Zophiel
M >> Maria Gowen Brooks >> ZophielZOPHIEL,
A Poem,
By Mrs. Brooks.
------------Forse la sorte
F. stanca di me tormentar--_Metastasio._
Boston:
Published by Richardson & Lord.
* * *
J. H. A. Frost, Printer.
1825.
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS, to wit:
District Clerk's Office.
Be it remembered, that on the twelfth day of August, A. D. 1825, in
the fiftieth year of the Independence of the United States of
America, _Richardson & Lord,_ of the said District, have deposited in
this office the Title of a Book, the right whereof they claim as
Proprietors, in the words following, _to wit:_
Zophiel, a Poem, by Mrs. Brooks.
----------Forse la sorte
E stanca di me tormentar.--_Metastasio._
In conformity to the Act of the Congress of the United States,
entitled, "An Act for the encouragement of Learning, by securing the
Copies of Maps, Charts and Books, to the Authors and Proprietors of
such Copies, during the times therein mentioned:" and also to an
Act, entitled, "An Act supplementary to an Act, entitled, An Act for
the encouragement of Learning, by securing the Copies of Maps, Charts
and Books to the Authors and Proprietors of such Copies during the
times therein mentioned; and extending the benefits thereof to the
Arts of Designing, Engraving and Etching Historical and other Prints."
JOHN W. DAVIS,
Clerk of the District of Massachusetts.
PREFACE.
Wishing to make a continued effort, in an art which, though almost
in secret, has been adored and assiduously cultivated from earliest
infancy, it was my intention to have chosen some incident from Pagan
history, as the foundation of my contemplated poem. But, looking over
the Jewish annals, I was induced to select for my purpose, one of
their well-known stories which besides its extreme beauty, seemed to
open an extensive field for the imagination which might therein avail
itself not only of important and elevated truths but pleasing and
popular superstitions.
Having finished one Canto I left the United States for the West
Indies in the hope of being able to sail thence for Great Britain,
where I might submit what I had done to the candour of some able
writer; publish it, if thought expedient; and obtain advice and
materials for the improvement and prosecution of my work. But as
events have transpired to frustrate that intention I have endeavored
to make it as perfect, as with the means I have access to, is
possible.
It is, now, far beneath what might have been done, under the
influence of more decided hopes and more auspicious circumstances.
Yet, as it is, I am induced to place it before the public, with that
anxiety which naturally attends the doubtful accomplishment of any
favourite object, on the principle that no artist can make the same
improvement, or labour with so much pleasure to himself, in private,
as when comparing his efforts with those of others, and listening to
the opinions of critics and the remarks of connoisseurs. The beauty,
though she may view herself, in her mirror, from the ringlets of her
hair to the sole of her slipper, and appear most lovely to her own
gaze, can never be certain of her power to please until the suffrage
of society confirm the opinion formed in seclusion; and "Qu'est ce
que la beaute s'elle ne touche pas?"
Literary employments are necessary to the happiness and almost to
the vitality of those who pursue them with much ardour; and though
the votaries of the muses are, too often, debased by faults, yet,
abstractedly considered, a taste for any art, if well directed, must
seem a preservative not only against melancholy, but even against
misery and vice.
Genius, whatever its bent, supposes a refined and delicate moral
sense and though sometimes perverted by sophistry or circumstance,
and sometimes failing through weakness; can always, at least,
comprehend and feel, the grandeur of honour and the beauty of virtue.
As to the faults of those to whom the world allows the possession of
genius, there are, perhaps, good grounds for the belief that they
have actually fewer than those employed about ordinary affairs; but
the last are easily concealed and the first carefully dragged to
light.
The miseries too, sometimes attendant to persons of distinguished
literary attainments, are often held forth as a subject of "warn and
scare" but Cervantes and Camoens would both have been cast into
prison even though unable to read or write, and Savage, though a
mechanic or scrivener, would probably have possessed the same
failings and consequently have fallen into the same, or a greater
degree of poverty and suffering. Alas! how many, in the flower of
youth and strength, perish in the loathsome dungeons of this island,
and, when dead, are refused a decent grave; who, in many instances,
were their histories traced by an able pen would be wept by half the
civilized world.
