i. Translation from an Unpublished Work of Herodotus

ii. The Shield of Achilles, with Variations

iii. The Two Deans

iv. On the Italian Priesthood

Butler wrote these four pieces while he was an undergraduate at St. John’s College, Cambridge. He kept no copy of any of them, but his friend the Rev. Canon Joseph McCormick, D.D., Rector of St. James’s, Piccadilly, kept copies in a note-book which he lent me. The only one that has appeared in print is “The Shield of Achilles,” which Canon McCormick sent to The Eagle, the magazine of St. John’s College, Cambridge, and it was printed in the number for December 1902, about six months after Butler’s death.

“On the Italian Priesthood” is a rendering of the Italian epigram accompanying it which, with others under the heading “Astuzia, Inganno,” is given in Raccolta di Proverbi Toscani di Giuseppe Giusti (Firenze, 1853).

v. A Psalm of Montreal

This was written in Canada in 1875. Butler often recited it and gave copies of it to his friends. Knowing that Mr. Edward Clodd had had something to do with its appearance in the Spectator I wrote asking him to tell me what he remembered about it. He very kindly replied, 29th October, 1905:

“The ‘Psalm’ was recited to me at the Century Club by Butler. He gave me a copy of it which I read to the late Chas. Anderson, Vicar of S. John’s, Limehouse, who lent it to Matt. Arnold (when inspecting Anderson’s Schools) who lent it to Richd. Holt Hutton who, with Butler’s consent, printed it in the Spectator of 18th May, 1878.”

The “Psalm of Montreal” was included in Selections from Previous Works (1884) and in Seven Sonnets, etc.

vi. The Righteous Man

Butler wrote this in 1876; it has appeared before only in 1879 in the Examiner, where it formed part of the correspondence “A Clergyman’s Doubts” of which the letter signed “Ethics” has already been given in this volume (see p. 304 ante). “The Righteous Man” was signed “X.Y.Z.” and, in order to connect it with the discussion, Butler prefaced it with a note comparing it to the last six inches of a line of railway; there is no part of the road so ugly, so little travelled over, or so useless generally, but it is the end, at any rate, of a very long thing.

vii. To Critics and Others.

This was written in 1883 and has not hitherto been published.

viii. For Narcissus

These are printed for the first time. The pianoforte score of Narcissus was published in 1888. The poem (A) was written because there was some discussion then going on in musical circles about additional accompaniments to the Messiah and we did not want any to be written for Narcissus.

The poem (B) shows how Butler originally intended to open Part II with a kind of descriptive programme, but he changed his mind and did it differently.

ix. A Translation Attempted in Consequence of a Challenge

This translation into Homeric verse of a famous passage from Martin Chuzzlewit was a by-product of Butler’s work on the Odyssey and the Iliad. It was published in The Eagle in March, 1894, and was included in Seven Sonnets.

I asked Butler who had challenged him to attempt the translation and he replied that he had thought of that and had settled that, if any one else were to ask the question, he should reply that the challenge came from me.

x. In Memoriam H. R. F.

This appears in print now for the first time. Hans Rudolf Faesch, a young Swiss from Basel, came to London in the autumn of 1893. He spent much of his time with us until 14th February, 1895, when he left for Singapore. We saw him off from Holborn Viaduct Station; he was not well and it was a stormy night. The next day Butler wrote this poem and, being persuaded that we should never see Hans Faesch again, called it an In Memoriam. Hans did not die on the journey, he arrived safely in Singapore and settled in the East where he carried on business. We exchanged letters with him frequently; he paid two visits to Europe and we saw him on both occasions. But he did not live long. He died in the autumn of 1903 at Vien Tiane in the Shan States, aged 32, having survived Butler by about a year and a half.

xi. An Academic Exercise

This has never been printed before. It is a Farewell, and that is why I have placed it next after the In Memoriam. The contrast between the two poems illustrates the contrast pointed out at the close of the note on “The Dislike of Death” (ante, p. 359):

“The memory of a love that has been cut short by death remains still fragrant though enfeebled, but no recollection of its past can keep sweet a love that has dried up and withered through accidents of time and life.”

