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diff --git a/6670.txt b/6670.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f718ed3 --- /dev/null +++ b/6670.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1868 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Christmas Eve, by Robert Browning + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Christmas Eve + +Author: Robert Browning + +Posting Date: March 16, 2014 [EBook #6670] +Release Date: October, 2004 +First Posted: January 12, 2003 +Last Updated: February 4, 2008 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHRISTMAS EVE *** + + + + +Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Charles Franks and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team. HTML version by Al +Haines. + + + + + + + + + + + CHRISTMAS EVE + + ROBERT BROWNING + + + + I + + Out of the little chapel I burst + Into the fresh night-air again. + Five minutes full, I waited first + In the doorway, to escape the rain + That drove in gusts down the common's centre + At the edge of which the chapel stands, + Before I plucked up heart to enter. + Heaven knows how many sorts of hands + Reached past me, groping for the latch + Of the inner door that hung on catch + More obstinate the more they fumbled, + Till, giving way at last with a scold + Of the crazy hinge, in squeezed or tumbled + One sheep more to the rest in fold, + And left me irresolute, standing sentry + In the sheepfold's lath-and-plaster entry, + Six feet long by three feet wide, + Partitioned off from the vast inside-- + I blocked up half of it at least. + No remedy; the rain kept driving. + They eyed me much as some wild beast, + That congregation, still arriving, + Some of them by the main road, white + A long way past me into the night, + Skirting the common, then diverging; + Not a few suddenly emerging + From the common's self thro' the paling-gaps + --They house in the gravel-pits perhaps, + Where the road stops short with its safeguard border + Of lamps, as tired of such disorder;-- + But the most turned in yet more abruptly + From a certain squalid knot of alleys, + Where the town's bad blood once slept corruptly, + Which now the little chapel rallies + And leads into day again,--its priestliness + Lending itself to hide their beastliness + So cleverly (thanks in part to the mason), + And putting so cheery a whitewashed face on + Those neophytes too much in lack of it, + That, where you cross the common as I did, + And meet the party thus presided, + "Mount Zion" with Love-lane at the back of it, + They front you as little disconcerted + As, bound for the hills, her fate averted, + And her wicked people made to mind him, + Lot might have marched with Gomorrah + behind him. + + + II + + Well, from the road, the lanes or the common, + In came the flock: the fat weary woman, + Panting and bewildered, down-clapping + Her umbrella with a mighty report, + Grounded it by me, wry and flapping, + A wreck of whalebones; then, with snort, + Like a startled horse, at the interloper + (Who humbly knew himself improper, + But could not shrink up small enough) + --Round to the door, and in,--the gruff + Hinge's invariable scold + Making my very blood run cold. + Prompt in the wake of her, up-pattered + On broken clogs, the many-tattered + Little old-faced peaking sister-turned-mother + Of the sickly babe she tried to smother + Somehow up, with its spotted face, + From the cold, on her breast, the one warm place; + She too must stop, wring the poor ends dry + Of a draggled shawl, and add thereby + Her tribute to the door-mat, sopping + Already from my own clothes' dropping, + Which yet she seemed to grudge I should stand on: + Then, stooping down to take off her pattens, + She bore them defiantly, in each hand one, + Planted together before her breast + And its babe, as good as a lance in rest. + Close on her heels, the dingy satins + Of a female something, past me flitted, + With lips as much too white, as a streak + Lay far too red on each hollow cheek; + And it seemed the very door-hinge pitied + All that was left of a woman once, + Holding at least its tongue for the nonce. + Then a tall yellow man, like the Penitent Thief, + With his jaw bound up in a handkerchief, + And eyelids screwed together tight, + Led himself in by some inner light. + And, except from him, from each that entered, + I got the same interrogation-- + "What, you the alien, you have ventured + "To take with us, the elect, your station? + "A carer for none of it, a Gallio!"-- + Thus, plain as print, I read the glance + At a common prey, in each countenance + As of huntsman giving his hounds the tallyho. + And, when the door's cry drowned their wonder, + The draught, it always sent in shutting, + Made the flame of the single tallow candle + In the cracked square lantern I stood under, + Shoot its blue lip at me, rebutting + As it were, the luckless cause of scandal: + I verily fancied the zealous light + (In the chapel's secret, too!) for spite + Would shudder itself clean off the wick, + With the airs of a Saint John's Candlestick. + [Footnote: See Rev. i. 20.] + There was no standing it much longer. + "Good folks," thought I, as resolve grew stronger, + "This way you perform the Grand-Inquisitor + "When the weather sends you a chance visitor? + "You are the men, and wisdom shall die with you, + "And none of the old Seven Churches vie with you! + "But still, despite the pretty perfection + "To which you carry your trick of exclusiveness, + "And, taking God's word under wise protection, + "Correct its tendency to diffusiveness, + "And bid one reach it over hot ploughshares,-- + "Still, as I say, though you've found salvation, + "If I should choose to cry, as now, 'Shares!'-- + "See if the best of you bars me my ration! + "I prefer, if you please, for my expounder + "Of the laws of the feast, the feast's own Founder; + "Mine's the same right with your poorest and sickliest + "Supposing I don the marriage vestiment: + "So shut your mouth and open your Testament, + "And carve me my portion at your quickliest!" + Accordingly, as a shoemaker's lad + With wizened face in want of soap, + And wet apron wound round his waist like a rope, + (After stopping outside, for his cough was bad, + To get the fit over, poor gentle creature, + And so avoid disturbing the preacher) + --Passed in, I sent my elbow spikewise + At the shutting door, and entered likewise, + Received the hinge's accustomed greeting, + And crossed the threshold's magic pentacle, + And found myself in full conventicle, + --To wit, in Zion Chapel Meeting, + On the Christmas-Eve of 'Forty-nine, + Which, calling its flock to their special clover, + Found all assembled and one sheep over, + Whose lot, as the weather pleased, was mine. + + + III + + I very soon had enough of it. + The hot smell and the human noises, + And my neighbour's coat, the greasy cuff of it, + Were a pebble-stone that a child's hand poises, + Compared with the pig-of-lead-like pressure + Of the preaching man's immense