Although I can boast nothing but an extreme and unquenchable love
for the art to which my humble aspirations are confined, my lyre has
been a solace when every thing else has failed; soothing when
agitated, and when at peace furnishing that exercise and excitement
without which the mind becomes sick, and all her faculties retrograde
when they ought to be advancing. Men, when they feel that nature has
kindled in their bosoms a flame which must incessantly be fed, can
cultivate eloquence and exert it, in aid of the unfortunate before
the judgment seats of their country; or endeavour to "lure to the
skies" such as enter the temples of their god; but woman, alike
subject to trials and vicissitudes and endowed with the same wishes,
(for the observation, "there is no sex to soul," is certainly not
untrue,) condemned, perhaps, to a succession of arduous though minute
duties in which, oftentimes, there is nothing to charm and little to
distract, unless she be allowed the exercise of her pen must fall
into melancholy and despair, and perish, (to use the language of Mad.
de Stael,) "consumed by her own energies."
Thus do we endeavour to excuse any inordinate or extreme attachment
by labouring to show in their highest colours the merits of its
object.
Zophiel may or may not be called entirely a creature of imagination,
as comports with the faith of the reader; he is not, however, endowed
with a single miraculous attribute; for which the general belief of
ages, even among christians, may not be produced as authority.
The stanza in which his story is told though less complicate and
beautiful than the Spencerian, is equally ancient; and favorable to a
pensive melody, is also susceptible of much variety.
The marginal notes will be useless to such as have read much.
_San Patricio, Island of Cuba, March 30, 1825._
INVOCATION.
Thou with the dark blue eye upturned to heaven,
And cheek now pale, now warm with radiant glow,
Daughter of God,--most dear,--
Come with thy quivering tear,
And tresses wild, and robes of loosened flow,--
To thy lone votaress let one look be given!
Come Poesy! nor like some just-formed maid,
With heart as yet unswoln by bliss or woe;--
But of such age be seen
As Egypt's glowing queen,
When her brave Roman learned to love her so
That death and loss of fame, were, by a smile, repaid.
Or as thy Sappho, when too fierce assailed
By stern ingratitude her tender breast:--
Her love by scorn repaid
Her friendship true betrayed,
Sick of the guileful earth, she sank for rest
In the cold waves embrace; while Grecian muse bewailed.
Be to my mortal eye, like some fair dame--
Ripe, but untouched by time; whose frequent blush
Plays o'er her cheek of truth
As soft as earliest youth;
While thoughts exalted to her mild eye rush--
And the expanded soul, tells 'twas from heaven it came.
Daughter of life's first cause; who, when he saw
The ills that unborn innocents must bear,
When doomed to come to earth--
Bethought--and gave thee birth
To charm the poison from affliction there;
And from his source eternal, bade thee draw.
He gave thee power, inferior to his own
But in control o'er matter. 'Mid the crash
Of earthquake, war, and storm,
Is seen thy radiant form
Thou com'st at midnight on the lightning's flash,
And ope'st to those thou lov'st new scenes and worlds unknown.
And still, as wild barbarians fiercely break
The graceful column and the marble dome--
Where arts too long have lain
Debased at pleasure's fain,
And bleeding justice called on wrath to come,
'Mid ruins heaped around, thou bidst thy votarists wake.
Methinks I see thee on the broken shrine
Of some fall'n temple--where the grass waves high
With many a flowret wild;
While some lone, pensive, child
Looks on the sculpture with a wondering eye
Whose kindling fires betray that he is chosen thine. [FN#1]
[FN#1] Genius, perhaps, has often, nay generally, been awakened and
the whole future bent of the mind thus strongly operated upon,
determined, by some circumstance trivial as this.
Or on some beetling cliff--where the mad waves
Rush echoing thro' the high-arched caves below,
I view some love-reft fair
Whose sighing warms the air,
Gaze anxious on the ocean as it raves
And call on thee-alone, of power to sooth her woe.
Friend of the wretched; smoother of the couch
Of pining hope; thy pitying form I know!
Where thro' the wakeful night,
By a dim taper's light,
Lies a pale youth, upon his pallet low,
Whose wan and woe-worn charms rekindle at thy touch.
Friendless--oppressed by fate--the restless fires
Of his thralled soul prey on his beauteous frame--
Till, strengthened by thine aid,
He shapes some kindred maid,
Pours forth in song the life consuming flame,
And for awhile forgets his sufferings and desires.
