The Poetical Works of Thomas Traherne, 1636?-1674, from the original manuscripts

APPENDIX

The poems in the foregoing pages are derived (as I have already explained) from three separate MS. volumes, and from the author's prose volume, entitled "Christian Ethicks." The bulk of them (ending with "Goodness") are from the folio volume. The remainder—with the exception of the three which are from the volume of "Meditations and Devotions"—are from the prose volume entitled "Centuries of Meditations." I have printed all the poems which I have found in these various sources, with one exception. This is a poem which appears in the folio volume, but which is there crossed through as though marked for suppression.[M] Whether this mark of suppression was made by the author or by another person there are no means of judging; but as the poem in question is, as I think, somewhat below the level of its companions, I have thought it better to reserve it for the appendix than to print it between the poems "Thoughts" I. and II., where it occurs in the MS.

BLISS

I

All Bliss

Consists in this,

To do as Adam did,

And not to know those superficial Toys

Which in the Garden once were hid.

Those little new-invented things,

Cups, saddles, crowns are childish joys,

So ribbands are and rings,

Which all our happiness destroys.

II

Nor God

In His abode,

Nor Saints, nor little boys,

Nor Angels made them; only foolish men,

Grown mad with custom, on those toys,

Which more increase their wants, do dote,

And when they older are do then

Those baubles chiefly note

With greedier eyes, more boys tho' men.

To enable the reader to judge whether my hypothesis that the author of "A Serious and Patheticall Contemplation of the Mercies of God" is also the author of the other poems contained in the present volume, is well or ill-founded, I will now print the three poems which appear in the above-mentioned work. They are as follows:

[LIFE'S BLESSEDNESS]

While I, O Lord, exalted by Thy hand

Above the skies, in glory seem to stand,

The skies being made to serve me, as they do,

While I thy Glories in thy Goodness view.

To be in Glory higher than the skies

Is greater bliss than 'tis in place to rise

Above the Stars: More blessed and divine

To live and see than like the Sun to shine.

O what Profoundness in my Body lies

For whom the Earth was made, the Sea, the Skies!

So greatly high our human Bodies are

That Angels scarcely may with these compare:

In all the heights of Glory seated, they

Above the Sun in Thine eternal day

Are seen to shine; with greater gifts adorned

Than Gold with Light or Flesh with Life suborned;

Suns are but Servants, Skies beneath their feet;

The Stars but Stones; Moons but to serve them meet.

Beyond all heights above the World they reign

In thy great Throne ordained to remain.

All Tropes are Clouds; Truth doth itself excel,

Whatever Heights Hyperboles can tell.

[THE RESURRECTION]

Then shall each Limb a spring of Joy be found,

And every member with its Glory crown'd:

While all the Senses, fill'd with all the Good

That ever Ages in them understood

Transported are: Containing Worlds of Treasure

At one delight with all their Joy and Pleasure,

From whence, like Rivers, Joy shall ever flow,

Affect the Soul, though in the Body grow,

Return again and make the Body shine

Like Jesus Christ, while both in one combine.

Mysterious Contracts are between the Soul,

Which touch the Spirits and by those its Bowl;

The Marrow, Bowels, Spirits, melt and move,

Dissolving ravish, teach them how to love.

He that could bring the Heavens thro' the eye,

And make the World within the Fancy lie,

By beams of Light that closing meet in one,

From all the parts of His celestial Throne,

Far more than this in framing Bliss can do,

Inflame the Body and the Spirit too:

Can make the Soul by Sense to feel and see,

And with her Joy the Senses wrap'd to be:

Yea, while the Flesh or Body subject lies

To those Affections which in Souls arise;

All holy Glories from the Soul redound,

And in the Body by the Soul abound,

Are felt within and ravish ev'ry Sense

With all the Godhead's glorious Excellence,

Who found the way Himself to dwell within,

As if even Flesh were nigh to Him of kin:

His Goodness, Wisdom, Power, Love Divine,

Make by the Soul convey'd the Body shine,

Not like the Sun (that earthly Darkness is)

But in the strengths and heights of all this bliss,

For God designed thy Body for His sake,

A Temple of the Deity to make.