Where on the towering shore a mighty gorge
Breaks headlong through the mountains to the sea,
And a deep stream into a haven large
Spreads for the welcome of all ships that sail
The Mediterranean ocean, there of old
Myra, metropolis of Lycia, sat;
Mart once of many meeting nations—now
A few colossal shadows sign and say
Mutely, 'Here Myra was, and she was great!'
At Myra safe arrived and anchor cast,
That Adramyttian vessel disembarked
Her voyagers bound to Rome, and went her way.
When she at Cæsarea touching found
That Jewish prisoner there and bore him thence,
She had suddenly gone sailing unaware,
In transit as of star athwart the sun,
Into the solar light of history;
At Myra parting with him she passed on
Into the rim of dark and disappeared:
A moment in a light she guessed not of
Illuminated for all time to see,
Then heedless dipping deep her plunging keel
And foundering in the gulfs of the unknown!
A bark of Egypt seeking Italy,
Wheat-laden of the fatness of the Nile,
Swung resting in the Myra roadstead nigh.
Hereon were re-embarked that company,
Paul, and the friends that sailed with Paul to Rome—
Fallen Felix too, with his wife spurring him
To hope yet and to strive and still be strong.
Alexandreia sent the vessel forth,
City twice famous, joining to her own
The august tradition of her founder's fame,
The mighty Macedonian's mightier son,
Great Alexander who the whole world gained
Indeed—with what for profit of it all?
At this sea-gate wide opening to the West,
From all the East men met and hence dispersed—
That current laden most which drew to Rome.
Besides from Egypt her hierophants,
Hence thither flocked those worshippers of fire
From Persia holding Zoroaster sage,
Astrologers of Assyria, and from Ind
Confessors of the somber faith of Buddh.
Of many such as these on board that bark
One Indian Buddhist votary there was
Worthy of note: a gentle-mannered man
Deep in himself involved, as who mused much
Of hidden things and hard to understand,
The pathos of the mystery of the world,
The human strife, with the defeat foregone
Companioning the strife and ending it—
Yet ending not a strife that could not end,
But ever, round and round, one dull defeat,
Trod the treadmill of fate, no hope, no goal.
A gentle-mannered man, but sad of cheer,
Krishna his name, pilgrim of many climes,
Not idly curious to behold and learn,
But hiding pity in his heart for men
Seen everywhere the same, poor blinded moles
Toiling and moiling in the sunless mines
Of being, where no joy, whence no escape.
Escape none, or, if any, then escape
Impossible to win except by slow,
And unimaginably slow, process
Of suicide to endless date prolonged,
Æons on æons following numberless,
And fatal transmigrations of the soul
From state to state, from form to form, of self:
Yet progress none that might be felt the while,
But one long-drawn monotony instead
Of labor waste in movement seeming vain,
Cycles of change returning on themselves
Forever, bound to orbits that revolve
Eternal repetitions of the same
Vicissitude (the weaver's shuttle flung
Tediously back and forth from hand to hand—
Or swinging pendulum), 'twixt death and birth,
Lapses from misery to misery
Always, prospect like retrospect stretched out
To vista and perspective vanishing
Of path to be pursued and still pursued
By the undaunted seeker of an end—
He by his own act dying all the time
In ceaseless effort utterly to cease,
Will willing not to will, desire desiring
To be desire no more, pure apathy,
No hope, no fear, no motion of the mind,
Until, through dull disuse and atrophy,
Extinguished be capacity itself
To do or suffer anything, and so,
Down sinking through the bottomless abyss
Of being, at last the fugitive go free,
Emancipate but by becoming—naught!
Krishna thus deeming of his fellow-men,
Their present and their future and their fate,
Hid a vast pity in his heart for them,
Pity the vaster that he could not help.
This melancholy man compassionate,
Who might in musing to himself seem lost,
Yet saw and heard with vigilant quick sense
Whatever passed about him where he stood,
Or where he sat—for most he moveless sat,
Moveless and silent, on the swarming deck.
One man indeed he spake with, yet with him
His speech, grave ever, he spared, and sheathed in tones
Soothingly soft and low like blandishment.
That one man was a Roman; Roman less
To seeming than cosmopolite—his air
An air of long-accustomed conversance
With whatsoever might be seen and learned
Through much Ulyssean wandering to and fro
And up and down among his fellow-men,
And watching of their works and words and ways.
This Roman citizen of the world, mailed proof
In habit of a full-experienced mind
Against commotion from surprise, was now
Visibly moved to wonder seeing Paul.
His wonder checked with reverence and with love
Indignant to behold the captive state
Of one deserving rather wreath than bond,
He stepped toward Paul and with such homage paid
As liege to lord might pay saluted him.
"Grace unto thee, my brother," answered Paul,
"From the Lord Jesus Christ, thy Lord and mine!"
