And putteth forth heaven's strength be

low

To bear.

Ador. And that creates His anguish

now,

Which made His glory there.
Zerah. Shall it indeed be so?

Awake, thou Earth! behold!
Thou, uttered forth of old
In all thy life-emotion,
In all thy vernal noises;
In the rollings of thine ocean,
Leaping founts, and rivers run-

ning;

In thy woods' prophetic heaving
Ere the rains a stroke have given ;
In thy winds' exultant voices
When they feel the hills anear:
In the firmamental sunning,
And the tempest which rejoices
Thy full heart with an awful cheer!
Thou, uttered forth of old
And with all thy musics, rolled
In a breath abroad
By the breathing God!
Awake! He is here! behold!
Even thou-

Beseems it good
To thy vacant vision dim,
That the deathly ruin should,
For thy sake, encompass Him?
That the Master-word should lie
A mere silence-while His own,

Processive harmony

The faintest echo of His lightest tone
Is sweeping in a choral triumph by?
Awake! emit a cry!
And say, albeit used

From Adam's ancient years
To falls of acrid tears,
To frequent sighs unloosed,
Caught back to press again
On bosoms zoned with pain-
To corses still and sullen
The shine and music dulling
With closed eyes and ears
That nothing sweet can enter
Commoving thee no less
With that forced quietness,
Than the earthquake in thy cen-

tre

Thou hast not learnt to bear This new divine despair! These tears that sink into thee,

These dying eyes that view thee, This dropping blood from lifted rood,

They darken and undo thee! Thou canst not, presently, sustain this corse!

Cry, cry, thou hast not force!
Cry, thou wouldst fainer keep
Thy hopeless charnels deep-
Thyself a general tomb-

Where the first and second Death
Sit gazing face to face

And mar each other's breath,
While silent bones through all the place,
'Neath sun and moon do faintly glisten,
And seem to lie and listen
For the tramp of the coming Doom.
Is it not meet

That they who erst the Eden fruit did eat,

Should champ the ashes? That they who wrapt them in the thunder-cloud,

Should wear it as a shroud, Perishing by its flashes? That they who vexed the lion, should be rent?

Cry, cry-'I will sustain my punish

I am weary—

I am blind with mine own grief, and cannot see,

As clear-eyed angels can, His agony : And what I see I also can sustain, Because His power protects me from His pain.

I have groaned-I have travailed-I am dreary,

Hearkening the thick sobs of my children's heart:

And can I say 'Depart' To that Atoner making calm and free? Am I a God as He,

To lay down peace and power as willingly?

Ador. He looked for some to pity. There is none.

All pity is within Him, and not for Him;

It pleased Him to overleap
His glory with His love, and sever
From the God-light and the throne
And all angels bowing down,
From whom His every look did
touch

New notes of joy from the unworn
string

Of an eternal worshipping!

For such He left His heaven? There, though never bought by blood

And tears, we gave Him gratitude! We loved Him there, though unforgiven!

Ador. The light is riven

Above, around, And down in lurid fragments flung, That catch the mountain-peak and

stream

With momentary gleam, Then perish in the water and the ground. River and waterfall,

Forest and wilderness, Mountain and city, are together wrung Into one shape, and that is shapeless

ness;

The darkness stands for all. Zerah. The pathos hath the day undone :

The death-look of His eyes
Hath overcome the sun,

And made it sicken in its narrow skies.
Ador. Is it to death? He dieth.
Zerah.
Through the dark,
He still, He only, is discernible-
The naked hands and feet transfixed
stark,

Hath He wandered as a stranger,
Sorrowed as a victim. Thou

Appear for Him, O Father!
Appear for Him, Avenger!
Appear for Him, just One and holy One,
For He is holy and just!

