Richard Chenevix Trench

“ The word of power, that from the mind
All sad and drear thoughts shall repel,
All solitary broodings quell;
If in the joy of heav’n we live,
Nor only on what earth can give,
Tho’ pure and high—so we may learn
Unto the soul’s great good to turn
What things soever best engage
Our thoughts towàrd our pilgrimage,
Which teach us this is not our rest,
That here we are but as a guest.{112}
As doubtless ’twas no other thought
That in his holy bosom wrought,
Who not alone content to win
In life the shelter of an inn,
Was fain to finish the last stage
There of his mortal pilgrimage [7] ”

“ The men who for this earthly life would claim
Well nigh the whole, and if the work of heaven
Be relegated to one day in seven,
Account the other six may without blame,
Unsanctified by one diviner aim,
To self to mammon and the world be given,
These scanty worshippers might nigh be driven,
Were they but here, to profitable shame.
This eve, the closing of no festal day,
This common work-day eve, in the open street
Seen have I groups of happy people meet,
Putting for this their toil and tasks away,
Men, women, boys, at one rude shrine to pray,
And there their fervent litanies repeat. ”

“ A patch of sunshine amid shadows lying;
This must not be, we were not called to this.
And all the peace we know must be within,
And from within—from that glad river fed,
Whose springs lie deeper than that heat or cold,
Or the vicissitudes earth’s surface knows
Can reach to harm them.
Mayest thou know well
What are these springing waters, wells of life,
By the great Father dug for us at first,
And which, when sin had stopped them, love anew{7}
Has opened, and has given them their old names
And former virtue [1] ”

“ And with pure hearts are seeking what is fair
In Nature, then believe we shall not need
Long anxious quests, exploring earth and air
Ere we shall find wherewith our hearts to feed:
The beauty which is scattered everywhere
Will in our souls such deep contentment breed,
We shall not pine for aught remote or rare;
We shall not ask from some transcendant height
To gaze on such rare scenes, as may surpass
Earth’s common shows, ere we will own delight:
We shall not need in quest of these to roam,
While sunshine lies upon our English grass,
And dewdrops glitter on green fields at home. ”

“ To think that thou thy proud foot shouldst advance
Forward so far into the mighty sea;
Joy was it and exultation to behold
Thine ancient standard’s rich emblazonry,
A glorious picture by the wind unrolled.
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ENGLAND.
We look for, and have promise to behold
A better country, such as earth has none—
Yet, England, am I still thy duteous son,
And never will this heart be dead or cold
At the relation of thy glories old,
Or of what newer triumphs thou hast won,
Where thou as with a mighty arm hast done
The work of God, quelling the tyrants bold. ”

“ High hopes have fallen to the ground,
And the ambassadors of peace
Go weeping, that men will not cease
To strive with heaven—they weep and mourn,
That suffering men will not be blest,
That weary men refuse to rest,
And wanderers to return.
III.
Well is it, if has not ensued
Another and a worser mood,
When all unfaithful thoughts have way,
When we hang down our hands, and say,
Alas! it is a weary pain,
To seek with toil and fruitless strife
To chafe the numbed limbs into life,
That will not live again. ”

“ Mayest thou in this mean world find nothing great,
Nor aught that shall the memories efface
Of that true greatness which was once thine own,
As knowing thou must keep thy kingly state,
If thou wouldst reascend thy kingly throne.
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NEW YEAR’S EVE.
The strong in spiritual action need not look
Upon the new-found year as on a scroll,
The which their hands lack cunning to unroll,
But in it read, as in an open book,
All they are seeking—high resolve unshook
By circumstance’s unforeseen control,
Successful striving, and whate’er the soul
Has recognised for duty, not forsook. ”

“ Out of the earth a heavenly plant appears;
The growth and produce of a fairer land,
And thence transplanted to a barren soil,
It needs the tendance of a careful hand,
Of love, that is not weary with long toil.
And thou, dear child, whose very helplessness
Is as a bond upon us and a claim,
Mayest thou have this of us, as we no less
Have daily from our Father known the same. ”

“ Such comes not now, or who with impious strife
Would seek to untenant meadow stream and plain
Of that indwelling power, which is the life
And which sustaineth each, which poets old
As god and goddess thus have loved to feign.
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AT SEA.
The sea is like a mirror far and near,
And ours a prosperous voyage, safe from harms;
And yet the sense that everlasting arms
Are round us and about us, is as dear
Now when no sight of danger doth appear,
As though our vessel did its blind way urge
’Mid the long weltering of the dreariest surge,
Through which a perishing bark did ever steer. ”

