| Matthew Arnold (1822–88). The Poems of Matthew Arnold, 1840–1867. 1909. | | | | Empedocles on Etna, and Other Poems | | Consolation |
| | [First published 1852. Reprinted 1853, ’54, ’57.]
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MIST 1 clogs the sunshine, | |
| Smoky dwarf houses | |
| Hem me round everywhere. | |
| A vague dejection | |
| Weighs down my soul. | 5 |
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| Yet, while I languish, | |
| Everywhere, countless | |
| Prospects unroll themselves, | |
| And countless beings | |
| Pass countless moods. | 10 |
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| Far hence, in Asia, | |
| On the smooth convent-roofs, | |
| On the gold terraces | |
| Of holy Lassa, | |
| Bright shines the sun. | 15 |
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| Grey time-worn marbles | |
| Hold the pure Muses. | |
| In their cool gallery, | |
| By yellow Tiber, | |
| They still look fair. | 20 |
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| Strange unlov’d uproar 2 | |
| Shrills round their portal. | |
| Yet not on Helicon | |
| Kept they more cloudless | |
| Their noble calm. | 25 |
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| Through sun-proof alleys | |
| In a lone, sand-hemm’d | |
| City of Africa, | |
| A blind, led beggar, | |
| Age-bow’d, asks alms. | 30 |
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| No bolder Robber | |
| Erst abode ambush’d | |
| Deep in the sandy waste: | |
| No clearer eyesight | |
| Spied prey afar. | 35 |
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| Saharan sand-winds | |
| Sear’d his keen eyeballs. | |
| Spent is the spoil he won. | |
| For him the present | |
| Holds only pain. | 40 |
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| Two young, fair lovers, | |
| Where the warm June wind, | |
| Fresh from the summer fields, | |
| Plays fondly round them, | |
| Stand, tranc’d in joy. | 45 |
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| With sweet, join’d voices, | |
| And with eyes brimming— | |
| ‘Ah,’ they cry, ‘Destiny! | |
| Prolong the present! | |
| Time! stand still here!’ | 50 |
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| The prompt stern Goddess | |
| Shakes her head, frowning. | |
| Time gives his hour-glass | |
| Its due reversal. | |
| Their hour is gone. | 55 |
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| With weak indulgence | |
| Did the just Goddess | |
| Lengthen their happiness, | |
| She lengthen’d also | |
| Distress elsewhere. | 60 |
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| The hour, whose happy | |
| Unalloy’d moments | |
| I would eternalize, | |
| Ten thousand mourners | |
| Well pleas’d see end. | 65 |
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| The bleak stern hour, | |
| Whose severe moments | |
| I would annihilate, | |
| Is pass’d by others | |
| In warmth, light, joy. | 70 |
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| Time, so complain’d of, | |
| Who to no one man | |
| Shows partiality, | |
| Brings round to all men | |
| Some undimm’d hours. | 75 |
| | Note 1. Consolation] In 1853 and 1854 the following lines are printed as a motto to the poem:—| The wide earth is still | | Wider than one man’s passion: there’s no mood, | | No meditation, no delight, no sorrow, | | Cas’d in one man’s dimensions, can distil | | Such pregnant and infectious quality, | | Six yards round shall not ring it.— |
| | Note 2. Written during the siege of Rome by the French [1849]. [back] | | |
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