They twain fell on each other's neck and kissed
With tears. Such salutation and embrace—
No more; but this with variant mood was marked
By three that saw it. The centurion
Blent in his look pleasure with his surprise;
But Felix and Drusilla frowned askance
(They also knowing the Roman, as at court
Courtiers know one another—without love);
Those frowned askance, and mixed their mutual eyes
In sinister exchange of look malign
Portending sequel if the chance should serve;
And in Neronian Rome the happy chance
Of mischief, but be patient, scarce could fail!
That gentle Indian with his pregnant eye
Saw all and mused it—then, and after, long—
The cheerful, joyful, reverent greeting given
A Jewish prisoner by a Roman lord
And by the Jewish prisoner so returned
In unaccustomed words ill understood
But solemn like the language of a spell;
This, with the Roman captain's look benign
Approving what surprised him yet; nor less,
The menace of the mutual scowls that met
Darkening each other on the alien brows
Of Felix and Drusilla at the sight—
Most like two clouds that, black already, blown
Together, shadow into a deeper dark!
In due time, anchor weighed with choral sound
Of sailors' voices cheering each himself
And each his fellow in a formless tune,
The ship from out the haven slowly slid,
Urged with the oar but wooing too the wind
With slack sail doubtful drooping by the mast.
Large planes of lucid ocean tranced in calm
They traversed with loth labor of the oar,
Or else were buffeted of winds that blew
Thwart or full opposite day after day,
While they hugged close the Asian shore, then Rhodes
Saw southward, mooring fair her fruitful isle.
The leisures long-drawn-out of those delays,
To Paul and to his friends were prize and spoil.
Grown wonted to the sway of wind and wave,
They spent, cradled at grateful ease, the slow,
Soft-lapsing, indistinguishable hours
That wore the sunny summer season out,
In various converse or communion sweet
Oft with mere sense of mutual nearness nursed.
"Who was that kindly courteous gentleman,"
Thus at fit moment Rachel asked of Paul,
"That spoke so fair my brother coming up?
Roman he seemed, and lordly was his air;
Yet something other, sweeter, differenced him
From his compatriot peers, and I observed
Thou gavest him thy grace from Christ the Lord."
"That, Rachel," Paul replied, "was one I knew—
Almost mightst thou have known him—long ago
In Tarsus; we were boys together there.
But since then twice, with now this added time,
Has God in wisdom made our pathways meet.
That Roman to Damascus went with me
And saw, what time the glory of the Lord
Blinded me to behold at last the True.
But him that glory, seen not suffered, left
For outward vision what he was before,
While inwardly with denser darkness blind,
Reclaimed from atheism to idolatry!
But God had mercy on him; years went by,
And I, with Barnabas to Cyprus come,
Found there this selfsame Roman, governor.
The skeptic whom theophany had made
Religious not, but superstitious, now
Led captive of delusion—worldly-wise
Albeit he was, yet unto God a fool!—
Was given up wholly dupe and devotee
Of a deceiver, Jew, Bar-jesus named,
Pretender to the gift of prophecy.
This sorcerer dared withstand us to the face
Before the governor, who had summoned us
(Not dreaming whom he summoned summoning me)
To tell him of the word of God. But I,
Filled with the Spirit of the Lord—mine eyes
On him, that sorcerer, fastened—uttered words
Which God the Faithful followed with such blast
And blight of blindness on the wretched man
That he groped seeking who would lead him thence.
The governor beheld and wonder-struck
To see God's work God's word at last believed.
The pagan playmate of my boyhood so
Became the changed soul thou hast seen him here,
In Jesus brother, loving and beloved;
And Sergius Paulus thou his name mayst call."
"O Saul," said Rachel, "in what history
Of marvel following marvel has thy life,
Since when that noon Christ met thee in thy way
Damascus-ward, been portioned out to thee!
The stories of the prophets old whom God
Wrought through to show His people how behind
The thick veil of His outward handiwork
He Himself lived and was a present God—
Those tales of wonders, let me own it, Saul,
Had grown to me to seem so far away
From our time, and so alien from the things
We with our eyes behold, hear with our ears,
Much more, with these our hands perform, that I
Almost had fallen, not into disbelief
(Not that, ever, I trust—nay, God forbid!)
Concerning them, but into a listless mind
Which to itself no image of them framed—
Fault well-nigh worse than outright disbelief!
That now the things themselves, nay, things more strange,
Should be by God repeated in the world,
Nor only so, that one of mine own blood,
My brother, should a chosen vessel be
Of this great grace of God through Christ to men—
This less with wonder than with awe fills me,
And I—believe not, faith were name too faint
For passion such as mine is—I adore!"
