Lowell’s Writings. _POEMS._ Complete. _Diamond Edition._ One volume. _POEMS._ With Portrait. _Blue and Gold Edition._ Two volumes. _POEMS._ With Portrait. _Cabinet Edition._ Two volumes. _POEMS._ With Portrait. 16mo Edition. Two volumes. _FIRESIDE TRAVELS._ One volume. _A FABLE FOR CRITICS._ One volume. _THE BIGLOW PAPERS._ Two Series. Each in one volume. _THE VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL._ One volume. _THE VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL._ Illustrated. _Red-Line Edition._ One elegant small 4to volume. _UNDER THE WILLOWS, AND OTHER POEMS._ One volume. _AMONG MY BOOKS._ A new volume, in press, and nearly ready. FIELDS, OSGOOD, & CO., Publishers. The Cathedral. Οὐδὲν σοφιζώμεσθα τοῖσι δαίμοισιν. Πατρίους παραδοχὰς, ἄς θ’ ὁμήλικας χρόνῳ Κεκτήμεθ’, οὐδεις αὐτὰ καταβαλέι λόγος, Οὐδ’ ἣν δι’ ἄκρων τὸ σορόν εὔρεται φρενῶν. EURIPIDES, _Bacchæ_, 196-199. The Cathedral. BY JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. [Illustration: colophon] BOSTON: FIELDS, OSGOOD, & CO. 1870. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1869, by FIELDS, OSGOOD, & CO., in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. UNIVERSITY PRESS: WELCH, BIGELOW, & CO., CAMBRIDGE. To MR. JAMES T. FIELDS. MY DEAR FIELDS,-- Dr. Johnson’s sturdy self-respect led him to invent the Bookseller as a substitute for the Patron. My relations with you have enabled me to discover how pleasantly the Friend may replace the Bookseller. Let me record my sense of many thoughtful services by associating your name with a poem which owes its appearance in this form to your partiality. Cordially yours, J. R. LOWELL. CAMBRIDGE, Nov. 29, 1869. [Illustration] THE CATHEDRAL. Far through the memory shines a happy day, Cloudless of care, down-shod to every sense, And simply perfect from its own resource, As to a bee the new campanula’s Illuminate seclusion swung in air. Such days are not the prey of setting suns, Nor ever blurred with mist of afterthought; Like words made magical by poets dead, Wherein the music of all meaning is The sense hath garnered or the soul divined, They mingle with our life’s ethereal part, Sweetening and gathering sweetness evermore, By beauty’s franchise disenthralled of time.