stupidity, + As he poured his doctrine forth, full measure, + To meet his audience's avidity. + You needed not the wit of the Sibyl + To guess the cause of it all, in a twinkling: + No sooner our friend had got an inkling + Of treasure hid in the Holy Bible, + (Whene'er 'twas the thought first struck him, + How death, at unawares, might duck him + Deeper than the grave, and quench + The gin-shop's light in hell's grim drench) + Than he handled it so, in fine irreverence, + As to hug the book of books to pieces: + And, a patchwork of chapters and texts in severance, + Not improved by the private dog's-ears and creases, + Having clothed his own soul with, he'd fain see equipt yours,-- + So tossed you again your Holy Scriptures. + And you picked them up, in a sense, no doubt: + Nay, had but a single face of my neighbours + Appeared to suspect that the preacher's labours + Were help which the world could be saved without, + 'Tis odds but I might have borne in quiet + A qualm or two at my spiritual diet, + Or (who can tell?) perchance even mustered + Somewhat to urge in behalf of the sermon: + But the flock sat on, divinely flustered, + Sniffing, methought, its dew of Hermon + With such content in every snuffle, + As the devil inside us loves to ruffle. + My old fat woman purred with pleasure, + And thumb round thumb went twirling faster, + While she, to his periods keeping measure, + Maternally devoured the pastor. + The man with the handkerchief untied it, + Showed us a horrible wen inside it, + Gave his eyelids yet another screwing, + And rocked himself as the woman was doing. + The shoemaker's lad, discreetly choking, + Kept down his cough. 'Twas too provoking! + My gorge rose at the nonsense and stuff of it; + So, saying like Eve when she plucked the apple, + "I wanted a taste, and now there's enough of it," + I flung out of the little chapel. + + + IV + + There was a lull in the rain, a lull + In the wind too; the moon was risen, + And would have shone out pure and full, + But for the ramparted cloud-prison, + Block on block built up in the West, + For what purpose the wind knows best, + Who changes his mind continually. + And the empty other half of the sky + Seemed in its silence as if it knew + What, any moment, might look through + A chance gap in that fortress massy:-- + Through its fissures you got hints + Of the flying moon, by the shifting tints, + Now, a dull lion-colour, now, brassy + Burning to yellow, and whitest yellow, + Like furnace-smoke just ere flames bellow, + All a-simmer with intense strain + To let her through,--then blank again, + At the hope of her appearance failing. + Just by the chapel, a break in the railing + Shows a narrow path directly across; + 'Tis ever dry walking there, on the moss-- + Besides, you go gently all the way uphill. + I stooped under and soon felt better; + My head grew lighter, my limbs more supple, + As I walked on, glad to have slipt the fetter. + My mind was full of the scene I had left, + That placid flock, that pastor vociferant, + --How this outside was pure and different! + The sermon, now--what a mingled weft + Of good and ill! Were either less, + Its fellow had coloured the whole distinctly; + But alas for the excellent earnestness, + And the truths, quite true if stated succinctly, + But as surely false, in their quaint presentment, + However to pastor and flock's contentment! + Say rather, such truths looked false to your eyes, + With his provings and parallels twisted and twined, + Till how could you know them, grown double their size + In the natural fog of the good man's mind, + Like yonder spots of our roadside lamps, + Haloed about with the common's damps? + Truth remains true, the fault's in the prover; + The zeal was good, and the aspiration; + And yet, and yet, yet, fifty times over, + Pharaoh received no demonstration, + By his Baker's dream of Basket Three, + Of the doctrine of the Trinity,-- + Although, as our preacher thus embellished it, + Apparently his hearers relished it + With so unfeigned a gust--who knows if + They did not prefer our friend to Joseph? + But so it is everywhere, one way with all of them! + These people have really felt, no doubt, + A something, the motion they style the Call of them; + And this is their method of bringing about, + By a mechanism of words and tones, + (So many texts in so many groans) + A sort of reviving and reproducing, + More or less perfectly, (who can tell?) + The mood itself, which strengthens by using; + And how that happens, I understand well. + A tune was born in my head last week, + Out of the thump-thump and shriek-shriek + Of the train, as I came by it, up from Manchester; + And when, next week, I take it back again, + My head will sing to the engine's clack again, + While it only makes my neighbour's haunches stir, + --Finding no dormant musical sprout + In him, as in me, to be jolted out. + 'Tis the taught already that profits by teaching; + He gets no more from the railway's preaching + Than, from this preacher who does the rail's office, I: + Whom therefore the flock cast a jealous eye on. + Still, why paint over their door "Mount Zion," + To which all flesh shall come, saith the prophecy? + + + V + + But wherefore be harsh on a single case? + After how many modes, this Christmas Eve, + Does the self-same weary thing take place? + The same endeavour to make you believe, + And with much the same effect, no more: + Each method abundantly convincing, + As I say, to those convinced before, + But scarce to be swallowed without wincing + By the not-as-yet-convinced. For me, + I have my own church equally: + And in this church my faith sprang first! + (I said, as I reached the rising ground, + And the wind began again, with a burst + Of rain in my face, and a glad rebound + From the heart beneath, as if, God speeding me, + I entered his church-door, nature leading me) + --In youth I look to these very skies, + And probing their immensities, + I found God there, his visible power; + Yet felt in my heart, amid all its sense + Of the power, an equal evidence + That his love, there too, was the nobler dower. + For the loving worm within its clod, + Were diviner than a loveless god + Amid his worlds, I will dare to say. + You know what I mean: God's all, man's nought: + But also, God, whose pleasure brought + Man into being, stands away + As it were a handbreadth off, to give + Room for the newly-made to live, + And look at him from a place apart, + And use his gifts of brain and heart, + Given, indeed, but to keep for ever. + Who speaks of man, then, must not sever + Man's very elements from man, + Saying, "But all is God's"--whose plan + Was to create man and then leave him + Able, his own word saith, to grieve him + But able to glorify him too, + As a mere machine could never do, + That prayed or praised, all unaware + Of its fitness for aught but praise and prayer, + Made perfect as a thing of course. + Man, therefore, stands on his own stock + Of love and power as a pin-point rock: + And, looking to God who ordained divorce + Of the rock from his boundless continent, + Sees, in his power made evident, + Only excess by a million-fold + O'er the power God gave man in the mould. + For, note: man's hand, first formed to carry + A few pounds' weight, when taught to marry + Its strength with an engine's, lifts a mountain, + --Advancing in power by one degree; + And why count steps through eternity? + But love is the ever-springing fountain: + Man may enlarge or narrow his bed + For the water's play, but the water-head-- + How can he multiply or reduce it? + As easy create it, as cause it to cease; + He may profit by it, or abuse it, + But 'tis not a thing to bear increase + As power does: be love less or more + In the heart of man, he keeps it shut + Or opes it wide, as he pleases, but + Love's sum remains what it was before. + So, gazing up, in my youth, at love + As seen through power, ever above + All modes which make it manifest, + My soul brought all to a single test-- + That he, the Eternal First and Last, + Who, in his power, had so surpassed + All man conceives of what is might,-- + Whose wisdom, too, showed infinite, + --Would prove as infinitely good; + Would never, (my soul understood,) + With power to work all love desires, + Bestow e'en less than man requires; + That he who endlessly was teaching, + Above my spirit's utmost reaching, + What love can do in the leaf or stone, + (So that to master this alone, + This done in the stone or leaf for me, + I must go on learning endlessly) + Would never need that I, in turn, + Should point him out defect unheeded, + And show that God had yet to learn + What the meanest human creature needed, + --Not life, to wit, for a few short years, + Tracking his way through doubts and fears, + While the stupid earth on which I stay + Suffers no change, but passive adds + Its myriad years to myriads, + Though I, he gave it to, decay, + Seeing death come and choose about me, + And my dearest ones depart without me. + No: love which, on earth, amid all the shows of it, + Has ever been seen the sole good of life in it, + The love, ever growing there, spite of the strife in it. + Shall arise, made perfect, from death's repose of it, + And I shall behold thee, face to face, + O God, and in thy light retrace + How in all I loved here, still wast thou! + Whom pressing to, then, as I fain would now, + I shall find as able to satiate + The love, thy gift, as my spirit's wonder + Thou art able to quicken and sublimate, + With this sky of thine, that I now walk under, + And glory in thee for, as I gaze + Thus, thus! Oh, let men keep their ways + Of seeking thee in a narrow shrine-- + Be this my way! And this is mine! + + + VI + + For lo, what think you? suddenly + The rain and the wind ceased, and the sky + Received at once the full fruition + Of the moon's consummate apparition. + The black cloud-barricade was riven, + Ruined beneath her feet, and driven + Deep in the West; while, bare and breathless, + North and South and East lay ready + For a glorious thing that, dauntless, deathless, + Sprang across them and stood steady. + 'Twas a moon-rainbow, vast and perfect, + From heaven to heaven extending, perfect + As the mother-moon's self, full in face. + It rose, distinctly at the base + With its seven proper colours chorded, + Which still, in the rising, were compressed, + Until at last they coalesced, + And supreme the spectral creature lorded + In a triumph of whitest white,-- + Above which intervened the night. + But above night too, like only the next, + The second of a wondrous sequence, + Reaching in rare and rarer frequence, + Till the heaven of heavens were circumflexed, + Another rainbow rose, a mightier, + Fainter, flushier and flightier,-- + Rapture dying along its verge. + Oh, whose foot shall I see emerge, + Whose, from the straining topmost dark, + On to the keystone of that arc? + + + VII + + This sight was shown me, there and then,-- + Me, out of a world of men, + Singled forth, as the chance might hap + To another if, in a thunderclap + Where I heard noise and you saw flame, + Some one man knew God called his name. + For me, I think I said, "Appear! + "Good were it to be ever here. + "If thou wilt, let me build to thee + "Service-tabernacles three, + "Where, forever in thy presence, + "In ecstatic acquiescence, + "Far alike from thriftless learning + "And ignorance's undiscerning, + "I may worship and remain!" + Thus at the show above me, gazing + With upturned eyes, I felt my brain + Glutted with the glory, blazing + Throughout its whole mass, over and under + Until at length it burst asunder + And out of it bodily there streamed, + The too-much glory, as it seemed, + Passing from out me to the ground, + Then palely serpentining round + Into the dark with mazy error. + + + VIII + + All at once I looked up with terror. + He was there. + He himself with his human air. + On the narrow pathway, just before. + I saw the back of him, no more-- + He had left the chapel, then, as I. + I forgot all about the sky. + No face: only the sight + Of a sweepy garment, vast and white, + With a hem that I could recognize. + I felt terror, no surprise; + My mind filled with the cataract, + At one bound of the mighty fact. + "I remember, he did say + "Doubtless that, to this world's end, + "Where two or three should meet and pray, + "He would be in their midst, their friend; + "Certainly he was there with them!" + And my pulses leaped for joy + Of the golden thought without alloy, + Then I saw his very vesture's hem. + Then rushed the blood back, cold and clear, + With a fresh enhancing shiver of fear; + And I hastened, cried out while I pressed + To the salvation of the vest, + "But not so, Lord! It cannot be + "That thou, indeed, art leaving me-- + "Me, that have despised thy friends! + "Did my heart make no amends? + "Thou art the love of God--above + "His power, didst hear me place his love, + "And that was leaving the world for thee. + "Therefore thou must not turn from me + "As I had chosen the other part! + "Folly and pride o'ercame my heart. + "Our best is bad, nor bears thy test; + "Still, it should be our very best. + "I thought it best that thou, the spirit, + "Be worshipped in spirit and in truth, + "And in beauty, as even we require it-- + "Not in the forms burlesque, uncouth, + "I left but now, as scarcely fitted + "For thee: I knew not what I pitied. + "But, all I felt there, right or wrong, + "What is it to thee, who curest sinning? + "Am I not weak as thou art strong? + "I have looked to thee from the beginning, + "Straight up to thee through all the world + "Which, like an idle scroll, lay furled + "To nothingness on either side: + "And since the time thou wast descried, + "Spite of the weak heart, so have I + "Lived ever, and so fain would die, + "Living and dying, thee before! + "But if thou leavest me----" + + + IX + + Less or more, + I suppose that I spoke thus. + When,--have mercy, Lord, on us! + The whole face turned upon me full. + And I spread myself beneath it, + As when the bleacher spreads, to seethe it + In the cleansing sun, his wool,-- + Steeps in the flood of noontide whiteness + Some denied, discoloured web-- + So lay I, saturate with brightness. + And when the flood appeared to ebb, + Lo, I was walking, light and swift, + With my senses settling fast and steadying, + But my body caught up in the whirl and drift + Of the vesture's amplitude, still eddying + On, just before me, still to be followed, + As it carried me after with its motion: + What shall I say?