At once the darkness and dishonor rather

To the ragged jaws of hungry chaos rake,

And hurl aback to ancient dust
These mortals that make blasphemies
With their made breath! this earth
and skies

That only grow a little dim,
Seeing their curse on Him!
But Him, of all forsaken,

Of creature and of brother,
Never wilt Thou forsake!
Thy living and Thy loving cannot
slacken

Their firm essential hold upon each other

And well Thou dost remember how His part

Was still to lie upon Thy breast, and be Partaker of the light that dwelt in Thee Ere sun or seraph shone;

And how while silence trembled round the throne,

Thou countedst by the beatings of His heart,

The moments of Thine own eternity!

Awaken,

O right Hand with the lightnings!

Instead of downward voice, a cry

Is uttered from beneath!

Zerah. And by a sharper sound than death,

Mine immortality is riven. The heavy darkness which doth tent the sky,

Floats backward as by a sudden windBut I see no light behind :

But I feel the farthest stars are all

Stricken and shaken,

And I know a shadow sad and broad,

Doth fall-doth fall

On our vacant thrones'in heaven.

Voice from the Cross. My GOD, MY
GOD,

WHY HAST THOU ME FORSAKEN?

The Earth. Ah me, ah me, ah me! the dreadful why!

My sin is on Thee, sinless One! Thou

My God, my God! where is it? Doth
that curse
Reverberate spare us, seraph or uni-
verse?

He hath forsaken Him.
Ador. He cannot fail.
Angel voices. We faint-we droop-
Our love doth tremble like fear-
Voices of Fallen Angels from the
Earth. Do we prevail?

Or are we lost?-Hath not the ill we did

Been heretofore our good?

Is it not ill that One, all sinless, should Hang heavy with all curses on a cross? Nathless, that cry!- with huddled faces hid

Within the empty graves which men did scoop

To hold more damnèd dead, we shudder through

What shall exalt us or undo,--
Our triumph, or-our loss.
Voice from the Cross. IT IS FINISHED.
Zerah.
Hark, again!
Like a victor, speaks the Slain-
Angel voices. Finished be the trem-
bling vain!

Ador. Upward, like a well-loved Son,
Looketh He, the orphaned One---
Angel voices. Finished is the mystic
pain!

Voices of Fallen Angels. His deathly
forehead at the word,

Gleameth like a seraph sword. Angel voices. Finished is the demon reign!

Ador. His breath, as living God, createth

His breath, as dying man, completeth.

Angel voices.

hands sustain !

Finished work His

The Earth. In mine ancient sepulchres

Where my kings and prophets
freeze,

Adam dead four thousand years,
Unwakened by the universe's
Everlasting moan,

Aye his ghastly silence, mockingUnwakened by his children's knocking

At his old sepulchral stone

'Adam, Adam! all this curse is Thine and on us yet!'-Unwakened by the ceaseless tears Wherewith they made his cere

ment wet

'Adam, must thy curse remain?'Starts with sudden life, and hears Through the slow dripping of the cav-" erned eaves,—

Angel voices. Finished is his bane! Voice from the Cross. FATHER! MY SPIRIT TO THINE HANDS IS GIVEN ! Ador. Hear the wailing winds that be

By wings of unclean Spirits made!

They, in that last look, surveyed The love they lost in losing heaven, And passionately flee,

With a desolate cry that cleaves
The natural storms-though they are
lifting

God's strong cedar-roots like leaves;
And the earthquake and the thunder,
Neither keeping neither under,
Roar and hurtle through the glooms,—
And a few pale stars are drifting
Past the Dark, to disappear,
What time, from the splitting tombs,
Gleamingly the Dead arise,
Viewing with their death-calmned
The elemental strategies,

eyes,

To witness, victory is the Lord's!
Hear the wail o' the spirits! hear.
Zerah. I hear alone the memory of
His words.

Of Him who died, and deathless wears the crown

Or whether at this hour, ye haply are Anear, around me, hiding in the night Of this permitted ignorance your light, This feebleness to spare,

Forgive me, that mine earthly heart should dare

Shape images of unincarnate spirits, And lay upon their burning lips a thought

Cold with the weeping which mine earth inherits;

And though ye find in such hoarse music wrought

To copy yours, a cadence all the while Of sin and sorrow-only pitying smile!— Ye know to pity, well.