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Now that the Spring ushers smiling the full, glad Summer,
As the bride-maiden the bride, to grow modest beside her,
“Here is my sister,” she saith, “but more fashioned and perfect,
Come to a fuller growth in the heart of the Highest,
She the decision, I the intent of His kindness—
Her receive, O ye mortals, for good and fruition.
And as my blushes are lost in the glow of her beauty,
So let your pleasures give place to the earnest of Wisdom.
Wisdom, the true joy extatic, made good through upholding
The burthen of noontide, with multiform splendors o'ercharging
Man's weak brain, which resists them and therefore is manly.
Ye who walk happy to-day, who unclasp the light vesture,
That to the heart the warm sunshine may do its glad mission,
That through the breast may strike rapturous joy and expansion,
Ye will have sighs to give forth ere the mantle fold closer;
Ye must be sadder and wiser ere Summer shall leave you.”
What should the Summer prove, what the brunt and the bearing,
When the fair Spring-tide doth leave us a sting in her blossoms?
What shall the action be, what the striving and tearing,
When the great heart of a Nation, in wildest commotion
Shakes with its terrible heaving the green earth beneath us?
Heart like a woman's, (the heart is the woman in all things,)
That, through false guidance betrayed from its own nobler instincts,
Wakes yet to consciousness, learning too late the foul treason,
Cries thence for succor, if there be justice in heaven.
What are these passions, the fiendish, that rush into transport?
What are these voices, the earnest, that rise to rebuke them?
What is this anguish? the poor heart grows passive and breathless,
Tightened with terror lest they, the malignant, should conquer,
Lifting its hope to the Godhead that, brooding above us,
Says of the Chaos, this too is my righteous appointing.
Yes, but the Chaos knew the command of its master,
Sleeked its black roughness, and sank at his feet like a watch-dog.
'T was but the threshold I kept of thine uncounted treasures;
Take them unwasted, Master, bring out their fair beauties;
Fling to the wondering deep the new sun and the planets,
Build in the infinite largeness the heavens that shall praise Thee.
Oh! had it risen instead with a purpose persistent;
Said: I am somewhat, and that which I am I continue.
Why should I yield my tumultuous joy of rebellion,
That thy law should remodel my ancient dominion;
That thy will, which I care not to know, be accomplished?
With what a smile had the lips which I dare not imagine
Struck the rude outlaw to mute and immediate homage!
How had the outstretched finger vouchsafed its calm guidance,
Till the dark pulses should leap to the thrill of His music!
So, from the wilder tumult these symbols would picture,
Let the torn heart of my country turn, silent and steadfast,
Seized with the courage of good, till the uproar receding
Be as the thoughts of a child, who, admonished at bedtime,
“Thou hast been froward,” creeps nearer the breast of his mother,
Strangely recalling the passionate cries of the morning.
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