Paul bent on Rachel eyes unutterable
Wherein a sense of sympathy serene
Betwixt himself and her he talked with, shone,
And they twain dwelt in a suspense supreme,
Silent, of adoration where they stood—
The rapture of doxology unbreathed
To either doubled as by other shared.
At length Paul spoke; his tones intense and low
Thrilled through the ear of Rachel to her heart:
"O Rachel, He who out of darkness once
Bade the light shine, God, shined into our hearts
Enkindling there this dayspring from on high,
This light of knowing from the face of Christ
The glory inexpressible of God!"
A pause once more of rapt communion; then
This added in a chastened other strain:
"But we such treasure have in urns of clay
Fragile and nothing worth that all in all
The exceeding greatness of the power may be
Not of ourselves but ever only God's!
Constrained I find myself in every way,
But straitened not; perplexed, but not dismayed;
Hunted, but not forsaken; smitten down,
But not destroyed; forever bearing round
Within the body wheresoever driven
The dying of the Lord, that the Lord's life
May also in my body forth be shown.
Therefore I faint not; let my outward man
Fail, if it must, my inward man meantime
Is day by day in fadeless youth renewed.
How light affliction sits upon my heart!
It is but for a moment, and it works
The while for me an ever-growing weight
Of glory fixed forever to be mine!
I look no longer on the things about
Me, seeming to be real, since they are seen,
But far away instead, far, far away
Beyond these, at the things that are not seen.
These for a season, Rachel, the things seen!
But those, the things not seen, eternal they!
"When I saw Stephen upward into heaven
Gaze, and behold there what no eye might see,
The glory of the Ever-living God,
And Jesus standing by His Father's side;
When afterward I saw Hirani stand
Before the anger of the Sanhedrim,
His eyes not seeing what their faces looked,
His ears not hearing what the voices round
Were saying and forswearing to his harm,
But steadfastly his vision fixed afar
And all his hearkening bent for sounds unheard,
Sights, sounds, sent couriers from the world to come,
The real world, the eternal, and the blest—
How little knew I then what now I know!
O Rachel, why was I not then disturbed
With doubts and fears, and guesses of the true?
The darkness of that hour before the dawn!
The brightness of this full-accomplished day!
The glory of that other day that waits!
The Jacob's ladder and the shining rounds!
The moving pomps of angels up and down
Ascending and descending the degrees
Betwixt the heights of heavenly and my feet!
"Now unto Him that in such darkness died,
But rose amid such brightness from the tomb
And reascended where He was before
To glory inaccessible with God,
And there expects until He thither bring
Us also both to witness and to share
His exaltation to the almighty throne—
To our Lord Christ, Redeemer by His blood,
Worthy, and only worthy, to receive
Ascription without measure of men's praise,
Be honor, worship, thanks, obedience, paid,
And love, even love like His, forevermore!"
Rachel had barely to her brother's words
Breathed fervently her low amen, when he,
The passion of doxology unspent
Yet quivering in his tones, went on and said:
"But, Rachel, all amid this strain of joy
Exulting like a fountain in my heart—
Unspeakable and full of glory indeed,
As Peter matched it with his mighty phrase!—
Yea, in it, as if of it and the same,
I feel a sense of pathos and of pain
And hint of earthly with the heavenly mixed.
I cannot but of Shimei think, and grieve—
The grief indeed a paradox of joy,
Such pity and such anguish of desire
To help and save! Can we not succor him?
Can we not have him forth of his duress
In dungeon into this fair light of day?
I feel it must be possible. Pray thou,
And I will pray, and haply God may touch
The heart of Julius to such act of grace
That at our suit and intercession he
Will bid the wretched bondman up again
Out of the noisome darkness where he pines,
If to full freedom not, at least to breathe
The freshness of the unpolluted air
And feel the force of the reviving sun.
Sick he may be, in prison is, we know,
And neighbor let us count him, taught of Christ
To hold for neighbor any who in need
Is nigh enough to us for us to help.
Sick and in prison Jesus we might find
In Shimei, if for Jesus' sake we go
And carry him the solaces of love!"
"But he, will he receive what we should bring?"
Said Rachel; "would not bitter-making thought
Welling up in him like a secret spring
Of brackish issue gushing from beneath
A crystal runlet pure as Siloa's brook,
Turn for him all our sweetness into gall?"
"Perhaps, perhaps," said Paul; "we cannot know.
That were for thee and me defeat indeed—
To be of evil overcome! But, nay,
Nay, Rachel, let us hope, and overcome
Evil with good. What is impossible?
Is this, even this, impossible—through Christ?
Love, if love perfect be, hopeth all things.
There is in love, as John delights to say,
No fear; for perfect love casteth out fear.
Perfect our love, be faithless outcast fear
No counsellor of ours; but hope instead
Far-seeing, with her forward-looking eyes
Reflecting hither light from that beyond.
