Sleep that no pain shall wake;
Night that no morn shall break
Till joy shall overtake

Her perfect peace.

AFTER DEATH

SONNET

The curtains were half drawn, the floor was swept
And strewn with rushes, rosemary and may
Lay thick upon the bed on which I lay,
Where through the lattice ivy-shadows crept.
He leaned above me, thinking that I slept

And could not hear him; but I heard him say:
"Poor child, poor child :" and as he turned away
Came a deep silence, and I knew he wept.
He did not touch the shroud, or raise the fold
That hid my face, or take my hand in his,
Or ruffle the smooth pillows for my head:
He did not love me living; but once dead
He pitied me; and very sweet it is

To know he still is warm though I am cold.

LORD LYTTON

Born 1831

THE HEART AND NATURE

The lake is calm; and, calm, the skies
In yonder cloudless sunset glow,
Where, o'er the woodland, homeward flies
The solitary crow;

No moan the cushat makes to heave
A leaflet round her windless nest;
The air is silent in the eve;

The world's at rest.

All bright below; all pure above;
No sense of pain, no sign of wrong;
Save in thy heart of hopeless love,
Poor Child of Song!

Why must the soul through Nature rove,
At variance with her general plan?
A stranger to the Power, whose love
Soothes all save Man?

Why lack the strength of meaner creatures? The wandering sheep, the grazing kine, Are surer of their simple natures

Than I of mine.

For all their wants the poorest land

Affords supply; they browse and breed; I scarce divine, and ne'er have found, What most I need.

O God, that in this human heart

Hath made Belief so hard to grow, And set the doubt, the pang, the smart In all we know

Why hast thou, too, in solemn jest

At this tormented Thinking-power, Inscribed, in flame on yonder West, In hues on every flower,

Through all the vast unthinking sphere
Of mere material Force without,
Rebuke so vehement and severe
To the least doubt?

And robed the world, and hung the night, With silent, stern, and solemn forms; And strown with sounds of awe, and might, The seas and storms ;

Trampled in myriads down.

By the careless wayfarers' feet

The beautiful creatures lie.

Who knows what myriads have sunk

To drown in the oily waves,

Till all our sea-side world shows

Like a graveyard crowded with graves? Humble creatures and small,

How shall the Will which sways

This enormous unresting ball,

Through endless cycles of days,

Take thought for them or care?

And yet, if the greatest of kings,
With the wisest of sages combined,
Never could both devise-

Strong arm and inventive mind-
So wondrous a shining coat,

Such delicate wings and free,

As have these small creatures which float
Over the breathless sea

On this summer morning so fair.

And the life, the wonderful life,

Which not all the wisdom of earth

Can give to the humblest creature that moves The mystical process of birth

The nameless principle which doth lurk

Far away beyond atom, or monad, or cell, And is truly His own most marvellous workWas it good to give it, or, given, well

To squander it thus away?

For surely a man might think

So precious a gift and grand—

God's essence in part-should be meted out
With a thrifty and grudging hand.

And hard by, on the yellowing corn,

Myriads of tiny jaws

Are bringing the husbandman's labour to scorn, And the cankerworm frets and gnaws,

Which was made for these for a prey.

For a prey for these? but, oh!

Who shall read us the riddle of life

The prodigal waste, which naught can redress But a cycle of sorrow and strife,

The continual sequence of pain,

The perpetual triumph of wrong,

The whole creation in travail to make

A victory for the strong,

And not with frail insects alone?

For is not the scheme worked out

Among us who are raised so high?