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arrived at the hopeful point of a distinct perception of the means of amelioration. On the other hand, the characteristic trait of our age, rapid material growth, tends to set up a coarse and limited ideal of life, which only makes the absence of loftier aims the more keenly felt by the more discerning order of mind. How can men who have had visions of universal equality and fraternity find consolation in the spectacle of a plethora of material prosperity confined to a mere handful in the crowd, and serving only to throw out into bolder relief the prevailing emptiness?

the world of power that is secured to man by the control and defiance and defeat of desire, or the higher uses and secrets of cravings that are never satisfied. He alone loved to dwell upon the

sorrow

Sorrow that is not sorrow, but delight;
And miserable love that is not pain
To hear of, for the glory that redounds
Therefrom to human kind, and what we are.

Rare, and, as a rule, hard and passionless are those poets who can dwell on the from the belief that these sufferings are sufferings of mankind without shrinking amongst the highest and most necessary part of man's destiny, who can dwell with any true poetical rapture on the thought

that

Amid the groves, under the shadowy hills
The generations are prepared; the pangs,
The internal pangs, are ready, the dread
Of poor Humanity's afflicted will.

strife

We have no doubt at all that the gorgeous political dream and the profound political disappointment or disillusionment of the French Revolution, had, and still has, an enormous influence in confounding the aspirations of our Western poets, at least of all those and they are likely to be among the most numerous of the poets for generations to come, who find the thought of suffering multitudes, of misery on a large scale, intolerable; and who, when once they have realized that this is But of those who can dwell on this, not the inevitable result of the existing law only without shrinking, but with a certain of society, feel as if their imagination had exaltation, Wordsworth was the chief. grasped the conception of something like For the most part, the modern poet no an evil law of nature, or, still more terrible, sooner realizes this necessity of human an evil God. Poets naturally dwell with suffering on a large scale than he sinks more passion than any other class of men into pessimism. The mere conception of on the disappointed desires of human life, the physical evils of the various climates and dwell on the disappointed desires all of the world fills Leopardi, for instance, the more, when they have satisfied them with such horror that he finds in it one of selves that theirs are not selfish desires, the main grounds of his pessimism, as his but are, like the utopian visions of Shel- dialogue between an Icelander and Nature ley, passionate aspirations for the renova- sufficiently shows. Yet even the comtion of that suffering humanity, which, in monest and most superficial philosophy its present condition, is, when you get to has admitted that the necessity for strife the dregs of it, as hideous as it is miserable. with natural evils has been the root of We do not doubt at all that modern pessi-progress to the savage and the barbarian, mism does really owe a great deal of its ardor to the poets, especially to voluptu ous poets, not so much because they are voluptuous, as because the same characteristic which makes them dwell so constantly on the gratified or suffering senses of men, blinds them to that aspect of life in which it is seen that disappointment becomes the condition of the truest vision, and that suffering is transmuted into the rarest power. For this is the point of view which modern poets, and especially poets whose imagination dwells habitually on pleasure as it so often does, - seldom seize. It was because Wordsworth seized it, that the great social catastrophe which drove so many poets into pessimism, raised him to the highest point of his visionary power. No poet of mere desire ever felt, as Wordsworth felt, the true significance of desire,

just

and is, in a more refined form, a principal
stimulus to progress still. But this the
southern poet, the poet to whom the evils
of physical suffering seem intolerable, can-
not realize; and it is because so many of
our own modern poets seem to have mould-
ed themselves in the same school, to have
taken upon themselves to bewail every
mass of human suffering as a final evil
which they see no way to mitigate,
as if there could be nothing indirectly en-
nobling and tempering in the suffering
itself, that there is such a tendency to
pessimism in the poetry of our own day.
We have quoted Mr. Symonds's picture
of humanity, like the protomartyr Prome-
theus, "dreeing life's doom on Caucasus,"
because we suppose that, as this, sonnet
stands last in his series of pictures of the
soul of man, he regards that as the out-
come of the whole. But surely a poet

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A TRANSLATION FROM HEINE.
FUR DIE MOUCHE.

his death.)

a I DREAMT a dream upon a summer night,
Where pale, dissolving in the moon's cold
glance,

Lay works of ancient beauty and of might,
Old ruins from the time of Renaissance.

who could conceive of this as the noblest
outcome of human idealism, should have
reflected that while the fabled Prometheus (Heine's last poem, written a week or two before
had no power of suicide, man has such a
power, and no need at all to "dree ""
frightful doom, unless there be something
noble, something grand, some ultimate
and final conquest over evil, to be gained
by dreeing this doom, and that if this
be so, there clearly must be a God over
all the changes and chances of this world,
both to prophecy to the soul, and to elicit,
the final issue. Mr. Symonds himself has
put this very finely in another sonnet, in-
tended, however, to image only that phase
of credulous hope which he ultimately
merges in his very dismal conclusion.
We will quote Mr. Symonds himself, as
the best antidote to Mr. Symonds:
Pathos of piety! Poor human brain,

In thine own image moulding God, to be
Victim and victor of sin's curse like thee,
Like thee submissive to the laws of pain!
Rising not up in anger to arraign
Heaven's justice, thou, with proud humility,
Didst own thy guileless guilt the cause why He
Who made Man's soul thus faulty, wrought in
vain!

