Epilogue
Regent of Change, thou waning Moon,
Whom they, the sons of night, adore,
Her feet are on thee! Late or soon
Heap up upon the expectant shore
The tides of Man's Intelligence;
Or backward to the blackening deep
Remit them: Knowledge won from Sense
But sleeps to wake, and wakes to sleep.
Where are the hands that reared on high
Heaven-threat'ning Babel? where the might
Of them, that giant progeny,
The Deluge dealt with? Lost in night.
The child who knows his creed doth stretch
A sceptred hand o'er Space, and hold
The end of all those threads that catch
In wisdom's net the starry fold.
The Sabbath comes: the work-days six
Of Time go by; meantime the key,
O salutary crucifix,
Of all the worlds, we clasp in thee.
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Truth deeplier felt by none than him [Footnote 9]
Who at the Alban mountain's foot,
Wandering no more in shadows dim,
Lay down, a lamb-like offering mute.
[Footnote 9: Robert Isaak Wilberforce.]
His mighty lore found rest at last
In Faith, and woke in God. Ah, Friend!
When life which is not Life is past,
Pray that like thine may be my end.
Thy fair large front; thine eyes' grave blue;
Thine English ways so staid and plain;—
Through native rosemaries and rue
Memory creeps back to thee again.
Beside thy dying bed were writ
Some snatches of these random rhymes;
Weak Song, how happy if with it
Thy name should blend in after times.
Rome, April 27, 1857.