Verses on Various Occasions - John Henry Newman (best beach reads txt) 📗

tear is fain to start.
Nay, from no fount impure these drops arise;
’Tis but that sympathy with Adam’s race
When in each brother’s history reads its own.
So let the cliffs and seas of this fair place
Be named man’s tomb and splendid record-stone,
High hope, pride-stain’d, the course without the prize.

Messina. February 9, 1833.

LXXII Warnings

When Heaven sends sorrow,
Warnings go first,
Lest it should burst
With stunning might
On souls too bright
To fear the morrow.

Can science bear us
To the hid springs
Of human things?
Why may not dream,
Or thought’s day-gleam,
Startle, yet cheer us?

Are such thoughts fetters,
While Faith disowns
Dread of earth’s tones,
Reeks but Heaven’s call,
And on the wall
Reads but Heaven’s letters?

Between Calatafimi and Palermo. February 12, 1833.

LXXIII Dreams

Oh! miserable power
To dreams allow’d, to raise the guilty past,
And back awhile the illumined spirit to cast
On its youth’s twilight hour;
In mockery guiling it to act again
The revel or the scoff in Satan’s frantic train!

Nay, hush thee, angry heart!
An Angel’s grief ill fits a penitent;
Welcome the thorn⁠—it is divinely sent,
And with its wholesome smart
Shall pierce thee in thy virtue’s palmy home,
And warn thee what thou art, and whence thy wealth has come.

Paestum. February 26, 1833.

LXXIV Temptation

O holy Lord, who with the Children Three
Didst walk the piercing flame,
Help, in those trial-hours, which, save to Thee,
I dare not name;
Nor let these quivering eyes and sickening heart
Crumble to dust beneath the Tempter’s dart.

Thou, who didst once Thy life from Mary’s breast
Renew from day to day,
Oh, might her smile, severely sweet, but rest
On this frail clay!
Till I am Thine with my whole soul; and fear,
Not feel a secret joy, that Hell is near.

Frascati. March 28, 1833.

LXXV Our Future

“What I do, thou knowest not now; but thou shalt know hereafter.”

Did we but see,
When life first open’d, how our journey lay
Between its earliest and its closing day,
Or view ourselves, as we one time shall be,
Who strive for the high prize, such sight would break
The youthful spirit, though bold for Jesu’s sake.

But Thou, dear Lord!
Whilst I traced out bright scenes which were to come,
Isaac’s pure blessings, and a verdant home,
Didst spare me, and withhold Thy fearful word;
Willing me year by year, till I am found
A pilgrim pale, with Paul’s sad girdle bound.

Tre Fontane. April 2, 1833.

LXXVI Heathenism

’Mid Balak’s magic fires
The Spirit spake, clear as in Israel;
With prayers untrue and covetous desires
Did God vouchsafe to dwell;
Who summon’d dreams, His earlier word to bring
To patient Job’s vex’d friends, and Gerar’s guileless king.

If such o’erflowing grace
From Aaron’s vest e’en on the Sibyl ran,
Why should we fear, the Son now lacks His place
Where roams unchristen’d man?
As though, where faith is keen, He cannot make
Bread of the very stones, or thirst with ashes slake.

Messina. April 21, 1833.

LXXVII Taormini

“And Jacob went on his way, and the Angels of God met him.”

Say, hast thou track’d a traveller’s round,
Nor visions met thee there,
Thou couldst but marvel to have found
This blighted world so fair?

And feel an awe within thee rise,
That sinful man should see
Glories far worthier Seraph’s eyes
Than to be shared by thee?

Store them in heart! thou shalt not faint
’Mid coming pains and fears,
As the third heaven once nerved a Saint
For fourteen trial-years.

Magnisi. April 26, 1833.

LXXVIII Sympathy

Souls of the Just, I call not you
To share this joy with me,
This joy and wonder at the view
Of mountain, plain, and sea;

Ye, on that loftier mountain old,
Safe lodged in Eden’s cell,
Whence run the rivers four, behold
This earth, as ere it fell.

Or, when ye think of those who stay
Still tried by the world’s fight,
’Tis but in looking for the day
Which shall the lost unite.

Ye rather, elder Spirits strong!
Who from the first have trod
This nether scene, man’s race among,
The while you live to God,

Ye see, and ye can sympathize⁠—
Vain thought! their mighty ken
Fills height and depth, the stars, the skies,
They smile at dim-eyed men.

Ah, Saviour! I perforce am Thine,
Angel and Saint apart:
Those searching Eyes are all-divine,
All-human is that Heart.

Agosta. April 29, 1833.

LXXIX Relics of Saints

“He is not the God of the dead, but of the living; for all live unto Him.”

“The Fathers are in dust, yet live to God:”⁠—
So says the Truth; as if the motionless clay
Still held the seeds of life beneath the sod,
Smouldering and struggling till the judgment-day.

And hence we learn with reverence to esteem
Of these frail houses, though the grave confines;
Sophist may urge his cunning tests, and deem
That they are earth;⁠—but they are heavenly shrines.

Palermo. June 1, 1833.

LXXX Day-Labourers

“And He said, It is finished.”

One only, of God’s messengers to man,
Finish’d the work of grace, which He began;
E’en Moses wearied upon Nebo’s height,
Though loth to leave the fight
With the doom’d foe, and yield the sun-bright land
To Joshua’s armèd hand.

And David wrought in turn a strenuous part,
Zeal for God’s house consuming him in heart;
And yet he might not build, but only bring
Gifts for the Heavenly King;
And these another rear’d, his peaceful son,
Till the full work was done.

List, Christian warrior! thou, whose soul is fain
To rid thy Mother of her present chain;⁠—
Christ will avenge His Bride; yea, even now
Begins the work, and thou
Shalt spend in it thy strength, but, ere He save,
Thy lot shall be the grave.

Palermo. June 2, 1833.

LXXXI Warfare

“Freely ye have received; freely give.”

“Give any boon for peace!
Why should our fair-eyed Mother e’er engage
In the world’s course and on a troubled stage,
From which her very call is a release?
No! in thy garden stand,
And tend with pious