Scorner of thoughtless grandeur, thou hast chose
Thy _best-beloved_ from ruddy Nature's breast:
The grotto dark and rude--
The forest solitude--
The craggy mount by blushing clouds carest--
Have altars where thy light etherial glows. [FN#2]
[FN#2] Every nation, however rude, has, as it has been justly
observed, a taste for poetry. This art after all that has and can be
said for and against it, is the language of nature, and among the
relics of the most polished and learned nations little has survived
except such as simply depicts those natural feelings and images which
have ever existed and ever must continue. Most of the great poets
have been individuals of humble condition rising from the mass of the
people by that natural principle which causes the most etherial
particles to rise and the denser to sink to the earth. But, as Byron
exquisitely says, in one of the most wonderfully beautiful pages he
ever composed,
"Many are poets who have never penned
Their inspirations, and, perchance, the best;
They felt, they loved, and died; but would not lend
Their thoughts to meaner beings; they comprest
The god within them, and rejoined the stars
Unlaurel'd upon earth."
In the place where I now write amid several hundred Africans of
different ages, and nations, the most debased of any on the face of
the earth, I have been enabled to observe, even in this, last link of
the chain of humanity, the strong natural love for music and poetry.
Any little incident which occurs on the estate where they toil, and
which the greater part of them are never suffered to leave, is
immediately made the subject of a rude song which they, in their
broken Spanish, sing to their companions; and thereby relieve a
little the monotony of their lives.
I have observed these poor creatures, under various circumstances,
and though, generally, extremely brutal, have, in some instances,
heard touches of sentiment from them, when under the influence of
grief, equal to any which have flowed from the pen of Rousseau.
Thy sovereign priest by earth's vile sons was driven
To make the cold unconscious earth his bed: [FN#3]
The damp cave mocked his sighs--
But from his sightless eyes,
Wrung forth by wrongs, the anguished drops he shed,
Fell each as an appeal to summon thee from heaven.
Thou sought'st him in his desolation; placed
On thy warm bosom his unpillowed head;
Bade him for visions live
More bright than worlds can give;
O'er his pale lips thy soul infusive shed
That left his dust adored where kings decay untraced.
[FN#3] "On the banks of the Meles was shown the spot where
Critheis, the mother of Homer, brought him into the world, and the
cavern to which he retired to compose his immortal verses. A monument
erected to his memory and inscribed with his name stood in the middle
of the city--it was adorned with spacious porticos under which the
citizens assembled."
Source of deep feeling--of surpassing love--
Creative power,--'tis thou hast peopled heaven
Since man from dust arose
His birth the cherub owes [FN#4]
To thee--by thee his rapturous harp was given
And white wings tipp'd with gold that cool the domes above.
[FN#4] The Indians (says M. de Voltaire) from whom every species of
theology is derived, invented the angels and represented them in
their ancient book the "Shasta," as immortal creatures, participating
in the divinity of their creator; against whom a great number
revolted in heaven, "Les Parsis ignicoles, qui subsistent encore ont
communique a l'auteur de la religion des anciens Perses les noms des
anges que les premiers Perses reconnaissaient. On en trouve cent-dix-
neuf, parmi desquels ne sont ni Raphael ni Gabriel que les Perses
n'adopterent que long-tems apres. Ces mots sont Chaldeens; ils ne
furent connus des Juifs que dans leur captivite."
Husher of secret sighs--from childhood's hour
The slave of Fate, I've knelt before thy throne;
To thy loved courts have sped
Whene'er my heart has bled,
And every ray of bliss that heart has known
Has reached it thro' thy grief-dispelling power.
Fain thro' my native solitudes I'd roam
Bathe my rude harp in my bright native streams
Twine it with flowers that bloom
But for the deserts gloom,
Or, for the long and jetty hair that gleams
O'er the dark-bosomed maid that makes the wild her home. [FN#5]
[FN#5] This invocation when composed was intended to precede a
series of poems entitled Occidental Eclogues; which work the writer
has never found opportunity to finish.
I sing not for the crowd, or low or high--
A pensive wanderer on life's thorny heath
Earth's pageants for my view
Have nought: I love but few,
And few who chance to hear thy trembling breath,
My lyre, for her who wakes thee, have a sigh. [FN#6]
[FN#6] It may not be improper to observe that these stanzas were
composed during a period of misfortune and dejection.
Forsake me not! none ever loved thee more!
Fair queen, I'll meet woe's fearfulest frown--and smile;
If mid the scene severe
Thou'lt drop on me one tear,
And let thy flitting form sometimes beguile
The present of its ills--I'll scorn them and adore.
Then warm the form relentless fate would chill--
Dark lours my night--Oh! give me one embrace!
If every pain I bear
Befit me for thy care,
Come sorrow--scorn--desertion--I can chase
Despair, fell watching for her victim still.
ZOPHIEL.