--as a path were hollowed + And a man went weltering through the ocean, + Sucked along in the flying wake + Of the luminous water-snake. + Darkness and cold were cloven, as through + I passed, upborne yet walking too. + And I turned to myself at intervals,-- + "So he said, so it befalls. + "God who registers the cup + "Of mere cold water, for his sake + "To a disciple rendered up, + "Disdains not his own thirst to slake + "At the poorest love was ever offered: + "And because my heart I proffered, + "With true love trembling at the brim, + "He suffers me to follow him + "For ever, my own way,--dispensed + "From seeking to be influenced + "By all the less immediate ways + "That earth, in worships manifold, + "Adopts to reach, by prayer and praise, + "The garment's hem, which, lo, I hold!" + + + X + + And so we crossed the world and stopped. + For where am I, in city or plain, + Since I am 'ware of the world again? + And what is this that rises propped + With pillars of prodigious girth? + Is it really on the earth, + This miraculous Dome of God? + Has the angel's measuring-rod + Which numbered cubits, gem from gem, + 'Twixt the gates of the New Jerusalem, + Meted it out,--and what he meted, + Have the sons of men completed? + --Binding, ever as he bade, + Columns in the colonnade + With arms wide open to embrace + The entry of the human race + To the breast of... what is it, yon building, + Ablaze in front, all paint and gilding, + With marble for brick, and stones of price + For garniture of the edifice? + Now I see; it is no dream; + It stands there and it does not seem; + For ever, in pictures, thus it looks, + And thus I have read of it in books + Often in England, leagues away, + And wondered how these fountains play, + Growing up eternally + Each to a musical water-tree, + Whose blossoms drop, a glittering boon, + Before my eyes, in the light of the moon, + To the granite layers underneath. + Liar and dreamer in your teeth! + I, the sinner that speak to you, + Was in Rome this night, and stood, and knew + Both this and more. For see, for see, + The dark is rent, mine eye is free + To pierce the crust of the outer wall, + And I view inside, and all there, all, + As the swarming hollow of a hive, + The whole Basilica alive! + Men in the chancel, body and nave, + Men on the pillars' architrave, + Men on the statues, men on the tombs + With popes and kings in their porphyry wombs, + All famishing in expectation + Of the main-altar's consummation. + For see, for see, the rapturous moment + Approaches, and earth's best endowment + Blends with heaven's; the taper-fires + Pant up, the winding brazen spires + Heave loftier yet the baldachin; [Footnote: Canopy over the High Altar.] + The incense-gaspings, long kept in, + Suspire in clouds; the organ blatant + Holds his breath and grovels latent, + As if God's hushing finger grazed him, + (Like Behemoth when he praised him) + At the silver bell's shrill tinkling, + Quick cold drops of terror sprinkling + On the sudden pavement strewed + With faces of the multitude. + Earth breaks up, time drops away, + In flows heaven, with its new day + Of endless life, when He who trod, + Very man and very God, + This earth in weakness, shame and pain, + Dying the death whose signs remain + Up yonder on the accursed tree,-- + Shall come again, no more to be + Of captivity the thrall, + But the one God, All in all, + King of kings, Lord of lords, + As His servant John received the words, + "I died, and live for evermore!" + + + XI + + Yet I was left outside the door. + "Why sit I here on the threshold-stone + "Left till He return, alone + "Save for the garment's extreme fold + "Abandoned still to bless my hold?" + My reason, to my doubt, replied, + As if a book were opened wide, + And at a certain page I traced + Every record undefaced, + Added by successive years,-- + The harvestings of truth's stray ears + Singly gleaned, and in one sheaf + Bound together for belief. + Yes, I said--that he will go + And sit with these in turn, I know. + Their faith's heart beats, though her head swims + Too giddily to guide her limbs, + Disabled by their palsy-stroke + From propping mine. Though Rome's gross yoke + Drops off, no more to be endured, + Her teaching is not so obscured + By errors and perversities, + That no truth shines athwart the lies: + And he, whose eye detects a spark + Even where, to man's, the whole seems dark, + May well see flame where each beholder + Acknowledges the embers smoulder. + But I, a mere man, fear to quit + The clue God gave me as most fit + To guide my footsteps through life's maze, + Because himself discerns all ways + Open to reach him: I, a man + Able to mark where faith began + To swerve aside, till from its summit + Judgment drops her damning plummet, + Pronouncing such a fatal space + Departed from the founder's base: + He will not bid me enter too, + But rather sit, as now I do, + Awaiting his return outside. + --'Twas thus my reason straight replied + And joyously I turned, and pressed + The garment's skirt upon my breast, + Until, afresh its light suffusing me, + My heart cried--What has been abusing me + That I should wait here lonely and coldly, + Instead of rising, entering boldly, + Baring truth's face, and letting drift + Her veils of lies as they choose to shift? + Do these men praise him? I will raise + My voice up to their point of praise! + I see the error; but above + The scope of error, see the love.-- + Oh, love of those first Christian days! + --Fanned so soon into a blaze, + From the spark preserved by the trampled sect, + That the antique sovereign Intellect + Which then sat ruling in the world, + Like a change in dreams, was hurled + From the throne he reigned upon: + You looked up and he was gone. + Gone, his glory of the pen! + --Love, with Greece and Rome in ken, + Bade her scribes abhor the trick + Of poetry and rhetoric, + And exult with hearts set free, + In blessed imbecility + Scrawled, perchance, on some torn sheet + Leaving Sallust incomplete + Gone, his pride of sculptor, painter! + --Love, while able to acquaint her + While the thousand statues yet + Fresh from chisel, pictures wet + From brush, she saw on every side, + Chose rather with an infant's pride + To frame those portents which impart + Such unction to true Christian Art. + Gone, music too! The air was stirred + By happy wings: Terpander's* bird + *[Footnote: Terpander, a famous Lesbian musician and lyric poet, 670 B.C.] + (That, when the cold came, fled away) + Would tarry not the wintry day,-- + As more-enduring sculpture