“ Has kept from hurt, and harm, and blind mischance,
Our happy home till now. Yet not for this
Can we escape our share of human fears
And dim forebodings, chiefly when we think
Under what hostile influence malign
They may grow up, for whom their life is cast{4}
Now to begin in this unhappy age,
When all, that by a solemn majesty
And an enduring being once rebuked
And put to shame the sordid thoughts of man,
Must be no more permitted to affront
Him and his littleness, or bid him back
Unto the higher tasks and nobler cares
For which he lives, for which his life is lent. ”

“ Their thoughts and passions from the selfish dream
Of earthly life, and its inglorious race.
If we might keep this awe upon us still,
If we might walk for ever in the power
And in the shadow of the mystery,
Which has been spread around us at this hour,
This might suffice to guard us from much ill,
This might go far to keep us pure and free. ”

“ Above the earth and all created things,
The sun and starry heavens—yea, and above
The mind of man, until they did attain
Where light no shadow has, and life no death,
Where past or future are not, nor can be,
But an eternal present, and the Lamb
His people feeds from indeficient streams. ”

“ And when they ceased, as time must bring
An end to every sweetest thing,
With what reluctancy came back
My spirits to their wonted track,
And how I loathed the common life,
The daily and recurring strife{89}
With petty sins, the lowly road
And being’s ordinary load.
Why after such a solemn mood
Should any meaner thought intrude?
Why will not heaven hereafter give,
That we for evermore may live
Thus at our spirit’s topmost bent? ”

“ Together with them in the dust of death:
That when the wise and the true-hearted fade,
So little of themselves they can bequeath
To us, who yet are in the race of life,
For labour and for toil, for weariness and strife.
{157}
IV.
But from behind the veil,
Where they are entered who have gone before,
A solemn voice arrests my feeble wail—
“And has thy life such worthier aims, O man,
That thou shouldst grudge to give its little span
To truth and knowledge, and faith’s holy lore,
Because the places for the exercise
Of these may be withdrawn from mortal eyes. ”

“ Meets at the throne of grace; one life divine
Through all the branches of the mystical vine
Flows ever, even as the same breath of air
Lifts every leaflet of a mighty grove.
And from our meeting we shall reap a share{116}
Of a yet higher good, if we have won
Hereby the strengthening of one weak desire,
The fanning of one faint spark to a fire,
The stirring of one prayer, that we may prove
Stedfast and faithful till our work be done,
Until the course appointed us be run.
We know not whither our frail barks are borne,
To quiet haven, or on stormy shore ”

“ Though not a cloud on all the horizon lowers
Of all our life—for even so shall we
Have greater boldness towards thee, when indeed
The storm is up, and there is earnest need.
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AN EVENING IN FRANCE.
One star is shining in the crimson eve,
And the thin texture of the faint blue sky
Above is like a veil intensely drawn;
Upon the spirit with a solemn weight
The marvel and the mystery of eve
Is lying, as all holy thoughts and calm,
By the vain stir and tumult of the day
Chased far away, come back on tranquil wing,
Like doves returning to their noted haunts. ”

“ While a deep chasm, deeper than natural love
Could e’er bridge over, lay betwixt their souls—
Of what must be the glorious life in heaven.
And looking forth on meadow, stream, and sky,
And on the golden west, that richest glow{65}
Of sunset to the uncreated light,
Which must invest for ever those bright worlds,
Seemed darkness, and the best that earth can give,
Its noblest pleasures, they with one consent
Counted as vile, nor once to be compared—
Oh! rather say not worthy to be named
With what is to be looked for there ”

“ When they who go before
Go furnished—or because their span was brief,
When in the acquist of what is life’s true gage,
Truth, knowledge, and that other worthiest lore,
They had fulfilled already a long age. ”

“ And Thou—is thine the spirit’s swift recoil,
Which follows every deed of acted wrath,
That holding in thine hand this lovely spoil,
Thou dost not triumph, feeling that the breath
Of life is sacred, whether it inform,
Loathly or beauteous, man or beast or worm? ”

