The day-star smiles, and light, with thee deceast, Now shines in all the chambers of the East. What stirs, what posting intercourse and mirth Of Saints and Angels glorifie the earth! What sighs, what whispers, busie stops and stays; Private and holy talk fill all the ways! They pass as at the last great day, and run In their white robes to seek the risen Sun; I see them, hear them, mark their haste, and move Amongst them, with them, wing'd with faith and love. To the intensity of his aspiration and hushed expectance the world seems only a turbulent passing pageant, or a hard wayfaring, suffered in a dream:-- Who stays Here long must passe O'er dark hills, swift streames, and steep ways As smooth as glasse. Or a brief sickness:-- So for this night I linger here, And, full of tossings to and fro, Expect still when thou wilt appear, That I may get me up and go. His eyes are fixed on the shining lights that beckon him; the world is full of voices, but its sights and sounds appeal to him in vain; the beauties that surround him are things of naught-- Glorious deceptions, gilded mists, False joyes, phantastick flights. In the distance before him there shines An air of glory Whose light doth trample on my days; My days, which are at best but dull and hoary, Meer glimmering and decays; and he lifts up his voice in passionate desire for the ultimate deliverance:-- Ah! what time will it come? When shall that crie _The Bridegroome's comming_! fill the sky? Shall it in the evening run, When our words and works are done? Or will thy all-surprising light Break at midnight? He broods over it till nothing else is present to him in the night-watches:-- I saw Eternity the other night Like a great ring of calm and endless light. The history of the struggles and corruption of mankind may close at any moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at a signal given:-- All's in deep sleep and night; thick darkness lyes And hatcheth o'er thy people-- But hark! what trumpet's that, what angel cries _Arise! Thrust in thy sickle!_ Here is a religious poet indeed, a visionary, a mystic, and a Christian; none of which names can be truly applied to Milton. And if we wish to find Love enjoying his just supremacy in poetry, we cannot do better than seek him among the lyrists of the Court of Charles II. Milton, self-sufficient and censorious, denies the name of love to these songs of the sons of Belial. Love, he says, reigns and revels in Eden, not in court amours, Mixed dance, or wanton mask, or midnight ball, Or serenate, which the starved lover sings To his proud fair, best quitted with disdain.