Sad, tender thought, that God himself should
bow

Under the doom he graved on Adam's brow!
Logic illogical, that He who framed

Man thrall of sin, death's slave, for suffering
born,

Should on his own head wear that crown of
thorn,

And dying prove man's soul from death re-
claimed.

Why" pathos of piety"? If the suffer-
ing of man is to answer its purpose, as
Mr. Symonds appears to expect,
- or he
would hardly urge man to take up volun-
tarily the part which Prometheus played
involuntarily, he must believe that there
is a power, overruling that will of man
which always strives to fly from anguish,
a power inspiring him "to dree his doom
on Caucasus." If it were not so, what is
to prevent him from taking his fate into
his own hands, and despatching himself,
as Carlyle so often suggested that it would
be an excellent thing for man to do? Yet
if there be this overruling power which
keeps us suffering while we need not suf-
fer, which makes us feel how much better
it is to "dree our doom" than to fly from
it, what can that power be except one
which loves a crown of thorns, which
knows how much the crown of thorns
adds to the power of him who wears it,
and that the true conquest of pain is ob-
tained by wholly submitting to its grasp,
not in shrinking fearfully from that grasp?

And here and there in that encumbered place
Rose some bold Doric column all alone,

And looked the frowning firmament in face,
As if it could defy the thunderstone.

Prone on the earth lay shattered all about
Doors, gables, roofs, with sculptures from an

æra

When man and beast were mingled in a rout
Of centaurs, sphinxes, satyrs, and chimera.
And in an open tomb of marble, fair,

Whole 'mid the ruin and the carven crea

tures,

Wrapped in his shroud, but to the night-winds bare,

A dead man lay, with pale, long-suffering features.

Strong caryatides, with throats upreared,

Held him aloft as if with might and main;
And on the coffer's either side appeared
In low relief, a wild and motley train.

Here, glorious from Olympus, came the band
Of heathen gods, all flushed with lawless
But Adam and his Eve are close at hand
passion;

In modest aprons of the fig-leaf fashion.
Paris and Helen, Hector too, are here,
Troy's fall and fire what next we may dis-
cern is ;

Moses and Aaron also hover near,

With Esther, Judith, Haman, Holofernes. Here likewise is the god of Love to see, Phoebus Apollo, Vulcan, lady Venus, Pluto and Proserpine, and Mercury,

God Bacchus, and Priapus, and Silenus. Here Balaam and his ass wait further on, The likeness of the ass is really speaking; And Abraham about to slay his son;

And Lot for whom his daughters twain are seeking.

Here before Herod sways the nimble child

given;

Of her to whom the Baptist's head was Here Hell broke loose, and Satan here beguiled;

Here Peter showed and shook the keys of
Heaven.

And further change there was to ponder on,
When wanton Jove, bent at all costs to win
his

Lascivious will, chased Leda as a swan,
And Danae in a shower of golden guineas.

Here Dian heads herself the eager press

Of kirtled nymphs, and deep-mouthed hounds
intoning;

And here sits Hercules in woman's dress.
The distaff in his hand, the spindle droning.

Here Sanäi his cloudy front uprears,

There at its foot is Israel with his ox; And in the Temple here the Lord appears, A child disputing with the orthodox.

The contrasts side by side are sharply set: The Greek light-heartedness, the stern Godfearing

Spirit of Judah, and the woven net

Of ivy-tendrils over all careering. Then, wonderful! The while, as I have said, These carven fancies in my dream went by, Sudden it seemed to come into my head,

The dead man in the marble tomb was I.

And bending down towards my resting-place There stood a flower, -a flower of such strange fashion,

A flower that had so wild a charm and grace,
That people call it flower of the Passion.
Purple and sulphur-pale, from out the sod
Of Calvary, they say this blossom burst
When men had crucified the Son of God,
And shed His blood to heal the world ac-
curst.

Blood-witness it is named, and you will find
That every several instrument of malice,
All tools of martyrdom of various kind,
It carries counterfeited in its chalice.