Hope maketh not ashamed, because the love
Of God is poured forth in our hearts a stream,
An overflowing, like the river of God,
Fed from the fulness of the Holy Ghost!
O, how omnipotent I feel in him!
But, behold, Julius! Let me speak straightway!"
"O thou, my keeper"—so to Julius Paul—
"Full courteous to thy prisoner often proved,
Nay, more than courteous, kind—beseech thee now
Beyond thy wont be courteously kind!"
"What wilt thou, then?" said Julius. "Grant it me,"
Paul answered, "to reprieve, from chains, I ask not,
But from his dungeon doom, to see the sun
And breathe this vital air, the wretched man
Whom, partly for my sake perhaps, thou keepest
Immured in dismal dark duress below!"
"Strange being thou!" said Julius answering Paul,
Yet answering not, with wonder overpowered.
"That wretch, that miscreant, craven, liar, proved
Corrupter of the faith of men through bribe—
Nay, but assassin, only that he failed,
Assassin disappointed in attempt—
On whose life but thine own?—such man accurst
Do I now hear thee interceding for,
Thee, prisoner thyself, and that—unless
The story of his plot and traitorhood
And band of forty sworn conspirators
Against thee at Jerusalem, have been
Falsely told me—aye, that solely through him!
I wonder at thee! Art thou mad? The day
Thy countryman confronted by thee quailed,
Convicted of his dastard perjury
Which aimed to make thee murderer of him—
Then, Paul, I thought thee sane enough, as thou
With words launched like the thunderbolts of Jove
Didst rive him to his rotten innermost!
Yet then, even then, relenting strangely, thou
Didst melt the hardness that became thee so—
Making thee almost Roman, as I thought—
Melt it into a softness like a woman's.
And now again from thee this wanton whim
And suit of pity for that damnable!
I cannot make thee out—unless it be
Thou art moonstruck, and maudlin-mindedness
At times seize thee betraying thy manhood thus!"
Paul did not answer the centurion's words
With words again; instead—with look serene,
Ascendant, irresistible—received,
Absorbed, and overbore that other's look
(Which, after the words spoken, rested on
Paul's face in pity that was almost scorn)
Quenching it as a shield a fiery dart;
Till Julius, fain to yield yet somewhat save
His pride in yielding, turned from Paul and said
To Rachel, as in condescension dashed
With banter: "Let thy sister if she will
Go carry Shimei tidings of reprieve;
A sister to a brother's murderer go
And take him token of her love—and his!"
A little softening, as he spoke, from sneer,
At the sheer aspect of her loveliness,
An aspect not of weakness, but wherein
There mingled, with the lovely woman's charm,
Something august of saintly matronhood,
Remote from any hint of what could seem
Defect of sane and saving self-control—
Thus wrought upon a little while he spoke,
Julius to Rachel turning spoke such words.
"All thanks," she gently said, "thou art most kind.
It shall be as thou sayest, for I will go."
She turned, but hung in action, as through doubt;
With artless art of hesitation sweet
Beyond persuasion eloquent, she said:
"Yea, thou art good, and gladly will I go,
But I—I am a woman—were it meet?—
If thou declarest it meet, then it shall be,
And thither will I venture down alone;
For God will round me globe an angel guard
To treasure me from peril and from soil."
Her grace, but more her graciousness, prevailed;
For won upon by her demeanor meek,
Majestic, and that awe of womanhood
Instinctive in a noble breast of man,
The Roman, with even a flush of shame at last
Not altogether hidden as he turned
His bronzéd cheek away, spoke out aloud:
"Varenus!" so he called the soldier's name
Whose turn it was that watch to sentry Paul—
The same that Shimei late had sought to bribe—
"Go bid up Shimei hither from the hold!"
Haggard, dejected, squalid from the filth
And fetor of his dungeon, in surprise
With terror, doubting what awaited him—
Dazed in the sudden light his blinking eyes—
The more bewildered that he could not frame
With any true and steady sight to see
Color, or shape, of person or of thing
Before him or about him anywhere,
Shimei stepped halt and staggering on the deck.
A spectacle for pity to abhor,
And for abhorrence shuddering to behold
With pity—wreck and remnant of a man!
The soldier would not touch to steady him,
But let him shuffle as he might his way.
Scarce more than one or two uncertain steps,
And Shimei insecure of standing stood,
Shaken in all the fabric of the man—
Like some decrepit crazy edifice
Wind-shaken trembling on the point to fall.
Paul saw, and felt his heart within him moved.
To the unmoved centurion thus he spoke:
"Wilt thou not let him rest awhile retired
Apart a little till his force revive
And his eyes grow rewonted to the light?"
"Have thou thy will with him," the Roman said,
"So far as of his chains to ease him not.
Thou art right perhaps; a little added strength
Were well, were timely, in his present plight—
May save him over to added punishment.
