§ 5.
… Hark to those sounds!
They come of tender beings angelical,
Least and most childlike of the sons of God.
FIRST CHOIR OF ANGELICALS.
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Praise to the Holiest in the height, In all his words most wonderful; To us his elder race he gave Without the chastisement of pain, The younger son he willed to be Spirit and flesh his parents were; The Eternal blessed his child and armed, To serve as champion in the field To be his vice-roy in the world Upon the frontier, toward the foe, |
And in the depth be praise: Most sure in all his ways! To battle and to win, Without the soil of sin. A marvel in his birth: His home was heaven and earth. And sent him hence afar, Of elemental war. Of matter, and of sense; A resolute defence. |
ANGEL.
We now have passed the gate, and are within
The house of judgment; and whereas on earth
Temples and palaces are formed of parts
Costly and rare, but all material,
So in the world of spirits nought is found,
To mould withal and form a whole,
But what is immaterial; and thus
The smallest portions of this edifice,
Cornice, or frieze, or balustrade, or stair,
The very pavement is made up of life—
Of holy, blessed, and immortal beings,
Who hymn their Maker's praise continually.
SECOND CHOIR OF ANGELICALS.
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Praise to the Holiest in the height, In all his words most wonderful; Woe to thee, man! for he was found And lost his heritage of heaven, Above him now the angry sky, Who once had angels for his friends, O man! a savage kindred they: He scaled the sea-side cave and clomb With now a fear and now a hope, From youth to old, from sire to son, He dreed his penance age by age; Slowly to doff his savage garb, And quickened by the Almighty's breath, And taught by angel-visitings, And learned to call upon his name, A household and a fatherland, Glory to him who from the mire, Elaborated into life |
And in the depth be praise: Most sure in all his ways! A recreant in the fight; And fellowship with light. Around the tempest's din Has but the brutes for kin. To flee that monster brood The giants of the wood. With aids which chance supplied, He lived, and toiled, and died. And step by step began And be again a man. And chastened by his rod, At length he sought his God; And in his faith create A city and a state. In patient length of days, A people to his praise! |
SOUL.
The sound is like the rushing of the wind—
The summer wind—among the lofty pines;
Swelling and dying, echoing round about,
Now here, now distant, wild and beautiful;
While scattered from the branches it has stirred,
Descend ecstatic odors.
THIRD CHOIR OF ANGELICALS.
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Praise to the Holiest in the height, In all his words most wonderful; The angels, as beseemingly At once were tried and perfected, For them no twilight or eclipse; Twas hopeless, all-engulfing night, But to the younger race there rose And slowly, surely, gracefully, And ages, opening out, divide And from the hard and sullen mass O man! albeit the quickening ray Takes him at length what once he was, Yet still between that earth and heaven— A double agony awaits A double debt he has to pay— The chill of death is past, and now Glory to him, who evermore Who tears the soul from out its case, |
And in the depth be praise: Most sure in all his ways! To spirit-kind was given, And took their seats in heaven. No growth and no decay: Or beatific day. A hope upon its fall; The morning dawned on all. The precious and the base, Mature the heirs of grace. Lit from his second birth, And heaven grows out of earth; His journey and its goal— His body and his soul. The forfeit of his sins: The penance-fire begins. By truth and justice reigns; And burns away its stains! |
ANGEL.
They sing of thy approaching agony,
Which thou so eagerly didst question of:
It is the face of the incarnate God
Shall smite thee with that keen and subtle pain;
And yet the memory which it leaves will be
A sovereign febrifuge to heal the wound;
And yet withal it will the wound provoke,
And aggravate and widen it the more.
SOUL.
Thou speakest mysteries; still methinks I know
To disengage the tangle of thy words:
Yet rather would I hear thy angel voice,
Than for myself be thy interpreter.
ANGEL.
When then—if such thy lot—thou seest thy Judge,
The sight of him will kindle in thy heart
All tender, gracious, reverential thoughts.
Thou wilt be sick with love, and yearn for him,
And feel as though thou couldst but pity him,
That one so sweet should e'er have placed himself
At disadvantage such, as to be used
So vilely by a being so vile as thee.
There is a pleading in his pensive eyes
Will pierce thee to the quick, and trouble thee.
And thou wilt hate and loathe thyself; for, though
Now sinless, thou wilt feel that thou hast sinned,
As never thou didst feel; and wilt desire
To slink away, and hide thee from his sight;
And yet wilt have a longing aye to dwell
Within the beauty of his countenance.
And these two pains, so counter and so keen,—
The longing for him, when thou seest him not;
The shame of self at thought of seeing him,—
Will be thy veriest, sharpest purgatory.
SOUL.
My soul is in my hand: I have no fear,—
In his dear might prepared for weal or woe.
But hark! a deep, mysterious harmony
It floods me, like the deep and solemn sound
Of many waters.
ANGEL.
We have gained the stairs
Which rise toward the presence-chamber; there
A band of mighty angels keep the way
On either side, and hymn the incarnate God.
ANGELS OF THE SACRED STAIR.
Father, whose goodness none can know, but they
Who see thee face to face,
By man hath come the infinite display
Of thine all-loving grace;
But fallen man—the creature of a day—
Skills not that love to trace.
It needs, to tell the triumph thou hast wrought,
An angel's deathless fire, an angel's reach of thought.
It needs that very angel, who with awe
Amid the garden shade,
The great Creator in his sickness saw,
Soothed by a creature's aid,
And agonized, as victim of the law
Which he himself had made;
For who can praise him in his depth and height,
But he who saw him reel in that victorious fight?
SOUL.
Hark! for the lintels of the presence-gate
Are vibrating and echoing back the strain.
FOURTH CHOIR OF ANGELICALS.
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Praise to the Holiest in the height, In all his words most wonderful; The foe blasphemed the holy Lord, In that he placed his puppet man For even in his best estate, A sorry sentinel was he, As though a thing, who for his help Could cope with those proud rebel hosts, And when, by blandishment of Eve, He shrieked in triumph, and he cried, The Maker by his word is bound, He must abandon to his doom, |
And in the depth be praise Most sure in all his ways! As if he reckoned ill, The frontier place to fill. With amplest gifts endued, A being of flesh and blood. Must needs possess a wife, Who had angelic life. That earth-born Adam fell, "A sorry sentinel. Escape or cure is none; And slay his darling Son." |
ANGEL.
And now the threshold, as we traverse it,
Utters aloud its glad responsive chant.
FIFTH CHOIR OF ANGELICALS.
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Praise to the Holiest in the height, In all his words most wonderful; O loving wisdom of our God! A second Adam to the fight O wisest love! that flesh and blood Should strive afresh against the foe, And that a higher gift than grace God's presence and his very self, O generous love! that he who smote The double agony in man And in the garden secretly, Should teach his brethren and inspire |
And in the depth be praise: Most sure in all his ways! When all was sin and shame, And to the rescue came. Which did in Adam fail, Should strive and should prevail. Should flesh and blood refine, And essence all-divine. In man for man the foe, For man should undergo; And on the cross on high, To suffer and to die. |