Part 18

Presently there is another cry: “Now she holds! She holds! The anchors have got her!” And men who have not spoken together during the voyage embrace each other for joy. The last link of scope is given; the chains are weather-bitted; the slatting canvas is furled; the yards are sharpened to the wind, and then she lies in that tremendous surf, whose pitiless diapason drowns every other sound--two hundred souls depending for life upon the links of those chains and the strength and clutch of those anchors.

Thus with the soul of man. Without the Christian hope it is a ship without an anchor, adrift on a stormy sea, at the mercy of its own passions, the temptations of life, and the wiles of the devil. These are the tempests which the soul must meet and struggle with; and, destitute of the gospel anchor, it must make shipwreck of faith and a good conscience.

The anchor is the seaman’s last resort. He has many expedients with which to battle and make head against the tempest, but when all other methods fail, then the anchor must bring her up or she is lost.

Thus the Christian, when all other expedients fail, when his own strength is but weakness, flings himself upon the mercy of God, and moors head and stern to the eternal promise and the covenants of grace.

“Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which entereth into that within the veil.”

Many a good ship has been lost, not because her anchors were insufficient and her ground tackle poor, not because they were not thrown clear and the ship properly secured to them, but because the holding ground was bad,--a smooth ledge, a soft mud, or loose sand,--insomuch that the anchors either slip over or cut through, and the seaman must perish without any fault of his own. In other places is found a soft mud or gravel upon the surface and beneath a strong clay, into which the anchor beds itself so sure and steadfast that no wind or sea will bring it home--the best of holding ground. Such anchorages are highly prized by seafaring men; they will beat up many a mile to windward to gain an anchor in them.

Thus the anchor of the soul is both sure and steadfast, because as the anchor of the ship goes through the surface mud into the deep, tenacious clay, it entereth into that within the veil.

The Holy of Holies, the most sacred place in the Jewish temple, was concealed by a veil, which was rent in twain at the crucifixion. That event was typical of those inward spiritual truths which are revealed to the believer by Christ, and in which his hope consists. The promises of grace and the inward witness of the spirit that he is an heir of those promises through faith in Christ are the holding ground of the believers’ anchor, where once bedded it is sure and steadfast.

These are inward spiritual joys of which the believer cannot be deprived except by his own remissness and the letting down of the anchor watch. These promises were the anchor of the apostle’s experience. A rough, stormy life was his--almost always on a lee shore and among the breakers. Very little smooth water did he see, for in every city bonds and imprisonment awaited him; but he had on board the gospel anchor, and shackled to it the chain of a rich and deep experience. The bitter end of that chain was clinched around the riding bits of his soul; and he had no fear that the anchor would come home or the chain part that moored him to it, and he could say: “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?”

Life is the sea; the soul is the vessel; the grace, gifts, and experience of the soul make up the priceless cargo with which the ship is freighted. Heaven is the harbor all hope to make. The temptations, labor, and afflictions of life are the tempests we must encounter. It is a stormy sea and a wintry passage. You need good ground tackle and good holding ground. Have you them? If not, it is from negligence, not necessity. It is, my friend, because you have not bestirred yourself to take hold of the promises of grace that have been pressed upon you.

PRAYER OFFERED ON MEMORIAL DAY (May 30, 1883) AT BRUNSWICK, MAINE

O Thou who art equally supreme in the moral and the material universe, guiding the sea-bird to her nest amid the blinding snows, the breaker’s foam, and the driving mist of ocean, who makest small the drops of rain, and a way for the lightning of thunder, and the thing that is hid bringest forth to light, we adore thy power and thy wisdom; we magnify thy grace; we hallow thy name. With penitence we confess our manifold transgressions as individuals and as a nation. Holiness belongeth unto Thee, but unto us shame and confusion of faces.

We thank Thee that Thou didst direct our forefathers to these shores, and inspire them with purpose and wisdom to form a civil compact built upon the principles of religion, education, law, and labor. We thank Thee that, in the face of famine, pestilence, and relentless foes, they accomplished their purpose, and with a spirit of self-sacrifice worthy of the cause, devoted themselves as stepping stones to bridge the path of future generations that they might create a republic, lay the foundations of civil liberty, resist oppression, and seal their devotion to their principles with their blood. We thank Thee that though they have passed away, their principles have survived, and that when the republic they had reared was rocking to its foundations, assailed by foes without and treachery within, their children did not prove unworthy of the sires who begat them, nor recreant to the principles they drew in with their mothers’ milk and were taught at their fathers’ knees. We thank Thee that they were equally ready to vindicate at the cannon’s mouth and maintain with property or life the principles of civil and religious liberty, and the inalienable right of every man to the fruit of his own labor.

