Complete Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Page 6
And feared to take, or shun, the last embrace!
Unhappy youth! the fates decree thy doom,
Those flowers prepared for joy, shall deck thy tomb.
Thy mother now no more shall hail thy name
So high enrolled upon the lists of fame,
Nor check the widow’s tear, the widow’s sigh
For e’en her son, her Zeno’s doom’d to die.
Zeno, e’en thou! for so the Gods decree,
A parents threshold opes no more for thee!
On him the hero turned his eye severe
Nor on his visage saw one mark of fear;
There manly grace improved each separate part
And joined by ties of truth, the face and heart.
The supple javelin then the Grecian tries
With might gigantic, and the youth defies.
Its point impetuous, at his breast he flung,
The brazen shield received, and mocking rung;
Then Zeno seized the lance, the Chief defied
And scoffing, thus begun, in youthful pride;
“Go, mighty Greek! to weaker warriors go.
And fear this arm, and an unequal foe;
A mother gave the mighty arms I bear,
Nor think with such a gift, I cherish fear.”
He hurled the lance, but Pallas self was there,
And turned the point, it passed in empty air.
With hope renewed, again the hero tries
His boasted might, the thirsty weapon flies
In Zeno’s breast it sinks, and drank the gore,
And stretched the hero, vanquished on the shore;
Gasping for utterance, and life, and breath.
For fame he sighs, nor fears approaching death.
Themistocles perceived, and bending low.
Thought of his friends, and tears began to flow
That washed the bleeding bosom of his foe.
Young Zeno then, the Grecian hero eyed
Rejects his offered aid, and all defied,
Breathed one disdainful sigh, and turned his head and died.
Such Persians did the godlike warrior slay,
And bad their groaning spirits pass away.
Epizelus the valiant, and the strong,
Thundered in fight, and carried death along;
Him not a Greek, in strength of arms surpassed,
In battle foremost, but in virtue last.
He, impious man, to combat dared defy
The Gods themselves, and senate of the sky,
E’en earth and heaven, and heaven’s eternal sire,
He mocks his thunders, and disdains his ire.
But now the retributive hour is come.
And rigid justice seals the Boaster’s doom.
Theseus he sees, within the fight, revealed
To him alone — to all the rest concealed.
To punish guilt, he leaves the shades below
And quits the seat of never ending woe.
Pale as in death, upon his hands he bore
Th’ infernal serpent of the dreadful shore,
To stay his progress should he strive to fly
From Tart’rus far, and gain the upper sky.
This (dreadful sight!) with slippery sinews now
Wreathed round his form, and clasped his ghastly brow;
With horror struck, and seized with sudden awe
The Greek beheld, nor mingled in the war.
Withheld from combat by the force of fear
He trembling thus— “Oh say, what God draws near?
But speak thy will, if ‘tis a God, oh speak!
Nor vent thy vengeance on a single Greek.”
Vainly he suppliant said — o’erpowered with fright,
And instant from his eye-balls fled the sight;
Confused, distracted, to the skies he throws
His frantic arms, and thus bewails his woes.
“Almighty! thou by whom the bolts are driven!”
He said, and cast his sightless balls to heav’n
“Restore my sight, unhappy me, restore
My own loved offspring, to behold once more!
So will I honor thy divine abodes.
And learn how dreadful th’ avenging Gods!
And if — but oh forbid! you mock my prayer
And cruel fates me ever cursed declare.
Give me, to yield to fame alone my life
And fall immortalized, — in glorious strife!”
He said — the God who thunders thro’ the air,
Frowns on his sufferings and rejects his prayer.
Around his form the dreadful aegis spread
And darts fall harmless on his wretched head;
Condemned by fate, in ceaseless pain to groan,
Friendless, in grief, in agony alone.
Now Mars and death pervade on every side
And heroes fall, and swell the crimson tide.
Not with less force th’ Athenian leader shone
In strife conspicuous, nor to fame unknown,
Advanced in wisdom, and in honored years,
He not for life, but for the battle fears.
Borne swift as winds within the flying car
Now here, now there, directs the swelling war.
On every side, the foaming coursers guides.
Here praises valour, and there rashness chides;
While from his lips persuasive accents flow
T’ inspire th’ Athenians, or unman the foe.
The glorious Greeks rush on, with daring might
And shout and thunder, and encrease the fight.
Nor yet inglorious, do the Persians shine.
In battle’s ranks, they strength and valour join.
Datis himself, impels the ponderous car.
Thro’ broken ranks, conspicuous in the war,
In armour sheathed, and terror round him spread
He whirls his chariot, over heaps of dead;
Where’er he dreadful rushes, warriors fly,
Ghosts seek their hell, and chiefs and heroes die.
All pale with rage he ranks on ranks o’erthrows,
For blood he gasps, and thunders midst his foes.
Callimachus, the mighty leader found
In fight conspicuous, bearing death around.
The lance wheeled instant from the Persian’s hand
Transfixed the glorious Grecian in the sand.
