Other formats

    Adobe Portable Document Format file (facsimile images)   TEI XML file   ePub eBook file  

Connect

    mail icontwitter iconBlogspot iconrss icon

The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: James Edward Fitzgerald Volume

II

page break

II.

vignette

12.
And when I think of those who never more
Shall brighten our home-circle with their love,
Whom Death's cruel mandate has sent on before
The dark hereafter's mystery to prove;
Think what they were, portray'd by memory,
I ask what now they are, from earthly garments free.

13.
Those gone forever like the passing year,
Or like a sunbeam fading from the sight,
Or like sweet music dying on the ear,
Or like a fleeting vision of the night;
The love, the pride, the hope that round them grew
Fonder with each year's promise, gone like summer's dew.

14.
Gone all but memory, whose feeble ray,
Which dimly lights the chambers of the past,
Still bids the lov'd idea of each to stay
Close to my side as long as life shall last,
Continuing in fancy's fond endeavor
That sweet commune which not e'en death shall wholly sever.

page 5

15.
Their various forms upon the mem'ry press,
Sometimes as infants on their mother's knee,
Sometimes array'd in childhood's loveliness,
Sometimes in radient boyhood's bravery;
And some best loved as when they left the earth,
By manhood crown'd with all of truest manhood's worth.

16.
We are not one, bat many: every stage
Of our short life presents some new aspect;
Our forms and features change from youth to age;
Feeling and thought like fickleness reflect;
The inner consciousness within our breasts
Alone the continuity of self attests.

17.
Not lost, but gone before! Is the dream true?
Shall I see them again in some hereafter?
Again our old fond intercourse renew,
And listen to the music of their laughter,
And see their forms once more as fresh and bright
And beautiful as when death stole them from our sight?

18.
Can it be true that the still dead shall see
Visions of glory in the Spirit-land—
Shall hear the awful voice of Deity,
As round the *rainbowed throne white-robed they stand,
And from "the crystal sea" their voices raise,
"Like voice of many waters," in rolling hymns of praise?

page 6

19.
Or, ghastly dream! that sinful souls shall dwell
For ever scorch'd, but unconsumed by fire,
Writhing and welt'ring in some crucible
Companion'd with fierce fiends and demons dire;
Eternity of woe for sins of time,
Like mead for faults of faith and deeds of foulest crime?

20.
Let it be true—not their's such awful doom,
For their short lives throughout were good and pure;
I ten times rather would believe the tomb
Ended all being, than think they would endure
Such pains hereafter, which not one who knew
And lov'd them here on earth would ever deem their due.

21.
But be it true—then their's the glorious lot
Of souls whose life is one perennial joy;
Their failings pardon'd, as by us forgot,
Their virtues purified from all alloy,
No fitter peers than they for that bright band,
The faithful, tender, true, who throng the Spirit-land.

* Rev. IV. 3.