must, + Till filthy saints rebuked the gust + With which they chanced to get a sight + Of some dear naked Aphrodite + They glanced a thought above the toes of, + By breaking zealously her nose off. + Love, surely, from that music's lingering, + Might have filched her organ-fingering, + Nor chosen rather to set prayings + To hog-grunts, praises to horse-neighings. + Love was the startling thing, the new: + Love was the all-sufficient too; + And seeing that, you see the rest: + As a babe can find its mother's breast + As well in darkness as in light, + Love shut our eyes, and all seemed right. + True, the world's eyes are open now: + --Less need for me to disallow + Some few that keep Love's zone unbuckled, + Peevish as ever to be suckled, + Lulled by the same old baby-prattle + With intermixture of the rattle, + When she would have them creep, stand steady + Upon their feet, or walk already, + Not to speak of trying to climb. + I will be wise another time, + And not desire a wall between us, + When next I see a church-roof cover + So many species of one genus, + All with foreheads bearing _lover_ + Written above the earnest eyes of them; + All with breasts that beat for beauty, + Whether sublimed, to the surprise of them, + In noble daring, steadfast duty, + The heroic in passion, or in action,-- + Or, lowered for sense's satisfaction, + To the mere outside of human creatures, + Mere perfect form and faultless features. + What? with all Rome here, whence to levy + Such contributions to their appetite, + With women and men in a gorgeous bevy, + They take, as it were, a padlock, clap it tight + On their southern eyes, restrained from + feeding + On the glories of their ancient reading, + On the beauties of their modern singing, + On the wonders of the builder's bringing, + On the majesties of Art around them,-- + And, all these loves, late struggling incessant, + When faith has at last united and bound them, + They offer up to God for a present? + Why, I will, on the whole, be rather proud of it,-- + And, only taking the act in reference + To the other recipients who might have allowed it, + I will rejoice that God had the preference. + + + XII + + So I summed up my new resolves: + Too much love there can never be. + And where the intellect devolves + Its function on love exclusively, + I, a man who possesses both, + Will accept the provision, nothing loth, + --Will feast my love, then depart elsewhere, + That my intellect may find its share. + And ponder, O soul, the while thou departest, + And see them applaud the great heart of the artist, + Who, examining the capabilities + Of the block of marble he has to fashion + Into a type of thought or passion,-- + Not always, using obvious facilities, + Shapes it, as any artist can, + Into a perfect symmetrical man, + Complete from head to foot of the life-size, + Such as old Adam stood in his wife's eyes,-- + But, now and then, bravely aspires to consummate + A Colossus by no means so easy to come at, + And uses the whole of his block for the bust, + Leaving the mind of the public to finish it, + Since cut it ruefully short he must: + On the face alone he expends his devotion, + He rather would mar than resolve to diminish it, + --Saying, "Applaud me for this grand notion + "Of what a face may be! As for completing it + "In breast and body and limbs, do that, you!" + All hail! I fancy how, happily meeting it, + A trunk and legs would perfect the statue, + Could man carve so as to answer volition. + And how much nobler than petty cavils, + Were a hope to find, in my spirit-travels, + Some artist of another ambition, + Who, having a block to carve, no bigger, + Has spent his power on the opposite quest, + And believed to begin at the feet was best-- + For so may I see, ere I die, the whole figure! + + + XIII + + No sooner said than out in the night! + My heart lighter and more light: + And still, as before, I was walking swift, + With my senses settling fast and steadying, + But my body caught up in the whirl and drift + Of the vesture's amplitude, still eddying + On just before me, still to be followed, + As it carried me after with its motion, + --What shall I say?--as a path, were hollowed, + And a man went weltering through the ocean, + Sucked along in the flying wake + Of the luminous water-snake. + + + XIV + + Alone! I am left alone once more-- + (Save for the garment's extreme fold + Abandoned still to bless my hold) + Alone, beside the entrance-door + Of a sort of temple,-perhaps a college, + --Like nothing I ever saw before + At home in England, to my knowledge. + The tall old quaint irregular town! + It may be... though which, I can't affirm... any + Of the famous middle-age towns of Germany: + And this flight of stairs where I sit down, + Is it Halle, Weimar, Cassel, Frankfort + Or Gottingen, I have to thank for't? + It may be Gottingen,--most likely. + Through the open door I catch obliquely + Glimpses of a lecture-hall; + And not a bad assembly neither, + Ranged decent and symmetrical + On benches, waiting what's to see there: + Which, holding still by the vesture's hem, + I also resolve to see with them, + Cautious this time how I suffer to slip + The chance of joining in fellowship + With any that call themselves his friends; + As these folk do, I have a notion. + But hist--a buzzing and emotion! + All settle themselves, the while ascends + By the creaking rail to the lecture-desk, + Step by step, deliberate + Because of his cranium's over-freight, + Three parts sublime to one grotesque, + If I have proved an accurate guesser, + The hawk-nosed high-cheek-boned Professor. + I felt at once as if there ran + A shoot of love from my heart to the man-- + That sallow virgin-minded studious + Martyr to mild enthusiasm, + As he uttered a kind of cough-preludious + That woke my sympathetic spasm, + (Beside some spitting that made me sorry) + And stood, surveying his auditory + With a wan pure look, well-nigh celestial,-- + Those blue eyes had survived so much! + While, under the foot they could not smutch, + Lay all the fleshly and the bestial. + Over he bowed, and arranged his notes, + Till the auditory's clearing of throats + Was done with, died into a silence; + And, when each glance was upward sent, + Each bearded mouth composed intent, + And a pin might be heard drop half a mile hence,-- + He pushed back higher his spectacles, + Let the eyes stream out like lamps from cells, + And giving his head of hair--a hake + Of undressed tow, for colour and quantity-- + One rapid and impatient shake, + (As our own Young England adjusts a jaunty tie + When about to impart, on mature digestion, + Some thrilling view of the surplice-question) + --The Professor's grave voice, sweet though hoarse, + Broke into his Christmas-Eve discourse. + + + XV + + And he began it by observing + How reason dictated that men + Should rectify the natural swerving, + By a reversion, now and then, + To the well-heads of knowledge, few + And far away, whence rolling grew + The life-stream wide whereat we drink, + Commingled, as