For, seeing what I see, ye have me now
In the believing mood!
Florinda cried, 'tis from the bitterness,
Not from the hardness of the heart, he speaks!
Hear him! and in your goodness give the scoff
The virtue of a prayer! So saying, she raised
Her hands in fervent action claspt to Heaven;
Then as, still claspt, they fell, toward her sire
She turned her eyes, beholding him through tears.
The look, the gesture, and that silent woe,
Softened her father's heart, which in this hour
Was open to the influences of love.
Priest, thy vocation were a blessed one,
Said Julian, if its mighty power were used
To lessen human misery, not to swell
The mournful sum, already all-too-great.
If, as thy former counsel should imply,
Thou art not one who would for his craft's sake
Fret with corrosives and inflame the wound,
Which the poor sufferer brings to thee in trust,
That thou with virtuous balm wilt bind it up,..
If, as I think, thou art not one of those
Whose villainy makes honest men turn Moors,
Thou then wilt answer with unbiassed mind
What I shall ask thee, and exorcise thus
The sick and feverish conscience of my child,
From inbred phantoms, fiend-like, which possess
Her innocent spirit. Children we are all
Of one great Father, in whatever clime
Nature or chance hath cast the seeds of life,
All tongues, all colours: neither after death
Shall we be sorted into languages
And tints,.. white, black, and tawny, Greek and Goth,
Northmen and offspring of hot Africa;
The All-Father, he in whom we live and move,
He the indifferent Judge of all, regards
Nations, and hues, and dialects alike.
According to their works shall they be judged,
When even-handed Justice in the scale
Their good and evil weighs. All creeds, I ween,
Agree in this, and hold it orthodox.
Roderick, perceiving here that Julian paused,
As if he waited for acknowledgement
Of that plain truth, in motion of assent
Inclined his brow complacently, and said,
Even so. What follows?.. This, resumed the Count,
That creeds like colours being but accident,
Are therefore in the scale imponderable; ..
Thou seest my meaning;.. that from every faith
As every clime, there is a way to Heaven,
And thou and I may meet in Paradise.
Oh grant it, God! cried Roderick fervently,
And smote his breast. Oh grant it, gracious God!
Through the dear blood of Jesus, grant that he
And I may meet before the Mercy-throne!
That were a triumph of Redeeming Love,
For which admiring Angels would renew
Their halleluiahs through the choir of Heaven!
Man! quoth Count Julian, wherefore art thou moved
To this strange passion? I require of thee
Thy judgement, not thy prayers!
In gentle voice subdued the Goth replies ;
A prayer, from whatsoever lips it flow,
By thy own rule should find the way to Heaven,
So that the heart in its sincerity
Straight forward breathe it forth. I, like thyself,
Am all untrained to subtleties of speech,
Nor competent of this great argument
Thou openest; and perhaps shall answer thee
Wide of the words, but to the purport home.
There are to whom the light of gospel truth
Hath never reached; of such I needs must deem
As of the sons of men who had their day
Before the light was given. But, Count, for those
Who, born amid the light, to darkness turn,
Wilful in error,... I dare only say,
God doth not leave the unhappy soul without
An inward monitor, and till the grave
gate of mercy is not closed.
Priest-like! the renegade replied, and shook
His head in scorn. What is not in the craft
Is error, and for error there shall be
mercy found in him whom yet ye name The merciful!
Now God forbid, rejoined
The fallen King, that one who stands in need
Of mercy for his sins should argue thus
Of error! Thou hast said that thou and I,
Thou dying in name a Musselman, and I
A servant of the Cross, may meet in Heaven.
Time was when in our fathers' ways we walked
Regardlessly alike; faith being to each,..
For so far thou hast reasoned rightly,.. like
Our country's fashion and our mother-tongue,
Of mere inheritance,.. no thing of choice
In judgement fixed, nor rooted in the heart.
Me have the arrows of calamity
Sore stricken; sinking underneath the weight
Of sorrow, yet more heavily opprest
Beneath the burthen of my sins, I turned
In that dread hour to Him who from the Cross
Calls to the heavy-laden. There I found
Relief and comfort; there I have my hope,
My strength and my salvation; there, the grave
Ready beneath my feet, and Heaven in view,
I to the King of Terrors say, Come, Death,..
Come quickly! Thou too wert a stricken deer,
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