He spake of love, such love as Spirits feel In worlds whose course is equable and pure; No fears to beat away — no strife to heal — The past unsighed for, and the future sure; Spake of heroic arts in graver mood Revived, with finer harmony pursued; Of all that is most beauteous — imaged there In happier beauty; more pellucid streams, An ampler ether, a diviner air, And fields invested with purpureal gleams; Climes which the sun, who sheds the brightest day Earth knows, is all unworthy to survey. Yet there the Soul shall enter which hath earned That privilege by virtue. — 'Ill,' said he, 'The end of man's existence I discerned, Who from ignoble games and revelry Could draw, when we had parted, vain delight, While tears were thy best pastime, day and night; 'And while my youthful peers before my eyes (Each hero following his peculiar bent) Prepared themselves for glorious enterprise By martial sports, — or, seated in the tent, Chieftains andjcings in council were detained; What time the fleet at Aulis lay enchained. 'The wished-for wind was given: — I then revolved The oracle, upon the silent sea; And, if no worthier led the way, resolved That, of a thousand vessels, mine should be The foremost prow in pressing to the strand, — Mine the first blood that tinged the Trojan sand. 'Yet bitter, oft-times bitter, was the pang When of thy loss I thought, beloved Wife! On thee too fondly did my memory hang, And on the joys we shared in mortal life, — The paths which we had trod — these fountains, flowers My new-planned cities, and unfinished towers. 'But should suspense permit the Foe to cry, 'Behold they tremble! — haughty their array, Yet of their number no one dares to die?' In soul I swept the indignity away: Old frailties then recurred: — but lofty thought, In act embodied, my deliverance wrought. 'And Thou, though strong in love, art all too weak In reason, in self-government too slow; I counsel thee by fortitude to seek Our blest re-union in the shades below. The invisible world with thee hath sympathised; Be thy affections raised and solemnised. 'Learn, by a mortal yearning, to ascend — Seeking a higher object. Love was given, Encouraged, sanctioned, chiefly for that end; For this the passion to excess was driven — That self might be annulled: her bondage prove The fetters of a dream, opposed to love.' — Aloud she shrieked! for Hermes reappears! Round the dear Shade she would have clung — 'tis vain: The hours are past — too brief had they been years; And him no mortal effort can detain: Swift, toward the realms that know not earthly day, He through the portal takes his silent way, And oh the palace-floor a lifeless corse She lay. Thus, all in vain exhorted and reproved, She perished; and, as for a wilful crime, By the just Gods whom no weak pity moved, Was doomed to wear out her appointed time, Apart from happy Ghosts, that gather flowers Of blissful quiet 'mid unfading bowers. — Yet tears to human suffering are due; And mortal hopes defeated and o'erthrown Are mourned by man, and not by man alone, As fondly he believes. - Upon the side Of Hellespont (such faith was entertained) A knot of spiry trees for ages grew