In the ordinary course Butler would have talked this Sonnet over with me at the time he wrote it, that is in January, 1902; he may even have done so, but I think not. From 2nd January, 1902, until late in March, when he left London alone for Sicily, I was ill with pneumonia and remember very little of what happened then. Between his return in May and his death in June I am sure he did not mention the subject. Knowing the facts that underlie the preceding poem I can tell why Butler called it an In Memoriam; not knowing the facts that underlie this poem I cannot tell why Butler should have called it an Academic Exercise. It is his last Sonnet and is dated “Sund. Jan. 12th 1902,” within six months of his death, at a time when he was depressed physically because his health was failing and mentally because he had been “editing his remains,” reading and destroying old letters and brooding over the past. One of the subjects given in the section “Titles and Subjects” (ante) is “The diseases and ordinary causes of mortality among friendships.” I suppose that he found among his letters something which awakened memories of a friendship of his earlier life—a friendship that had suffered from a disease, whether it recovered or died would not affect the sincerity of the emotions experienced by Butler at the time he believed the friendship to be virtually dead. I suppose the Sonnet to be an In Memoriam upon the apprehended death of a friendship as the preceding poem is an In Memoriam upon the apprehended death of a friend.

This may be wrong, but something of the kind seems necessary to explain why Butler should have called the Sonnet an Academic Exercise. No one who has read Shakespeare’s Sonnets Reconsidered will require to be told that he disagreed contemptuously with those critics who believe that Shakespeare composed his Sonnets as academic exercises. It is certain that he wrote this, as he wrote his other Sonnets, in imitation of Shakespeare, not merely imitating the form but approaching the subject in the spirit in which he believed Shakespeare to have approached his subject. It follows therefore that he did not write this sonnet as an academic exercise, had he done so he would not have been imitating Shakespeare. If we assume that he was presenting his story as he presented the dialogue in “A Psalm of Montreal” in a form “perhaps true, perhaps imaginary, perhaps a little of the one and a little of the other,” it would be quite in the manner of the author of The Fair Haven to burlesque the methods of the critics by ignoring the sincerity of the emotions and fixing on the little bit of inaccuracy in the facts. We may suppose him to be saying out loud to the critics: “You think Shakespeare’s Sonnets were composed as academic exercises, do you? Very well then, now what do you make of this?” And adding aside to himself: “That will be good enough for them; they’ll swallow anything.”

xii. A Prayer

Extract from Butler’s Note-Books under the date of February or March 1883:

“‘Cleanse thou me from my secret sins.’ I heard a man moralising on this and shocked him by saying demurely that I did not mind these so much, if I could get rid of those that were obvious to other people.”

He wrote the sonnet in 1900 or 1901. In the first quatrain “spoken” does not rhyme with “open”; Butler knew this and would not alter it because there are similar assonances in Shakespeare, e.g. “open” and “broken” in Sonnet LXI.

xiii. Karma

I am responsible for grouping these three sonnets under this heading. The second one beginning “What is’t to live” appears in Butler’s Note-Book with the remark, “This wants much tinkering, but I cannot tinker it”—meaning that he was too much occupied with other things. He left the second line of the third of these sonnets thus:

“Them palpable to touch and view.”

I have “tinkered” it by adding the two syllables “and clear” to make the line complete.

In writing this sonnet Butler was no doubt thinking of a note he made in 1891:

“It is often said that there is no bore like a clever bore. Clever people are always bores and always must be. That is, perhaps, why Shakespeare had to leave London—people could not stand him any longer.”

xiv. The Life after Death

Butler began to write sonnets in 1898 when he was studying those of Shakespeare on which he published a book in the following year. (Shakespeare’s Sonnets Reconsidered, &c.) He had gone to Flushing by himself and on his return wrote to me:

24 Aug. 1898. “Also at Flushing I wrote one myself, a poor innocent thing, but I was surprised to find how easily it came; if you like it I may write a few more.”

The “poor innocent thing” was the sonnet beginning “Not on sad Stygian shore,” the first of those I have grouped under the heading “The Life after Death.” It appears in his notebooks with this introductory sentence:

“Having now learned Shakespeare’s Sonnets by heart—and there are very few which I do not find I understand the better for having done this—on Saturday night last at the Hotel Zeeland at Flushing, finding myself in a meditative mood, I wrote the following with a good deal less trouble than I anticipated when I took pen and paper in hand. I hope I may improve it.”