“ With the most sacred gifts of soul and sense;
If they who tend thine altars, gathering thence
No strength, no purity, may still remain
Selfish and dark, and from Life’s sordid stain
Find in their ministrations no defence? ”

“ Much have we to support us in our strife
With things which else would crush us, nor alone
Secret refreshings of the inward life,
But many a flower of sweetest scent is strown
Upon our outward and our open way ”

“ This is not life’s inevitable law,—
But that the gladness we are called to know,
Is an increasing gladness, that the soil
Of the human heart, tilled rightly, will become
Richer and deeper, fitter to bear fruit{103}
Of an immortal growth, from day to day,
Fruit of love life and indeficient joy. ”

“ Not thou from us, O Lord, but we
Withdraw ourselves from thee.
When we are dark and dead,
And Thou art covered with a cloud,
Hanging before Thee, like a shroud,
So that our prayer can find no way,
Oh! teach us that we do not say,
“Where is thy brightness fled?”
But that we search and try
What in ourselves has wrought this blame;
For thou remainest still the same;
But earth’s own vapours earth may fill
With darkness and thick clouds, while still
The sun is in the sky.
{53}
TO A FRIEND ENTERING THE MINISTRY. I.
High thoughts at first, and visions high
Are ours of easy victory ”

“ To this her genial toil no end the years shall bring.
{86}
THE SAME, CONTINUED.
That her destroying fury was with noise
And sudden uproar—but far otherwise,
With silent and with secret ministries,
Her skill of renovation she employs:
For Nature, only loud when she destroys,
Is silent when she fashions. She will crowd
The work of her destruction, transient, loud,
Into an hour, and then long peace enjoys.
Yea, every power that fashions and upholds
Works silently—all things whose life is sure,
Their life is calm—silent the light that moulds
And colours all things ”

“ The golden chain from heav’n to earth let down,
That we might rise by it, nor fear to sink again.
{127}
SONNET.
A counsellor well fitted to advise
In daily life and at whose lips no less
Men may inquire or nations, when distress
Of sudden doubtful danger may arise,
Who, though his head be hidden in the skies,
Plants his firm foot upon our common earth,
Dealing with thoughts which everywhere have birth,—
This is the poet, true of heart and wise:
No dweller in a baseless world of dream,
Which is not earth nor heav’n: his words have past
Into man’s common thought and week-day phrase ”

“ A time like this, if there remain
True greetings for us, hand and heart,
Wherein we claim the chiefest part,
Although divided now they be
By many a tract of land and sea.{111}
If we can fly to thoughts like these,
Fall back on such sure sympathies,
This were sufficient to repress
That transient sense of loneliness.
Yet better if, where’er we roam,
Another country, truer home,
Is in our hearts ”

“ They who in despite
Of this, a people’s first and holiest right,
In lust of unchecked power or brutal rage,
Against a people’s life such warfare wage,
With man no more, but with the Eternal fight.
They who break down the barriers He hath set,
Break down what would another time defend
And shelter their own selves: they who forget
(For the indulgence of the present will)
The lasting ordinances, in the end
Will rue their work, when ill shall sanction ill.
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TO NICHOLAS, EMPEROR OF RUSSIA.
ON HIS REPORTED CONDUCT TOWARDS THE POLES.
What would it help to call thee what thou art? ”

“ I told him how, when I began
First to verge upward to a man,
These thoughts were mine—to dwell alone,
My spirit on its lordly throne,
Hating the vain stir, fierce and loud,
The din of the tumultuous crowd ”

“ Thou cam’st not to thy place by accident,
It is the very place God meant for thee; ”

“ Made gloomier thoughts depart;
XVII.
Till many times the sweetness of the thought
Of an eternal country—where it lies
Removed from care and mortal anguish, brought
Sweet tears into his eyes.
XVIII.
Thus, not unsolaced, he longwhile abode,
Filling all dreary melancholy time,
And empty spaces of the heart with God,
And with this hope sublime:
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XIX.
Even thus he lived, with little joy or pain,
Drawn thro’ the channels by which men receive—
Most men receive the things which for the main
Make them rejoice or grieve. ”

“ We live not in our moments or our years—
The Present we fling from us like the rind
Of some sweet Future, which we after find
Bitter to taste, or bind that in with fears,
And water it beforehand with our tears—
Vain tears for that which never may arrive:
Meanwhile the joy whereby we ought to live
Neglected or unheeded disappears. ”