Page:Undivine Comedy - Zygmunt Krasiński, tr. Martha Walker Cook.djvu/14

8 readers; that they "throw light upon the history of an epoch and develop the characteristics of a nation," is manifest in the strange truth that, as stated by Julian Klaczko, only through the lessons of Krasinski can some of the startling occurrences of the last Polish revolution be interpreted at all.

A curious spectacle is spread before the utilitarian and material spirit of the nineteenth century in the closely interwoven history of our author and his unhappy country. A Christian Poet teaching only forgiveness, patience, and self-abnegation,—the possession of whose works in his native land was Siberia or death, and who, to shield those dear to him from the vengeance of the oppressor, was forced to publish anonymously,—has so influenced the action of a brave, injured, and fiery people, that only in his poems can be found the clue to deeds which puzzled the despot and astonished the world! Thus only can be explained that startling scene which occurred in Warsaw in February, 1861, when unarmed men, women, and children bared their breasts, and fell without resistance before the Russian battalions maddened by the sight of the unfurled Polish banner. For their poet had sung:

"Holy Spirit, who hast taught us that the most sublime power on earth is the power of self-sacrifice, that the most mighty of arguments is virtue, grant that through love we may win the nations to the end whereto we aspire!"

"To each Nation Thou hast given avocation, O Christ! A profound idea springing from Thee lives in each, and in it is the secret of its destiny! Some Thou hast elected to defend the cause of celestial Beauty, and to offer to the world an angelic example by hopefully bearing their heavy cross along a weary way overflowing with their blood . . . until they have given loftier and more divine ideas to men through their sublime struggles; given a holier charity, a wider fraternity, in exchange for the sword that has been plunged into their bosoms!

"Such a nation is thy Poland, O Lord Jesus!" —Psalms of the Future,.

And with such ideas did this patriot-poet succeed in impregnating a nation! To the eternal glory of Poland