Each requisite of pain the flower adorns ; From out its torture-chamber nothing fails : The spittle and the cords, the crown of thorns, The cross, the cup, the hammer, and the nails.

And at my grave there stood a flower like this, And bent above my corpse so still and cold, With woman's sorrow, and with woman's kiss, Prest hands, brow, cheek, and wept on unconsoled.

Then, sorcery of dreams! this flower of mineThis blossom from the heart of passion blown,

Had changed into a woman's likeness, thine, Yes thine, my best and dearest, thine, thine

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We did not speak; but ah! I could perceive The inmost secret of your spirit clearly: The spoken word is shameless, may deceive, Love's pure unopened flower is silence merely.

Voiceless communing who could ever deem, In tender converse which no ear might hear, That time could fly as in my happy dream

That summer night so full of joy and fear?

What we then said, oh ask it of me never!

Ask of the glow-worm what it says in shining; Ask what the wavelet whispers to the river; Question the west wind of its soft repining.

Ask the carbuncle of its fiery gleam;

Ask what coy sweets the violet is betraying; But ask not what beneath the moon's sad beam The martyr-flower and her dead are saying!

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For EIGHT DOLLARS, remitted directly to the Publishers, the LIVING AGE will be punctually forwarded for a year, free of postage.

Remittances should be made by bank draft or check, or by post-office money-order, if possible. If neither of these can be procured, the money should be sent in a registered letter. All postmasters are obliged to register letters when requested to do so. Drafts, checks and money-orders should be made payable to the order of LITTELL & Co.

Single Numbers of THE LIVING AGE, 18 cents.

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192

ANGELO RIBELLO.

A VENETIAN STUDY.

I.

WIDE lucid eyes in cavernous orbits set;
Aflame like living opals or the sea;
Vibrant with floods of electricity;
The soul projected in each fiery jet:
This thy fierce fascination haunts me yet;
And I have dreamed all Venice into thee;
Her domes of pearl, her heaven's immensity,
And superhuman saints of Tintoret.
Hoarse-voiced art thou as Tritons of her
brine;

Swift as man-snaring murderous ocean shark; White as foam-wreaths blown over Lido's line; Stealthy as bats that skim those waves at dark;

Storm-browed with curls of thunder; leonine As the winged guardian war-beast of St. Mark.

II.

Rebellious Angel! Were it mine, the skill
Of those first Titans, Titian, Veronese,
Or him the master mightier-winged than
these,

Thy Tintoret who reigns o'er Venice still;
I would compel thee, by art's crucible

Severing the soul's ore from gross earthly lees,

To re-assume amid heaven's hierarchies Thy station, purged, pure, and of perfect will. A warrior angel, thou with those should'st stand

Who guard our Lady round her throne of light;

And in thy puissant grasp a gleaming brand;
And all about thy shoulders armor bright:
But I would have thine eyes even as they are,
Gazing from steel-clad brows, each orb a star.
Academy.
J. A. SYMONDS.

Soft and sound! No restless dreams
Trouble his repose;

Yet, while the form exhausted sleeps,
The spirit somewhere vigil keeps ;
For he who lives, and loves, and makes,
His impress on each thing he takes,
To shape, or change, or mould at will,
He does not lie there dumb and still,
As that his servant does.

Soft and sound it sleeps, while he
Breaks his prison bars,

Perchance to soar on fearless wings,
And in unconscious wanderings,
To hold communion full and free
With the beloved we may not see,
Till all our earthly race is run,
Beyond the moon, beyond the sun,
Beyond the great white stars.

Soft and sound, the while I creep
Noiseless ever, near;

My soul is captive as I sit

In the warm frame that waits with it,
And watch o'er him I love the best,
Half jealous of the tranquil rest
That sets his spirit free to rove
Somewhere- where I with all my love,
May scarcely follow, dear.

Soft and sound! My fingers glide
Into your nerveless hold;

Beside your head my own I lay,
I try to call your soul away,
Whate'er the holy haunts it seeks,
My will, its passionate summons speaks;
My love, and all its royal might,
I clothe my call in strength to-night.
Darling, will you obey?

All The Year Round.

THE SEA.

DUAL LIFE.

SOFT and sound he sleeps, my dear,
Dark fringed lids o'er tired eyes;
Strong hands, thrown in utter rest,
Quiet on the quiet breast;
Firm lips half fallen in smile apart,
And the pulsing of the heart
Scarcely fans my cheek who watch
The flutter of his breath to catch,
So very still he lies.

Soft and sound he sleeps, outworn,
By the fret and strife
Of the eager hours that fill
Each long day of good or ill;
Of gallant battle for the truth;
Of fiery thoughts of gifted youth;
Of fighting often hand to hand,
With fate he cannot understand,
For full and hard his life.

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