So nurse him fair, ye brotherhood," said he,
"And sisterhood, of mercy ill-bestowed!"
And round the Roman glanced, with Roman scorn
Masking some sense of admiration shamed,
Upon the group of ready hearts and hands,
The circle of Paul's fellowship in faith,
Now gathered nigh with looks of wish to help.
BOOK XI.
THE LAST OF SHIMEI.
Shimei in his feebleness and distress is ministered to by
the companions of Paul. Thus relieved, he falls asleep and
dreams. On his waking, ministration to his needs is renewed;
and, strengthened now with nourishment, he sleeps out the
night. The next morning he finds himself an altered man.
He at length makes some loth acknowledgment to Paul, who
in turn expresses his own sorrow for high words spoken in
pride against Shimei. A storm some days after rises, and
Shimei meets a sudden and awful doom.
THE LAST OF SHIMEI.
A parable in life of perfect love
(Other than was in heaven to be beheld),
The clustering angels, crowded nigh to see,
Saw in the things that then and there befell.
It might indeed have been a scene let down
Suddenly from above in lively show
Of love in act on earth like love in heaven—
Only that never in heaven is need of act,
From love, of mercy such as now was seen,
A living picture, on that vessel's deck!
Luke the physician, at a sign from Paul,
With Aristarchus, one on either side,
Supported Shimei, tottering as he went
(Too weak to wish or will or this or that,
Or otherwise behave than just submit),
To where with feat celerity meanwhile
The women, of one mind, Rachel and Ruth
And fair Eunicé, in a sheltered place
Had spread, of rug and pillow thither brought,
A sudden couch whereon a man might rest.
Stephen, from out the store of frugal cheer
By his forecasting mother's care purveyed—
Provision for the needs that might attend
The chances of sea-faring—brought and broached
A flagon of sweet wine. This, to the lips
Of Shimei in a slender goblet pressed,
Cheered him his heart and made him seem to live.
All was in silence done, and then, withdrawn
A little from about the man supine,
That company of ministrants, one will—
Among them Mary Magdalené too,
Pathetic, with her deep-experienced eyes—
Kept quiet watch and wished that he might sleep.
And Shimei slept; a deep dissolving sleep—
Unjointed all his members in remiss
Solution of the consciousness of life.
A long deep sleep; a dreamless sleep at first,
Then, as the hours wore on and still he slept,
Delicious reminiscences in dream
(Unconscious hoarded treasure of the brain,)
Were loosed within him of a dewy dawn
Forgotten, and a time when he was young.
He had found the fountain in that land of dream,
And drunk his fill from it with sweet delight,
Famed for its virtue to renew in youth.
The old man was a boy again, at home,
A Hebrew home though on an alien shore.
Perhaps some soft insinuation crept
Into his sleep from that last waking sense
Of his, the sense, to him unwonted long—
A lonely man, of wife, of child, bereft,
Who never sister's gentleness had known—
Of touch from woman's hand; however it was,
Shimei a vision of his mother had.
A son, her only, by his mother's knee,
That mother's blossoming hope, her joy, her pride,
He felt the benediction of a hand,
Her hand, laid like a softness on his brow;
And Shimei's lips, no longer thin and cold,
But warm now, and with flush of lifeblood full,
Moved in responsive welcome of a kiss,
Her kiss, and holy, like a touch of chrism.
How fair the vision was that then he saw!
How sweet the tones were that once more he heard!
Such sound, such sight, were better than sweet sleep;
And the fond sleeper fain would wake, to dream
So good a dream awake, and to the full
Taste it, with senses and with soul nowise
Bound from the right fruition of their feast.
So, as of his own motion, Shimei woke—
And instantly was sorry for the change.
His eyes he dared not open to the day,
Holding them shut to hold himself asleep.
Alas, in vain! Too late! Full well he knew
Now what he was, and where, and that in truth
His happy boyhood had come back in dream.
Yet lay he lapped in luxury of pain
And pathos, and sweet pity of himself,
And longings toward a past beyond recall,
With something also of a good remorse
That he was such as then he felt he was,
Poor broken worldling, empty heart, and old
(In contrast of his visionary youth!),
Therewith perhaps some upward-groping wish
That he were other. All-undoing stress
It was, of elemental motions blind
About the bases of his being bowed
Like Samson, and his state was overthrown.
Those agéd eyes that had been used to glint
Metallic lusters, or of adamant,
Softened beneath the lids, unseen, and tears
Forced themselves forth down either temple falling.
Instinctively he stirred, and with his hands
(Vainly, encumbered with their manacles!)
He sought to brush those trickling tears away.
They wandered down to mingle with his hair,
Long locks, and thin, of iron grey, unkempt,
Close clinging to the sunken temple walls.
