Seemed kindling in the air;
A thousand thousand silvery lyres
Resounded far and near:
Methought, the very breath I breathed
Was full of sparks divine,
And all my heather-couch was wreathed
By that celestial shine!
And, while the wide Earth echoing rung
To their strange minstrelsy,
The little glittering spirits sung,
Or seemed to sing, to me.
‘O mortal! mortal! let them die;
Let time and tears destroy,
That we may overflow the sky
With universal joy!
[…]
‘To thee the world is like a tomb,
A desert’s naked shore;
To us, in unimagined bloom,
It brightens more and more!
‘And could we lift the veil, and give
One brief glimpse to thine eye,
Thou wouldst rejoice for those that live,
Because they live to die.’
[…]
JEAN JOUBERT: Six Poems of Emily Brontë, Op. 63 (1969)
The composer writes:
I selected the six poems which comprise the text of this song-cycle to outline a spiritual journey from a mood of regret for the past to one of defiant optimism. In the first poem, ‘Harp’, the poet invokes a past happiness that she feels is lost beyond recall. The second song, ‘Sleep’, explores this mood more intensely. The poet, finding no consolation in sleep, longs only for the final sleep of death. A glimpse of a possible life beyond death is provided by ‘Oracle’, a dialogue in which a child, consulted by the poet, sees the future as a blinding vision of eternity. ‘Storm’ unleashes the forces of nature, in complete surrender to which the poet seeks escape from all sense of personal identity. In the central image of ‘Caged Bird’ Emily Brontё sees a symbol of her own captive spirit, longing to ‘soar away’ to eternal freedom. The final poem, ‘Immortality’ [‘the last lines my sister Emily ever wrote’ according to Charlotte Brontё], is a visionary affirmation of a life beyond and outside time. It constitutes both the goal and the climax of the cycle in its rejection of the material world in favour of a mystical faith transcending the dogmatic limitations of organized religion.
Harp
Harp of wild and dream like strain
When I touch thy strings
Why dost thou repeat again
Long forgotten things?
Harp in other earlier days
I could sing to thee
And not one of all my lays
Vexed my memory
But now if I awake a note
That gave me joy before
Sounds of sorrow from thee float
Changing evermore
Yet still steeped in memory’s dyes
They come sailing on
Darkening all my summer skies
Shutting out my sun
Sleep
Sleep brings no joy to me
Remembrance never dies,
My soul is given to misery
And lives in sighs
Sleep brings no rest to me
The shadows of the dead
My waking eyes may never see
Surround my bed
Sleep brings no hope to me
In soundest sleep they come,
And with their doleful imagery
Deepen the gloom
Sleep brings no strength to me
No power renewed [to] brave
I only sail a wilder sea
A darker wave
Sleep brings no friend to me
To soothe and aid to bear
They all gaze on how scornfully
And I despair
Sleep brings no wish to knit
My harassed heart beneath
My only wish is to forget
In endless sleep of death
(Maconchy)
Oracle
Tell me tell me smiling child
What the past is like to thee?
An Autumn evening soft and mild
With a wind that sighs mournfully
Tell me what is the present hour?
A green and flowery spray
Where a young bird sits gathering its power
To mount and fly away
And what is the future happy one?
