The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1885-01-24

Fear not their topping on thine airy
Their lofty SUBMITS lean against the Sun
Their iron sinews penetrate the huge
| Aud suHken bases of the awful hills
Are not their shadows lying at thy feet p
If shades they be-making better light
Than ever sunshine on the swaying woods
Perchanee the glory shesning from their
hrows,
In dazzling bands, may light thy crooked
path
Across the darkness, stunned with horrid
cries
| OF fiends, tormented for the bliss Of light.
Cross over, then, and let thy throned god,
Thy Chance of Chance, sole monarch of the
space,
Compress d within the limits Of thy dumb,
Iugiorious world - the blind, forgotten
grave
Uphold thy falling in the gloomy void,
That yawns between thy continent and
mine.
hnrl my sage defiant in thy teeth,
And challenge thee to combat to the life.
Thou darest not? Then will l teach thee
here
Behold this little blossom by the way
| gathered it from where the bitter dust
Blew down the windy highway of the hills
Hot, with the blasts Of sultry, searching
flame,
Struck from the fiery furnace of the Sun.
How glorious in its simple mechanism!
Who locked these cunning hinges on the
pale,
Soft holiness, within this emerald husk
WHO taught the golden fountains of the
dew,
trwelIiag through the jasper -ringed bars
| OF granite lodges, ancient as the night,
What time 10 break their charmed seals
and rise
To touch the eyslids Of this nameless bud .
| Who ai,i the fery arteries of the hills p
Who sunk the great heart in the roaring
sea-
And sent its icy pulses .hivering on
through the dead lapse of centuries, untired:
| N'ho beat the wool of golden-tanglsd stars
Into the warp of mystic, nebulous light,
':'etfed and drawn into the gorgeous bell
Tat sirds Orion champion of the hosts
Th.t-nishtly to the twang of sinuoul
| sound,
Struck from the ringin. harp-strings Of the
| North
"y wizard minst-ls, chanting potent charm.
To Chain the awful spirit of the deep
Move in majestic mea.ure-did blinc
| Chance?
| " ho harnesses the chariot of the Sun?
u no curbs the uar-horss of the thunder
clouG,
When, grit with blackness, terrible as death
Forth whirling to the charge of mighty
storms,
lie strikes tho lightnings from his fer,
hoofS,
And hurls them furious on the battling
winds?
Did Chance, thy god, thy dumb progenitor
Who rocks the whirlwind in its cradle cave
| To lronaous sleep, and mad, inpetuou
| dreams
| Oh roaring waters, and tumultuous winds
| Iieaviug the dark foundations of the hills
Who taught the jasper-tangle of tho brook
| Such endless joy? Who tuned tho dulci
mer
OF the wild breeze to sweeping minstrelsy
That erst the poets soul drank inspiration
| From out the mellow fountains of its bliss?
Come, lay thy naked bosom to the earth
| What fselest thou? A dumb and icy chill
Shoots through the empty chambers Of tn,
brain
Clogging the flow of those red, runninl
brooks,
life
Within the cincture of thy mortal frame.
Who babe the fountains of the sun o'erflow
And fill the void with universal light
And generous warmth, to clothe thy naked
| naSS
With gentle comfort, from ths searching
North?
Is ca til thy mother? Didst thou sprin
from chance,
Like a lost meteor from the womb of spa &C
To blaze a little period through the night
OF moral being, then, as deeply sink
With all thy projects, hopes, and won lrou
schemes
To rcach tie awful pinnacle of fame,-
Back whence thou earnest, to utter moth
ingness?
Is this the aim of thy immortal part?
Commune with Nature. Ask her, What
man?
Will SIZE reply, "A vassal born TO toll
\ weary laborer in the field of life,
Battling with grief, and care, and vain tn
mol,
And the hot blowing winds ofenvious strife
70 deive, to plough, to sow. perchance t
Tie bitter wormwood, and the taros tina
crow
Between the wheat, in better fields than hi,
Tue weaker brother, this is but his goal -
To fold tie gai ment Of his wretchedness
Close on the light; to crush the winged sou
To The bare level of his barren mind;
And, like an echo of the hungry wind,