But thou, though thou be trembling with thy dread, And parched with thy desire more fierce than flame, Think on the stream wherefrom thy life was fed, And that diviner fountain whence it came. Turn thee and cry--behold, it is not far-- Unto the hills where living waters are. {118} "Lord, though I lived on earth, the child of earth, Yet was I fathered by the starry sky: Thou knowest I came not of the shadows' birth, Let me not die the death that shadows die. Give me to drink of the sweet spring that leaps From Memory's fount, wherein no cypress sleeps." Then shalt thou drink, O Soul, and therewith slake The immortal longing of thy mortal thirst, So of thy Father's life shalt thou partake, And be for ever that thou wert at first. Lost in remembered loves, yet thou more thou With them shalt reign in never-ending Now. {119} _Il Santo_ Alas! alas! what impious hands are these? They have cut down my dark mysterious trees, Defied the brooding spell That sealed my sacred well, Broken my fathers' fixed and ancient bars, And on the mouldering shade Wherein my dead were laid Let in the cold clear aspect of the stars. Slumber hath held the grove for years untold: Is there no reverence for a peace so old? Is there no seemly awe For bronze-engraven law, For dust beatified and saintly name? When they shall see the shrine Princes have held divine, Will they not bow before the eternal flame? Vain! vain! the wind of heaven for ages long Hath whispered manhood, "Let thine arm be strong! Hew down and fling away The growth that veils decay, {120} Shatter the shrine that chokes the living spring. Scorn hatred, scorn regret, Dig deep and deeper yet, Leave not the quest for word of saint or king. "Dig deeper yet! though the world brand thee now, The faithful labour of an impious brow May for thy race redeem The source of that lost stream Once given the thirst of all the earth to slake. Nay, thou too ere the end Thy weary knee mayst bend And in thy trembling hands that water take." {121} _In July_ His beauty bore no token, No sign our gladness shook; With tender strength unbroken The hand of Life he took: But the summer flowers were falling, Falling and fading away, And mother birds were calling, Crying and calling For their loves that would not stay. He knew not Autumn's chillness, Nor Winter's wind nor Spring's; He lived with Summer's stillness And sun and sunlit things: But when the dusk was falling He went the shadowy way, And one more heart is calling, Crying and calling For the love that would not stay. {122} _From Generation to Generation_