A sea beneath a cloudless sun
A mighty glorious dazzling sea
Stretching into infinity
Storm1
High waving heather ’neath stormy blasts bending
Midnight and moonlight and bright shining stars
Darkness and glory rejoicingly blending
Earth rising to heaven and heaven descending
Man’s spirit away from its drear dungeon sending
Bursting the fetters and breaking the bars
All down the mountain sides wild forests lending
One mighty voice to the life giving wind
Rivers their banks in the jubilee rending
Fast through the valleys a reckless course wending
Wider and deeper their waters extending
Leaving a desolate desert behind
Shining and lowering and swelling and dying
Changing for ever from midnight to noon
Roaring like thunder like soft music sighing
Shadows on shadows advancing and flying
Lightning bright flashes the deep gloom defying
Coming as swiftly and fading as soon
The caged bird
[Caged bird]
And like myself lone wholly lone
It sees the day’s long sunshine glow
And like myself it makes its moan
In unexhausted woe
Give we the hills our equal prayer
Earth’s breezy hills and heaven’s blue sea
I ask for nothing further here
But my own heart and liberty
Ah could my hand unlock its chain
How gladly would I with it soar
And ne’er regret and ne’er complain
To see its shining eyes no more
But let me think that if today
It pines in cold captivity
Tomorrow both shall soar away
Eternally entirely Free
Immortality
No coward soul is mine
No trembler in the world’s storm-troubled sphere
I see Heaven’s glories shine
And Faith shines equal arming me from Fear
O God within my breast,
Almighty ever-present Deity
Life, that in me has rest
As I Undying Life, have power in thee
Vain are the thousand creeds
That move men’s hearts, unutterably vain,
Worthless as withered weeds
Or idlest froth amid the boundless main
To waken doubt in one
Holding so fast by thy infinity
So surely anchored on
The steadfast rock of Immortality
With wide-embracing love
Thy spirit animates eternal years
Pervades and broods above
Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates and rears
Though Earth and moon were gone
And suns and universes ceased to be
And thou wert left alone
Every Existence would exist in thee
There is not room for Death
Nor atom that his might could render void
Since thou art Being and Breath
And what thou art may never be destroyed
CECIL FRANCES ALEXANDER
(1818–95)
Unlike women preachers, who are still a bit suspect, women hymn-writers have been accepted and respected for a century and a half. That’s only fair, seeing that women probably make up the majority of hymn-singers. Not the first historically but undoubtedly the first in rank is Cecil Frances Alexander. She was the wife of an Irish clergyman who later
became Archbishop of Armagh and her hymns appeared during that purple period of British hymn-writing, the second half of Queen Victoria’s reign. As a matter of fact, her first book of hymns was published before she was married, when she was Miss C. F. Humphreys. Her godsons, so the story goes, complained that the catechism, which they were swotting up for confirmation, was difficult and boring. Her response was to write a set of verses illustrating the different clauses of the Creed for their benefit – verses that were published in 1848 under the title Hymns for Little Children. (It is not recorded what her godsons’ reaction was to that title.)
JOHN BETJEMAN: Sweet Songs of Zion (Hodder and Stoughton, 2007)
Born in Dublin, she was the third child of Major John Humphreys and Elizabeth, née Reed. Encouraged in her childhood by Dr Walter Hook, Dean of Chichester, to write poetry, she was later strongly influenced by the Oxford Movement and in particular John Keble, who edited her Hymns for Little Children (1848). Verses for Holy Seasons had appeared in 1846, followed by The Lord of the Forest and His Vassals (1847), and her work featured in Church of Ireland hymn books from her mid-twenties. In October 1850 she married the Anglican clergyman William Alexander, who later became Archbishop of Armagh and Protestant Primate of Ireland. Six years younger than his wife, he too published several books of poetry, the most celebrated of which was St Augustine’s Holiday and Other Poems. Cecil Frances Alexander was devoted all her life to charitable work, and used the profits from her early volumes of poetry to build the Derry and Raphoe Diocesan Institution for the Deaf and Dumb, which was founded in 1846 in Strabane. She was also involved with the Derry Home for Fallen Women. Through the simplicity of her poems she attempted to explain aspects of the Christian faith to little children: the mystery of the Incarnation, for example, in ‘Once in royal David’s city’, and the Apostles’ Creed in ‘All things bright and beautiful’. Her husband, William Alexander, published a posthumous collection of her verse, Poems of the Late Mrs Alexander, a year after her death. According to Charles Gounod, some of her lyrics ‘seemed to set themselves to music’, and Tennyson declared her ‘Burial of Moses’ to be one of the few poems by a living author he wished he had written.
HENRY GAUNTLETT
Who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary
[Once in royal David’s city] (1849)
Once in royal David’s City,
Stood a lowly cattle shed,
Where a mother laid her Baby
In a manger for His bed.
Mary was that mother mild,
JESUS CHRIST her little Child.
He came down to earth from Heaven
Who is God and Lord of all,
And His shelter was a stable,
And His cradle was a stall;
With the poor, and mean, and lowly
Lived on earth our SAVIOUR Holy.
And through all His wondrous childhood,
He would honour and obey,
Love and watch the lowly maiden,
In whose gentle arms He lay.
Christian children all must be
Mild, obedient, good as He.
For He is our childhood’s Pattern,
Day by day like us He grew,
He was little, weak and helpless,
Tears and smiles like us He knew;
And He feeleth for our sadness,
And He shareth in our gladness.
And our eyes at last shall see Him,
Through His Own redeeming love,
For that Child so dear and gentle
Is our LORD in Heaven above;
And He leads His children on
To the place where He is gone.
Not in that poor lowly stable,
With the oxen standing by,
We shall see Him; but in Heaven,
Set at GOD’s right Hand on high;
When like stars His children crowned,
All in white, shall wait around.
