By night we dragg'd her to the college tower Might have been happy: but what lot is pure? And so return'd unfarrow'd to her sty. John. They found you out? What know we of the secret of a man ? His nerves were wrong. What ails us, who are sound, That we should mimic this raw fool the world, Which charts us all in its coarse blacks or whites, As ruthless as a baby with a worm, As cruel as a schoolboy ere he grows To Pity—more from ignorance than will. But put your best foot forward, or I fear That we shall miss the mail: and here it comes With five at top: as quaint a four-in-hand As shall see you three pyebalds and a roan. ST. SIMEON STYLITES. ALTHO' I be the basest of mankind, From scalp to sole one slough and crust of sin, I will not cease to grasp the hope I hold Of saintdom, and to clamour, mourn and sob, Battering the gates of heaven with storms of prayer, Have mercy, Lord, and take away my sin. This not be all in vain, that thrice ten years, In hungers and in thirsts, fevers and cold. In coughs, aches, stitches, ulcerous throes and cramps, A sign betwixt the meadow and the cloud, Patient on this tall pillar I have borne Rain, wind, frost, heat, hail, damp, and sleet, and snow; And I had hoped that ere this period closed The meed of saints, the white robe and the palm. Than were those lead-like tons of sin, that crush'd O Lord, Lord, Thou knowest I bore this better at the first, For I was strong and hale of body then; And though my teeth, which now are dropt away, I drown'd the whoopings of the owl with sound Now am I feeble grown: my end draws nigh I hope my end draws nigh: half deaf I am, So that I scarce can hear the people hum About the column's base, and almost blind, And scarce can recognise the fields I know. And both my thighs are rotted with the dew, Yet cease I not to clamour and to cry, While my stiff spine can hold my weary head, Till all my limbs drop piecemeal from the stone, Have mercy, mercy: take away my sin. O Jesus, if thou wilt not save my soul, Who may be saved? who is it may be saved? In twain beneath the ribs; but I die here |