Poetical works of William Cullen Bryant

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Contents

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Hymn of the Waldenses Monument Mountain After a Tempest Autumn Woods Mutation November

Song of the Greek Amazon To a Cloud

II

And therefore, to our hearts, the days gone by, When lived the honored sage whose death we wept, And the soft virtues beamed from many an eye, And beat in many a heart that long has slept — Like spots of earth where angel-feet have stepped, Are holy ; and high-dreaming bards have told Of times when worth was crowned, and faith was kept Ere friendship grew a snare, or love waxed cold — Those pure and happy times — the golden days of old.

ill.

Peace to the just man's memory ; let it grow Greener with years, and blossom through the flight Of ages ; let the mimic canvas show His calm benevolent features ; let the light Stream on his deeds of love, that shunned the sight Of all but heaven, and in the book of .fame The glorious record of his virtues write And hold it up to men, and bid them claim A palm like his, and catch from him the hallowed flame.

IV

But oh, despair not of their fate who rise To dwell upon the earth when we withdraw !

Lo ! the same shaft by which the righteous dies, Strikes through the wretch that scoffed at mercy's law,

THE AGES.

NaUire, in her calm, majestic march."

POEMS.

And trode his brethren down, and felt no awe Of Him who will avenge them. Stainless worth, Such as the sternest age of virtue saw, Ripens, meanwhile, till time shall call it forth From the low modest shade, to light and bless the earth.

v.

Has Nature, in her calm, majestic march, Faltered with age at last ? does the bright sun Grow dim in heaven ? or, in their far blue arch, Sparkle the crowd of stars, when day is done, Less brightly ? when the dew-lipped Spring comes on, Breathes she with airs less soft, or scents the sky With flowers less fair than when her reign begun ? Does prodigal Autumn, to our age, deny The plenty that once swelled beneath his sober eye ?

VI

Look on this beautiful world, and read the truth In her fair page ; see, every season brings New change, to her, of everlasting youth ; Still the green soil, with joyous living things, Swarms, the wide air is full of joyous wings, And myriads, still, are happy in the sleep Of ocean's azure gulfs, and where he flings The restless surge. Eternal love doth keep, In his complacent arms, the earth, the air, the deep.

VII

Will then the merciful One, who stamped our race With his own image, and who gave them sway O'er earth, and the glad dwellers on her face, Now that our swarming nations far away

THE AGES.

Are spread, where'er the moist earth drinks the day, Forget the ancient care that taught and nursed His latest offspring? will he quench the ray Infused by his own forming smile at first, And leave a work so fair all blighted and accursed ?

VIII

Oh, no ! a thousand cheerful omens give Hope of yet happier days, whose dawn is nigh. He who has tamed the elements, shall not live The slave of his own passions ; he whose eye Unwinds the eternal dances of the sky, And in the abyss of brightness dares to span ;

The sun's broad circle, rising yet more high, In God's magnificent works his will shall scan— And love and peace shall make their paradise with man.

IX

Sit at the feet of History — through the night Of years the steps of virtue she shall trace. And show the earlier ages, where her sight Can pierce the eternal shadows o'er their face ; — When, from the genial cradle of our race, Went forth tribes of men, their pleasant lot To choose, where palm-groves cooled their dwelling-place, Or freshening rivers ran ; and there forgot The truth of heaven, and kneeled to gods that heard them not.

x.

Then waited not the murderer for the night, But smote his brother down in the bright day, And he who felt the wrong, and had the might, His own avenger, girt himself to slay ;

POEMS.

Beside the path the unburied carcass lay ; The shepherd, by the fountains of the glen, Fled, while the robber swept his flock away, And slew his babes. The sick, untended then, Languished in the damp shade, and died afar from men.

XI

But misery brought in love ; in passion's strife Man gave his heart to mercy, pleading long, And sought out gentle deeds to gladden life ; The weak, against the sons of spoil and wrong, Banded, and watched their hamlets, and grew strong ; States rose, and, in the shadow of their might, The timid rested. To the reverent throng, Grave and time-wrinkled men, with locks all white, Gave laws, and judged their strifes, and taught the way of right

XII

Till bolder spirits seized the rule, and nailed On men the yoke that man should never bear, And drave them forth to battle. Lo ! unveiled The scene of those stern ages ! What is there ! A boundless sea of blood, and the wild air, Moans with the crimson surges that entomb Cities and bannered armies ; forms that wear The kingly circlet rise, amid the gloom, O'er the dark wave, and straight are swallowed in its womb.

XIII

Those ages have no memory, but they left A record in the desert — columns strown On the waste sands, and statues fallen and cleft, Heaped like a host in battle overthrown ;

THE AGES.

Vast ruins, where the mountain's ribs of stone Were hewn into a city ; streets that spread

POEMS.

In the dark earth, where never breath has blown Of heaven's sweet air, nor foot of man dares tread The long and perilous ways — the Cities of the Dead !