VASTNESS. [BY ALFRED LORD TENNYSON POET LAUREATE.]

Te Aroha News, Volume III, Issue 134, 26 December 1885, Page 6

VASTNESS. [BY ALFRED LORD TENNYSON POET LAUREATE.]

apparently a satire on various contemporary, "politioal and social movements, The JAmerioan journals ':— _l Many a hearth upon our dark globe sighs after I m^n^-aivitnißfie'ditao'e^t'J !" ■'duß^vrf'a vanish'ddniiJo©'}^ *'* Vj! * | f ll '-' i>* iLles* updn this side, lies,updn;thtto side, truthlesi I , violence mourned by thewise : Thousand! 1 of : vdlceer r drowning his own in a * popular torrent of lies^jponlies ; .. : Stately Burpd&es", valour in battle; gloriouaaiinals ! of army and fleet 5 4 >< •> fi i< j r ! Death" Wr Wright .oau^erde^ath for the Wong i r oause, trumpetgjoffViotory, groans of defeat: tlnnooenoe ,seet|\efeiii' f he? i mqPier,'s millc, and oharity setting*ktne martyr aflame ; Thrallaom who WSlks B with ,tKe banner of free- " doni, and recto not to'ruinareahn in her *Faith at ker zenith, or, all but lost in the gloom . of doubts that^larken* the sohools ; Craft, with a bunch of all-heal in her hand, fol- .' lowed up by Mer vassal ledon of fools ; Pain that has crawled |rbin the, oorpse.of pleas,ure. a worm 'whioh-"writhe|3 all day and at slight . -Jt> ,r, r ;s< > Stirs up again* iiis^he.Jieart of 'the sleeper, and 'stings hin\ baok to-,thO' careiOf the light : Wealthi withniswin^and his wedded- harlotsi flattery gilding the'riftofa throne ; Opulent avarlcQilea|i as poverty, hpnest poverty - baUe to the bone? . Love for the maiden orqwned with marriage, no regrets for aught that v has been. Household happiness, gracious children, debt ' less competence, golden mean ; National hatreds of whole generations, and pigmy spites of the village spire ; Vowsthat will last to the Jast death rattle, and ! Vows that are snapt in a moment of fl re ; He that has lived for the lust 1 of the minute, and died in the doing it, flesh without m<nd ; He that has nailed all flesh to the cross, till self died out in the love 6f his kind ; Spring and summer -and autumn and winter, and all these old-revolutions of ; New and old revolutions of empire, ohange of the tide --what is all of it worth 1 What the philosophies all, the sciences, poesy varying voioes of prayer, All that is noblest, all that is basest, all that is filthy with all that is fair ? What 1b it all if we all of us end but'm being our own corpse coffins at last, Swallowed in vastness, lost in silenoe r drowned in the depths of a meaningless past ? What but the murmur of gnats in the gloom, or " a moment's anger of bees in their hive ? Peace, let it be, ,f or I loved him and lpvo him forever ; the dead are hot dead but alive. ►Supposed to refer W the Salvation Army, tThe " PallfMall Gazette" exposures. [Tennyson's ilin.es ,arer* printed, as the cable brings them, but there are probably errors in transmission.! , ■