Ecclesiastical Sonnets Read Online

HIGH and LOW,

Watchwords of Party, on all tongues are rife;

As if a Church, though sprung from heaven, must owe

To opposites and fierce extremes her life, –

Not to the golden mean, and quiet flow

Of truths that soften hatred, temper strife.

XII

Down a swift Stream, thus far, a bold design

Have we pursued, with livelier stir of heart

Than his who sees, borne forward by the Rhine,

The living landscapes greet him, and depart;

Sees spires fast sinking – up again to start!

And strives the towers to number, that recline

O'er the dark steeps, or on the horizon line

Striding with shattered crests his eye athwart.

So have we hurried on with troubled pleasure:

Henceforth, as on the bosom of a stream

That slackens, and spreads wide a watery gleam,

We, nothing loth a lingering course to measure,

May gather up our thoughts, and mark at leisure

How widely spread the interests of our theme.

XIII

Aspects of Christianity in America

I. – The Pilgrim Fathers

Well worthy to be magnified are they

Who, with sad hearts, of friends and country took

A last farewell, their loved abodes forsook,

And hallowed ground in which their fathers lay;

Then to the new-found World explored their way,

That so a Church, unforced, uncalled to brook

Ritual restraints, within some sheltering nook

Her Lord might worship and his word obey

In freedom. Men they were who could not bend;

Blest Pilgrims, surely, as they took for guide

A will by sovereign Conscience sanctified;

Blest while their Spirits from the woods ascend

Along a Galaxy that knows no end,

But in His glory who for Sinners died.

XIV

II. Continued

From Rite and Ordinance abused they fled

To Wilds where both were utterly unknown;

But not to them had Providence foreshown

What benefits are missed, what evils bred,

In worship neither raised nor limited

Save by Self-will. Lo! from that distant shore,

For Rite and Ordinance, Piety is led

Back to the Land those Pilgrims left of yore,

Led by her own free choice. So Truth and Love

By Conscience governed do their steps retrace. –

Fathers! your Virtues, such the power of grace,

Their spirit, in your Children, thus approve.

Transcendent over time, unbound by place,

Concord and Charity in circles move.

XV

III. Concluded. – American Episcopacy

Patriots informed with Apostolic light

Were they who, when their Country had been freed,

Bowing with reverence to the ancient creed,

Fixed on the frame of England's Church their sight,

And strove in filial love to reunite

What force had severed. Thence they fetched the seed

Of Christian unity, and won a meed

Of praise from Heaven. To Thee, O saintly WHITE,

Patriarch of a wide-spreading family,

Remotest lands and unborn times shall turn,

Whether they would restore or build – to Thee,

As one who rightly taught how zeal should burn,

As one who drew from out Faith's holiest urn

The purest stream of patient Energy.

XVI

Bishops and Priests, blessèd are ye, if deep

(As yours above all offices is high)

Deep in your hearts the sense of duty lie;

Charged as ye are by Christ to feed and keep

From wolves your portion of His chosen sheep:

Labouring as ever in your Master's sight,

Making your hardest task your best delight,

What perfect glory ye in Heaven shall reap! –

But in the solemn Office which ye sought

And undertook premonished, if unsound

Your practice prove, faithless though but in thought,

Bishops and Priests, think what a gulf profound

Awaits you then, if they were rightly taught

Who framed the Ordinance by your lives disowned!

XVII

Places of Worship

As star that shines dependent upon star

Is to the sky while we look up in love;

As to the deep fair ships which though they move

Seem fixed, to eyes that watch them from afar;

As to the sandy desert fountains are,

With palm-groves shaded at wide intervals,

Whose fruit around the sun-burnt Native falls

Of roving tired or desultory war –

Such to this British Isle her christian Fanes,

Each linked to each for kindred services;

Her Spires, her Steeple-towers with glittering vanes

Far-kenned, her Chapels lurking among trees,

Where a few villagers on bended knees

Find solace which a busy world disdains.

XVIII

Pastoral Character

A genial hearth, a hospitable board,

And a refined rusticity, belong

To the neat mansion, where, his flock among,

The learned Pastor dwells, their watchful Lord.

Though meek and patient as a sheathèd sword;

Though pride's least lurking thought appear a wrong

To human kind; though peace be on his tongue,

Gentleness in his heart – can earth afford

Such genuine state, pre-eminence so free,

As when, arrayed in Christ's authority,

He from the pulpit lifts his awful hand;

Conjures, implores, and labours all he can

For re-subjecting to divine command

The stubborn spirit of rebellious man?