WILLIAM HENRY MONK
Maker of Heaven and Earth
[All things bright and beautiful]
All things bright and beautiful,
All creatures great and small,1
All things wise and wonderful,
The LORD GOD made them all.
Each little flower that opens,
Each little bird that sings,
He made their glowing colours,
He made their tiny wings.
The rich man in his castle,2
The poor man at his gate,
God made them, high or lowly,
And ordered their estate.
The purple-headed mountain,
The river running by,
The sunset and the morning,
That brighten up the sky; –
The cold wind in the winter,
The pleasant summer sun,
The ripe fruits in the garden,
He made them every one.
The tall trees in the greenwood,
The meadows where we play,
The rushes by the water,
We gather every day; –
He gave us eyes to see them,
And lips that we may tell,
How great is GOD Almighty,
Who has made all things well.
WILLIAM HORSLEY
Suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried
[There is a green hill far away] (1844)1
There is a green hill far away,
Without a city wall,
Where the dear LORD was crucified,
Who died to save us all.
We may not know, we cannot tell,
What pains He had to bear,
But we believe it was for us
He hung and suffered there.
He died that we might be forgiven,
He died to make us good,
That we might go at last to Heaven,
Saved by His precious Blood.
There was no other good enough
To pay the price of sin;
He only could unlock the gate
Of Heaven, and let us in.
O dearly, dearly has He loved,
And we must love Him too,
And trust in His redeeming Blood,
And try His works to do.
MATTHEW ARNOLD
(1822–88)
With all his fastidiousness and superciliousness and officiality, Arnold is more intimate with us than Browning, more intimate than Tennyson ever is except at moments, as in the passionate flights in In Memoriam. He is the poet and critic of a period of false stability. All his writing in the kind of Literature and Dogma seems to me a valiant attempt to dodge the issue, to mediate between Newman and Huxley; but his poetry, the best of it, is too honest to employ any but his genuine feelings of unrest, loneliness and dissatisfaction.
T. S. ELIOT: The Use of Poetry and the Use of Criticism (1933)
Matthew Arnold, the son of Thomas Arnold, headmaster of Rugby School, was educated at Winchester, Rugby and Balliol College, Oxford, where he won the Newdigate Prize for poetry with ‘Cromwell’ (1843). Two years later he became a Fellow of Oriel College, but left Oxford to become private secretary to Lord Lansdowne. In his mid-twenties while in Switzerland he met a young woman who inspired the series of ‘Marguerite’ poems. Her name, like that of Heine’s muse who inspired many of the Buch der Lieder poems, has never been satisfactorily identified, but Arnold wrote from Switzerland to his friend A. H. Clough that he wished to ‘linger one day at the Hotel Bellevue for the sake of the blue eyes of one of its inmates’. The relationship failed to prosper, and Arnold eventually married Frances Lucy Wightman, who bore him six children, three of whom pre-deceased him.
He became an inspector of schools in 1851, travelling the length and breadth of England for thirty-five years, observing the social conditions that featured in both his prose works and his poems, of which ‘West London’ is a fine example. Between 1849 and 1867 he published several volumes of poems at regular intervals: The Strayed
Reveller, and Other Poems (1849), Empedocles on Etna, and Other Poems (1852), Poems (1853), Poems Second Series (1855), Merope (1858) and New Poems (1867). Though he wrote in a variety of forms – lyrics, ballads, poetic drama, elegies and occasional poems – there is a consistency about his themes, which are often characterized by introspection, sadness, alienation, spiritual emptiness and a brooding contemplation of the countryside. Arnold became Professor of Poetry at Oxford in 1858 and ironically, apart from New Poems (which contained two of his most famous: ‘Rugby Chapel’ and ‘Heine’s Grave’), wrote prose for the rest of his life. Essays in Criticism (first series) appeared in 1865 and was followed by the posthumous publication of the second series (1888). Culture and Anarchy (1869), Saint Paul and Protestantism (1870), Literature and Dogma (1873), God and the Bible (1875) and Last Essays on Church and Religion (1877) all, in their different ways, deal with the arts, religion and society, and attack dogmatism and unthinking orthodoxy.
‘Dover beach’ was probably written on his honeymoon in 1851, and, like no other poem of the Victorian era, it voices the uncertainties of belief brought on by modern life. One problem for poets was that the new industrial age tended to look down on literature and saw it as a frivolous, dispensable luxury.
FRANK BRIDGE
Longing
[Come to me in my dreams] (1906, rev. 1918)
Come to me in my dreams, and then
By day I shall be well again.1
For then the night will more than pay
The hopeless longing of the day.
The Penguin Book of English Song Page 42