And strangely soft to-night the spice-wind comes!
When it is on my forehead! Abra sweet!
Would I were in the desert at thy feet!
My barb! my glorious steed! Methinks my soul would mount upon its track More fleetly, could I die upon thy back! How would thy thrilling speed
Quicken my pulse!-Oh, Allah! I get wild! Would that I were once more a desert-child!
My mother! my star mother!-Ha! my breath Stifles!- -more air!Ben Khorat! this is-death! Touch me l- -I feel you not!
Dying!-Farewell! good master !-room! more room! Abra! I loved thee! star-bright star! Icome !"
How idly of the human heart we speak,
Giving it gods of clay! How worse than vain
Is the school homily, that Eden's fruit
Cannot be plucked too freely from "the tree Of good and evil." Wisdom sits alone,
Topmost in heaven ;-she is its light-its God! And in the heart of man she sits as high- Though grovelling eyes forget her oftentimes, Seeing but this world's idols. The pure mind Sees her for ever: and in youth we come Filled with her sainted ravishment, and kneel, Worshipping God through her sweet altar-fires, And then is knowledge "good." We come too oft- The heart grows proud with fulness, and we soon Look with licentious freedom on the maid Throned in celestial beauty. There she sits, Robed in her soft and seraph loveliness, Instructing and forgiving, and we gaze Until desire grows wild, and, with our hands Upon her very garments, are struck down, Blasted with a consuming fire from heaven! Yet, oh! how full of music from her lips
Breathe the calm tones of wisdom! Human praise
Is sweet till envy mars it, and the touch Of new-won gold stirs up the pulses well, And woman's love, if in a beggar's lamp
'Twould burn, might light us cheerly through the world; But Knowledge hath a far more 'wildering tongue,
And she will stoop and lead you to the stars, And witch you with her mysteries, till gold
Is a forgotten dross, and power and fame Toys of an hour, and woman's careless love, Light as the breath that breaks it. He who binds His soul to knowledge steals the key of heaven- But 'tis a bitter mockery that the fruit
May hang within his reach, and when, with thirst
Wrought to a maddening frenzy, he would taste- It burns his lips to ashes!
THE HEALING OF THE DAUGHTER OF JAIRUS.
FRESHLY the cool breath of the coming eve Stole through the lattice, and the dying gir Felt it upon her forehead. She had lain Since the hot noontide in a breathless trance, Her thin pale fingers clasp'd within the hand Of the heart-broken Ruler, and her breast, Like the dead marble, white and motionless. The shadow of a leaf lay on her lips, And as it stirr'd with the awakening wind, The dark lids lifted from her languid eyes, And her slight fingers mov'd, and heavily She turn'd upon her pillow. He was there- The same lov'd, tireless watcher, and she look'd
THE HEALING OF THE DAUGHTER OF JAIRUS.
Into his face until her sight grew dim
With the fast-falling tears, and, with a sigh Of tremulous weakness, murmuring his name, She gently drew his hand upon her lips, And kiss'd it as she wept. The old man sunk Upon his knees, and in the drapery
Of the rich curtains buried up his face- And when the twilight fell, the silken folds Stirr'd with his prayer, but the slight hand he held Had ceased its pressure, and he could not hear In the dead, utter silence, that a breath
Came through her nostrils, and her temples gave To his nice touch no pulse, and at her mouth He held the lightest curl that on her neck Lay with a mocking beauty, and his gaze Ach'd with its deathly stillness.
And softly o'er the Sea of Galilee
Danced the breeze-ridden ripples to the shore, Tipp'd with the silver sparkles of the moon.
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