XIX

The Liturgy

Yes, if the intensities of hope and fear

Attract us still, and passionate exercise

Of lofty thoughts, the way before us lies

Distinct with signs, through which in set career,

As through a zodiac, moves the ritual year

Of England's Church; stupendous mysteries!

Which whoso travels in her bosom eyes,

As he approaches them, with solemn cheer.

Upon that circle traced from sacred story

We only dare to cast a transient glance,

Trusting in hope that Others may advance

With mind intent upon the King of Glory,

From his mild advent till his countenance

Shall dissipate the seas and mountains hoary.

XX

Baptism

Dear be the Church that, watching o'er the needs

Of Infancy, provides a timely shower

Whose virtue changes to a christian Flower

A Growth from sinful Nature's bed of weeds! –

Fitliest beneath the sacred roof proceeds

The ministration; while parental Love

Looks on, and Grace descendeth from above

As the high service pledges now, now pleads.

There, should vain thoughts outspread their wings and fly

To meet the coming hours of festal mirth,

The tombs – which hear and answer that brief cry,

The Infant's notice of his second birth –

Recall the wandering Soul to sympathy

With what man hopes from Heaven, yet fears from Earth.

XXI

Sponsors

Father! to God himself we cannot give

A holier name! then lightly do not bear

Both names conjoined, but of thy spiritual care

Be duly mindful: still more sensitive

Do Thou, in truth a second Mother, strive

Against disheartening custom, that by Thee

Watched, and with love and pious industry

Tended at need, the adopted Plant may thrive

For everlasting bloom. Benign and pure

This Ordinance, whether loss it would supply,

Prevent omission, help deficiency,

Or seek to make assurance doubly sure.

Shame if the consecrated Vow be found

An idle form, the Word an empty sound!

XXII

Catechising

From Little down to Least, in due degree,

Around the Pastor, each in new-wrought vest,

Each with a vernal posy at his breast,

We stood, a trembling, earnest Company!

With low soft murmur, like a distant bee,

Some spake, by thought-perplexing fears betrayed;

And some a bold unerring answer made:

How fluttered then thy anxious heart for me,

Belovèd Mother! Thou whose happy hand

Had bound the flowers I wore, with faithful tie:

Sweet flowers! at whose inaudible command

Her countenance, phantom-like, doth reappear:

O lost too early for the frequent tear,

And ill requited by this heartfelt sigh!

XXIII

Confirmation

The Young-ones gathered in from hill and dale,

With holiday delight on every brow:

'Tis past away; far other thoughts prevail;

For they are taking the baptismal Vow

Upon their conscious selves; their own lips speak

The solemn promise. Strongest sinews fail,

And many a blooming, many a lovely, cheek

Under the holy fear of God turns pale;

While on each head his lawn-robed servant lays

An apostolic hand, and with prayer seals

The Covenant. The Omnipotent will raise

Their feeble Souls; and bear with his regrets,

Who, looking round the fair assemblage, feels

That ere the Sun goes down their childhood sets.

XXIV

Confirmation Continued

I saw a Mother's eye intensely bent

Upon a Maiden trembling as she knelt;

In and for whom the pious Mother felt

Things that we judge of by a light too faint:

Tell, if ye may, some star-crowned Muse, or Saint!

Tell what rushed in, from what she was relieved –

Then, when her Child the hallowing touch received,

And such vibration through the Mother went

That tears burst forth amain. Did gleams appear?

Opened a vision of that blissful place

Where dwells a Sister-child? And was power given

Part of her lost One's glory back to trace

Even to this Rite? For thus She knelt, and, ere

The summer-leaf had faded, passed to Heaven.

XXV

Sacrament

By chain yet stronger must the Soul be tied:

One duty more, last stage of this ascent,

Brings to thy food, mysterious Sacrament!

The Offspring, haply at the Parent's side;

But not till They, with all that do abide

In Heaven, have lifted up their hearts to laud

And magnify the glorious name of God,

Fountain of Grace, whose Son for sinners died.

Ye, who have duly weighed the summons, pause

No longer; ye, whom to the saving rite

The Altar calls; come early under laws

That can secure for you a path of light

Through gloomiest shade; put on (nor dread its weight)

Armour divine, and conquer in your cause!

XXVI

The Marriage Ceremony

The Vested Priest before the Altar stands;

Approach, come gladly, ye prepared, in sight

Of God and chosen friends, your troth to plight

With the symbolic ring, and willing hands

Solemnly joined. Now sanctify the bands

O Father! – to the Espoused thy blessing give,

That mutually assisted they may live

Obedient, as here taught, to thy commands.

