Bugbear of fools, a summons to the | Secure against his own mistakes, brave: Strength found he in the unsympathizing sun, And strange stars from beneath the And the dumb ocean pitilessly grave : But bolder they who first off-cast For all earth's width of waters is a And their convulsed existence mere repose, Matched with the unstable heart of man, Open to every wind of sect or clan, 2. They steered by stars the elder shipmen knew, Content with what life gives or takes, A cog of iron in an iron wheel, As if he must be other than he seems Postponing Time's slow proof to petu- Yet herein they were great Of hardier growth, alive from rind to By making man sole sponsor of himself. 3. And laid their courses where the cur- God of our fathers, Thou who wast, rents draw Of ancient wisdom channelled deep in law, The undaunted few Who changed the Old World for the And more devoutly prized The more imperfect that had roots and They founded deep and well, In some fine flourish of a pen, To make a better man Art, and shalt be when those eye-wise Thy secret presence shall be lost We, sprung from loins of stalwart men And walk with them a fellow-citizen Than long-considering Nature will or The land to Human Nature dear can, Shall not be unbeloved of Thee. And some scant use of language taught, steel-cold fact in one laconic thrust. Tells only what he must, 2. So thought I, as, with vague, mechanic eyes, I scanned the festering news we half despise And Yet scramble for no less, read of public scandal, private fraud, Crime flaunting scot-free while the mob applaud, Office made vile to bribe unworthiness, To teach the Old World how to When suddenly, As happens if the brain, from overweight Of blood, infect the eye, Three tiny words grew lurid as I read, And reeled commingling: Agassiz is dead. As when, beneath the street's familiar jar, An earthquake's alien omen rumbles far, Men listen and forebode, I hung my head, And strove the present to recall, As if the blow that stunned were yet to fall. 3. Uprooted is our mountain oak, That promised long security of shade And brooding-place for many a winged thought; Not by Time's softly warning stroke With pauses of relenting pity stayed, But ere a root seemed sapt, a bough decayed, From sudden ambush by the whirlwind caught And in his broad maturity betrayed! Well might I, as of old, appeal to you, O mountains woods and streams, To help us mourn him, for ye loved him too; But simpler moods befit our modern themes, And no less perfect birth of nature can, Though they yearn tow'rd him, sympathize with man, Save as dumb fellow-prisoners through a wall; Answer ye rather to my call, Strong poets of a more unconscious day, When Nature spake nor sought nice reasons why, Too much for softer arts forgotten since That teach our forthright tongue to lisp and mince, And drown in music the heart's bitter cry! Lead me some steps in your directer way, Teach me those words that strike a solid root Within the ears of men; Ye chiefly, virile both to think and feel, Deep-chested Chapman and firm-footed Ben, For he was masculine from head to heel. Himself from out the recent dark I claim In some the genius is a thing apart, Its intellectual gain; Man's web of circumstance and fate They from their perch of self observe, Indifferent as the figures on a slate Are to the planet's sun-swung curve Whose bright returns they calculate; Their nice adjustment, part to part, Were shaken from its serviceable mood By unpremeditated stirs of heart Or jar of human neighborhood: Some find their natural selves, and only then, In furloughs of divine escape from men, And when, by that brief ecstasy left bare, Driven by some instinct of desire, They wander worldward, 't is to blink and stare, Like wild things of the wood about a fire, Dazed by the social glow they cannot share; |