Eternity enclosed me, and I knew not,
Knew not, even then, my destiny. To doubt
Was to despair;—I doubted and despair'd.
Then horrible delirium whirl'd me down
To ocean's nethermost recess; the waves
Disparting freely, let me fall, and fall,
Lower and lower, passive as a stone,
Yet rack'd with miserable pangs, that gave
The sense of vain but violent resistance:
And still the depths grew deeper; still the ground
Receded from my feet as I approach'd it.
O how I long'd to light on rocks, that sunk
Like quicksands ere I touch'd them; or to hide
In caverns ever open to ingulf me,
But, like the horizon's limit, never nearer!
Meanwhile the irrepressible tornado,
Burst, and involved the elements in chaos;
Wind, rain, and lightning, in one vast explosion,
Rush'd from the firmament upon the deep.
Heaven's adamantine arch seem'd rent asunder,
And following in a cataract of ruins
My swift descent through bottomless abysses,
Where ocean's bed had been absorb'd in nothing.
I know no farther. When again I saw
The sun, the sea, the island, all was calm,
And all was desolation: not a tree,
Of thousands flourishing erewhile so fair,
But now was split, uprooted, snapt in twain,
Or hurl'd with all its honours to the dust.
Heaps upon heaps, the forest giants lay,
Even like the slain in battle, fall'n to rise
No more, till heaven, and earth, and sea, with all
Therein, shall perish, as to me they seem'd
To perish in that ruthless hurricane.
NATURE and Time were twins. Companions still,
Their unretarded, unreturning flight
They hold together. Time, with one sole aim,
Looks ever onward, like the moon through space
With beaming forehead, dark and bald behind,
Nor ever lost a moment in his course.
Nature looks all around her, like the sun,
And keeps her works, like his dependent worlds,
In constant motion. She hath never miss'd
One step in her victorious march of change,
For chance she knows not; He who made her, gave
His daughter power o'er all except Himself,
- Power in whate'er she does to do his will,
Behold the true, the royal law of Nature!
Hence failures, hinderances, and devastations
Are turn'd to trophies of exhaustless skill,
That out of ruin brings forth strength and beauty,
Yea, life and immortality from death.
I gazed in consternation on the wreck
Of that fair island, strown with prostrate trees,
The soil plough'd up with horrid inundations,
The surface black with sea-weed, not a glimpse
Of verdure peeping; stems, boughs, foliage lay
Rent, broken, clotted, perishing in slime.
"How are the mighty fallen!" I exclaim'd;
Surely the feller hath come up among ye,
And with a stroke invisible hewn down
The growth of centuries in one dark hour!
Is this the end of all perfection? This
The abortive issue of a new creation,
Erewhile so fruitful in abounding joys,
And hopes fulfilling more than all they promised?
Ages to come can but repair this ravage;
The past is lost for ever. Reckless Time
Stays not; astonied Nature stands aghast,
And wrings her hands in silent agony,
Amidst the annihilation of her works."
Thus raved I; but I wrong'd thee, glorious Nature! With whom adversity is but transition.
Thou never didst despair, wert never foil'd,
Nor weary with exhaustion, since the day,
When, at the word, "Let there be light," light sprang,
And show'd thee rising from primeval darkness,
That fell back like a veil from thy young form,
And Chaos fled before the apparition.
While yet mine eye was mourning o'er the scene, Nature and Time were working miracles : The isle was renovated; grass and flowers Crept quietly around the fallen trees; A deeper soil embedded them, and o'er The common sepulchre of all their race Threw a rich covering of embroider'd turf, Lovely to look on as the tranquil main,
When, in his noonward track, the unclouded sun
Tints the green waves with every hue of heaven,
More exquisitely brilliant and aërial
Than morn or evening's gaudier pageantry.
Amidst that burial of the mighty dead,
There was a resurrection from the dust
Of lowly plants, impatient for the light,
Long interrupted by o'ershadowing woods,
While in the womb of earth their embryos tarried,
Unfructifying, yet imperishable.
Huge remnants of the forest stood apart,
Like Tadmor's pillars in the wilderness,
Startling the traveller 'midst his thoughts of home;
- Bare trunks of broken trees, that gave their heads
To the wind's axe, but would not yield their roots
To the uptearing violence of the floods.
From these a slender race of scions sprang,
Which with their filial arms embraced and shelter'd The monumental relics of their sires;
But, limited in number, scatter'd wide,
And slow of growth, they overran no more
The Sun's dominions in that open isle.
Meanwhile the sea-fowl, that survived the storm, Whose rage had fleck'd the waves with shatter'd plumes
And weltering carcasses, the prey of sharks,
Came from their fastnesses among the rocks,
And multiplied like clouds when rains are brooding,
Or flowers, when clear warm sunshine follows rain.
The inland birds had perish'd, nor again,
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