Rachel with Ruth remarked the motions vain,
And gently, without word, moved to his side.
There Rachel with her kerchief wiped the tears
With strokes as of caress, so loving light;
But Ruth, observing for a moment, turned
With token to Eunicé, quick of heart
To understand, who hastening lightly thence
A laver full of water brought, wherefrom
The mother washed the forehead and the face,
As had that agéd man her father been,
Then dried them with a towel clean and sweet.
Not once the while would Shimei lift the lids
That trembled shutting over his dim eyes:
Strange new emotion made him shrink from seeing—
Shame, and a tenderness of gratitude,
And love, that, with wing-footed Memory,
Ran backward to his boyhood and there fell
With tears and kisses on his mother's neck—
Remembered, she, a woman—such as these!
The squalid wretchedness of his estate
Forgotten, and its utter hopelessness,
Was it not blesséd, only thus to lie
Ministered to as if he were beloved
Of some one, he who long had no one loved!
Melted like wax within him was his heart,
And when at length they spoke to him, and said,
"Thy hands too, if we might too wash thy hands!"
And when, he neither yes nor no with word
Or sign replying, they, with yes assumed,
Did it, assuaging with all healing heed
The hurts and bruises of the chafing chains,
Then the old man with a convulsive wrench
Turned his whole frame averse from them to hide
The tears that streamed in rivers from his eyes.
"And this they do for love of their Lord Christ!"—
Such muffled words, sobbed out amid his tears
And shaken with the throbs that shook his frame,
Those women seemed to hear from Shimei's lips.
"Lo, Jesus, wilt thou master also me?
I cannot bear the pressure of this love!
Crushed am I under it into the babe
Indeed I dreamed just now I was become!"
So Shimei to himself, in words more clear
With the abating passion of his sobs,
Spoke plaintive with the accents of a child.
A start of tears responsive orbed the eyes
Of Ruth and Rachel at such token shown
Of gracious change in Shimei; grateful tears
They were, and hopeful, and each tear a prayer—
How prevalent, who knows?—for Shimei.
God, in His lachrymary urn reserved
To long remembrance, treasures up such tears!
Paul, at remove with Stephen, beholding all,
Felt a great pang and passion of desire
To bear some part and render a testimony
Of love and of forgiveness toward this man,
Yea, of sweet will to be forgiven and loved
By him in turn, that Shimei needs must trust.
He thought of how the Lord, that extreme night
In which He was betrayed, He knowing well
The Father had given all things into His hands,
And He was come from God and went to God,
Rose from the supper, disarrayed Himself—
As if so laying His majesty aside
To clothe Himself in mightier majesty
Of meekness, with the servant's towel girded!—
Then, pouring water in the basin, kneeled,
Girded in fashion as a menial, kneeled.
The Lord Himself of life and glory kneeled,
Washing and wiping his disciples' feet!
And Judas, Paul remembered, was among them!
"This is my time," said he, "my time at last;
Shimei will not resist nor say me nay,
And I, with mine own hands, will wash his feet."
But Stephen said: "Lo, I have hated him
More wickedly than any, I beseech
Mine uncle let me do this thing to him.
Shimei will know I do it for thy sake,
And it will be to him as if thou didst it."
So, Paul allowing it for his nephew's sake,
Glad to confirm him in that gentleness,
Stephen a ewer of water made haste to bring,
And there amid them all admiring him
Known to have hated Shimei so, he stooped,
With a most beautiful behavior stooped—
Not without qualms of lothness overcome,
Considering he how swift those feet had been,
How swift those agéd feet, how long, had been,
To shed blood, and what blood to shed how swift!—
And dutifully washed and wiped them clean.
The old man now lay utterly relapsed,
Exhausted his capacity to feel,
Resistance therefore, and even reaction, none,
A state suspended between life and death;
So had the vehemence of his passion wrought
On Shimei's weakness to disable him.
The women with sure instinct knew his need;
They lightly on him laid one covering more,
For now the coolness of the night was nigh,
And again wished for him the gift of sleep.
And again Shimei slept, to wake refreshed
Then when the moonless sky was bright with stars,
Stars that not more intently over all
Watched, than those faithful had watched over him.
Refection from their hands, both heedful meet
And choicest possible to case like theirs,
Strengthened the faster for a night-long sleep,
Which with the morning brought him back himself,
A self with pity and terror purified,
But better purified with thanks and love.
So, lapt in a delightsome consciousness,
Half haze, a kind of infant consciousness,
Of being changed to other than before,
Shimei slid sweetly on in reverie—
No words, nay, thoughts even not, pure reverie;
But if that mist of musing in his mind
Had into thoughts, like star-dust into stars,
Been orbed, their purport such as this had been:
'I miss it, and I feel that I should grope
Vainly to find in me the power that once
Was ever mine to be my proper self.