CANTO I.
I.
The time has been--this holiest records say--
In punishment for crimes of mortal birth,
When spirits banished from the realms of day
Wandered malignant o'er the nighted earth.(1)
And from the cold and marble lips declared,
Of some blind-worshipped--earth-created god,
Their deep deceits; which trusting monarchs snared
Filling the air with moans, with gore the sod. [FN#7]
Yet angels doffed their robes in radiance dyed,
And for a while the joys of heaven delayed,
To watch benign by some just mortal's side--
Or meet th' aspiring love of some high gifted maid. [FN#8]
Blest were those days!--can these dull ages boast
Aught to compare? tho' now no more beguile--
Chain'd in their darkling depths th' infernal host--
Who would not brave a fiend to share an angel's smile?
[FN#7] The god who conducted the Hebrews sent a malignant spirit to
speak from the mouth of the prophets, in order to deceive king Achab.
[FN#8] It is useless to note this stanza, as two well-known poems
have lately been founded on the same passage of the Pentateuch to
which it alludes.
II.
'Twas then there lived a captive Hebrew pair;
In woe th' embraces of their youth had past,
And blest their paler years one daughter--fair
She flourished, like a lonely rose, the last
And loveliest of her line. The tear of joy--
The early love of song--the sigh that broke
From her young lip--the best-beloved employ--
What womanhood disclosed in infancy bespoke.
A child of passion--tenderest and best
Of all that heart has inly loved and felt;
Adorned the fair enclosure of her breast--
Where passion is not found, no virtue ever dwelt.
Yet not, perverted, would my words imply
The impulse given by Heaven's great Artizan
Alike to man and worm--mere spring, whereby
The distant wheels of life, while time endures, roll on--
But the collective ministry that fill
About the soul, their all-important place--
That feed her fires--empower her fainting will--
And write the god on feeble mortals face.
III.
Yet anger, or revenge, envy or hate
The damsel knew not: when her bosom burned
And injury darkened the decrees of fate,
She had more pitious wept to see that pain returned.
Or if, perchance, tho' formed most just and pure,
Amid their virtue's wild luxuriance hid,
Such germ all mortal bosoms must immure
Which sometimes show their poisonous heads unbid--
If haply such the lovely Hebrew finds,
Self knowledge wept th' abasing truth to know,
And _innate pride,_ that _queen of noble minds,_
Crushed them indignant ere a bud could grow.
IV.
And such--ev'n now, in earliest youth are seen--
But would they live, with armour more deform,
Their love--o'erflowing breasts must learn to screen:
"The bird that sweetest sings can least endure the storm."
V.
And yet, despite of all the gushing tear--
The melting tone--the darting heart-stream--proved,
The soul that in them spoke, could spurn at fear
Of death or danger; and had those she loved
Required it at their need, she could have stood,
Unmoved, as some fair-sculptured statue, while
The dome that guards it, earth's convulsions, rude
Are shivering--meeting ruin with a smile.
VI.
And this, at intervals in language bright
Told her blue eyes; tho' oft the tender lid
Like lilly drooping languidly; and white
And trembling--all save love and lustre hid.
Then, as young christian bard had sung, they seemed
Like some Madonna in his soul--so sainted;
But opening in their energy--they beamed
As tasteful pagans their Minerva painted;
While o'er her graceful shoulders' milky swell,
Like those full oft on little children seen
Almost to earth her silken ringlets fell
Nor owned Pactolus' sands more golden sheen.
VII.
And now, full near, the hour unwished for drew
When fond, Sephora hoped to see her wed;
And, for 'twould else expire, impatient grew
To renovate her race from beauteous Egla's bed.
VIII.
None of their kindred lived to claim her hand
But stranger-youths had asked her of her sire
With gifts and promise fair; he could withstand
All save her tears; and harkening her desire
Still left her free; but soon her mother drew
From her a vow, that when the twentieth year
Its full, fair finish o'er her beauty threw,
If what her fancy fed on, came not near,
She would entreat no more but to the voice
Of her light-giver hearken; and her life
And love--all yielding to that kindly choice
Would hush each idle wish and learn to be a wife.
IX.