Of course I liked the sonnet very much and he did write “a few more”—among them the two on Handel which I have put after “Not on sad Stygian shore” because he intended that they should follow it. I am sure he would have wished this volume to close with these three sonnets, especially because the last two of them were inspired by Handel, who was never absent from his thoughts for long. Let me conclude these introductory remarks by reproducing a note made in 1883:

“Of all dead men Handel has had the largest place in my thoughts. In fact I should say that he and his music have been the central fact in my life ever since I was old enough to know of the existence of either life or music. All day long—whether I am writing or painting or walking, but always—I have his music in my head; and if I lose sight of it and of him for an hour or two, as of course I sometimes do, this is as much as I do. I believe I am not exaggerating when I say that I have never been a day since I was 13 without having Handel in my mind many times over.”

i—Translation from an Unpublished Work of Herodotus

And the Johnians practise their tub in the following manner:—They select 8 of the most serviceable freshmen and put these into a boat and to each one of them they give an oar; and, having told them to look at the backs of the men before them, they make them bend forward as far as they can and at the same moment, and, having put the end of the oar into the water, pull it back again in to them about the bottom of the ribs; and, if any of them does not do this or looks about him away from the back of the man before him, they curse him in the most terrible manner, but if he does what he is bidden they immediately cry out:

“Well pulled, number so-and-so.”

For they do not call them by their names but by certain numbers, each man of them having a number allotted to him in accordance with his place in the boat, and the first man they call stroke, but the last man bow; and when they have done this for about 50 miles they come home again, and the rate they travel at is about 25 miles an hour; and let no one think that this is too great a rate for I could say many other wonderful things in addition concerning the rowing of the Johnians, but if a man wishes to know these things he must go and examine them himself. But when they have done they contrive some such a device as this, for they make them run many miles along the side of the river in order that they may accustom them to great fatigue, and many of them, being distressed in this way, fall down and die, but those who survive become very strong and receive gifts of cups from the others; and after the revolution of a year they have great races with their boats against those of the surrounding islanders, but the Johnians, both owing to the carefulness of the training and a natural disposition for rowing, are always victorious. In this way, then, the Johnians, I say, practise their tub.

ii—The Shield of Achilles—With Variations

And in it he placed the Fitzwilliam and King’s College Chapel and the lofty towered church of the Great Saint Mary, which looketh towards the Senate House, and King’s Parade and Trumpington Road and the Pitt Press and the divine opening of the Market Square and the beautiful flowing fountain which formerly Hobson laboured to make with skilful art; him did his father beget in the many-public-housed Trumpington from a slavey mother and taught him blameless works; and he, on the other hand, sprang up like a young shoot and many beautifully matched horses did he nourish in his stable, which used to convey his rich possessions to London and the various cities of the world; but oftentimes did he let them out to others and whensoever any one was desirous of hiring one of the long-tailed horses he took them in order, so that the labour was equal to all, wherefore do men now speak of the choice of the renowned Hobson. And in it he placed the close of the divine Parker, and many beautiful undergraduates were delighting their tender minds upon it playing cricket with one another; and a match was being played and two umpires were quarrelling with one another; the one saying that the batsman who was playing was out and the other declaring with all his might that he was not; and while they two were contending, reviling one another with abusive language, a ball came and hit one of them on the nose and the blood flowed out in a stream and darkness was covering his eyes, but the rest were crying out on all sides:

“Shy it up.”

And he could not; him, then, was his companion addressing with scornful words:

“Arnold, why dost thou strive with me since I am much wiser? Did not I see his leg before the wicket and rightly declare him to be out? Thee, then, has Zeus now punished according to thy deserts and I will seek some other umpire of the game equally-participated-in-by-both-sides.”

And in it he placed the Cam and many boats equally rowed on both sides were going up and down on the bosom of the deep rolling river and the coxswains were cheering on the men, for they were going to enter the contest of the scratchean fours; and three men were rowing together in a boat, strong and stout and determined in their hearts that they would either first break a blood vessel or earn for themselves the electroplated-Birmingham-manufactured magnificence of a pewter to stand on their ball tables in memorial of their strength, and from time to time drink from it the exhilarating streams of beer whensoever their dear heart should compel them; but the fourth was weak and unequally matched with the others and the coxswain was encouraging him and called him by name and spake cheering words:

“Smith, when thou hast begun the contest, be not flurried nor strive too hard against thy fate, look at the back of the man before thee and row with as much strength as the Fates spun out for thee on the day when thou fellest between the knees of thy mother, neither lose thine oar, but hold it tight with thy hands.”

iii—The Two Deans

Scene: The Court of St. John’s College, Cambridge. Enter the two deans on their way to morning chapel.