we needs must think, + With waters alien to the source; + To do which, aimed this eve's discourse; + Since, where could be a fitter time + For tracing backward to its prime + This Christianity, this lake, + This reservoir, whereat we slake, + From one or other bank, our thirst? + So, he proposed inquiring first + Into the various sources whence + This Myth of Christ is derivable; + Demanding from the evidence, + (Since plainly no such life was livable) + How these phenomena should class? + Whether 'twere best opine Christ was, + Or never was at all, or whether + He was and was not, both together-- + It matters little for the name, + So the idea be left the same. + Only, for practical purpose' sake, + 'Twas obviously as well to take + The popular story,--understanding + How the ineptitude of the time, + And the penman's prejudice, expanding + Fact into fable fit for the clime, + Had, by slow and sure degrees, translated it + Into this myth, this Individuum,-- + Which, when reason had strained and abated it + Of foreign matter, left, for residuum, + A Man!--a right true man, however, + Whose work was worthy a man's endeavour: + Work, that gave warrant almost sufficient + To his disciples, for rather believing + He was just omnipotent and omniscient, + As it gives to us, for as frankly receiving + His word, their tradition,--which, though it meant + Something entirely different + From all that those who only heard it, + In their simplicity thought and averred it, + Had yet a meaning quite as respectable: + For, among other doctrines delectable, + Was he not surely the first to insist on + The natural sovereignty of our race?-- + Here the lecturer came to a pausing-place. + And while his cough, like a drouthy piston, + Tried to dislodge the husk that grew to him, + I seized the occasion of bidding adieu to him, + The vesture still within my hand. + + + XVI + + I could interpret its command. + This time he would not bid me enter + The exhausted air-bell of the Critic. + Truth's atmosphere may grow mephitic + When Papist struggles with Dissenter, + Impregnating its pristine clarity, + --One, by his daily fare's vulgarity, + Its gust of broken meat and garlic; + --One, by his soul's too-much presuming + To turn the frankincense's fuming + And vapours of the candle starlike + Into the cloud her wings she buoys on. + Each, that thus sets the pure air seething, + May poison it for healthy breathing-- + But the Critic leaves no air to poison; + Pumps out with ruthless ingenuity + Atom by atom, and leaves you--vacuity. + Thus much of Christ does he reject? + And what retain? His intellect? + What is it I must reverence duly? + Poor intellect for worship, truly, + Which tells me simply what was told + (If mere morality, bereft + Of the God in Christ, be all that's left) + Elsewhere by voices manifold; + With this advantage, that the stater + Made nowise the important stumble + Of adding, he, the sage and humble, + Was also one with the Creator. + You urge Christ's followers' simplicity: + But how does shifting blame, evade it? + Have wisdom's words no more felicity? + The stumbling-block, his speech--who laid it? + How comes it that for one found able + To sift the truth of it from fable, + Millions believe it to the letter? + Christ's goodness, then--does that fare better? + Strange goodness, which upon the score + Of being goodness, the mere due + Of man to fellow-man, much more + To God,--should take another view + Of its possessor's privilege, + And bid him rule his race! You pledge + Your fealty to such rule? What, all-- + From heavenly John and Attic Paul, + And that brave weather-battered Peter, + Whose stout faith only stood completer + For buffets, sinning to be pardoned, + As, more his hands hauled nets, they hardened,-- + All, down to you, the man of men, + Professing here at Gottingen, + Compose Christ's flock! They, you and I, + Are sheep of a good man! And why? + The goodness,--how did he acquire it? + Was it self-gained, did God inspire it? + Choose which; then tell me, on what ground + Should its possessor dare propound + His claim to rise o'er us an inch? + Were goodness all some man's invention, + Who arbitrarily made mention + What we should follow, and whence flinch,-- + What qualities might take the style + Of right and wrong,--and had such guessing + Met with as general acquiescing + As graced the alphabet erewhile, + When A got leave an Ox to be, + No Camel (quoth the Jews) like G*,-- + *[Footnote: Gimel, the Hebrew G, means camel.] + For thus inventing thing and title + Worship were that man's fit requital. + But if the common conscience must + Be ultimately judge, adjust + Its apt name to each quality + Already known,--I would decree + Worship for such mere demonstration + And simple work of nomenclature, + Only the day I praised, not nature, + But Harvey, for the circulation. + I would praise such a Christ, with pride + And joy, that he, as none beside, + Had taught us how to keep the mind + God gave him, as God gave his kind, + Freer than they from fleshly taint: + I would call such a Christ our Saint, + As I declare our Poet, him + Whose insight makes all others dim: + A thousand poets pried at life, + And only one amid the strife + Rose to be Shakespeare: each shall take + His crown, I'd say, for the world's sake-- + Though some objected--"Had we seen + "The heart and head of each, what screen + "Was broken there to give them light, + "While in ourselves it shuts the sight, + "We should no more admire, perchance, + "That these found truth out at a glance, + "Than marvel how the bat discerns + "Some pitch-dark cavern's fifty turns, + "Led by a finer tact, a gift + "He boasts, which other birds must shift + "Without, and grope as best they can." + No, freely I would praise the man,-- + Nor one whit more, if he contended + That gift of his, from God descended. + Ah friend, what gift of man's does not? + No nearer something, by a jot, + Rise an infinity of nothings + Than one: take Euclid for your teacher: + Distinguish kinds: do crownings, clothings, + Make that creator which was creature? + Multiply gifts upon man's head, + And what, when all's done, shall be said + But--the more gifted he, I ween! + That one's made Christ, this other, Pilate, + And this might be all that has been,-- + So what is there to frown or smile at? + What is left for us, save, in growth + Of soul, to rise up, far past both, + From the gift looking to the giver, + And from the cistern to the river, + And from the finite to infinity, + And from man's dust to God's divinity? + + + XVII + + Take all in a word: the truth in God's breast + Lies trace for trace upon curs impressed: + Though he is so bright and we so dim, + We are made in his image to witness him: + And were no eye in us to tell, + Instructed by no inner sense, + The light of heaven from the dark of hell, + That light would want its evidence,-- + Though justice, good and truth were still + Divine, if, by some demon's will, + Hatred and wrong had been proclaimed + Law through the worlds, and right misnamed. + No mere exposition of morality + Made or in part or in totality, + Should win you to give it worship, therefore: + And, if no better proof you will care for, + --Whom do you count the worst man upon earth? + Be sure, he knows, in his conscience, more + Of what right is, than arrives at birth + In the best man's acts that we bow before: + This last knows better--true, but my fact is, + 'Tis one thing to know, and another to practise. + And thence I conclude that the real God-function + Is to furnish a motive and injunction + For practising what we know already. + And such an injunction and such a motive + As the God in Christ, do you waive, and "heady, + "High-minded," hang your tablet-votive + Outside the fane on a finger-post? + Morality to the uttermost, + Supreme in Christ as we all confess, + Why need we prove would avail no jot + To make him God, if God he were not? + What is the point where himself lays stress? + Does the precept run "Believe in good, + "In justice, truth, now understood + "For the first time?"