The Trance of Time

'Felix, qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas,
Atque metus omnes, et inexorabile fatum
Subjecit pedibus, strepitumque Acherontis avari!'

IN childhood, when with eager eyes
The season-measured year I view'd,
All garb'd in fairy guise,
Pledged constancy of good.

Spring sang of heaven; the summer flowers
Bade me gaze on, and did not fade;
Even suns o'er autumn's bowers
Heard my strong wish, and stay'd.

They came and went, the short-lived four;
Yet, as their varying dance they wove,
To my young heart each bore
Its own sure claim of love.

Far different now;—the whirling year

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poem by John Henry Newman
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A Thanksgiving

Lord, in this dust Thy sovereign voice
First quicken'd love divine;
I am all Thine,—Thy care and choice,
My very praise is Thine.

I praise Thee, while Thy providence
In childhood frail I trace,
For blessings given, ere dawning sense
Could seek or scan Thy grace;

Blessings in boyhood's marvelling hour,
Bright dreams, and fancyings strange;
Blessings, when reason's awful power
Gave thought a bolder range; {46}

Blessings of friends, which to my door
Unask'd, unhoped, have come;
And, choicer still, a countless store
Of eager smiles at home.

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poem by John Henry Newman
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Consolations in Bereavement

Death was full urgent with thee, Sister dear,
And startling in his speed;—
Brief pain, then languor till thy end came near—
Such was the path decreed,
The hurried road
To lead thy soul from earth to thine own God's
abode.

Death wrought with thee, sweet maid, impatiently:—
Yet merciful the haste
That baffles sickness;—dearest, thou didst die,
Thou wast not made to taste
Death's bitterness,
Decline's slow-wasting charm, or fever's fierce
distress.

Death came unheralded:—but it was well;
For so thy Saviour bore
Kind witness, thou wast meet at once to dwell
On His eternal shore;

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poem by John Henry Newman
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Snapdragon a Riddle for a Flower Book

'Snapdragon' a Riddle for a Flower Book

I am rooted in the wall
Of buttress'd tower or ancient hall;
Prison'd in an art-wrought bed.
Cased in mortar, cramp'd with lead;
Of a living stock alone
Brother of the lifeless stone.

Else unprized, I have my worth
On the spot that gives me birth;
Nature's vast and varied field
Braver flowers than me will yield,
Bold in form and rich in hue,
Children of a purer dew;
Smiling lips and winning eyes
Meet for earthly paradise.
Choice are such,—and yet thou knowest
Highest he whose lot is lowest.
They, proud hearts, a home reject

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poem by John Henry Newman
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Paraphrase of Isaiah, Chap. 64

O that Thou wouldest rend the breadth of sky,
That veils Thy presence from the sons of men!
O that, as erst Thou camest from on high
Sudden in strength, Thou so would'st come again!
Track'd out by judgments was Thy fiery path,
Ocean and mountain withering in Thy wrath!

Then would Thy name—the Just, the Merciful—
Strange dubious attributes to human mind,
Appal Thy foes; and, kings, who spurn Thy rule,
Then, then would quake to hopeless doom
consign'd.
See, the stout bows, and totters the secure,
While pleasure's bondsman hides his head impure!

Come down! for then shall from its seven bright
springs
To him who thirsts the draught of life be given;
Eye hath not seen, ear hath not heard the things
Which He hath purposed for the heirs of heaven,—

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poem by John Henry Newman
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A Picture

'
The maiden is not dead, but sleepeth.
'
She is not gone;—still in our sight
That dearest maid shall live,
In form as true, in tints as bright,
As youth and health could give.

Still, still is ours the modest eye;
The smile unwrought by art;
The glance that shot so piercingly
Affection's keenest dart;

The thrilling voice, I ne'er could hear
But felt a joy and pain;—
A pride that she was ours, a fear
Ours she might not remain;

Whether the page divine call'd forth
Its clear sweet, tranquil tone,

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poem by John Henry Newman
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Nature and Art For an Album

'Man goeth forth' with reckless trust
Upon his wealth of mind,
As if in self a thing of dust
Creative skill might find;
He schemes and toils; stone, wood and ore
Subject or weapon of His power.

By arch and spire, by tower-girt heights,
He would his boast fulfil;
By marble births, and mimic lights,—
Yet lacks one secret still;
Where is the master-hand shall give
To breathe, to move, to speak, to live?

O take away this shade of might,
The puny toil of man,
And let great Nature in my sight
Unroll her gorgeous plan;
I cannot bear those sullen walls,
Those eyeless towers, those tongueless halls.

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poem by John Henry Newman
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To F. W. N. A Birthday Offering

Dear Frank, this morn has usher'd in
The manhood of thy days;
A boy no more, thou must begin
To choose thy future ways;
To brace thy arm, and nerve thy heart,
For maintenance of a noble part.

And thou a voucher fair hast given,
Of what thou wilt achieve,
Ere age has dimm'd thy sun-lit heaven,
In weary life's chill eve;
Should Sovereign Wisdom in its grace
Vouchsafe to thee so long a race.

My brother, we are link'd with chain
That time shall ne'er destroy;
Together we have been in pain,
Together now in joy;
For duly I to share may claim
The present brightness of thy name.

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poem by John Henry Newman
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My Birthday

Let the sun summon all his beams to hold
Bright pageant in his court, the cloud-paved sky
Earth trim her fields and leaf her copses cold;
Till the dull month with summer-splendours vie.
It is my Birthday;—and I fain would try,
Albeit in rude, in heartfelt strains to praise
My God, for He hath shielded wondrously
From harm and envious error all my ways,
And purged my misty sight, and fixed on heaven
my gaze.

Not in that mood, in which the insensate crowd
Of wealthy folly hail their natal day,—
With riot throng, and feast, and greetings loud,
Chasing all thoughts of God and heaven away.
Poor insect! feebly daring, madly gay,
What! joy because the fulness of the year
Marks thee for greedy death a riper prey?
Is not the silence of the grave too near?
Viewest thou the end with glee, meet scene for

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poem by John Henry Newman
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