Fate ends the hero’s life, and stays his breath
And clouds his eye balls with the shades of death:
Erect in air the cruel javelin stood,
Peirced thro’ his breast, and drank the spouting blood
Released from life’s impending woes and care,
The soul immerges in the fields of air:
Then, crowned with laurels, seeks the blest abodes,
Of awful Pluto, and the Stygian floods.
And now with joy great Aristides saw
Again proud Hippias thundering thro’ the war,
And mocking thus, “Oh tyrant, now await
The destined blow, behold thy promised fate!
Thrice mighty King, obey my javelins call
For e’en thy godlike self’s decreed to fall;”
He said, and hurled the glittering spear on high
The destined weapon hissed along the sky
Winged by the hero’s all destroying hand,
It pierced the Prince, and stretched him on the sand.
Then thro’ the air the awful peals were driven
And lightnings blazed along the vast of heaven.
The Persian hosts, behold their bulwark die
Fear chills their hearts, and all their numbers fly,
And reached the fleet, the shouting Greeks pursue
All Asia’s millions, flying in their view.
On, on, they glorious rush, and side by side
Yet red with gore, they plunge into the tide;
For injured freedom’s sake, th’
indignant main
With swelling pride receives the crimson stain;
The Persians spread the sail, nor dare delay.
And suppliant call upon the King of day.
But vainly to their Gods the cowards pray.
Some of the ships th’ Athenian warriors stay
And fire their bulks; the flames destroying rise
Rushing they swell, and mount into the skies.
Foremost Cynoegirus with might divine
While midst the waves, his arms majestic shine.
With blood stained hand, a Persian ship he seized
The vessel vainly strove to be released;
With fear the crew, the godlike man beheld,
And pride and shame, their troubled bosoms swelled,
They lop his limb, then Pallas fires his frame
With scorn of death, and hope of future fame:
Then with the hand remaining seized the prize
A glorious spirit kindling in his eyes.
Again the Persians wield the unmanly blow
And wreak their vengeance on a single foe.
The fainting Greek by loss of blood opprest
Still feels the patriot rise within his breast.
Within his teeth the shattered ship he held
Nor in his soul, one wish for life rebelled.
But strength decaying, fate supprest his breath
And o’er his brows, expand the dews of death;
The Elysium plains his generous spirit trod
“He lived a Hero and he died a God”
By vengeance fired, the Grecians from the deep
With rage and shouting, scale the lofty ship,
Then in the briny bosom of the main
They hurl in heaps the living and the slain.
Thro’ the wide shore resound, triumphant cries,
Fill all the seas, and thunder thro’ the skies.
THE END
A Essay on Mind, with Other Poems
From a young age, Barrett Browning took great delight in reading Virgil in the original Latin, as well as studying the works of Shakespeare and Milton. By 1821 she had read Mary Wollstonecraft’s Vindication of the Rights of Woman and she at once became a passionate supporter of Wollstonecraft’s ideas. The child’s intellectual fascination with the classics and metaphysics was reflected in a religious intensity which she later described as “not the deep persuasion of the mild Christian, but the wild visions of an enthusiast”.
Aged fifteen, Barrett Browning began to battle with a lifelong illness, which the medical science of the time was unable to diagnose. All three sisters came down with the syndrome, although it lasted only with Elizabeth. She experienced intense head and spinal pain with loss of mobility. This illness caused her to be frail and weak, reducing her to a slight, delicate figure. She began to take opiates for the pain and she became dependent on them for much of her adulthood.
Barrett Browning’s first collection of poems, An Essay on Mind, with Other Poems, was published in 1826, when she was twenty years old. The varied range of poems and poetic forms reflect her passion for the works of Byron and Spenser, as well as her tendencies towards Greek politics.
Barrett Browning, close to the time of the publication of her first collection
CONTENTS
AN ESSAY ON MIND. BOOK I.
AN ESSAY ON MIND. BOOK II.
TO MY FATHER ON HIS BIRTH-DAY.
SPENSERIAN STANZAS ON A BOY OF THREE YEARS OLD.
VERSES TO MY BROTHER.
STANZAS ON THE DEATH OF LORD BYRON.
MEMORY.
TO ——
STANZAS OCCASIONED BY A PASSAGE IN MR. EMERSON’S JOURNAL
THE PAST.
THE PRAYER.
ON A PICTURE OF RIEGO’S WIDOW, PLACED IN THE EXHIBITION.
WEEP, AS IF YOU THOUGHT OF LAUGHTER!
THE DREAM.
RIGA’S LAST SONG.
THE VISION OF FAME.
THE TEMPEST.
A SEA-SIDE MEDITATION.
A VISION OF LIFE AND DEATH.
EARTH.
THE PICTURE GALLERY AT PENSHURST.
TO A POET’S CHILD.
MINSTRELSY.
TO THE MEMORY OF SIR UVEDALE PRICE, BART.
THE AUTUMN.
THE DEATH-BED OF TERESA DEL RIEGO.
TO VICTOIRE, ON HER MARRIAGE.
TO A BOY.