Junior Dean: Brother, I am much pleased with Samuel Butler,
I have observed him mightily of late;
Methinks that in his melancholy walk
And air subdued when’er he meeteth me
Lurks something more than in most other men.

Senior Dean: It is a good young man. I do bethink me
That once I walked behind him in the cloister,
He saw me not, but whispered to his fellow:
“Of all men who do dwell beneath the moon
I love and reverence most the senior Dean.”

Junior Dean: One thing is passing strange, and yet I know not
How to condemn it; but in one plain brief word
He never comes to Sunday morning chapel.
Methinks he teacheth in some Sunday school,
Feeding the poor and starveling intellect
With wholesome knowledge, or on the Sabbath morn
He loves the country and the neighbouring spire
Of Madingley or Coton, or perchance
Amid some humble poor he spends the day
Conversing with them, learning all their cares,
Comforting them and easing them in sickness.
Oh ’tis a rare young man!

Senior Dean: I will advance him to some public post,
He shall be chapel clerk, some day a fellow,
Some day perhaps a Dean, but as thou sayst
He is indeed an excellent young man—

Enter Butler suddenly without a coat, or anything on his head, rushing through the cloisters, bearing a cup, a bottle of cider, four lemons, two nutmegs, half a pound of sugar and a nutmeg grater.

Curtain falls on the confusion of Butler and the horror-stricken dismay of the two deans.

iv—On the Italian Priesthood

(Con arte e con inganno, si vive mezzo l’anno;
Con inganno e con arte, si vive l’altra parte.)

In knavish art and gathering gear
They spend the one half of the year;
In gathering gear and knavish art
They somehow spend the other part.

v—A Psalm of Montreal

The City of Montreal is one of the most rising and, in many respects, most agreeable on the American continent, but its inhabitants are as yet too busy with commerce to care greatly about the masterpieces of old Greek Art. In the Montreal Museum of Natural History I came upon two plaster casts, one of the Antinous and the other of the Discobolus—not the good one, but in my poem, of course, I intend the good one—banished from public view to a room where were all manner of skins, plants, snakes, insects, etc., and, in the middle of these, an old man stuffing an owl.

“Ah,” said I, “so you have some antiques here; why don’t you put them where people can see them?”

“Well, sir,” answered the custodian, “you see they are rather vulgar.”

He then talked a great deal and said his brother did all Mr. Spurgeon’s printing.

The dialogue—perhaps true, perhaps imaginary, perhaps a little of the one and a little of the other—between the writer and this old man gave rise to the lines that follow:

Stowed away in a Montreal lumber room
The Discobolus standeth and turneth his face to the wall;
Dusty, cobweb-covered, maimed and set at naught,
Beauty crieth in an attic and no man regardeth:
O God! O Montreal!

Beautiful by night and day, beautiful in summer and winter,
Whole or maimed, always and alike beautiful—
He preacheth gospel of grace to the skin of owls
And to one who seasoneth the skins of Canadian owls:
O God! O Montreal!

When I saw him I was wroth and I said, “O Discobolus!
Beautiful Discobolus, a Prince both among gods and men!
What doest thou here, how camest thou hither, Discobolus,
Preaching gospel in vain to the skins of owls?”
O God! O Montreal!

And I turned to the man of skins and said unto him, “O thou man of skins,
Wherefore hast thou done thus to shame the beauty of the Discobolus?”
But the Lord had hardened the heart of the man of skins
And he answered, “My brother-in-law is haberdasher to Mr. Spurgeon.”
O God! O Montreal!

“The Discobolus is put here because he is vulgar—
He has neither vest nor pants with which to cover his limbs;
I, Sir, am a person of most respectable connections
My brother-in-law is haberdasher to Mr. Spurgeon.”
O God! O Montreal!