All standing-ground seems melted under me,
Planted whereon I might with hope resist.
It is all emptiness, all nothingness
About me, I am utter helplessness.
Yet somehow it is blesséd helplessness!
Let Him do with me as He will, Who now
Is dealing thus with me through these! O ye,
His ministers, O, holy women, ye,
Behold, I give myself through you to Him!
Ye have conquered me for Him at last with love.
No weapons have I to withstand such might.
Tell Paul that he and ye have overcome
For that both he and ye were overcome
Yourselves first by the love that made you love
Even me, even me, even me, grown gray in sin,
Such sin, amid such light, against such love!
Forgive ye me, forgive, forgive, forgive,
And pray ye all that I may be forgiven
Of Him to Whom henceforth, unworthy I
To be at all accepted to such thrall,
I give myself forever up a slave!'
Thus Shimei, in his formless fantasy,
Which being nor word, nor thought, still less was will,
Mused, like a river lapsing to the sea;
So softly did an inner current draw
Him unresisting whither it desired.
It seemed to Shimei, in that strong access
And overflow of feeling new to him,
As if it would be easy to speak out.
Nay, but as if he must at once speak out,
Aloud, for those to hear toward whom he now
Felt this delicious love and longing; yet
He never did so speak, alas, but wronged
Himself, wronged them, refraining; more, the Spirit
Of grace nigh quenched with silence! So it fared
With Shimei then, self-shut from needful speech,
As might it with some tender plant denied
Its freedom of the sun and air, that peaks
And pines and cannot open into flower.
Perhaps the habit of his heart life-long
Was winter all too fast for any spring
To solve; perhaps he could not, if he would,
Unbind its cold constriction from himself
For welcome and exchange of sweet good-will
Such as he felt rife round him in the air,
Wooing him, like bland weather, toward full bloom
In frank affections and fair courtesies.
Sad, if indeed the faculty in him
Of finer feeling and the word to fit
Were lost through long disuse, or by abuse!
But it was much in Shimei that thenceforth
He never was bitter again with cynicism;
The fountains of his evil humor were dry;
He never vented blast of unbelief
To blight the region round him with black death
To every springing plant and opening flower
Of cheerful faith in human nobleness;
That mordant tongue refrained itself from sneer.
Yea—this with travail of will through enforced lips—
Shimei, in frugal phrase, but phrase sincere,
Gave, of his conscience, rather than his heart,
Thanks to them all that ministered to him.
More: after days of silence, passed in muse
And struggle in secret with himself, and prayer,
Once, having asked to speak with Paul apart
And easily won what he desired, he said:
"Behold, O Saul, I think that I have erred,
Mistaking thee, perhaps myself mistaking—
Yea, but I know that I mistook myself,
And mistook God, both what He was and wished;
Most wickedly mistook Him, honestly—
Honestly deeming Him other than He was,
Imputing honestly what was not His will—
Mistaking, with no heed not to mistake!
This was my wickedness, that lightly I
Misdeemed Him such an one as I myself.
And thee I wronged comparing thee with myself,
And hated thee for what, I now am sure,
Thou wast not. Saul, I need to be forgiven!"—
Wherewith his heavy head the old man bent low,
With his uplifted hands in manacles
Seeking to hide his face as if in shame;
Not shame that he had sinned, but that he now
Had spoken thus. Yet did that gesture naught
Diminish from his words, but only show
At cost how great he had wrung them from himself.
Paul understood the anguish of his mind,
And said to Shimei: "Nay, my brother, nay,
Forgiven thou art, nor needst to be forgiven,
Or at least I have nothing to forgive thee;
I long ago forgave thee all in all.
But I myself would be of thee forgiven!
I vexed thee once with high words spoken in pride;
I never have forgiven myself that pride.
Forgive me thou it, thou, that hadst thy hate
Needlessly blown to hotter flame thereby.
Let us forgive each other and love henceforth,
As God, for Christ's sake, will us both forgive!"
As Paul these last words spoke, he strongly yearned,
Even for Christ's sake, to throw himself in tears
On Shimei's neck and there weep out his love.
But he, for Shimei's sake, forbore; he saw
That Shimei, softened as he was, and changed,
Was not ripe for forgiveness so complete.
So Paul forbore, rejoiced that Shimei spoke
No word, and signified with silence naught,
In blasphemy of the Belovéd Name;
Name by himself in hope, not without fear,
Pronounced—like costliest pearl at venture flung
Before what under foot might trample it
And round to rend the largess-giver turn.
The chill obstruction never to the end
Was altogether thawed in Shimei's heart
To make him childlike placable and mild.
Perhaps more time, and vernal influence
Permitted longer to brood over him,
Had made it different; but the time was short
For Shimei in that air of Paradise.
