POETRY.
ELIJAH.
"Elijah went up by a whirlwind into Heaven."—II. Kings ii., 11.
So passed the prophet, rapt from mortal eyes, And saw not death : to what serener air, What nobler work translated, passes all God grants of knowledge,—only this we know : Who stands while God prepares his judgment-day, And in the dawn that seems to other eyes Mere darkness bears his witness to the light, Stands in his spirit and power ; who cries, Prepare, Make straight the crooked ways of wrong, and raise Mean things to greatness, and abase the proud,' His voice is as Elijah's. Such was he, Greatest of woman-born, the Baptist named, Whom that stern mother, Solitude, had wrought To such a steadfast strength, that not the curse Of priests, or frowning kings, or deadlier rage Of woman shamed in lust, could stir his soul.
Such he, the Florentine, whose thunders shook The Mediceiin halls, and thrilled the soul Of slumbering Italy from Alp to sea ; And such the Teuton Great-heart, undismayed, Whom not the angry Kaiser, where he sat With prince and prelate, nor the mystic power Of Peter's triple crown, one hair's-breadth stirred From that high vantage whence he moved the world.
O England ! 0 my country ! if there come Such voice to thee, in these dark, latter days ; If some stern prophet—and Elijah's God Has yet his prophets—bid thee cleanse thy house From foulness that thou knowest, myriad sins That ease has bred, and faithless pride, and scorn Of kindred blood, and hatred, child of wrong, Heed, lest the curse should fall, and topple down Thy greatness in the dust, for all thy bounds Stretch from the rising to the setting Sun, And touch at either Pole the eternal frost.
ALFRED CHURCH.
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