Poems

Front matter

* 9 ,

POEMS

RICHARD CHENEVIX TRENCH

Preface

In issuing the present volume, a word or two of explanation is due to the reader ; and it has rarely fallen to the lot of an American Editor to have a more agreeable duty to discharge than in saying what is requisite to the occasion.

It may not be known to every one, that Richard Chenevix Trench is a poet as well as a divine ; that he is one of the truest and best of the poets of our day ; and that he has cultivated the muses no less successfully than the graver studies of the theologian and professor of divinity. With us, he is widely known and revered as a profound master in theological science, and a ripe and admirable scholar in polite literature. In England, he is also recognised as a poet worthy to rank with the Herberts, the Hebers, the Kebles, and others of the clergy, who have given utterance to strains of poesy as charming and soothing as they are instructive and elevating. The " Christian Remembrancer" — no mean authority — in an able article, some years ago, on " The Religious Poets of the Day," declares of Mr. Trench : " We put him at the head of our present religious poets. More than any of his brethren, he seems to us to have a distinct calling to serve the Muses. He was born a poet, and would have been one, we think, had his mind never been called to the sacred subjects which have exercised it, and which have 1 moralized his strain.' He is, too, more than any of his rivals in the same line, an artist, nearly always seeking to perfect his veriest trifles In keeping with this great merit, we must

4 PREFACE,

mention the severity and purity of Mr. Trench's English, a praise which we can not accord to other of his contemporaries, whom, in some respects, we rate very highly."

Fully persuaded of all this, it seemed to the American Editor only meet and proper that Mr. Trench should be permitted to delight the lovers of poesy on this side of the Atlantic by his wooings of the muse, no less than by his noble contributions to theological and general literature. During past years he has published several volumes of poems ; * and it occurred to the Editor that a copious selection from these volumes might be made, which should bring the learned and estimable author before American readers in a somewhat new but not less pleasing light. Accordingly, in the course of correspondence, he suggested the plan and its substance to Mr. Trench ; and received in reply, not only the author's consent, but his most hearty commendation of the plan and its execution.

The selection in the present volume comprises considerably more than half of Mr. Trench's published poems. Confidently believing that it has been so made as not unwittingly to do injustice to the accomplished author, and not without hope that the entire collection may, at no distant day, be called for, the present volume is commended to the thousands of intelligent readers in our country who can appreciate and enjoy the rich repast here

set before them.

J. A. Spencer.

New York, Easter Even, 1856.

# " The Story of Justin Martyr, and other Poems." Third Edition, 1851, pp. 284.

" Poems from Eastern Sources, Genoveva, and other Poems." Second Edition, with Additions, 1851, pp. 245.

"Elegiac Poems." Second Edition, 1850, pp. 75.

"Alma, and other Poems." Second Edition, 1855, pp. 44.

Contents

PAGE

TO A CHILD PLAYING 35

A WALK IN A CHURCHYARD 36

II. Not otherwise perhaps this argument

Won from me, where I found it, such regard,

That I esteemed no labor thereon spent As wearisome or hard.

in.

In huge and antique volume did it lie,

That by two solemn clasps was duly bound,

As neither to be opened nor laid by But with due thought profound.

IV

There fixed thought to questions did I lend, Which hover on the bounds of mortal ken,

And have perplexed, and will unto the end Perplex the brains of men :

Y.

Of what is time, and what eternity,

Of all that seems and is not — forms of things Till my tired spirit followed painfully

On flagging, weary wings :

That grace must help me, as it only can,

Winning such transient credence, while I tell

What to a cloistered, solitary man In distant times befell.

IX

Him little might our earthly grandeur feed, Who to the uttermost was vowed to be

A follower of his Master's barest need In holy poverty.

Nor might he know the gentle mutual strife Of home-affections, which can more or less

Temper with sweet the bitter of our life, And lighten its distress.

Even thus he lived, with little joy or pain

Drawn through the channels by which men receive -

Most men receive the things which for the main Make them rejoice or grieve.

XX

But for delight, on spiritual gladness fed, And obvious to temptations of like kind ;

One such, from out his very gladness bred, It was his lot to find.

When first it came, he lightly put it by, But it returned again to him ere long,

And ever hanging got some new ally, And every time more strong —

XXII

A little worm that gnawed the life away Of a tall plant, the canker of its root,

Or like as when, from some small speck, decay Spreads o'er a beauteous fruit.

xxm.

For still the doubt came back—" Can God provide

For the large heart of man what shall not pall, Nor through eternal ages' endless tide - On tired spirits fall ?

This mood endured, till every act of love,

Yigils of praise and prayer, and midnight choir,

All shadows of the service done above, And which, while his desire —

XXVII

And while his hope was heavenward, he had loved, As helps to disengage him from the chain

That fastens unto earth — all these now proved Most burdensome and vain.

xxvin.

What must have been the issue of that mood It were a thing to fear — but that one day,

Upon the limits of an ancient wood, His thoughts him led astray.

XXIX. Darkling he went, nor once applied his ear

(On a loud sea of agitations thrown), Nature's low tones and harmonies to hear,

Heard by the calm alone.

The merry chirrup of the grasshopper,

Sporting among the roots of withered grass,

The dry leaf rustling to the wind's light stir, Did each unnoted pass :

XXXI

He, walking in a trance of selfish care, Not once observed the beauty shed around,

The blue above, the music in the air, The flowers upon the ground :