By night we dragg'd her to the college tower From her warm bed, and up the corkscrew stair Might have been happy but what lot is pure? : We took them all, till she was left alone Upon her tower, the Niobe of swine, And so return'd unfarrow'd to her sty. John. They found you out? James. Not they. John. Well-after all What know we of the secret of a man? His nerves were wrong. What ails us, who are sound, That we should mimic this raw fool the world, Which charts us all in its coarse blacks or whites, As ruthless as a baby with a worm, As cruel as a schoolboy ere he grows To Pity-more from ignorance than will. But put your best foot forward, or I fear That we shall miss the mail: and here it comes With five at top: as quaint a four-in-hand As you shall see -three pyebalds and a roan. ST. SIMEON STYLITES. ALTHO' I be the basest of mankind, From scalp to sole one slough and crust of sin, I will not cease to grasp the hope I hold Of saintdom, and to clamour, mourn and sob, Battering the gates of heaven with storms of prayer, Have mercy, Lord, and take away my sin. Let this avail, just, dreadful, mighty God, This not be all in vain, that thrice ten years, Thrice multiplied by superhuman pangs, In hungers and in thirsts, fevers and cold, In coughs, aches, stitches, ulcerous throes and cramps, A sign betwixt the meadow and the cloud, Patient on this tall pillar I have borne Rain, wind, frost, heat, hail, damp, and sleet, and snow; And I had hoped that ere this period closed Thou wouldst have caught me up into thy rest, The meed of saints, the white robe and the palm. Than were those lead-like tons of sin, that crush'd O Lord, Lord, Thou knowest I bore this better at the first, I drown'd the whoopings of the owl with sound Now am I feeble grown : my end draws nigh- While my stiff spine can hold my weary head, O Jesus, if thou wilt not save my soul, Who may be saved? who is it may be saved? Who may be made a saint, if I fail here? Show me the man hath suffer'd more than I. For did not all thy martyrs die one death? For either they were stoned, or crucified, Or burn'd in fire, or boil'd in oil, or sawn In twain beneath the ribs; but I die here To-day, and whole years long, a life of death. Bear witness, if I could have found a way (And heedfully I sifted all my thought) More slowly-painful to subdue this home |