--or, "Believe in me, + "Who lived and died, yet essentially + "Am Lord of Life?" Whoever can take + The same to his heart and for mere love's sake + Conceive of the love,--that man obtains + A new truth; no conviction gains + Of an old one only, made intense + By a fresh appeal to his faded sense. + + + XVIII + + Can it be that he stays inside? + Is the vesture left me to commune with? + Could my soul find aught to sing in tune with + Even at this lecture, if she tried? + Oh, let me at lowest sympathize + With the lurking drop of blood that lies + In the desiccated brain's white roots + Without throb for Christ's attributes, + As the lecturer makes his special boast! + If love's dead there, it has left a ghost. + Admire we, how from heart to brain + (Though to say so strike the doctors dumb) + One instinct rises and falls again, + Restoring the equilibrium. + And how when the Critic had done his best, + And the pearl of price, at reason's test, + Lay dust and ashes levigable + On the Professor's lecture-table,-- + When we looked for the inference and monition + That our faith, reduced to such condition, + Be swept forthwith to its natural dust-hole,-- + He bids us, when we least expect it, + Take back our faith,--if it be not just whole, + Yet a pearl indeed, as his tests affect it, + Which fact pays damage done rewardingly, + So, prize we our dust and ashes accordingly! + "Go home and venerate the myth + "I thus have experimented with-- + "This man, continue to adore him + "Rather than all who went before him, + "And all who ever followed after!"-- + Surely for this I may praise you, my brother! + Will you take the praise in tears or laughter? + That's one point gained: can I compass another? + Unlearned love was safe from spurning-- + Can't we respect your loveless learning? + Let us at least give learning honour! + What laurels had we showered upon her, + Girding her loins up to perturb + Our theory of the Middle Verb; + Or Turk-like brandishing a scimitar + O'er anapasts in comic-trimeter; + Or curing the halt and maimed 'Iketides,' + [Footnote: "The Suppliants," a fragment of a play by Aeschylus.] + While we lounged on at our indebted ease: + Instead of which, a tricksy demon + Sets her at Titus or Philemon! + When ignorance wags his ears of leather + And hates God's word, 'tis altogether; + Nor leaves he his congenial thistles + To go and browse on Paul's Epistles. + --And you, the audience, who might ravage + The world wide, enviably savage, + Nor heed the cry of the retriever, + More than Herr Heine (before his fever),-- + I do not tell a lie so arrant + As say my passion's wings are furled up, + And, without plainest heavenly warrant, + I were ready and glad to give the world up-- + But still, when you rub brow meticulous, + And ponder the profit of turning holy + If not for God's, for your own sake solely, + --God forbid I should find you ridiculous! + Deduce from this lecture all that eases you, + Nay, call yourselves, if the calling pleases you, + "Christians,"--abhor the deist's pravity,-- + Go on, you shall no more move my gravity + Than, when I see boys ride a-cockhorse, + I find it in my heart to embarrass them + By hinting that their stick's a mock horse, + And they really carry what they say carries them. + + + XIX + + So sat I talking with my mind. + I did not long to leave the door + And find a new church, as before, + But rather was quiet and inclined + To prolong and enjoy the gentle resting + From further tracking and trying and testing. + "This tolerance is a genial mood!" + (Said I, and a little pause ensued). + "One trims the bark 'twixt shoal and shelf, + "And sees, each side, the good effects of it, + "A value for religion's self, + "A carelessness about the sects of it. + "Let me enjoy my own conviction, + "Not watch my neighbour's faith with fretfulness, + "Still spying there some dereliction + "Of truth, perversity, forgetfulness!" + Better a mild indifferentism, + "Teaching that both our faiths (though duller + "His shine through a dull spirit's prism) + "Originally had one colour! + "Better pursue a pilgrimage + "Through ancient and through modern times + "To many peoples, various climes, + "Where I may see saint, savage, sage + "Fuse their respective creeds in one + "Before the general Father's throne!" + + + XX + + --'Twas the horrible storm began afresh! + The black night caught me in his mesh, + Whirled me up, and flung me prone. + I was left on the college-step alone. + I looked, and far there, ever fleeting + Far, far away, the receding gesture, + And looming of the lessening vesture!-- + Swept forward from my stupid hand, + While I watched my foolish heart expand + In the lazy glow of benevolence, + O'er the various modes of man's belief. + I sprang up with fear's vehemence. + Needs must there be one way, our chief + Best way of worship: let me strive + To find it, and when found, contrive + My fellows also take their share! + This constitutes my earthly care: + God's is above it and distinct. + For I, a man, with men am linked + But not a brute with brutes; no gain + That I experience, must remain + Unshared: but should my best endeavour + To share it, fail--subsisteth ever + God's care above, and I exult + That God, by God's own ways occult, + May--doth, I will believe--bring back + All wanderers to a single track. + Meantime, I can but testify + God's care for me--no more, can I-- + It is but for myself I know; + The world rolls witnessing around me + Only to leave me as it found me; + Men cry there, but my ear is slow: + There races flourish or decay + --What boots it, while yon lucid way + Loaded with stars divides the vault? + But soon my soul repairs its fault + When, sharpening sense's hebetude, + She turns on my own life! So viewed, + No mere mote's-breadth but teems immense + With witnessings of providence: + And woe to me if when I look + Upon that record, the sole book + Unsealed to me, I take no heed + Of any warning that I read! + Have I been sure, this Christmas-Eve, + God's own hand did the rainbow weave, + Whereby the truth from heaven slid + Into my soul?