Then I said, “O brother-in-law to Mr. Spurgeon’s haberdasher,
Who seasonest also the skins of Canadian owls,
Thou callest trousers ‘pants,’ whereas I call them ‘trousers,’
Therefore thou art in hell-fire and may the Lord pity thee!”
O God! O Montreal!

“Preferrest thou the gospel of Montreal to the gospel of Hellas,
The gospel of thy connection with Mr. Spurgeon’s haberdashery to the gospel of the Discobolus?”
Yet none the less blasphemed he beauty saying, “The Discobolus hath no gospel,
But my brother-in-law is haberdasher to Mr. Spurgeon.”
O God! O Montreal!

vi—The Righteous Man

The righteous man will rob none but the defenceless,
Whatsoever can reckon with him he will neither plunder nor kill;
He will steal an egg from a hen or a lamb from an ewe,
For his sheep and his hens cannot reckon with him hereafter—
They live not in any odour of defencefulness:
Therefore right is with the righteous man, and he taketh advantage righteously,
Praising God and plundering.

The righteous man will enslave his horse and his dog,
Making them serve him for their bare keep and for nothing further,
Shooting them, selling them for vivisection when they can no longer profit him,
Backbiting them and beating them if they fail to please him;
For his horse and his dog can bring no action for damages,
Wherefore, then, should he not enslave them, shoot them, sell them for vivisection?

But the righteous man will not plunder the defenceful—
Not if he be alone and unarmed—for his conscience will smite him;
He will not rob a she-bear of her cubs, nor an eagle of her eaglets—
Unless he have a rifle to purge him from the fear of sin:
Then may he shoot rejoicing in innocency—from ambush or a safe distance;
Or he will beguile them, lay poison for them, keep no faith with them;
For what faith is there with that which cannot reckon hereafter,
Neither by itself, nor by another, nor by any residuum of ill consequences?
Surely, where weakness is utter, honour ceaseth.

Nay, I will do what is right in the eye of him who can harm me,
And not in those of him who cannot call me to account.
Therefore yield me up thy pretty wings, O humming-bird!
Sing for me in a prison, O lark!
Pay me thy rent, O widow! for it is mine.
Where there is reckoning there is sin,
And where there is no reckoning sin is not.

O Critics, cultured Critics!
Who will praise me after I am dead,
Who will see in me both more and less than I intended,
But who will swear that whatever it was it was all perfectly right:
You will think you are better than the people who, when I was alive, swore that whatever I did was wrong
And damned my books for me as fast as I could write them;
But you will not be better, you will be just the same, neither better nor worse,
And you will go for some future Butler as your fathers have gone for me.
Oh! How I should have hated you!

But you, Nice People!
Who will be sick of me because the critics thrust me down your throats,
But who would take me willingly enough if you were not bored about me,
Or if you could have the cream of me—and surely this should suffice:
Please remember that, if I were living, I should be upon your side
And should hate those who imposed me either on myself or others;
Therefore, I pray you, neglect me, burlesque me, boil me down, do whatever you like with me,
But do not think that, if I were living, I should not aid and abet you.
There is nothing that even Shakespeare would enjoy more than a good burlesque of Hamlet.

viii—For Narcissus

(A)

(To be written in front of the orchestral score.)

May he be damned for evermore
Who tampers with Narcissus’ score;
May he by poisonous snakes be bitten
Who writes more parts than what we’ve written.
We tried to make our music clear
For those who sing and those who hear,
Not lost and muddled up and drowned
In over-done orchestral sound;
So kindly leave the work alone
Or do it as we want it done.

(B)

Part II

Symphony

(During which the audience is requested to think as follows:)

An aged lady taken ill
Desires to reconstruct her will;
I see the servants hurrying for
The family solicitor;
Post-haste he comes and with him brings
The usual necessary things.
With common form and driving quill
He draws the first part of the will,
The more sonorous solemn sounds
Denote a hundred thousand pounds,
This trifle is the main bequest,
Old friends and servants take the rest.
’Tis done! I see her sign her name,
I see the attestors do the same.
Who is the happy legatee?
In the next number you will see.

ix—A Translation

(Attempted in consequence of a challenge.)

