To him who in the love of Nature holds
Communion' with her visible forms, she speaks
A various language: for his gayer hours
She has a voice of gladness, and a smile
And eloquence of beauty; and she glides
Into his darker musings,3 with a mild
And healing sympathy, that steals 5 away
Their sharpness, ere he is aware. When thoughts
Of the last bitter hour come like a blight
Over thy spirit, and sad images
Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,
And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,
Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart;
Go forth, under the open sky, and list
To Nature's teachings, while from all around-
Earth and her waters, and the depths of air-
Comes a still voice: Yet a few days, and thee
The all-beholding sun shall see no more
In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground,
Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears,
Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist
Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim
Thy growth,1 to be resolved to earth again;
And, lost each human trace," surrendering up
Thine individual being, shalt thou go
To mix for ever with the elements;
To be a brother to the insensible 12 rock,
And to the sluggish ciod, which the rude swain 13 Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak Shall send his roots abroad and pierce thy mould.
Yet not to thine eternal resting-place Shalt thou retire alone, nor couldst thou wish Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down With patriarchs 14 of the infant world, with kings,
The powerful of the earth, the wise, the good,
Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,
All in one mighty sepulchre. The hills
Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun; 15 the vales
Stretching in pensive quietness 10 between;
The venerable 17 woods; rivers that move
In majesty, and the complaining brooks
That make the meadows green; and poured round all Old Ocean's gray and melancholy 18 waste,
Are but the solemn decorations all
Of the great tomb of man.
The planets, all the infinite host of heaven,19
Are shining on the sad abodes of death,
Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread
The globe are but a handful to the tribes
That slumber in its bosom. Take the wings
Of morning," pierce the Barcan wilderness,
Or lose thyself in the continuous woods
Where rolls the Oregon,23 and hears no sound
Save his own dashings, — yet the dead are there!
And millions in those solitudes,24 since first
The flight of years began, have laid them down
In their last sleep, — the dead reign there alone.
So shalt thou rest; and what if thou withdraw
In silence 25 from the living, and no friend
Take note of thy departure? All that breathe
Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh
When thou art gone, the solemn brood
of care
Plod on, and each one, as before, will chase
His favorite phantom; 27 yet all these shall leave
Their mirth and their employments, and shall come
And make their bed with thee. As the long train
Of ages glide 28 away, the sons of men
The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes
In the full strength of years, matron and maid,
The speechless babe, and the gray-headed man
Shall one by one be gathered to thy side,
By those who in their turn shall follow them.
So live, that when thy summons comes to join The innumerable caravan that moves
To that mysterious realm,3° where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,
Thou go not, like the quarry slave at night,
Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.
WHITHER, midst falling dew,'
While glow the heavens with the last steps of day, Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue Thy solitary 3 way?
Vainly the fowler's eye
Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong,
As, darkly seen against the crimson sky,
Thy figure floats 5 along.
All day thy wings have fanned,
At that far height,1° the cold, thin atmosphere,
Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land,
Though the dark night is near.
And soon that toil shall end;
Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest,
And scream among thy fellows; reeds shall bend,
Soon, o'er thy sheltered nest.
Thou'rt gone, the abyss" of heaven
Hath swallowed up thy form; yet, on my heart
Deeply has sunk the lesson 12 thou hast given,
And shall not soon depart:
He who, from zone to zone,
Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight,
In the long way that I must tread alone,
Will lead my steps aright.
THE groves were God's first temples. Ere man learned To hew the shaft, and lay the architrave,'
And spread the roof above them,
The lofty vault,2 to gather and roll back
The sound of anthems; 3 in the darkling wood,
Amid 5 the cool and silence, he knelt down,
And offered to the Mightiest solemn 6 thanks
And supplication. For his simple heart
Might not resist the sacred influences
Which, from the stilly twilight of the place,
And from the gray old trunks that high in heaven
Mingled their mossy boughs, and from the sound
Of the invisible breath that swayed at once
All their green tops, stole over him, and bowed
His spirit with the thought of boundless power
And inaccessible majesty. Ah, why
Should we, in the world's riper years, neglect
God's ancient sanctuaries, 10 and adore
Only among the crowd, and under roofs
That our frail hands have raised?
Here, in the shadow of this aged wood,
Offer one hymn-thrice happy, if it find
Acceptance in His ear.
Hath reared these venerable columns, thou
Didst weave this verdant roof. Thou didst look down
forthwith, rose
They, in thy sun,
Upon the naked earth," and,
All these fair ranks of trees.
Budded and shook their green leaves in thy breeze,
And shot toward heaven. The century-living crow
Whose birth was in their tops, grew old and died
Among their branches, till, at last, they stood,
As now they stand, massy, and tall, and dark,
Fit shrine 12 for humble worshipper to hold
Communion with his Maker. These dim vaults,
These winding aisles, of human pomp or pride
Report 13 not. No fantastic 14 carvings show
The boast of our vain race to change the form
Of thy fair works. But thou art here thou fill'st
The solitude. Thou art in the soft winds
That run along the summit of these trees
In music; thou art in the cooler breath
That from the inmost darkness of the place
Comes, scarcely felt; the barky trunks, the ground,
The fresh moist ground, are all instinct 15 with thee.
Here is continual worship; - Nature, here,
In the tranquillity that thou dost love,
Enjoys thy presence. Noiselessly, around,
From perch to perch, the solitary bird
Passes; and yon clear spring, that, midst its herbs,
Wells softly forth and wandering steeps the roots
Of half the mighty forest, tells no tale
Of all the good it does. Thou hast not left
Thyself without a witness, in the shades,
Of thy perfections. Grandeur, strength, and grace
Are here to speak of thee. This mighty oak
By whose immovable stem I stand and seem
Almost annihilated-
In all that proud old world beyond the deep,
E'er wore his crown as loftily as he
Wears the green coronal of leaves with which
Thy hand has graced him. Nestled at his root
Is beauty, such as blooms not in the glare
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