So prays the Church, to consecrate a Vow

»The which would endless matrimony make;«

Union that shadows forth and doth partake

A mystery potent human love to endow

With heavenly, each more prized for the other's sake;

Weep not, meek Bride? uplift thy timid brow.

XXVII

Thanksgiving after Childbirth

Woman! the Power who left His throne on high,

And deigned to wear the robe of flesh we wear,

The Power that thro' the straits of Infancy

Did pass dependent on maternal care,

His own humanity with Thee will share,

Pleased with the thanks that in His People's eye

Thou offerest up for safe Delivery

From Childbirth's perilous throes. And should the Heir

Of thy fond hopes hereafter walk inclined

To courses fit to make a mother rue

That ever he was born, a glance of mind

Cast upon this observance may renew

A better will; and, in the imagined view

Of thee thus kneeling, safety he may find.

XXVIII

Visitation of the Sick

The Sabbath bells renew the inviting peal;

Glad, music! yet there be that, worn with pain

And sickness, listen where they long have lain,

In sadness listen. With maternal zeal

Inspired, the Church sends ministers to kneel

Beside the afflicted; to sustain with prayer,

And soothe the heart confession hath laid bare –

That pardon, from God's throne, may set its seal

On a true Penitent. When breath departs

From one disburthened so, so comforted,

His Spirit Angels greet; and ours be hope

That, if the Sufferer rise from his sick-bed,

Hence he will gain a firmer mind, to cope

With a bad world, and foil the Tempter's arts.

XXIX

The Commination Service

Shun not this Rite, neglected, yea abhorred,

By some of unreflecting mind, as calling

Man to curse man, (thought monstrous and appalling).

Go thou and hear the threatenings of the Lord;

Listening within his Temple see his sword

Unsheathed in wrath to strike the offender's head,

Thy own, if sorrow for thy sin be dead,

Guilt unrepented, pardon unimplored.

Two aspects bears Truth needful for salvation;

Who knows not that? – yet would this delicate age

Look only on the Gospel's brighter page:

Let light and dark duly our thoughts employ;

So shall the fearful words of Commination

Yield timely fruit of peace and love and joy.

XXX

Forms of Prayer at Sea

To kneeling Worshippers no earthly floor

Gives holier invitation than the deck

Of a storm-shattered Vessel saved from Wreck

(When all that Man could do avail'd no more)

By Him who raised the Tempest and restrains:

Happy the crew who this have felt, and pour

Forth for His mercy, as the Church ordains,

Solemn thanksgiving. Nor will they implore

In vain who, for a rightful cause, give breath

To words the Church prescribes aiding the lip

For the heart's sake, ere ship with hostile ship

Encounters, armed for work of pain and death.

Suppliants! the God to whom your cause ye trust

Will listen, and ye know that He is just.

XXXI

Funeral Service

From the Baptismal hour, thro' weal and woe,

The Church extends her care to thought and deed;

Nor quits the Body when the Soul is freed,

The mortal weight cast off to be laid low.

Blest Rite for him who hears in faith, »I know

That my Redeemer liveth,« – hears each word

That follows – striking on some kindred chord

Deep in the thankful heart; – yet tears will flow.

Man is as grass that springeth up at morn,

Grows green, and is cut down and withereth

Ere nightfall – truth that well may claim a sigh,

Its natural echo; but hope comes reborn

At Jesu's bidding. We rejoice, »O Death,

Where is thy Sting? – O Grave, where is thy Victory?«

XXXII

Rural Ceremony

Closing the sacred Book which long has fed

Our meditations, give we to a day

Of annual joy one tributary lay;

This day, when, forth by rustic music led,

The village Children, while the sky is red

With evening lights, advance in long array

Through the still churchyard, each with garland gay,

That, carried sceptre-like, o'ertops the head

Of the proud Bearer. To the wide church-door,

Charged with these offerings which their fathers bore

For decoration in the Papal time,

The innocent Procession softly moves: –

The spirit of Laud is pleased in heaven's pure clime,

And Hooker's voice the spectacle approves!

XXXIII

Regrets

Would that our scrupulous Sires had dared to leave

Less scanty measure of those graceful rites

And usages, whose due return invites

A stir of mind too natural to deceive;

Giving to Memory help when she would weave

A crown for Hope! – I dread the boasted lights

That all too often are but fiery blights,

Killing the bud o'er which in vain we grieve.