“‘Mrs. Harris,’ I says to her, ‘dont name the charge, for if I could afford to lay all my feller creeturs out for nothink I would gladly do it; sich is the love I bear ’em. But what I always says to them as has the management of matters, Mrs. Harris,’”—here she kept her eye on Mr. Pecksniff—“‘be they gents or be they ladies—is, Dont ask me whether I wont take none, or whether I will, but leave the bottle on the chimley piece, and let me put my lips to it when I am so dispoged.’” (Martin Chuzzlewit, Chap. XIX).

“ως εφατ αυταρ εyώ μιν αμειβομένη προσέειπον,
‘δαιμονίη, Άρρισσιαδέω αλοχ' αντιθέοιο,
μη θην δη περι μίσθον ανείρεο, μήδ’ ονόμαζε
τοίη yάρ τοι εyων αyανη και ηπίη ειμί,
η κεν λαον απαντ’ ει μοι δύναμίς yε παρείη,
σίτου επηετανου βιότου θ’ αλις ενδον εόντος,
ασπασίως και αμισθος εουσα περιστείλαιμι
[εν λέκτρω λέξασα τανηλεyέος θανάτοιο
αυτή, ος κε θάνησι βροτων και πότμον επίσπη]
αλλ’ εκ τοι ερέω συ δ’ ενι φρεσι βάλλεο σησιν’”—
οσσε δέ οι Πεξνειφον εσέδρακον ασκελες αιεί—
“‘κείνοισιν yαρ πασι πιφαυσκομένη αyορεύω
ειτ’ ανδο’ ειτε yυναίχ’ οτέω τάδε ερyα μέμηλεν,
ω φίλε, τίπτε συ ταυτα μ’ ανείρεαι; ουδέ τί σε χρη
ιδμέναι η εθέλω πίνειν μέθυ, ηε και ουχί
ει δ’ αy’ επ’ εσχάροφιν κάταθες δέπας ηδέος οινου,
οφρ’ εν χερσιν ελω πίνουσά τε τερπομένη τε,
χείλεά τε προσθεισ’ οπόταν φίλον ητορ ανώyη.’”

x—In Memoriam

Feb. 14th, 1895

To

H. R. F.

Out, out, out into the night,
With the wind bitter North East and the sea rough;
You have a racking cough and your lungs are weak,
But out, out into the night you go,
So guide you and guard you Heaven and fare you well!

We have been three lights to one another and now we are two,
For you go far and alone into the darkness;
But the light in you was stronger and clearer than ours,
For you came straighter from God and, whereas we had learned,
You had never forgotten. Three minutes more and then
Out, out into the night you go,
So guide you and guard you Heaven and fare you well!

Never a cross look, never a thought,
Never a word that had better been left unspoken;
We gave you the best we had, such as it was,
It pleased you well, for you smiled and nodded your head;
And now, out, out into the night you go,
So guide you and guard you Heaven and fare you well!

You said we were a little weak that the three of us wept,
Are we then weak if we laugh when we are glad?
When men are under the knife let them roar as they will,
So that they flinch not.
Therefore let tears flow on, for so long as we live
No such second sorrow shall ever draw nigh us,
Till one of us two leaves the other alone
And goes out, out, out into the night,
So guard the one that is left, O God, and fare him well!

Yet for the great bitterness of this grief
We three, you and he and I,
May pass into the hearts of like true comrades hereafter,
In whom we may weep anew and yet comfort them,
As they too pass out, out, out into the night,
So guide them and guard them Heaven and fare them well!

. . .

The minutes have flown and he whom we loved is gone,
The like of whom we never again shall see;
The wind is heavy with snow and the sea rough,
He has a racking cough and his lungs are weak.
Hand in hand we watch the train as it glides
Out, out, out into the night.
So take him into thy holy keeping, O Lord,
And guide him and guard him ever, and fare him well!

xi—An Academic Exercise

We were two lovers standing sadly by
While our two loves lay dead upon the ground;
Each love had striven not to be first to die,
But each was gashed with many a cruel wound.
Said I: “Your love was false while mine was true.”
Aflood with tears he cried: “It was not so,
’Twas your false love my true love falsely slew—
For ’twas your love that was the first to go.”
Thus did we stand and said no more for shame
Till I, seeing his cheek so wan and wet,
Sobbed thus: “So be it; my love shall bear the blame;
Let us inter them honourably.” And yet
I swear by all truth human and divine
’Twas his that in its death throes murdered mine.

