A living death, then quickest to conceive
The Form of mine Idea. Anon, awaken,
I saw the Woman, and I called her Eve.
Life of my Life! how sweet with her partaken,
A Paradise within a Paradise,
A Fountain sealed, a City unforsaken-
Lovely though weak, and winning if not wise,
She having her perfection but in me,
And I in turn lived only in her eyes;
Imperfect both, but more imperfect she;
Naked, though unashamed; and, under Law,
Guiltless of Sin, yet not from Nature free;
Nature, whose incomplete Creations awe,
Speaking, like Woman, of a Life by-gone,
And one commenced-and one that Faith foresaw,
Teeming with Life completed in a Son,
Whom the Revealer, in the days that are,
Hath manifested in the Eternal One.
Almighty Lord! the Universal Heir!
Thy Church hath wandered from Thee..dwelt apart, And of her habitation passing fair
Made to herself a temple, where her heart
Idolatrous adored and deified
The Vanities of Lust,- the lies of Art,
Whose swift degrees the poles of Sense divide,
The Good and Evil that with Knowledge came,
Labour and pain, and peril-taught and tried,
And cleansed with Blood. The Sacrificial Flame,
From Heaven, accepted the Devoted Life,
Whose Shedding clothed Humanity from Shame,
Forth sent to hold with Nature stubborn strife,
Debarred from touching, by Cherubic fire,
The Tree whose fruitage now is ripe and rife,
That whoso plucks may live. Eternal Sire,
Thy potent Word, out of Thy royal Throne,
Leapt down from heaven amidst a land of Ire,
Sworded with Thine unfeigned Decree alone,—
And standing up, Avenger unadored,
Filled all the region of that populous zone
With death;-it swept o'er earth, to heaven it soared,
It swooped to hell, and smote her land with fear.
-By Suffering perfected, by Death restored,
Anon, behold, the Blameless Man appear―
Her wrecks are levelled, and her ruin healed.
Each Son of mine is the first Labourer's heir-
He speaks-Winds listen and the billows yield—
He prays and Angels minister his need,-
His Blessing fattens the renewed field:
Heir of all things-the Woman's only Seed!
Oh Eve! Strong was my Love as Death, to share
With thee the Curse of that ambitious deed
Which did our human nakedness declare-
Stronger his Love who hath atonement made,
And died, that he a body may prepare
Of Glory; so the Bride shall be arrayed,
And for the senselessness of shame she lost,
Be in the marriage garment well displayed.
-Thus triumphs Love, but in the End the most,
The First and Last of Beings. Hence began
The Ages; and His Words, the Countless Host
Of Generation: hence the Worlds: hence Man:
Hence Woman; and with woman man partook
Her doom; and great Messiah's grace outran
Transgression, and withstood the Law's Rebuke,
And shall redeem with energy divine
All to Himself, wherefore He all forsook,
And thence into His Father's hand resign.
WHILE Adam spake, reposed upon his heart
Beloved Abel, who, in the World's prime,
Watched the devoted Flock-thus set apart
For Sacrifice, when God, from Heaven sublime
Descending, in the cool of day, appointed,
For Sin, Atonement from the birth of Time.
Then Adam first saw Death, hailed and arointed;
Both Curse and Cure, a refuge for the Soul,
And to redeem the flesh it kills anointed.
In sign whereof, a sapless barkless bole,
Man's body, for whose food all perisheth,
Attired thro' the mutation of the whole.
Who would be clothed with Heaven must live by Faith, As, by the organons of touch, the Mind
Discourses with the World whose life is death
They, in all elements' corruption, find
Life still regenerated bodily,
Still mortal, every moment recombined.
Thou who for man plantedst the mystic Tree,
E'en in the heart of his peculiar sphere,
Hast drank Death's Vintage thus outpoured for thee!
So while the Shepherd fed his flock, in fear
Unto the Mystery of Blood he bowed,
Shed for the World ere her foundations were,
Witness of Truth,..and thus his own blood flowed.
For Labour, the great Curse, made Cain as stern
As Earth, fat with his sweat; hence he bestowed
His haughty offering as the meet return
Of one who had well-done, expecting straight
The guerdon of his toil. No man may earn
The free gift, Life eternal.
Was thine, O Seth! who now on that same hill
Reposest, where of old, in placid state,
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