Page:The poetical works of Matthew Arnold, 1897.djvu/475

Rh I in the world must live; but thou,

Thou melancholy shade!

Wilt not, if thou canst see me now,

Condemn me, nor upbraid.

For thou art gone away from earth,

And place with those dost claim,

The children of the second birth,

Whom the world could not tame;

And with that small transfigured band,

Whom many a different way

Conducted to their common land,

Thou learn'st to think as they

Christian and Pagan, king and slave,

Soldier and anchorite,

Distinctions we esteem so grave,

Are nothing in their sight.

They do not ask, who pined unseen,

Who was on action hurled,

Whose one bond is, that all have been

Unspotted by the world.

There without anger thou wilt see

Him who obeys thy spell

No more, so he but rest, like thee,

Unsoiled; and so, farewell!

Farewell! Whether thou now liest near

That much-loved inland sea,

The ripples of whose blue waves cheer

Vevey and Meillerie;

And in that gracious region bland,

Where with clear-rustling wave