The sea is calm to-night, The tide is full, the moon lies fair Upon the straits;--on the French coast the light Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand, Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay. Come to the window, sweet is the night-air! Only, from the long line of spray Where the sea meets the moon-blanch'd land, Listen! you hear the grating roar Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling, At their return, up the high strand, Begin, and cease, and then again begin, With tremulous cadence slow, and bring The eternal note of sadness in. Sophocles long ago Heard it on the Ægæan, and it brought Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow Of human misery; we Find also in the sound a thought, Hearing it by this distant northern sea. The Sea of Faith Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furl'd. But now I only hear Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar, Retreating, to the breath Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear And naked shingles of the world. Ah, love, let us be true To one another! for the world, which seems To lie before us like a land of dreams, So various, so beautiful, so new, Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light, Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain; And we are here as on a darkling plain Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight, Where ignorant armies clash by night. MORALITY We cannot kindle when we will The fire that in the heart resides; The spirit bloweth and is still, In mystery our soul abides; But tasks in hours of insight will'd Can be through hours of gloom fulfill'd. With aching hands and bleeding feet We dig and heap, lay stone on stone; We bear the burden and the heat Of the long day, and wish 'twere done. Not till the hours of light return, All we have built do we discern. Then, when the clouds are off the soul, When thou dost bask in Nature's eye, Ask, how _she_ view'd thy self-control, Thy struggling task'd morality-- Nature, whose free, light, cheerful air, Oft made thee, in thy gloom, despair. And she, whose censure thou dost dread, Whose eye thou wert afraid to seek, See, on her face a glow is spread, A strong emotion on her cheek. "Ah child," she cries, "that strife divine-- Whence was it, for it is not mine? "There is no effort on _my_ brow-- I do not strive, I do not weep. I rush with the swift spheres, and glow In joy, and, when I will, I sleep. Yet that severe, that earnest air I saw, I felt it once--but where? "I knew not yet the gauge of Time, Nor wore the manacles of Space. I felt it in some other clime-- I saw it in some other place. --'Twas when the heavenly house I trod, And lay upon the breast of God." SELF-DEPENDENCE