We pray Thee that, on this day, set apart by the Executive of the nation as a day of grateful remembrance, we may appreciate the true nature of the perils we have escaped and acknowledge our indebtedness to the providence of that Being who ruleth over the affairs of nations. May we not in our prosperity forget those dark hours when all faces gathered blackness. May we not merely decorate the graves, but may we ever cherish with affectionate remembrance our obligations to those whose courage mounted in proportion to the imminence of the danger, and who approved their loyalty with their blood. May we not on this day fraught with associations so sad to those whose wounds, partially healed, are this day reopened, forget the fatherless whose parents sleep in bloody graves, and the widows whom this day reminds of all they have lost, and the aged parents from whom war took the support of their declining years. We commit these to thy care and keeping; we commit unto Thee all those who suffered and sacrificed that the Union might be preserved. And we thank Thee for the comfort of a vast army come back from the deadly uproar of arms to take up again the unheroic duties of life, and strive by honest living to maintain the principles they fought to defend.

We pray for thy blessing upon thy servant. May he be enabled to expound and enforce those principles which lie at the foundation of social happiness and free institutions; those principles which have made this republic, which a little more than a century ago was a mere shrub with bare shade sufficient to cover its roots, to become a tree that hath sent forth its roots to the sea and its branches to the rivers, and on whose foliage the sunlight loves to linger, and on whose branches the dew of heaven lieth all night.--AMEN.

VERSE

FROM “THE PHANTOMS OF THE MIND”

[First printed in _Bowdoin Portfolio_, September, 1839.]

I would not be a fragile flower To languish in a lady’s bower, A silken thing of texture rare That fears to meet God’s blessed air; My life a water, stagnant, low, Without an ebb, without a flow; Chained like a captive to his oar To toil on, on, forevermore! And supplicate with frantic cry For the “poor privilege to die”; A smooth-faced boy, a harmless thing, A kitten playing with a string, A child without, a brute within, Without e’en energy to sin. Not thus, when erst that iron race From whom our birth we proudly trace, No sculptured arras decked the bed Whereon reposed the patriot’s head; Nor proud device or motto wore Those stern-faced men that lived of yore In the good days of “auld lang syne,” When liberty, a feeble vine, Lay bruised and trailing on the ground, Nor yet a single trellis found; Gently they reared its drooping crest, They bade its tendrils twine, And many a traveller since hath blessed The shadow of that vine.

THE DEMON OF THE SEA

[First printed in _Bowdoin Portfolio_, November, 1839.]

Ah! tell me not of your shady dells, Where the lilies gleam and the fountain wells, Where the reaper rests when his task is o’er, And the lake-wave sobs on the verdant shore, And the rustic maid with a heart all free, Hies to the well-known trysting-tree; For I’m the god of the rolling sea, And the charms of earth are nought to me. O’er the thundering chime of the breaking surge, On the lightning’s wing my course I urge, On the thrones of foam right joyous ride ’Mid the sullen dash of the angry tide. I hear ye tell of music’s power, The rapture of a sigh, When beauty in her wizard bower Unveils her languid eye. Of those who die in rugged fight And battling for their country’s right With the shivered brand in the “red right hand,” And the plaudits of a rescued land. Ye never knew the infernal fire, The withering curse, the scorching ire, That rages, maddens in the breast Of him who rules the billow’s crest. Heard ye that last despairing yell That wailed Creation’s funeral knell, When young and old, the vile, the brave, Were circled in one common grave? While on my ear of driving foam By moaning whirlwinds sped, O’er what _was_ joyous earth I roam, And trample on the dead. This is the music that my ear Thrills with stern ecstasy to hear! I love to view some lonely bark, The sport of storms, the lightning’s mark, Scarce struggling through the fresh’ning wave That foams and yawns to be her grave! I saw a son and father fight For a drifting spar their lives to save; The son he throttled his father gray, And tore the spar from his clutch away, Till he sank beneath the wave; And deemed it were a noble sight. I saw upon a shattered wreck All swinging at the tempest’s beck, A mother lone, whose frenzied eye Wandered in hopeless agony O’er that vast plain where naught was seen, The ocean and the sky between, And there all buried to the breast In the hungry surf that round her prest-- With feeble arms, in anguish wild, High o’er her head she raised her child, Endured of winds and waves the strife, To add a unit to its life.

