Your loss is rarer; for this star

Rose with you thro' a little arc Of heaven, nor having wander'd far Shot on the sudden into dark.

I knew your brother: his mute dust

I honor and his living worth: A man more pure and bold and just Was never born into the earth.

I have not look'd upon you nigh,

Since that dear soul hath fall'n
asleep.

Great Nature is more wise than I:
I will not tell you not to weep.

And tho' mine own eyes fill with dew, Drawn from the spirit thro' the brain,

I will not even preach to you,
"Weep, weeping dulls the in vard
pain."

Let Grief be her own mistress still.
She loveth her own anguish deep
More than much pleasure. Let her
will
Be done

to weep or not to weep.

I will not say, "God's ordinance
Of Death is blown in every wind";

For that is not a common chance
That takes away a noble mind.

His memory long will live alone

In all our hearts, as mournful light That broods above the fallen sun,

And dwells in heaven half the night.

Vain solace! Memory standing near Cast down her eyes, and in her throat

Her voice seem'd distant, and a tear Dropt on the letters as I wrote.

I wrote I know not what. In truth, How should I soothe you anyway. Who miss the brother of your youth? Yet something I did wish to say:

For he too was a friend to me:

Both are my friends, and my true breast

Bleedeth for both; yet it may be That only silence suiteth best. Words weaker than your grief would make

A saying, hard to shape in act;

For all the past of Time reveals A bridal dawn of thunder-peals, Wherever Thought hath wedded Fact.

Ev'n now we hear with inward strife
A motion toiling in the gloom-
The Spirit of the years to come
Yearning to mix himself with Life.

A slow-develop'd strength awaits
Completion in a painful school;
Phantoms of other forms of rule,
New Majesties of mighty States

The warders of the growing hour,
But vague in vapor, hard to mark;
And round them sea and air are
dark

With great contrivances of Power.

Of many changes, aptly join'd,

Is bodied forth the second whole. Regard gradation, lest the soul Of Discord race the rising wind;

A wind to puff your idol-fires,

And heap their ashes on the head; To shame the boast so often made, That we are wiser than our sires.

Oh yet, if Nature's evil star

Drive men in manhood, as in youth, To follow flying steps of Truth Across the brazen bridge of war

If New and Old, disastrous feud,

Must ever shock, like armed foes, And this be true, till Time shall close,

That Principles are rain'd in blood;

Not yet the wise of heart would cease To hold his hope thro' shame and guilt,

But with his hand against the hilt, Would pace the troubled land, like Peace;

Not less, tho' dogs of Faction bay, Would serve his kind in deed and word,