Go, seek, when Christmas snows discomfort bring,

The counter Spirit found in some gay church

Green with fresh holly, every pew a perch

In which the linnet or the thrush might sing,

Merry and loud and safe from prying search,

Strains offered only to the genial Spring.

XXXIV

Mutability

From low to high doth dissolution climb,

And sink from high to low, along a scale

Of awful notes, whose concord shall not fail;

A musical but melancholy chime,

Which they can hear who meddle not with crime,

Nor avarice, nor over-anxious care.

Truth fails not; but her outward forms that bear

The longest date do melt like frosty rime,

That in the morning whitened hill and plain

And is no more; drop like the tower sublime

Of yesterday, which royally did wear

His crown of weeds, but could not even sustain

Some casual shout that broke the silent air,

Or the unimaginable touch of Time.

XXXV

Old Abbeys

Monastic Domes! following my downward way,

Untouched by due regret I marked your fall!

Now, ruin, beauty, ancient stillness, all

Dispose to judgments temperate as we lay

On our past selves in life's declining day:

For as, by discipline of Time made wise,

We learn to tolerate the infirmities

And faults of others – gently as he may,

So with our own the mild Instructor deals,

Teaching us to forget them or forgive.

Perversely curious, then, for hidden ill

Why should we break Time's charitable seals?

Once ye were holy, ye are holy still;

Your spirit freely let me drink, and live.

XXXVI

Emigrant French Clergy

Even while I speak, the sacred roofs of France

Are shattered into dust; and self-exiled

From altars threatened, levelled, or defiled,

Wander the Ministers of God, as chance

Opens a way for life, or consonance

Of faith invites. More welcome to no land

The fugitives than to the British strand,

Where priest and layman with the vigilance

Of true compassion greet them. Creed and test

Vanish before the unreserved embrace

Of catholic humanity: – distrest

They came, – and, while the moral tempest roars

Throughout the Country they have left, our shores

Give to their Faith a fearless resting-place.

XXXVII

Congratulation

Thus all things lead to Charity, secured

By THEM who blessed the soft and happy gale

That landward urged the great Deliverer's sail,

Till in the sunny bay his fleet was moored!

Propitious hour! had we, like them, endured

Sore stress of apprehension, with a mind

Sickened by injuries, dreading worse designed,

From month to month trembling and unassured,

How had we then rejoiced! But we have felt,

As a loved substance, their futurity:

Good, which they dared not hope for, we have seen;

A State whose generous will through earth is dealt;

A State – which, balancing herself between

Licence and slavish order, dares be free.

XXXVIII

New Churches

But liberty, and triumphs on the Main,

And laurelled armies, not to be withstood –

What serve they? if, on transitory good

Intent, and sedulous of abject gain,

The State (ah, surely not preserved in vain!)

Forbear to shape due channels which the Flood

Of sacred truth may enter – till it brood

O'er the wide realm, as o'er the Egyptian plain

The all-sustaining Nile. No more – the time

Is conscious of her want; through England's bounds,

In rival haste, the wished-for Temples rise!

I hear their sabbath bells' harmonious chime

Float on the breeze – the heavenliest of all sounds

That vale or hill prolongs or multiplies!

XXXIX

Church to Be Erected

Be this the chosen site; the virgin sod,

Moistened from age to age by dewy eve,

Shall disappear, and grateful earth receive

The corner-stone from hands that build to God.

Yon reverend hawthorns, hardened to the rod

Of winter storms, yet budding cheerfully;

Those forest oaks of Druid memory,

Shall long survive, to shelter the Abode

Of genuine Faith. Where, haply, 'mid this band

Of daisies, shepherds sate of yore and wove

May-garlands, there let the holy altar stand

For kneeling adoration; – while – above,

Broods, visibly portrayed, the mystic Dove,

That shall protect from blasphemy the Land.

XL

Continued

Mine ear has rung, my spirit sunk subdued,

Sharing the strong emotion of the crowd,

When each pale brow to dread hosannas bowed

While clouds of incense mounting veiled the rood,

That glimmered like a pine-tree dimly viewed

Through Alpine vapours. Such appalling rite

Our Church prepares not, trusting to the might

Of simple truth with grace divine imbued;

Yet will we not conceal the precious Cross,

Like men ashamed: the Sun with his first smile

Shall greet that symbol crowning the low Pile:

And the fresh air of incense-breathing morn

Shall wooingly embrace it; and green moss

Creep round its arms through centuries unborn.