I whelmed that infant in the sea To add a pang to her misery, And the wretched mother’s frantic yell Came o’er me like a soothing spell! Are ye so haughty in your pride, To deem of all the earth beside That yours are fields and fragrant flowers, And lute-like voices in your bowers, And gold and gems of priceless worth, And all the glory of the earth? Ah, mean is all your pageantry To that proud, fadeless blazonry, That waves in scathless beauty free Beneath the blue, old rolling sea! For there are flowers that wither not, And leaves that never fall, Immortal forms in each wild grot, Still bright and changeless all. Decay is not on beauty’s bloom, No canker in the rose, No prescience of a future doom To mar the sweet repose-- There Proteus’ changeful form is seen, And Triton winds his shell, While through old Ocean’s valleys green, The tuneful echoes swell. But though a Demon rightly named, For terror more than mercy famed,-- Yet demons e’en respect the power That nerves the heart in danger’s hour. And when the veteran of a hundred storms, Whom many a wild midnight I’ve girded with a thousand startling forms Of terror and affright,-- When tempests roar and hell-fiends scream, The thunders crash, the lightnings gleam, ’Mid biting cold and driving hail Still grasps the helm, still trims the sail, Nor deigns to utter coward cries, But as he lived, so fearless dies,-- Mingles his last faint, bubbling sigh With the pealing tempest’s banner-cry;-- Then winds are hushed, the billow falls Where storms were wont to be, As I bear him to the untrodden halls Of the deep unfathomed sea! Now Triton sends a mournful strain Through all that vast profound,-- At once a bright immortal train Comes thronging at the sound. And on a shining pearly car They place the honored dust, And Ocean’s chargers gently bear Along the sacred trust, While far o’er all the glassy plain By mighty Neptune led, In sadness moves that funeral train,-- Thus Ocean wails her dead! And now the watch of life is past, The shattered hulk is moored at last, Nor e’en the tempest’s thrilling breath Can wake “the dull, cold ear of death.” No bitter thoughts of home and loved ones dart Their untold anguish through the seaman’s heart.

Peaceful be thy slumbers, brother, There’s no prouder grave for thee, Well may pine for thee a mother, Flower of ocean’s chivalry!

PORTLAND

Still may I love, beloved of thee, My own fair city of the sea! Where moulders back to kindred dust The mother who my childhood nurst, And strove, with ill-requited toil, To till a rough, ungrateful soil; Yet kindly spared by Heaven to know That Faith’s reward is sure, though slow, And see the prophet’s mantle grace The rudest scion of her race.

And while around thy seaward shore The Atlantic doth its surges pour, (Those verdant isles, thy bosom-gems) May Temples be thy diadems; Spire after spire in beauty rise, Still pointing upward to the skies, Unwritten sermons, and rebukes of love, To point thy toiling throngs to worlds above.

AN ODE

[Written for the Semi-centennial Celebration at Bowdoin College, August 31, 1852.]

From waves that break to break again, From winds that die to gather might, How pleasant on the stormy main Appears the sailor’s native height.

And sweet, I ween, the graceful tears That glisten in the wand’rer’s eye, As haunts and homes of early years Begemmed with morning’s dewdrops lie.

Borne on the fragrant breath of morn, His lazy vessel stems the tide Among the fields of waving corn That nestle on the river’s side.

His mother’s cottage through the leaves Gleams like a rainbow seen at night, While all the visions fancy weaves Are stirring at the well-known sight.

But sweeter memories cluster here Than ever stirred a seaman’s breast, Than e’er provoked his grateful tear, Or wooed the mariner to rest.

’Twas here our life of life began-- The spirit felt its dormant power; ’Twas here the child became a man-- The opening bud became a flower.

And from Niagara’s distant roar And homes beside the heaving sea, Rank upon rank thy children pour, And gather to thy Jubilee.

On these old trees each nestling leaf, The murmur of yon flowing stream, Has power to stir a buried grief, Or to recall some youthful dream.

Each path that skirts the tangled wood, Or winds amidst its secret maze, Worn by the feet of those we loved, Brings back the forms of other days.

Of those whose smile was heaven to thee, Whose voice a richer music made Than brooks that murmur to the sea, Or birds that warble in the shade.

Around these ancient altar fires We cluster with a joyous heart, While ardent youth and hoary sires Alike sustain a grateful part.

A HYMN

[Written for the Celebration of the Twenty-eighth Anniversary of the Boston Seaman’s Friend Society, at Music Hall, Boston, May 28, 1856.]

I was not reared where heaves the swell Of surf on coasts remote and drear, But grew with roses, in a dell, And waked with bird-notes in my ear.

Glad hours on golden pinions sped, As folded to her throbbing breast, A mother’s lips their fragrance shed, And lulled me with a prayer to rest.

The red has faded from my cheek, And bronzed and scarred the boyish face; Affection’s eye might vainly seek One lingering lineament to trace.

Shipwrecked, the Sailor’s Home I sought, My raiment gone, my shipmates dead, Through poverty reluctant brought, And there a sober life I led.

But when the evening prayer was said, It brought the unaccustomed tear, A mother’s hand was on my head, Her voice was thrilling in mine ear.

Old memories waked that long had slept, They forced the spirit’s brazen crust; I wept and prayed, I prayed and wept, Till anguish ripened into trust.

Blest be the hands that reared thy dome The wandering seaman’s step to greet; Guiding the homeless to a home, And sinners to a mercy-seat.