The voyage long had been with froward winds;
At length those winds blew into tempest wild,
With winter lightnings strangely intermixed,
God thundering marvellously with His voice:
All on that ship were awed, and some appalled.
Shimei, hugging himself upon the deck
Where most were gathered, for to most it seemed
Better to stand beneath the open sky
Shelterless, than, though sheltered, not to see
God make himself thus terrible in storm—
Shimei, who, not more helpless than the rest,
Felt a degree more helpless through his chains,
Listened intently, with some power of calm
Communicated to him, while, in tones
Depressed unshaken into depths of awe,
Paul, meek inheritor of the universe,
As conscious child to God through Jesus Christ—
The spirit of adoption in his heart
That moment crying, "Abba Father!"—spoke
Of how those dwelling in the secret place
Of the Most High, beneath the shadow abode
Of the Almighty, safe from every harm.
Amid the booms of thunder bursting nigh
The dreadful forks of lightning flashed the while
And fell all round the ship into the sea,
Frequent, dividing pathways blinding bright
Between sheer walls of blackness built like stone,
So dense was piled the darkness of the night!
For it was night, no moon, no star, and cloud
Hung drooping in festoons from all the sky
Wind-swept along the bosom of the deep—
Sky only by the lightning flashes seen,
At intervals, yet every moment felt,
Oppressive, like a mighty incubus.
The lightning flashes thick and thicker fell,
Near, nearer, deadlier, as in conscious aim,
Like the fierce vengeful flames from heaven that once
Elijah prophet, on Mount Carmel, drew
Down on his altar trenched about with flood:
Those tongues of fire that circling trench lapped dry,
But these divided tongues of lightning seemed
Equal to lick the boundless ocean up!
The watchers huddling on the deck beheld
In silence—for now also Paul was dumb—
The imminent menace of the elements.
Then what might seem a frightful sign from heaven!
A leap of lightning and a rending roar
Of thunder at one selfsame moment broke,
Sudden, and nigh at hand—as if he, seen
Of John on Patmos isle, that angel dread
(Who, setting his right foot upon the sea
And his left foot upon the land, so cried
With a loud voice) now standing on this ship
Had once more cried and loosed the thunders seven,
So manifold the noise!—and therewith swayed
The sword of God in a descending stroke
On some one there select for punishment.
They looked, and, lo, the fearful stroke had fallen
On Shimei; he lay lifeless on the deck.
No motion, save of falling, and no voice—
Appalling silence and appalling calm!
Close at the foot of the tall mast he fell,
Against which with his shoulder he had leaned
To stay him where he stood and watched the storm.
The storm seemed broken with that burst of rage,
And quieted itself through slow degrees
Of sullenness to peace. But the tall mast
At top had been enkindled with the touch
Of the fell lightning, and it burned a while
Lifted amid the tempest and the night,
A beacon flaming from the Most High God.
Such was the end of Shimei, unforeshown;
To this he tended all those devious ways!
Next morning mid a weather pacified
They shrouded him for burial in the deep.
"Until the sea give up its dead!" said Paul
Solemnly, as the corse went weighted down.
Julius would not let free his hands from chains;
"Culprit he was and culprit he shall go,"
He said, "to Hades by this watery way.
Incenséd Jupiter despatched him hence,
And Neptune will convey him duly down
To where their brother Pluto will behold
Upon him the Olympian's thunderbrand,
And send to Rhadamanthus to be judged!"
But Paul said to his company apart:
"Let us not judge before the time; the Day,
The Day, that shall declare it. Let us hope;
The mercy of the Lord is measureless:
It is, even like His judgment, a great deep,
And it endures forever; as the psalm
Sings it, again and yet again, in long
Antiphony of praise that cannot end.
Think not, because the promise is no harm
Shall light on any one who dwells within
The secret place of the Most High, that thence,
Seeing this awful-seeming way of death
Has found out Shimei, he perforce has proved
Not to have fixed his dwelling ere he died
Safe in the shadow of the Almighty's throne.
The safety promised is not for the flesh,
But for the spirit. The outward perishes
In many ways that to the senses seem
Preclusive quite of hope for life to come.
But, so the inward bide untouched of harm,
The true self lives and is inviolate.
That lightning did not fall on Shimei's soul;
No certain sign was it of wrath divine:
Nay, even perhaps the opposite of such,
It may have been a fiery chariot
With fiery horses hither sent from heaven,
To bear him up Elijah-like to God.
Far be it to say that this indeed was so;
Yet often last is first, as first is last.
Ye saw how wrought upon our brother was
Of late to be how different from himself!
I trust he trusted in the atoning blood.
I shall have hope to see him yet endued
In shining robes of Jesus' righteousness,
Translucent shining robes wherethrough the soul
Herself shows shining in essential white!
God grant it, and farewell to Shimei!"