On the great Prophet, styled the Voice of One Now that their snows must melt, their herbs and flowers Revive, their obstinate winter pass away, That awful name to thee, thee, simple Cuckoo, Voice of the desert, fare thee well; sweet Bird' If that substantial title please thee more, Farewell! but go thy way; no need hast thou Of a good wish sent after thee; from bower To bower as green, from sky to sky as clear, Thee gentle breezes waft, or airs that meet Thy course and sport around thee softly fan, Till Night, descending upon hill and vale, Grants to thy mission a brief term of silence, And folds thy pinions up in blest repose. XV. AT THE CONVENT OF CAMALDOLI. GRIEVE for the Man who hither came bereft Nor grieve the less that skill to him was left bind can they assist tc Thoughts that would stray from Heaven? The dream must cease To be; by Faith, not sight, his soul must live; Else will the enamored Monk too surely find How wide a space can part from inward peace The most profound repose his cell can give. XVI. CONTINUED. THE world forsaken, all its busy cares And stirring interests shunned with desperate flight, Those helps rejected, they whose minds perceive heave For such a one beset with cloistral snares. Father of Mercy! rectify his view, If with his vows this object ill agree; : Shed over it thy grace, and thus subdue XVII. AT THE EREMITE OR UPPER CONVENT OF CAMALDOLI. WHAT aim had they, the pair of Monks, in size Of Brethren who, here fixed, on Jesu wait * See Note. XVIII. AT VALLOMBROSA. Thick as autumnal leaves that strew the brooks High over-arched embower.* ↳ VALLOMBROSA, PARADISE LOST. I longed in thy shadiest wood To slumber, reclined on the moss-covered floor!" Fond wish that was granted at last, and the Flood, That lulled me asleep, bids me listen once more. Its murmur how soft! as it falls down the steep, Near that Cell - yon sequestered Retreat high in air Where our Milton was wont lonely vigils to keep For converse with God, sought through study and prayer. The Monks still repeat the tradition with pride, And its truth who shall doubt? for his Spirit is here; In the cloud-piercing rocks doth her grandeur abide, In the pines pointing heavenward her beauty austere ; In the flower-besprent meadows his genius we trace Turned to humbler delights, in which youth might confide, See for the two first lines, "Stanzas composed in the Simplon Pass." That would yield him fit help while prefiguring that Place Where, if Sin had not entered, Love never had died. When with life lengthened out came a desolate time, And darkness and danger had compassed him round, With a thought he would flee to these haunts of his prime, And here once again a kind shelter be found. Vallombrosa! of thee I first heard in the page And the realized vision is clasped to my heart. Even so, and unblamed, we rejoice as we may |