TRUE POETRY’S TASK

When first the human clay, instinct with thought, Doth feel the motions of those hidden fires That by a subtle alchemy sublime The crude contexture of its grosser powers, It is not life--rather capacity Of life and power hereafter to be given. Life lies beyond us, as an Orphic tale Of things mysterious and dimly seen, A gorgeous phantom, but a phantom still That ever is, and ever is without. We dwell amid the border flowers that bloom To bless and cheer life’s brier-planted paths, Its dusty turnpikes, and its scorching noons; And thus our primal being is a dream And most mysterious to the dreamer, E’en as the dim and iron forms that frown From the dark walls of some old corridor On which the moonbeams thro’ the crumbling towers Bestow expression and inform with life Delicious but delight indefinite. The finer tissues of that wondrous web That doth so strangely link spirit to sense Matter to mind, are all unwoven yet; Those subtle telegraphs that make report Of outward action to the inward life Still in the secret caves of being sleep. The soul is conscious of no other tie To nature than to love its beauty And with an open sense luxuriate In woods and fields with animal delight. For as the sturdy trunk and massive limbs Of the gigantic oak, lie deftly hid Within the acorn’s small periphery, Till in the pregnant bosom of the earth, Warmed by the sun, moistened with summer dews, It bursts its coffin and leaps forth to light; Thus when the soul is in its progress brought, Led on by nature’s genial processes, To touch reality and outward life, There is a stirring, from its inmost depths, Of yearning thoughts and deathless energies, Seeking the outward vesture that confers A definite existence and a form. Strong roots shoot forth and fibres more minute That by mysterious alchemy impart Substance to shadow, breath to lifeless forms. Life is no more a pageant to admire; Since with a yearning for a higher life, The power to struggle, and the thirst to know, Awakes a bitter principle to sin, Breeding intestine war and conflict fierce, Till powers are marshalled in the mind itself That with itself chaotic warfare wage. Henceforth man’s life is conflict, and his doom By conflict to grow stronger, to contend From the rude cross within some Alpine gorge To the proud blazon of ancestral tombs. In eastern myths and Christian chronicles, In heathen temples, and in holy shrines The same stern truth is graven on them all-- That conflict only doth ennoble man. But man is not sufficient to himself In this great conflict, therefore God has given A twofold revelation to his faith. Subjective, one to reason makes appeal; The other to the grosser sense explains Stern truths by most persuasive images, Graving dread mandates on the shifting clouds, Weaving of wild flowers and of foliage green A genial symbol for a genial faith. This is the task to Poetry assigned: Of life divine to be the messenger. As to the sorrow-stricken soul of him Who knelt and prayed in lone Gethsemane The angel choir did gently minister, E’en thus true Poetry doth nerve the soul Upon its Alpine passage to commune With truths that quicken and with thoughts that stir. It is the soul’s sheet-anchor in the strife.

MISCELLANEOUS

MEMORIES OF LONGFELLOW

TOPSHAM, MAINE, February 10, 1885.

EDITORS OF THE ORIENT:

_Dear Sirs_,--I have received your note requesting me to furnish some reminiscences of Longfellow. I would say in reply that although yielding to no one in my admiration of the character and genius of Mr. Longfellow or regard for his memory, I still feel quite unable to contribute anything that would meet your expectations or serve your purpose, from the fact that my knowledge of him began and to a large extent closed in very early youth before his powers had developed. Nevertheless, as everything even remotely connected with him or his is valued and treasured, I will endeavor to comply with your request.

Hon. Stephen Longfellow, the father of Henry, was a friend of my father’s and resided near us. Judge Potter, the father of the poet’s first wife, lived almost directly opposite to us; and in an adjoining house a sister of the late Eben Steele taught a school which I attended with two of the daughters of Judge Potter and other children. The Potter children, being the nearest neighbors, were my playmates. I can see them now with their little blue aprons and happy faces. There was something very attractive in the expression of Mary Potter’s features, the future wife of the poet. It remains as fresh in my recollection to-day as it was then. I used to hear a great deal about angels, but cherished very incoherent ideas in regard to them, and one evening when my mother was teaching me a hymn, the conclusion of which was:--

“May angels guard me while I sleep Till morning light appears,”

I astonished her by asking if Mary Potter was not an angel.

Though she was quiet and retiring, it made one happy to be in her society; and she enjoyed fun as well as the rest of us, only in a more quiet way. One morning there was a platform laid around the pump in the schoolyard and a man employed to paint it red. On going to dinner he put his paint-pot and brush under the edge of the platform where we discovered it. The Potters wore red morocco shoes and I wore black ones. Some other children who rejoiced in red shoes were very proud of them, which excited my envy. I painted my own and the shoes of several others a staring red, and we strutted among our mates with great satisfaction, which, however, was somewhat abated upon the arrival of the schoolmistress.