Volume Iii Part 31 (1/2)
ON FIRST LOOKING INTO CHAPMAN'S HOMER.
Much have I traveled in the realms of gold, And many goodly states and kingdoms seen; Round many western islands have I been Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold.
Oft of one wide expanse had I been told That deep-browed Homer ruled as his demesne: Yet did I never breathe its pure serene Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold.
Then felt I like some watcher of the skies When a new planet swims into his ken; Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes He stared at the Pacific--and all his men Looked at each other with a wild surmise-- Silent, upon a peak in Darien.
JOHN KEATS.
ULYSSES.
It little profits that an idle king, By this still hearth, among these barren crags, Matched with an aged wife, I mete and dole Unequal laws unto a savage race, That h.o.a.rd, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.
I cannot rest from travel: I will drink Life to the lees: all times have I enjoyed Greatly, have suffered greatly, both with those That loved me, and alone; on sh.o.r.e, and when Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades Vext the dim sea: I am become a name; For always roaming with a hungry heart Much have I seen and known; cities of men And manners, climates, councils, governments, Myself not least, but honored of them all; And drunk delight of battle with my peers, Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.
I am a part of all that I have met; Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'
Gleams that untraveled world, whose margin fades For ever and for ever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end, To rust unburnished, not to s.h.i.+ne in use!
As tho' to breathe were life. Life piled on life Were all too little, and of one to me Little remains: but every hour is saved From that eternal silence, something more, A bringer of new things; and vile it were For some three suns to store and h.o.a.rd myself, And this gray spirit yearning in desire To follow knowledge like a sinking star, Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.
This is my son, mine own Telemachus, To whom I leave the scepter and the isle-- Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfill This labor, by slow prudence to make mild A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centered in the sphere Of common duties, decent not to fail In offices of tenderness, and pay Meet adoration to my household G.o.ds, When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.
There lies the port: the vessel puffs her sail: There gloom the dark broad seas. My mariners, Souls that have toiled, and wrought, and thought with me-- That ever with a frolic welcome took The thunder and the suns.h.i.+ne, and opposed Free hearts, free foreheads--you and I are old; Old age hath yet his honor and his toil; Death closes all: but something ere the end, Some work of n.o.ble note, may yet be done, Not unbecoming men that strove with G.o.ds.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks: The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends, 'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down: It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles, And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho' much is taken, much abides: and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days Moved earth and heaven; that which we are, we are; One equal temper of heroic hearts, Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
ALFRED TENNYSON.
[Ill.u.s.tration: DEATH OF CaeSAR.]
ANTONY'S EULOGY ON CaeSAR.
Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears; I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them; The good is oft interred with their bones; So let it be with Caesar. The n.o.ble Brutus Hath told you Caesar was ambitious: If it were so, it were a grievous fault, And grievously hath Caesar answered it.
Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest-- For Brutus is an honorable man; So are they all, all honorable men-- Come I to speak in Caesar's funeral.
He was my friend, faithful and just to me: But Brutus says he was ambitious; And Brutus is an honorable man.
He hath brought many captives home to Rome, Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill: Did this in Caesar seem ambitious?
When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept: Ambition should be made of sterner stuff: Yet Brutus says he was ambitious; And Brutus is an honorable man.