but from the poet’s affection for Humanity, and his sorrow at its ills. Take this picture of Summer and Winter”:— “It was a bright and cheerful afternoon, Towards the end of the sunny month of June, When the north wind congregates in crowds The floating mountains of the silver clouds From the horizon—and the stainless sky Opens beyond them like seternity. All things rejoiced beneath the sun—the weeds, The river, and the corn-fields, and the reeds; The willow leaves that glanced in the bright breeze, And the firm foliage of the larger trees. It was a winter such as when birds die In the deep forests; and the fishes lie Stiffened in the translucent ice, which makes Even the mud and slime of the warm lakes A wrinkled clod, as hard as brick; and when, Among their children, comfortable men Gather about great fires, and yet feel cold; Alas! then, for the homeless beggar old.” Shelley, with all his love for Nature, could no longer dwell upon the last scene. The wind sowing the flakes of snow on the earth, the frozen grass lying on the bald fields like grey hair, and the icicles hanging like a beard from the rocks, had no charms for him. He was thinking of all the frost-bitten, homeless, breadless wanderers. So through all his poetry he is ever musing �His Melancholy Feelings, and their Causes. 129 on the wrongs and sufferings of poor humanity. This gives it a peculiar melancholy tone, not morbidness, but a true deep pathos. He writes more of the fall of the year, than of its birth. He sings the dirge over its bier, rather than the marriage-song of the Spring. The wild wind, “the world’s rejected guest,” moans among his verses, and there finds a home. Ever does he say, “ the sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.” Another reason is there for this feeling with Shelley, his habit of looking at the world from a metaphysical point of view. The very grandeur and might of the Universe casts a shadow upon the heart of man. All great minds have ever known this profound gloom. Whether CEdipus interprets or not the world-riddle, he shall die. Mark how in “ Alastor” Shelley writes— “ The thunder and the hiss of homeless streams.” How much is conveyed in that word “ homeless.” The streams wandering along, seeking rest and finding none, until they reach the haven of the sea, and then are snatched away again into the air, seeming to say, “ we change, but we cannot die;” here we are condemned to be for ever, restless, shifting, changing. So with all things. And Shelley felt this strongly. The mountains which seem so firm, and “ all that must seternal be,” are after all but as changeful as the clouds which rest upon their brows. Many minor points are there which we might discuss, such as Shelley’s particular fondness for a certain class of images, and particular words. On one of these in particular, taken from the green fields, he seems to dwell with great affection. Thus he writes— “ Nor peace, nor strength, nor skill in arms, or arts, Shepherd those herds whom tyranny makes tame.” (“ Sonnet on Political Greatness.”) So he speaks of Arethusa "‘shepherding her bright fountains of Adonais, “ whose quick dreams were his flocks and of the West Wind— “ Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed on air.” So, again, in the “ Witch of Atlas,” he calls the wind “the shep­ herdess of ocean flocksand he speaks of the earth itself as “ the last of the flock of the starry fold.”* Even in his prose * It is curious to notice how the “ one miud common to all individual men,” as Mr. Emerson would say, repeats the same idea. Thus Edward Bolton, a poet but little known, writes thus:— “ Lo! how the firmament Within an azure fold Theflock of the stars hath pent.”—(“ Hymn for Christmas.”) [Vol. LXIX. No. CXXXV.]—New Series, Vol. XIII. No. I. K �130 Shelley. he returns to this metaphor, and calls Dante “the Lucifer of the starry flock.”* And even in his translation he uses it, thus expanding eXar^pa (3oG>v, i]yhTOp oveipwv Nvktog, (“ The Homeric Hymn to Mercury.”) into “ a Shepherd of thin dreams, a cow stealing.” Other favourite words, such as “winged,” “islanded,” will readily occur to every reader. Space fails us, and we must he brief. Much more is there that might be said about Shelley’s poems, showing how, in the first place, they were inspired by his early reading, how they next yielded to German influences, how these developed themselves into Materialism, and how this, too, was merging into a sort of Spiritualism at the time of his death; marking each era accu­ rately, and showing, too, what effects the French and Italian schools of poetry had upon him. Especially, too, should we like to dwell on some of his lyrics; nothing approaches them for sweetness and melody, except some of Shakspeare’s songs, or some of Goethe’s minor pieces. But we must turn to the man himself. Poetry he loved with a religious spirit. Noble was he in work­ ing at it as his profession. Noble, too, was he in his choice of life. On one hand lay ten thousand a-year and its game pre­ serves, and its bright smiles of courtly women, its soft-cushioned