Chapter XII: Part THE THIRD

"I argue not
Against Heaven's hand or will, nor bate a jot
Of heart or hope, but still bear up, and steer
Right onward. What supports me, dost thou ask?
The conscience, friend."--MILTON'S _Sonnet to Cyriack Skinner_.

I.

Years have flown by;--and Strife hath raged and ceased;
Still on the ear the halted thunder rings;
And still in halls, where purple tyrants feast,
Glares the red warning to inebriate kings.
Midnight is past: the lamp with steadfast light
A silent cell, a mighty toil illumes;
And hot and lurid on the student's sight
Flares the still ray which, like himself, consumes
Its life in gilding darkness. Damp and chill
Gather the dews on aching temples wan,
Wrung from the frame which fails the unconquer'd will
In the fierce struggle between soul and man.

II.

Alas! no more to golden palaces,
To starlit founts and dryad-haunted trees,
The SWEET DELUSION wafts the dreamy soul;
But with slow step and steadfast eyes that strain
Dazzled and scathed, towards the far-flaming goal
He braved the storm, and labour'd up the plain
O doubtful labour, but O glorious pain!
On the doom'd sight the gradual darkness steals
Bates he a jot of heart and hope?--he feels
But in his loss a world's eternal gain.[E]
Blame we or laud the Cause, all human life
Is grander by one grand self-sacrifice;
While earth disputes if righteous be the strife,
The martyr soars beyond it to the skies.
Yes, though when Freedom had her temple won
She rear'd a scaffold to obscure a shrine;
And, by the human sacrifice of one,
Sullied the million,--who could then define
The subtle tints where good and evil blend?--
There comes no rainbow when the floods descend!
Who, just escaped the chain and prison-bar,
Halts on the bridge to guess where glides the stream;
Who plays the casuist 'mid the roar of war;
Or in the arena builds the Academe?
Whate'er their errors, lightly those condemn
Who, had they felt not, fought not, glow'd and err'd,
Had left us what their fathers left to them--
Either the thraldom of the passive herd
Stall'd for the shambles at the master's word,
Or the dread overleap of walls that close,
And spears that bristle:--And the last they chose.
Calm from the hills their children gaze to-day,
And breathe the airs to which they forced the way.

III.

And thou, of whom I sing--what should we all,
Whate'er our state-creed, venerate in thee?
Purpose heroic; and majestical
Disdain of self;--the soul in which we see
Conviction, welding, from the furnace-zeal,
Duty, the iron mainspring of the mind;
Ardour, if fierce, yet fired for England's weal;
And man's strong heart-throb beating for mankind.
These move our homage, doubtful though we be
If ev'n thy pen acquits the headman's steel,
When thy page cites the crownless Dead--and pleads
Defence for nations in a judgeless cause:
Judgeless, for time shall ne'er decide what deeds
Damn or absolve the hosts whom Freedom leads
O'er the pale border-land of dying laws
Into the vague world of Necessity.

IV.

He lifts his look where on the lattice bar,
Through clouds fast gathering, shines a single star;
Large on the haze of his receding sight
It spreads, and spreads, and floods all space with light;
Nature's last glorious mournful smile on him
Ev'n while on earth so near the Seraphim.
Now from the blaze he veils with tremulous hand
The scorching eyes:--and now the starlight fades:
Midnight and cloud resettle on the Land,
And o'er her champion's vision rush the shades.

What rests to both?--the inner light that glows
Out from the gloom that Fate on each bestows;
There is no PRESENT to a hope sublime;
Man has eternity, and Nations time!

[E] The Council of State ordered, January 1649-50, "That Mr. Milton
do prepare something in answer to the book of Salmasius, and
when he hath done itt, bring itt to the Council." He was
present, says his biographer, at the discussion which led to the
order, and though warned that the loss of sight would be the
certain consequence of obeying it, did so.--He called to mind,
to use his own image, the two destinies the oracle announced to
Achilles:--"If he stay before Troy, he will return to his land
no more, but have everlasting glory--if he withdraw, long will
be his life and short his fame."