REMONSTRANCE.
REPLY.
EPITAPH.
THE IMAGE OF GOD.
THE APPEAL.
IDOLS.
HYMN.
WEARINESS.
AN ESSAY ON MIND.
“My narrow leaves cannot in them contayne
The large discourse.”
Spenser.
AN ESSAY ON MIND. BOOK I.
ANALYSIS OF THE FIRST BOOK.
The poem commences by remarking the desire, natural to the mind, of investigating its own qualities — qualities the more exalted, as their developement has seldom been impeded by external circumstances — The various dispositions of different minds are next considered, and are compared to the varieties of scenic nature; inequalities in the spiritual not being more wonderful than inequalities in the natural — Byron and Campbell contrasted — The varieties of genius having been thus treated, the art of criticism is briefly alluded to, as generally independent of genius, but always useful to its productions — Jeffrey — The various stages of life in which genius appears, and the different causes by which its influence is discovered — Cowley, Alfieri — Allusion to the story of the emotion of Thucydides on hearing Herodotus recite his History at the Olympic Games — The elements of Mind are thus arranged, Invention, Judgment, Memory, and Association — The creations of mind are next noticed, among which we first behold Philosophy — History, Science, and Metaphysics, are included in the studies of Philosophy.
Of History, it is observed, that though on a cursory view her task of recalling the past may appear of little avail, it is in reality one of the highest importance — The living are sent for a lesson to the grave — The present state of Rome alluded to; and the future state of England anticipated — Condemnation of those who deprive historical facts of their moral inference, and only make use of their basis to render falsehood more secure — Gibbon — Condemnation of those who would colour the political conduct of past ages with their own political feelings — Hume, Mitford — From the writers, we turn to the readers of history — Their extreme scepticism, or credulity — They are recommended to be guided by no faction; but to measure facts by their consistency with reason — to study the personal character and circumstances of an historian, before they give entire credit to his representations — The influence of private feeling and prejudice — Miller — Science is introduced — Apostrophe to man — Episode of Archimedes — Parallel between history and science — The pride of the latter considered most excessive — The risk attending knowledge — Buffon, Leibnitz — The advantageous experience to be derived from the errors of others, illustrated by an allusion to Southey’s Hexameters — Utility the object of science — An exclusive attention to parts deprecated, since it is impossible even to have a just idea of parts , without acquiring a knowledge of their relative situation in the whole — The extreme difficulty of enlarging the contemplations of a mind long accustomed to contracted views — The scale of knowledge — every science being linked with the one preceding and succeeding — giving and receiving reciprocal support — Why this system is not calculated, as might be conjectured, either to render scientific men superficial, or to intrude on the operations of genius — That the danger of knowledge originates in partial knowledge — Apostrophe to Newton.
Since Spirit first inspir’d, pervaded all,
And Mind met Matter, at th’ Eternal call —
Since dust weigh’d Genius down, or Genius gave
Th’ immortal halo to the mortal’s grave;
Th’ ambitious soul her essence hath defin’d,
And Mind hat
h eulogiz’d the pow’rs of Mind.
Ere Revelation’s holy light began
To strengthen Nature, and illumine Man —
When Genius, on Icarian pinions, flew,
And Nature’s pencil, Nature’s portrait, drew;
When Reason shudder’d at her own wan beam,
And Hope turn’d pale beneath the sickly gleam —
Ev’n then hath Mind’s triumphant influence spoke,
Dust own’d the spell, and Plato’s spirit woke —
Spread her eternal wings, and rose sublime
Beyond th’ expanse of circumstance and time:
Blinded, but free, with faith instinctive, soar’d,
And found her home, where prostrate saints ador’d!
Thou thing of light! that warm’st the breasts of men,
Breath’st from the lips, and tremblest from the pen!
Thou, form’d at once t’ astonish, fire, beguile, —
With Bacon reason, and with Shakespeare smile!
The subtle cause, ethereal essence! say,
Why dust rules dust, and clay surpasses clay;
Why a like mass of atoms should combine
To form a Tully, and a Catiline?
Or why, with flesh perchance of equal weight,
One cheers a prize-fight, and one frees a state?
Why do not I the muse of Homer call,
Or why, indeed, did Homer sing at all?
Why wrote not Blackstone upon love’s delusion,
Or Moore, a libel on the Constitution?
Why must the faithful page refuse to tell
That Dante, Laura sang, and Petrarch, Hell —
That Tom Paine argued in the throne’s defence —
That Byron nonsense wrote, and Thurlow sense —
That Southey sigh’d with all a patriot’s cares,
While Locke gave utterance to Hexameters?
Thou thing of light! instruct my pen to find
Th’ unequal pow’rs, the various forms of Mind!
O’er Nature’s changeful face direct your sight;
View light meet shade, and shade dissolve in light!
Mark, from the plain, the cloud-capp’d mountain soar;
The sullen ocean spurn the desert shore!
Behold, afar, the playmate of the storm,
Wild Niagara lifts his awful form —
Spits his black foam above the madd’ning floods,