XLI

New Church-Yard

The encircling ground, in native turf arrayed,

Is now by solemn consecration given

To social interests, and to favouring Heaven;

And where the rugged colts their gambols played,

And wild deer bounded through the forest glade,

Unchecked as when by merry Outlaw driven,

Shall hymns of praise resound at morn and even;

And soon, full soon, the lonely Sexton's spade

Shall wound the tender sod. Encincture small,

But infinite its grasp of weal and woe!

Hopes, fears, in never-ending ebb and flow; –

The spousal trembling, and the ›dust to dust,‹

The prayers, the contrite struggle, and the trust

That to the Almighty Father looks through all.

XLII

Cathedrals, etc.

Open your gates, ye everlasting Piles!

Types of the spiritual Church which God hath reared;

Not loth we quit the newly-hallowed sward

And humble altar, 'mid your sumptuous aisles

To kneel, or thrid your intricate defiles,

Or down the nave to pace in motion slow;

Watching, with upward eye, the tall tower grow

And mount, at every step, with living wiles

Instinct – to rouse the heart and lead the will

By a bright ladder to the world above.

Open your gates, ye Monuments of love

Divine! thou Lincoln, on thy sovereign hill!

Thou, stately York! and Ye, whose splendours cheer

Isis and Cam, to patient Science dear!

XLIII

Inside of King's College Chapel, Cambridge

Tax not the royal Saint with vain expense,

With ill-matched aims the Architect who planned –

Albeit labouring for a scanty band

Of white-robed Scholars only – this immense

And glorious Work of fine intelligence!

Give all thou canst; high Heaven rejects the lore

Of nicely-calculated less or more;

So deemed the man who fashioned for the sense

These lofty pillars, spread that branching roof

Self-poised, and scooped into ten thousand cells,

Where light and shade repose, where music dwells

Lingering – and wandering on as loth to die;

Like thoughts whose very sweetness yieldeth proof

That they were born for immortality.

XLIV

The Same

What awful pérspective! while from our sight

With gradual stealth the lateral windows hide

Their Portraitures, their stone-work glimmers, dyed

In the soft chequerings of a sleepy light.

Martyr, or King, or sainted Eremite,

Whoe'er ye be, that thus, yourselves unseen,

Imbue your prison-bars with solemn sheen,

Shine on, until ye fade with coming Night! –

But, from the arms of silence – list! O list!

The music bursteth into second life;

The notes luxuriate, every stone is kissed

By sound, or ghost of sound, in mazy strife;

Heart-thrilling strains, that cast, before the eye

Of the devout, a veil of ecstasy!

XLV

Continued

They dreamt not of a perishable home

Who thus could build. Be mine, in hours of fear

Or grovelling thought, to seek a refuge here;

Or through the aisles of Westminster to roam;

Where bubbles burst, and folly's dancing foam

Melts, if it cross the threshold; where the wreath

Of awe-struck wisdom droops: or let my path

Lead to that younger Pile, whose sky-like dome

Hath typified by reach of daring art

Infinity's embrace; whose guardian crest,

The silent Cross, among the stars shall spread

As now, when She hath also seen her breast

Filled with mementos, satiate with its part

Of grateful England's overflowing Dead.

XLVI

Ejaculation

Glory to God! and to the Power who came

In filial duty, clothed with love divine,

That made His human tabernacle shine

Like Ocean burning with purpureal flame;

Or like the Alpine Mount, that takes its name

From roseate hues, far kenned at morn and even,

In hours of peace, or when the storm is driven

Along the nether region's rugged frame!

Earth prompts – Heaven urges; let us seek the light,

Studious of that pure intercourse begun

When first our infant brows their lustre won;

So, like the Mountain, may we grow more bright

From unimpeded commerce with the Sun,

At the approach of all-involving night.

XLVII

Conclusion

Why sleeps the future, as a snake enrolled,

Coil within coil, at noon-tide? For the WORD

Yields, if with unpresumptuous faith explored,

Power at whose touch the sluggard shall unfold

His drowsy rings. Look forth! – that Stream behold,

THAT STREAM upon whose bosom we have passed

Floating at ease while nations have effaced

Nations, and Death has gathered to his fold

Long lines of mighty Kings – look forth, my Soul!

(Nor in this vision be thou slow to trust)

The living Waters, less and less by guilt

Stained and polluted, brighten as they roll,

Till they have reached the eternal City – built

For the perfècted Spirits of the just!