Are all nations communing? is there going to be but one heart to the globe? Is humanity forming en masse ?—for lo! tyrants tremble, crowns grow dim; The earth, restive, confronts a new era, perhaps a general divine war; No one knows what will happen next-such portents fill the days and nights. Years prophetical! the space ahead as I walk, as I vainly try to pierce it, is full of phantoms; Unborn deeds, things soon to be, project their shapes around me ; This incredible rush and heat-this strange ecstatic fever of dreams, O years! Your dreams, O years, how they penetrate through me! (I know not whether I sleep or wake!) The performed America and Europe grow dim, retiring in shadow behind me, The unperformed, more gigantic than ever, advance, advance upon me. J TO THINK OF TIME. I. To think of time-of all that retrospection! To think of to-day, and the ages continued henceforward! Have you guessed you yourself would not continue? Have you dreaded these earth-beetles? Have you feared the future would be nothing to you? Is to-day nothing? Is the beginningless past nothing? If the future is nothing, they are just as surely nothing. To think that the sun rose in the east! that men and women were flexible, real, alive! that everything was alive! To think that you and I did not see, feel, think, nor bear our part! To think that we are now here, and bear our part! 2. Not a day passes--not a minute or second, without an accouchement ! Not a day passes-not a minute or second, without a corpse ! The dull nights go over, and the dull days also, The children come hurried and weeping, and the brothers and sisters are sent for, Medicines stand unused on the shelf (the camphorsmell has long pervaded the rooms,) The faithful hand of the living does not desert the hand of the dying, The twitching lips press lightly on the forehead of the dying, The breath ceases, and the pulse of the heart ceases, The corpse stretches on the bed, and the living look upon it, It is palpable as the living are palpable. The living look upon the corpse with their eyesight, But without eyesight lingers a different living, and looks curiously on the corpse. 3. To think the thought of Death, merged in the thought of materials ! To think that the rivers will flow, and the snow fall, and fruits ripen, and act upon others as upon us now -yet not act upon us! To think of all these wonders of city and country, and others taking great interest in them-and we taking no interest in them! To think how eager we are in building our houses! To think others shall be just as eager, and we quite indifferent! (I see one building the house that serves him a few years, or seventy or eighty years at most; I see one building the house that serves him longer than that.) Slow-moving and black lines creep over the whole earth--they never cease-they are the burial lines, He that was President was buried, and he that is now President shall surely be buried. 4. A reminiscence of the vulgar fate, A frequent sample of the life and death of workmen, Each after his kind. Cold dash of waves at the ferry-wharf-posh and ice in the river, half-frozen mud in the streets, a grey discouraged sky overhead, the short last daylight of Twelfth-month, A hearse and stages-other vehicles give place-the funeral of an old Broadway stage-driver, the cortege mostly drivers. Steady the trot to the cemetery, duly rattles the deathbell, the gate is passed, the new-dug grave is halted at, the living alight, the hearse uncloses, The coffin is passed out, lowered and settled, the whip is laid on the coffin, the earth is swiftly shovelled in, The mound above is flatted with the spades-silence, A minute—no one moves or speaks—it is done, He is decently put away-is there anything more? He was a good fellow, free-mouthed, quick-tempered, not bad-looking, able to take his own part, witty, sensitive to a slight, ready with life or death fot a friend, fond of women, gambled, ate hearty, drank hearty, had known what it was to be flush, grew low-spirited toward the last, sickened, was helped by a contribution, died, aged forty-one years—and that was his funeral, Thumb extended, finger uplifted, apron, cape, gloves, strap, wet-weather clothes, whip carefully chosen, boss, spotter, starter, hostler, somebody loafing on you, you loafing on somebody, headway, man before and man behind, good day's work, bad day's work, pet stock, mean stock, first out, last out, turning-in at night; To think that these are so much and so nigh to other drivers and he there takes no interest in them! 5. The markets, the government, the working-man's wages -to think what account they are through our nights and days! To think that other working-men will make just as great account of them-yet we make little or no account! The vulgar and the refined-what you call sin, and what you call goodness-to think how wide a difference! To think the difference will still continue to others, yet we lie beyond the difference. To think how much pleasure there is! Have you pleasure from looking at the sky? have you pleasure from poems ? Do you enjoy yourself in the city? or engaged in business? or planning a nomination and election? or with your wife and family? Or with your mother and sisters? or in womanly housework? or the beautiful maternal cares? -These also flow onward to others-you and I flow onward, But in due time, you and I shall take less interest in them. Your farm, profits, crops,-to think how engrossed you are! To think there will still be farms, profits, crops-yet, for you, of what avail? 6. What will be will be well-for what is is well, To take interest is well, and not to take interest shall be well. The sky continues beautiful, The pleasure of men with women shall never be sated, nor the pleasure of women with men, nor the pleasure from poems, The domestic joys, the daily housework or business, the building of houses-these are not phantasms— they have weight, form, location; Farms, profits, crops, markets, wages, government, are none of them phantasms, The difference between sin and goodness is no delusion, The earth is not an echo-man and his life, and all the things of his life, are well-considered. You are not thrown to the winds-you gather certainly and safely around yourself; Yourself! Yourself! Yourself, for ever and ever! 7. It is not to diffuse you that you were born of your mother and father-it is to identify you; It is not that you should be undecided, but that you should be decided; Something long preparing and formless is arrived and formed in you, You are henceforth secure, whatever comes or goes. The threads that were spun are gathered, the weft crosses the warp, the pattern is systematic. The preparations have every one been justified, The orchestra have sufficiently tuned their instruments -the baton has given the signal. The guest that was coming-he waited long, for reasons -he is now housed, |
