The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 4, October, 1863. Various
brothers, and feared that human art would be deemed vain and worthless in heaven. For the saints forget that God himself is the Great Artist!
Then was there silence in heaven, and the brothers knelt before the Throne.
The Father spoke:
'Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord. Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise, be thankful unto him, and bless his name: the Lion of the tribe of Judah hath conquered. He will give to him that overcometh to eat of the Tree of Life, which is in the Paradise of God.'
The silence that ensued was the bliss of heaven!
As Rubi, the Angel of Beauty, advanced to greet the spirits whom he had left on the confines of chaos, the triumphant song burst from the young choir of angels: 'For they shall not hunger nor thirst any more; neither shall the sun fall on them or any heat. For the Lamb, which is in the midst of the throne, shall rule them, and shall lead them to the fountains of the waters of life, and God shall wipe away all tears from their fives.'
Joy! joy! for the soul of the musician! The heart of the Rose had broken while chanting the last Miserere, and she was again at his side to catch his first Hosanna!
'Angelo—Angelo—parting and death are only seeming!'
To the soul of the poet was given the highest theme, the splendor and love of the Eternal City, and power to join the scribes of heaven. And the painter looked upon the face of the Virgin, the strange lights, the forms of Cherubim and Seraphim, and the twelve gates and the golden streets of that city; 'which needeth not sun or moon to shine in it, for the glory of God hath enlightened it; and the Lamb is the light thereof.'
Who can imagine that region of supernal splendor, 'whose glories eye hath not seen, ear hath not heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive'?
The strings of Angelo's heaven harp quivered as though stirred by the breath of God.
Then did he first truly discern the soul of that divine language whose form he had made known on earth.
Then arose 'as it were the voice of a great multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying: Alleluia! for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.'
Loud rang the heaven harps: 'Holy—Holy—Holy! To Him that sitteth on the Throne, and to the Lamb, Benediction, and Honor, and Glory, and Power, forever and ever!'
UNUTTERED
Said a poet, sighing lowly,
As his life ebbed slowly, slowly,
And upon his pallid features shone the sun's last rosy light,
Shedding there a radiance tender,
Softened from the dazzling splendor
Of the burning clouds of sunset, gleaming in the west so bright,
Glancing redly, ere forever lost within the gloom of night:
'Gold and crimson clouds of even,
Kindling the blue vault of heaven,
Ye are types of airy fancies that within my spirit glow!
Thou, O Night, so darkly glooming,
And those brilliant tints entombing
In thy black and heavy shadows, thou art like this life of woe,
Prisoning all the glorious visions that still beat their wings to go!
'Oh, what brilliancy and glory
Had illumed my life's dull story,
Could those thoughts have found expression as within my soul they shone!
But though there like jewels gleaming,
And with golden splendor streaming,
Cold and dim their lustre faded, tarnished, like the sparkling stone
That, from out the blue waves taken, looks a pebble dull alone.
'For within my heart forever
Was a never-dying river,
Was a spring of deathless music welling from my deepest soul!
And all Nature's deep intonings,
Merry songs, and plaintive meanings,
Floated softly through my spirit, swelling where those bright waves stole,
Till the prisoning walls seemed powerless 'gainst that billowy rush and roll.
'Oh, the surging thoughts and fancies;
Oh, the wondrous, wild romances
That from morn till dewy twilight murmured through my haunted brain!
Thoughts as sweet as summer roses,
And with music's dreamiest closes,
Dying faintly into silence, from the full and ringing strain
That through all my spirit sounded with a rapture half of pain.
'How I longed those words to utter
That within my heart would flutter,
Beating wild against their prison, as its walls they'd burst in twain:
But it broke not, throbbing only,
Aching in a silence lonely,
Till my very life was flooded with a wild, delicious pain;
Kindled with a blaze illuming all the chambers of my brain!
'And to me death had been glorious,
If those burning words, victorious,
Had at last surged o'er their prison, bearing my departing soul!
Gladly were my heart's blood given,
If those bonds I