"Lead, kindly Light, amid th' encircling gloom.
Lead thou me on!
The night is dark, and I am far from home—
Lead thou me on!
Keep thou my feet: I do not ask to see
The distant scene—one step enough for me.
"I was not ever thus, nor prayed that thou
Would'st lead me on.
I loved to choose and see my path; but now
Lead thou me on!
I loved the garish day, and, spite of fears.
Pride ruled my will: remember not past years.
"So long thy power hath blest me, sure it still
Will lead me on
O'er moor and fen, o'er crag and torrent, till
The night is gone;
And with the morn those angel faces smile
Which I have loved long since, and lost awhile."
Fond as Dr. Newman is of modern poetry he has not imitated it. His style is original—a rare mixture of strength, sincerity, and sweetness, moulded rather after the choruses of Greek dramas, than the rich creations of Keats, Shelley, Tennyson, and Longfellow. Hence his poems bear a nearer resemblance to Milton's Samson Agonistes than to any other English production. His lyrical pieces, again, often remind us of George Herbert, and of Shenstone, Waller, and Cowley. They have a clearness of expression and bright fluency, which makes you love the writer even when you cannot greatly admire his verse. One of the best specimens of his poetic faculty in the Verses on Various Occasions is a poem called "Consolations in Bereavement," written in 1828. It turns on one idea—the rapidity of death's work in the case of the dear sister whom he mourns. He solaces himself with the reflection that the deed was quickly done, and thus derives comfort from a thought which is in most cases afflictive. Perhaps Byron's lines were unconsciously running in his head:
"I know not if I could have borne
To see thy beauties fade:
......
Thy day without a cloud hath past,
And thou wert lovely to the last;
Extinguished, not decayed;
As stars that shoot along the sky
Shine brightest as they fall from high."
Dr. Newman's poetry did not properly fall within the scope of this article, but we have been led to speak of it because he was Keble's colleague in the Lyra Apostolica, and because the verses of the surviving poet have just appeared in England in a new form, and have attracted general attention and been made the subject of admiring and affectionate criticism not merely by Catholic periodicals, but by non-Catholic reviews and newspapers of every political and religious shade. Indeed, the praise bestowed on them by such journalists has exceeded that of our own critics, because it has, generally speaking, been more discriminating and uttered by higher authorities in the literary world.
Let us then rejoice that English literature includes three poets at least—Cowper, Keble, and Wordsworth—who are in a good sense quietists, and the tenor of whose writings, from first to last, is tranquillizing. They may not, perhaps, be the authors who will afford us most pleasure in the tumultuous season of youthful enjoyment; but as years advance, and the trials of life present themselves, one by one, in all their painful reality; as reason matures and reflection ripens; as the probationary character of our mortal existence becomes more and more clear to our apprehension; as the discovery of much that is formal and hollow in society enamors us of rural retreats and sylvan solitudes; as the inexhaustible treasures of beauty and magnificence in the material universe unfold before our gaze; as the things unseen triumph over visible objects in our thoughts and affections, we shall find in such poetry as we have attempted to describe, more that is congenial and charming, and shall cherish with fonder remembrance the names of Cowper, the mellifluous exponent of Christian ethics and delights; of Keble, the bard of Biblical lore; and of Wordsworth, the child and poet of nature. Like skilful tuners of roughly-used instruments, they will reduce to sweetness our spirits' harsher and discordant tones, and fit us to take our part in the everlasting harmonies of the boundless universe. They will each make poetry, in our view, the handmaid of science and revelation, accepting with rapture the vast, amazing discoveries of the one, and ever seeking to harmonize them with the momentous and soul-subduing disclosures of the other. They will impart to mute matter the voice and power of a moral teacher, imbue inanimate things (to our imagination) with life and feeling, inspire us with "a glorious sympathy with suns that set" and rise, with "flowers that bloom and stars that glow," with the birdling warbling on her bough, and the ocean bellowing in his caves; and will lead us by nature's golden steps to the footstool of the Creator's throne; for, in the eyes of such poets, earth is "crammed with heaven," and every common bush on fire with God.
The Early Irish Church. [Footnote 77]
[Footnote 77: Essays on the Origin, Doctrines, and Discipline of the Early Irish Church. By the Rev. Dr. Moran, Vice-Rector of the Irish College, Rome. Dublin, 1864. Pp. vii., 337. For sale by the Catholic Publication Society, New York.]
The early Irish Church is now the subject of a close scrutiny and deep study, that bids fair to shed upon it all the light that can be poured upon the subject by such written material as war, oppression, persecution, and penal laws have been insufficient to destroy. There are two schools, and their emulating labors will allow little to escape, both being well versed in ecclesiastical history, the Irish language, annals, and literature.