6. In private places, among sordid objects, an act of truth or heroism seems at once to draw to itself the sky as its temple, the sun as its candle. Nature stretches out her arms to embrace man, only let his thoughts be of equal greatness. Willingly does she follow his steps with the rose and the violet, and bend her lines of grandeur and grace to the decoration of her darling child. Only let his thoughts be of equal scope, and the frame will suit the picture. A virtuous man is in unison with her works, and makes the central figure of the visible sphere.
Remains unshaken. Dignity and grace
Adorn his frame, and manly beauty, joined
With strength Herculean. On his aspect shines
Sublimest virtues and desire of fame,
Where justice gives the laurel; in his eye
The inextinguishable spark, which fires
The souls of patriots; while his brow supports
Undaunted valor, and contempt of death.
2. Serene he rose, and thus addressed the throng:
Why this astonishment on every face,
Ye men of Sparta? Does the name of death
Create this fear and wonder? O my friends!
Why do we labor through the arduous paths
Which lead to virtue? Fruitless were the toil,
Above the reach of human feet were placed
The distant summit, if the fear of death
Could intercept our passage. But in vain
His blackest frowns and terrors he assumes
To shake the firmness of the mind which knows
That, wanting virtue, life is pain and woe;
That, wanting liberty, even virtue mourns,
And looks around for happiness in vain.
3. "Then speak, O Sparta! and demand my life;
My heart, exulting, answers to thy call,
And smiles on glorious fate. To live with fame
Is allowed to the many; but to die
With equal luster is a blessing Heaven
Selects from all the choicest boons of fate,
And with a sparing hand on few bestows."
Salvation thus to Sparta he proclaimed.
Joy, wrapt awhile in admiration, paused,
Suspending praise; nor praise at last resounds
In high acclaim to rend the arch of heaven;
A reverential murmur breathes applause.
NOTE. ALCHEMY was an imaginary and pretended science, much cultivated in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. It related to the transmutation of base metals into gold, to the finding of a universal remedy for diseases, and a universal solvent, or fluid that dissolves all substances, as well as to other things, now treated as ridiculous.
SOLILOQUY OF THE DYING ALCHEMIST.
1. THE night wind with a desolate moan swept by;
And the old shutters of the turret swung,
Creaking upon their hinges; and the moon,
As the torn edges of the clouds flew past,
Struggled aslant the stained and broken panes
So dimly, that the watchful eye of death
Scarcely was conscious when it went and came.
2. The fire beneath his crucible was low;
Yet still it burned; and ever as his thoughts
Grew insupportable, he raised himself
Upon his wasted arm, and stirred the coals
With difficult energy, and when the rod
Fell from his nerveless fingers, and his eye
Felt faint within its socket, he shrunk back
Upon his pallet, and with unclosed lips
Muttered a curse on death!
From its dim corners, mockingly gave back
His rattling breath; the humming in the fire
Had the distinctness of a knell; and when
Duly the antique horologe beat one,
He drew a phial from beneath his head,
And drank. And instantly his lips compressed,
And, with a shudder in his skeleton frame,
He rose with supernatural strength, and sat
Upright, and communed with himself:-
I did not think to die
Till I had finished what I had to do;
I thought to pierce th' eternal secret through
With this my mortal eye;
I felt, O God! it seemeth even now
This can not be the death-dew on my brow!
And yet it is,-I feel,
Of this dull sickness at my heart, afraid;
And in my eyes the death-sparks flash and fade;
And something seems to steal
Over my bosom like a frozen hand,-
Binding its pulses with an icy band.
Feel I this wild recoil? It can not be
Th' immortal spirit shuddereth to be free!
Would it not leap to fly
Like a chain'd eaglet at its parent's call?
I fear, I fear,-that this poor life is all!
Yet thus to pass away!—
To live but for a hope that mocks at last,—
To agonize, to strive, to watch, to fast,
To waste the light of day,
Night's better beauty, feeling, fancy, thought,
All that we have and are,-for this,-for naught!
Grant me another year,
God of my spirit!--but a day, -to win
Something to satisfy this thirst within!
I would know something here!
Break for me but one seal that is unbroken!
Speak for me but one word that is unspoken!
Vain,-vain !—my brain is turning
With a swift dizziness, and my heart grows sick,
And these hot temple-throbs come fast and thick,
And I am freezing,-burning,-
Dying! O God! if I might only live!
-Ha! it thrills me,-I revive.
Aye, were not man to die
He were too mighty for this narrow sphere!
Had he but time to brood on knowledge here,-
Could he but train his eye,—
Might he but wait the mystic word and hour,—
Only his Maker would transcend his power!
Earth has no mineral strange,
Th' illimitable air no hidden wings,
Water no quality in covert springs,
And fire no power to change,
Seasons no mystery, and stars no spell,
Which the unwasting soul might not compel.
Oh, but for time to track
The upper stars into the pathless sky,-
To see th' invisible spirits, eye to eye,—
To hurl the lightning back,—
To tread unhurt the sea's dim-lighted halls,-
To chase Day's chariot to the horizon-walls,—
And more, much more,--for now
The life-sealed fountains of my nature move,—
To nurse and purify this human love,—
To clear the godlike brow
Of weakness and mistrust, and bow it down
Worthy and beautiful, to the much-loved one,—
This were indeed to feel
The soul-thirst slaken at the living stream,—
To live, O God! that life is but a dream!
And death- -Aha! I reel,-
Dim,-dim,-I faint,-darkness comes o'er my eye,→→→
Cover me! save me!- -God of Heaven! I die!
15. 'Twas morning, and the old man lay alone.
No friend had closed his eyelids, and his lips,
Open and ashy pale, th' expression wore
Of his death-struggle. His long silvery hair
Lay on his hollow temples thin and wild,
His frame was wasted, and his features wan
And haggard as with want, and in his palm
His nails were driven deep, as if the throe
Of the last agony had wrung
him sore.
16. The storm was raging still. The shutter swung
Creaking as harshly in the fitful wind,
And all without went on,- -as aye it will,
Sunshine or tempest, reckless that a heart
Is breaking, or has broken, in its change.
17. The fire beneath the crucible was out;
The vessels of his mystic art lay round,
Useless and cold as the ambitious hand
That fashioned them, and the small rod,
Familiar to his touch for threescore years,
Lay on th' alembic's rim, as if it still
Might vex the elements at its master's will.
18. And thus had passed from its unequal frame
A soul of fire,-
‚—a sun-bent eagle stricken
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