Now oft it happ'd when morning task was done
And for the virgins of her household made
And lotted each her toil; while yet the sun
Was young, fair Egla to a woody shade,
Loved to retreat; there, in the fainting hour
Of sultry noon the burning sunbeam fell
Like a warm twilight; so bereft of power,
It gained an entrance thro' the leafy bower;
That scarcely shrank the tender lilly bell
Tranquil and lone in such a light to be,
How sweet to sense and soul!--the form recline
Forgets it ere felt pain; and reverie,
Sweet mother of the muses, heart and soul are thine. [FN#9]
[FN#9] Every one talks and reads of groves, but it is impossible
for those who never felt it, to conceive the effect of such a
situation in a warm climate. In this island the woods which are
naturally so interwoven with vines as to be impervious to a human
being, are in some places, cleared and converted into nurseries for
the young coffee-trees which remain sheltered from the sun and wind
till sufficiently grown to transplant. To enter one of these
"semilleros," as they are here called, at noon day, produces an
effect like that anciently ascribed to the waters of Lethe. After
sitting down upon the trunk of a fallen cedar or palm-tree, and
breathing for a moment, the freshness of the air and the odour of the
passion flower, which is one of the most abundant, and certainly the
most beautiful of the climate; the noise of the trees, which are
continually kept in motion by the trade winds; the fluttering and
various notes, though not musical, of the birds; the loftiness of the
green canopy, for the trunks of the trees are bare to a great height,
and seem like pillars supporting the thick mass of leaves above; and
the rich mellow light which the intense rays of the sun, thus
impeded, produce; have altogether such an effect that one
involuntarily forgets every thing but the present, and it requires a
strong effort to rise and leave the place.
X.
This calm recess on summer day she sought
And sat to tune her lute; but all night long
Quiet had from her pillow flown, and thought
Feverish and tired, sent for th' unseemly throng
Of boding images. She scarce could woo
One song reluctant, ere advancing quick
Thro' the fresh leaves Sephora's form she knew
And duteous rose to meet; but fainting sick
Her heart sank tremulously in her; why
Sought out at such an hour, it half divined
And seated now beside, with downcast eye
And fevered pulse, she met the pressure, kind
And warmly given; while thus the matron fair
Nor yet much marr'd by time, with soothing words
Solicitous; and gently serious air
The purpose why she hither came preferr'd:
XI.
"Egla, my hopes thou knowest--tho' exprest
But rare lest they should pain thee--I have dealt
Not rudely towards thee tender; and supprest
The wish, of all, my heart has most vehement felt.
"Know I have marked, that when the reason why
Thou still wouldst live in virgin state, thy sire
Has prest thee to impart, quick in thine eye
Semblance of hope has played--fain to transpire
"Words seem'd to seek thy lip; but the bright rush
Of heart-blood eloquent, alone would tell
In the warm language of a rebel blush
What thy less treacherous tongue has guarded well.
XII.
"Dost waste so oft alone--the cheerful day?
Or haply, rather bath some pagan youth"--
She with quick burst--'whate'er has happ'd I'll say!
Doubt thou my wisdom, but regard my truth!
XIII.
"Long time ago, while yet a twelve years' child
These shrubs and vines, new planted, near this spot,
I sat me tired with pleasant toil, and whiled
Away the time with many a wishful thought
"Of desolate Judea. Every scene
Which thou so oft, while sitting on thy knee,
Wouldst sing of, weeping, thro' my mind has been
Successive; when from yon old mossy tree
"I heard a pitious moan. Wondering I went
And found a wretched man; worn and opprest
He seemed with toil and years; and whispering faint
He said "Oh little maiden, sore distrest
"I sink for very want. Give me I pray,
A drop of water and a cake: I die
Of thirst and hunger, yet my sorrowing way
May tread once more, if thou my needs supply."
XIV.
"A long time missing from thy fondling arms--
It chanced that day thou'dst sent me in the shade
New bread, a cake of figs, and wine of palms [FN#10]
Mingled with water, sweet with honey made.
"These did I bring--raised as I could, his head;
Held to his lip the cup; and while he quaffed,
Upon my garment wiped the tears that sped
Adown his silvery beard and mingled with the draft.
[FN#10] "The palm is a very common plant in this country,
(Assyria,) and generally fruitful; this they cultivate like fig-trees
and it produces them bread, wine and honey." See Beloe's notes to his
translation of Herodotus. Mr. Gibbon adds, that the diligent natives
celebrated, either in verse or prose, three hundred and sixty uses to
which the trunk, the branches, the leaves, the juice and the fruit of
this plant were applied. Nothing can be more curious and interesting
than the natural history of the palm tree.
XV.
"When gaining sudden strength, he raised his hand,
And in this guise did bless me, "Mayst thou be
A crown to him who weds thee.--In a land
Far distant bides a captive. Hearken me