He told it all—
Creation, and that Sin which marred its face;
And how the great Creator, creature made,
God—God for man incarnate—died for man:
Dead, with His Cross he thundered on the gates
Of Death’s blind Hades. Then, with hands outstretched
His Holy Ones that, in their penance prison
From hope in Him had ceased not, to the light
Flashed from His bleeding hands and branded brow
Through darkness soared: they reign with Him in heaven:
Their brethren we, the children of one Sire.
Long time he spake. The winds forbore their wail;
The woods were hushed. That wondrous tale complete,
Not sudden fell the silence; for, as when
A huge wave forth from ocean toiling mounts
High-arched, in solid bulk, the beach rock-strewn,
Burying his hoar head under echoing cliffs,
And, after pause, refluent to sea returns
Not all at once is stillness, countless rills
Or devious winding down the steep, or borne
In crystal leap from sea-shelf to sea-well,
And sparry grot replying; gradual thus
With lessening cadence sank that great discourse,
While round him gazed Saint Patrick, now the old
Regarding, now the young, and flung on each
In turn his boundless heart, and gazing longed
As only Apostolic heart can long
To help the helpless.
“Fair, O friends, the bourn
We dwell in! Holy King makes happy land:
Our King is in our midst. He gave us gifts;
Laws that are Love, the sovereignty of Truth.
What, sirs, ye knew Him not! But ye by signs
Foresaw His coming, as, when buds are red
Ye say, ‘The spring is nigh us.’ Him, unknown,
Each loved who loved his brother! Shepherd youths,
Who spread the pasture green beneath your lambs
And freshened it with snow-fed stream and mist?
Who but that Love unseen? Grey mariners,
Who lulled the rough seas round your midnight nets,
And sent the landward breeze? Pale sufferers wan,
Rejoice! His are ye; yea, and His the most!
Have ye not watched the eagle that upstirs
Her nest, then undersails her falling brood
And stays them on her plumes, and bears them up
Till, taught by proof, they learn their unguessed powers
And breast the storm? Thus God stirs up His people;
Thus proves by pain. Ye too, O hearths well-loved!
How oft your sin-stained sanctities ye mourned!
Wives! from the cradle reigns the Bethelem Babe!
Maidens! henceforth the Virgin Mother spreads
Her shining veil above you!
“Speak aloud,
Chieftains world-famed! I hear the ancient blood
That leaps against your hearts! What? Warriors ye!
Danger your birthright, and your pastime death!
Behold your foes! They stand before you plain:
Ill passions, base ambitions, falsehood, hate:
Wage war on these! A King is in your host!
His hands no roses plucked but on the Cross:
He came not hand of man in woman’s tasks
To mesh. In woman’s hand, in childhood’s hand,
Much more in man’s, He lodged His conquering sword;
Them too His soldiers named, and vowed to war.
Rise, clan of Kings, rise, champions of man’s race,
Heaven’s sun-clad army militant on earth,
One victory gained, the realm decreed is ours.
The bridal bells ring out, for Low with High
Is wed in endless nuptials. It is past,
The sin, the exile, and the grief. O man,
Take thou, renewed, thy sister-mate by hand;
Know well thy dignity, and hers: return,
And meet once more Thy Maker, for He walks
Once more within thy garden, in the cool
Of the world’s eve!”
The words that Patrick spake
Were words of power, not futile did they fall:
But, probing, healed a sorrowing people’s wound.
Round him they stood, as oft in Grecian days,
Some haughty city sieged, her penitent sons
Thronging green Pnyx or templed Forum hushed
Hung listening on that People’s one true Voice,
The man that ne’er had flattered, ne’er deceived,
Nursed no false hope. It was the time of Faith;
Open was then man’s ear, open his heart:
Pride spurned not then that chiefest strength of man
The power, by Truth confronted, to believe.
Not savage was that wild, barbaric race:
Spirit was in them. On their knees they sank,
With foreheads lowly bent; and when they rose
Such sound went forth as when late anchored fleet
Touched by dawn breeze, shakes out its canvas broad
And sweeps into new waters. Man with man
Clasped hands; and each in each a something saw
Till then unseen. As though flesh-bound no more,
Their souls had touched. One Truth, the Spirit’s life,
Lived in them all, a vast and common joy.
And yet as when, that Pentecostal morn,
Each heard the Apostle in his native tongue,
So now, on each, that Truth, that Joy, that Life
Shone forth with beam diverse. Deep peace to one
Those tidings seemed, a still vale after storm;
To one a sacred rule, steadying the world;
A third exulting saw his youthful hope
Written in stars; a fourth triumphant hailed
The just cause, long oppressed. Some laughed, some wept:
But she, that aged chieftain’s mournful wife
Clasped to her boding breast his hoary head
Loud clamouring, “Death is dead; and not for long
That dreadful grave can part us.” Last of all,
He too believed. That hoary head had shaped
Full many a crafty scheme:—behind them all
Nature held fast her own.
O happy night!
Back through the gloom of centuries sin-defaced
With what a saintly radiance thou dost shine!
They slept not, on the loud-resounding shore
In glory roaming. Many a feud that night
Lay down in holy grave, or, mockery made,
Was quenched in its own shame. Far shone the fires
Crowning dark hills with gladness: soared the song;
And heralds sped from coast to coast to tell
How He the Lord of all, no Power Unknown
But like a man rejoicing in his house,
Ruled the glad earth. That demon-haunted wood,
Sad Erin’s saddest region, yet, men say,
Tenderest for all its sadness, rang at last
With hymns of men and angels. Onward sailed
High o’er the long, unbreaking, azure waves
A mighty moon, full-faced, as though on winds
Of rapture borne. With earliest red of dawn
Northward once more the wingèd war-ships rushed
Swift as of old to that long hated shore—
Not now with axe and torch. His Name they bare
Who linked in one the nations.
On a cliff
Where Fochlut’s Wood blackened the northern sea
A convent rose. Therein those sisters twain
Whose cry had summoned Patrick o’er the deep,
Abode, no longer weepers. Pallid still,
In radiance now their faces shone; and sweet
Their psalms amid the clangour of rough brine.
Ten years in praise to God and good to men
That happy precinct housed them. In their morn
Grief had for them her great work perfected;
Their eve was bright as childhood. When the hour
Came for their blissful transit, from their lips
Pealed forth ere death that great triumphant chant
Sung by the Virgin Mother. Ages passed;
And, year by year, on wintry nights, that song
Alone the sailors heard—a cry of joy.
SAINT PATRICK AND KING LAEGHAIRE.
“Thou son of Calphurn, in peace go forth!
This hand shall slay them whoe’er shall slay thee!
The carles shall stand to their necks in earth
Till they die of thirst who mock or stay thee!
“But my father, Nial, who is dead long since,
Permits not me to believe thy word;
For the servants of Jesus, thy heavenly Prince,
Once dead, lie flat as in sleep, interred:
But we are as men that through dark floods wade;
We stand in our black graves undismayed;
Our faces are turned to the race abhorred,
And at each hand by us stand spear or sword,
Ready to strike at the last great day,
Ready to trample them back into clay!
“This is my realm, and men call it Eire,
Wherein I have lived and live in hate
Like Nial before me and Erc his sire,
Of the race Lagenian, ill-named the Great!”