and soft-carpeted drawing-rooms, its dinners with endless courses, its revenue of salutations and bows, its faithful army of faithless toadies; on the other, poverty with its bleak sharp rocks, where yet a man may find a cave to live in; its rude angry sea, yet to which if a man shall listen he may hear the eternal melodies; with its black clouds overhead, which, though so dense, will sometimes open out spaces of the clear, blue, unfathomable sky in the day, and the bright keen stars in the night. Shelley made no hesi­ tation which he should choose; and nobly done, we say to him, and all such. Noble, too, was he that he wrote on fearlessly and boldly in spite of party-reviews and party-critics. Fame was not his mistress. He worshipped not at the shrine of that most fickle of goddesses. Ever higher, was his motto. He was ever quoting this sentiment from the second volume of St. Leon— “ There is nothing which the human mind can- conceive which it may not executeand again, “ Shakspeare was only a human being.”t His face was ever upward—up the steep hill of poesy, whose rarest flowers bloom on the highest peaks. What he might And every one will recollect how Bloomfield’s “ Farmer’s Boy ” so naturally speaks of the stars as— “The beauteous semblance of a flock at rest.” * “Defence of Poetry,” p. 35. f See Mrs. Shelley’s note on “ The Cenci.” �His Personal Character. 131 have been, had he lived, we can never tell. Dying at twenty-nine, we are judging him only by his weaknesses. What could we have told of Shakspeare or Goethe, if the one had only lived to write his “ Pericles,” and the other his “ Werter” ? Let us not forget,- too, the pureness of Shelley s morals. His life in this respect was as pure as crystal without one flaw, one stain on it. Many scenes are there in his writings, one especially in the “ Revolt of Islam,” which could have been treated by no other man with the same pureness of thought. Above all things, too, do we prize his letters to his wife; they are so full of genuine affection and kindness. Well was it that he should die in the great ocean, pure as he himself was, that ocean which he so dearly loved. Above all men, too, is Shelley religious, strange as it will seem to many readers. Love for all that is good and beautiful and truthful, reverence for all that is great and noble, a spirit of humility, had their roots deep in the depths of his soul. What matters it about names and sects ? Let us hear no more about them; they are all but roads and lanes and paths, more or less straight, more or less wide, to the great Invisible Temple. We must place Shelley amongst the world’s Master-Spirits and Master-Singers; a younger brother of that grand blind old man, Cromwell’s secretary. Shelley, too, was one of the world’s Forlorn Hope; one of those generous martyrs who now and then appear at such rare intervals, and fill us with undying hope in the cause of Humanity; one of those who would willingly lay down his life in the trench, if his body would but bridge over the chasm for his comrades to pass. Such a man makes us prouder of our race; and his memory makes the earth itself a richer world. There is a light flung round Shelley’s life, though so marked with griefs and disasters, which has never shone on the most victorious king or Icaiser—a light that shall burn for ever as a beacon to all Humanity. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Victorian Blogging Description An account of the resource A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library &amp; Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span> Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Conway Hall Library & Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Conway Hall Ethical Society Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data Pamphlet Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Shelley Description An account of the resource Place of publication: [London] Collation: p. 97-131 ; 22 cm. Notes: Includes bibliography (p.97) and bibliographical references. Reviews of four works about Shelley: The Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley. Edited by Mrs. Shelley. 1853 -- Essays; Letters from Abroad; Translations and Fragments. by Percy Bysshe Shelley. Edited by Mrs. Shelley. 1854 -- The Life of Percy Bysshe Shelley, by Captain Thomas Medwin. 1847 -- The Shelley Papers by Captain Thomas Medwin. 1833. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. From Westminster Review 13 (January 1858). Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Wise, John Richard de Capel Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [n.d.] Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available [s.n.] Subject The topic of the resource Poetry Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Shelley), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span> Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context CT44 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English Conway Tracts English Poetry Percy Bysshe Shelley Poetry Poetry in English Romantic Poetry