xii—A Prayer

Searcher of souls, you who in heaven abide,
To whom the secrets of all hearts are open,
Though I do lie to all the world beside,
From me to these no falsehood shall be spoken.
Cleanse me not, Lord, I say, from secret sin
But from those faults which he who runs can see,
’Tis these that torture me, O Lord, begin
With these and let the hidden vices be;
If you must cleanse these too, at any rate
Deal with the seen sins first, ’tis only reason,
They being so gross, to let the others wait
The leisure of some more convenient season;
And cleanse not all even then, leave me a few,
I would not be—not quite—so pure as you.

xiii—Karma

(A)

Who paints a picture, writes a play or book
Which others read while he’s asleep in bed
O’ the other side of the world—when they o’erlook
His page the sleeper might as well be dead;
What knows he of his distant unfelt life?
What knows he of the thoughts his thoughts are raising,
The life his life is giving, or the strife
Concerning him—some cavilling, some praising?
Yet which is most alive, he who’s asleep
Or his quick spirit in some other place,
Or score of other places, that doth keep
Attention fixed and sleep from others chase?
Which is the “he”—the “he” that sleeps, or “he”
That his own “he” can neither feel nor see?

(B)

What is’t to live, if not to pull the strings
Of thought that pull those grosser strings whereby
We pull our limbs to pull material things
Into such shape as in our thoughts doth lie?
Who pulls the strings that pull an agent’s hand,
The action’s counted his, so, we being gone,
The deeds that others do by our command,
Albeit we know them not, are still our own.
He lives who does and he who does still lives,
Whether he wots of his own deeds or no.
Who knows the beating of his heart, that drives
Blood to each part, or how his limbs did grow?
If life be naught but knowing, then each breath
We draw unheeded must be reckon’d death.

(C)

“Men’s work we have,” quoth one, “but we want them—
Them, palpable to touch and clear to view.”
Is it so nothing, then, to have the gem
But we must weep to have the setting too?
Body is a chest wherein the tools abide
With which the craftsman works as best he can
And, as the chest the tools within doth hide,
So doth the body crib and hide the man.
Nay, though great Shakespeare stood in flesh before us,
Should heaven on importunity release him,
Is it so certain that he might not bore us,
So sure but we ourselves might fail to please him?
Who prays to have the moon full soon would pray,
Once it were his, to have it taken away.

xiv—The Life After Death

(A)

Μελλοντα ταυτα

Not on sad Stygian shore, nor in clear sheen
Of far Elysian plain, shall we meet those
Among the dead whose pupils we have been,
Nor those great shades whom we have held as foes;
No meadow of asphodel our feet shall tread,
Nor shall we look each other in the face
To love or hate each other being dead,
Hoping some praise, or fearing some disgrace.
We shall not argue saying “’Twas thus” or “Thus,”
Our argument’s whole drift we shall forget;
Who’s right, who’s wrong, ’twill be all one to us;
We shall not even know that we have met.
Yet meet we shall, and part, and meet again,
Where dead men meet, on lips of living men.

(B)

HANDEL

There doth great Handel live, imperious still,
Invisible and impalpable as air,
But forcing flesh and blood to work his will
Effectually as though his flesh were there;
He who gave eyes to ears and showed in sound
All thoughts and things in earth or heaven above.
From fire and hailstones running along the ground
To Galatea grieving for her love;
He who could show to all unseeing eyes
Glad shepherds watching o’er their flocks by night,
Or Iphis angel-wafted to the skies,
Or Jordan standing as an heap upright—
He’ll meet both Jones and me and clap or hiss us
Vicariously for having writ Narcissus.

(C)

HANDEL

Father of my poor music—if such small
Offspring as mine, so born out of due time,
So scorn’d, can be called fatherful at all,
Or dare to thy high sonship’s rank to climb—
Best lov’d of all the dead whom I love best,
Though I love many another dearly too,
You in my heart take rank above the rest;
King of those kings that most control me, you,
You were about my path, about my bed
In boyhood always and, where’er I be,
Whate’er I think or do, you, in my head,
Ground-bass to all my thoughts, are still with me;
Methinks the very worms will find some strain
Of yours still lingering in my wasted brain.