--I cannot bid + The world admit he stooped to heal + My soul, as if in a thunder-peal + Where one heard noise, and one saw flame, + I only knew he named my name: + But what is the world to me, for sorrow + Or joy in its censure, when to-morrow + It drops the remark, with just-turned head + Then, on again, 'That man is dead'? + Yes, but for me--my name called,--drawn + As a conscript's lot from the lap's black yawn, + He has dipt into on a battle-dawn: + Bid out of life by a nod, a glance,-- + Stumbling, mute-mazed, at nature's chance, + With a rapid finger circled round, + Fixed to the first poor inch of ground + To fight from, where his foot was found; + Whose ear but a minute since lay free + To the wide camp's buzz and gossipry-- + Summoned, a solitary man + To end his life where his life began, + From the safe glad rear, to the dreadful van! + Soul of mine, hadst thou caught and held + By the hem of the vesture!-- + + + XXI + + And I caught + At the flying robe, and unrepelled + Was lapped again in its folds full-fraught + With warmth and wonder and delight, + God's mercy being infinite. + For scarce had the words escaped my tongue, + When, at a passionate bound, I sprung, + Out of the wandering world of rain, + Into the little chapel again. + + + XXII + + How else was I found there, bolt upright + On my bench, as if I had never left it? + --Never flung out on the common at night, + Nor met the storm and wedge-like cleft it, + Seen the raree-show of Peter's successor, + Or the laboratory of the Professor! + For the Vision, that was true, I wist, + True as that heaven and earth exist. + There sat my friend, the yellow and tall, + With his neck and its wen in the selfsame place; + Yet my nearest neighbour's cheek showed gall. + She had slid away a contemptuous space: + And the old fat woman, late so placable, + Eyed me with symptoms hardly mistakable, + Of her milk of kindness turning rancid. + In short, a spectator might have fancied + That I had nodded, betrayed by slumber. + Yet kept my scat, a warning ghastly, + Through the heads of the sermon, nine in number, + And woke up now at the tenth and lastly. + But again, could such disgrace have happened? + Each friend at my elbow had surely nudged it; + And, as for the sermon, where did my nap end? + Unless I heard it, could I have judged it? + Could I report as I do at the close, + First, the preacher speaks through his nose: + Second, his gesture is too emphatic: + Thirdly, to waive what's pedagogic, + The subject-matter itself lacks logic: + Fourthly, the English is ungrammatic. + Great news! the preacher is found no Pascal, + Whom, if I pleased, I might to the task call + Of making square to a finite eye + The circle of infinity, + And find so all-but-just-succeeding! + Great news! the sermon proves no reading + Where bee-like in the flowers I bury me, + Like Taylor's the immortal Jeremy! + And now that I know the very worst of him, + What was it I thought to obtain at first of him? + Ha! Is God mocked, as he asks, + Shall I take on me to change his tasks, + And dare, despatched to a river-head + For a simple draught of the element, + Neglect the thing for which he sent, + And return with another thing instead?-- + Saying, "Because the water found + "Welling up from the underground, + "Is mingled with the taints of earth, + "While thou, I know, dost laugh at dearth, + "And couldst, at wink or word, convulse + "The world with the leap of a river-pulse,-- + "Therefore I turned from the oozings muddy, + "And bring thee a chalice I found, instead; + "See the brave veins in the breccia ruddy! + "One would suppose that the marble bled. + "What matters the water? A hope I have nursed: + "The waterless cup will quench my thirst." + --Better have knelt at the poorest stream + That trickles in pain from the straitest rift! + For the less or the more is all God's gift, + Who blocks up or breaks wide the granite-seam. + And here, is there water or not, to drink? + I then, in ignorance and weakness, + Taking God's help, have attained to think + My heart does best to receive in meekness + That mode of worship, as most to his mind, + Where earthly aids being cast behind, + His All in All appears serene + With the thinnest human veil between, + Letting the mystic lamps, the seven, + The many motions of his spirit, + Pass, as they list, to earth from heaven. + For the preacher's merit or demerit, + It were to be wished the flaws were fewer + In the earthen vessel, holding treasure + Which lies as safe in a golden ewer; + But the main thing is, does it hold good measure? + Heaven soon sets right all other matters!-- + Ask, else, these ruins of humanity, + This flesh worn out to rags and tatters, + This soul at struggle with insanity, + Who thence take comfort--can I doubt?-- + Which an empire gained were a loss without. + May it be mine! And let us hope + That no worse blessing befall the Pope, + Turned sick at last of to-day's buffoonery, + Of posturings and petticoatings, + Beside his Bourbon bully's gloatings + In the bloody orgies of drunk poltroonery! + Nor may the Professor forego its peace + At Gottingen presently, when, in the dusk + Of his life, if his cough, as I fear, should increase, + Prophesied of by that horrible husk-- + When thicker and thicker the darkness fills + The world through his misty spectacles, + And he gropes for something more substantial + Than a fable, myth or personification,-- + May Christ do for him what no mere man shall, + And stand confessed as the God of salvation! + Meantime, in the still recurring fear + Lest myself, at unawares, be found, + While attacking the choice of my neighbours round, + With none of my own made--I choose here! + The giving out of the hymn reclaims me; + I have done: and if any blames me, + Thinking that merely to touch in brevity + The topics I dwell on, were unlawful,-- + Or worse, that I trench, with undue levity, + On the bounds of the holy and the awful,-- + I praise the heart, and pity the head of him, + And refer myself to THEE, instead of him, + Who head and heart alike discernest + Looking below light speech we utter, + When frothy spume and frequent sputter + Prove that the soul's depths boil in earnest! + May truth shine out, stand ever before us! + I put up pencil and join chorus + To Hepzibah Tune, without further apology, + The last five verses of the third section + Of the seventeenth hymn of Whitfield's Collection, + To conclude with the doxology. + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Christmas Eve, by Robert Browning + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHRISTMAS EVE *** + +***** This file should be named 6670.txt or 6670.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/6/6/7/6670/ + +Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Charles Franks and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team. 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