Poems

Preface

In republishing a selection from poems, written some of them more than twenty years ago, and many of which have been in print more than sixteen years, I have been guided by the judgment of those to whose opinion I should naturally defer. It appears also that there is now a demand for the volumes, which have for some time been out of print. If I did not hope that with many readers, especially the young, the publication would answer a higher end than literary pleasure, and that the poems would, in their place and degree, co-operate with the more serious and religious works, which the public has received with so much kindness, I should shrink from a re-issue of them. But if the glory of God should be promoted to ever so small an amount by this volume, I confess it will be also an additional pleasure to myself, that the labour and energy of past years should not have been altogether wasted, so far as that one end is concerned, to which alone I have a right to devote myself, and whose sole interest and importance grow with growing age, the knowledge and love of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

F. W. Faber.

The Oratory. London.

Eve of SS. Peter and Paul. 1856.

CONTENTS,

Preface, ..

Prelude to the Styrian Lake, . . The Styrian Lake. i. The Lake,

2. The Legend, ..

3. Ghurch Matins,

4. Margaret's Pilgrimage,

5. Earth's Vespers, The Cherwell Water-lily, Memorials of a Happy Time.

The Meeting, ..

The Lesson, The Vision, The Teacher, . .

The Two Rivers,

6. The Younger River, [The Rothay,]

7. The Elder River, [The Brathay,]

8. The Preparation,

9. The Wheels, ..

10. The Glimpse, ..

1 1 . The Perplexity,

12. The Complaint,

13. The Voice,

14. The Temple, ..

15. The Priest,

16. The Humiliation,

17. The Haunted, Place Revisited,

18. A Dream, The Mourner's Dream, arising from a strange and distressing

impression of a friend's death in a foreign country,

1. The Ruined Harbour,

2. The Voyage, ..

3. The World's Edge,

'AGE I

5 9

16 28 33

Vllil

CONTEXTS.

PAGE

5. The Dream of King Croesus,

. 81

• 97

7. A Westmoreland Hamlet,

. 108

8. On Revisiting the River Eden, in "Westmoreland, 1S36.

• US

10. Heidelherg Castle,

• 125

11. Thelsis,

• 131

• 133

13. Ash- Wednesday, ..

• '35

14. Easter Communion,

• 137

15. The Signs of the Times,

• 139

16. Oxford in Spring, ..

. 140

17. Oxford in "Winter, ..

. 142

18. St. Marys at Xight,

• 145

19. College Chapel,

. 147

20. College Hall,

21. College Garden,

• 143

23. College Library,

. 148

23. Absence from Oxford, (1)

• 149

24. Absence from Oxford, (2)

■ 149

25. The Beginning of Term,

. 150

• 153

27. All Saints' Day.

1. The Gathering of the Dead,

• 157

2. The Middle Home,

• 159

28. The Storm is Past,

. 162

29. 'Tis -when we Suffer,

. 164

30. The Holy Angels ..

. 166

31. The Life of the Living,

33. ThePic-Xic,

34. My Godson's Baptism,

. 178

35. Birth-Day Thoughts, June 28, 1838. The Feast of St. Trenseu

The Vigil of St. Peter. The Coronation of Queen Victor!

36. Birthday Thoughts, at a Grave in Somersetshire, 1839,

. 183

37. A Lesson from the Ferns, . .

38. A Dream after an Argument with a Friend,

■ 187

39. I knew Three Sisters, who by Haunted Palls,

. 187

40. Some fall in Love with Voices, some with Eyes,

41. Castle-Hill, Keswick, .

42. Furness Abbey,

• 191

43. On the Heights near Devoke Water. August 7, 1838,

. 191

44.. The Groves of Penshurst,

45. The Iconoclast,

. 193

46. Three Happy Days,

• 193

47. Stern Friend,

• 194

48. To a Little Boy, ..

. 196

Contents

IX

PAGE

49. Verses sent to a Friend, with a Book,