She spake, and lo! celestial radiance beam’d

Amid the air, such odors wafting now

As erst came blended with the evening gale,

From Eden’s bowers of bliss. An angel form

Stood by the Maid; his wings, etherial white,

Flash’d like the diamond in the noon-tide sun,

Dazzling her mortal eye: all else appear’d

Her Theodore.

    Amazed she saw: the Fiend

Was fled, and on her ear the well-known voice

Sounded, tho’ now more musically sweet

Than ever yet had thrill’d her charmed soul,

When eloquent Affection fondly told

The day-dreams of delight.

    “Beloved Maid!

Lo! I am with thee! still thy Theodore!

Hearts in the holy bands of Love combin’d,

Death has no power to sever. Thou art mine!

A little while and thou shalt dwell with me

In scenes where Sorrow is not. Cheerily

Tread thou the path that leads thee to the grave,

Rough tho’ it be and painful, for the grave

Is but the threshold of Eternity.

    Favour’d of Heaven! to thee is given to view

These secret realms. The bottom of the abyss

Thou treadest, Maiden! Here the dungeons are

Where bad men learn repentance; souls diseased

Must have their remedy; and where disease

Is rooted deep, the remedy is long

Perforce, and painful.”

    Thus the Spirit spake,

And led the Maid along a narrow path,

Dark gleaming to the light of far-off flames,

More dread than darkness. Soon the distant sound

Of clanking anvils, and the lengthened breath

Provoking fire are heard: and now they reach

A wide expanded den where all around

Tremendous furnaces, with hellish blaze,

Flamed dreadful. At the heaving bellows stood

The meagre form of Care, and as he blew

To augment the fire, the fire augmented scorch’d

His wretched limbs: sleepless for ever thus

He toil’d and toil’d, of toil to reap no end

But endless toil and never-ending woe.

    An aged man went round the infernal vault,

Urging his workmen to their ceaseless task:

White were his locks, as is the wintry snow

On hoar Plinlimmon’s head. A golden staff

His steps supported; powerful talisman,

Which whoso feels shall never feel again

The tear of Pity, or the throb of Love.

Touch’d but by this, the massy gates give way,

The buttress trembles, and the guarded wall,

Guarded in vain, submits. Him heathens erst

Had deified, and bowed the suppliant knee

To Plutus. Nor are now his votaries few,

Tho’ he the Blessed Teacher of mankind

Hath said, that easier thro’ the needle’s eye

Shall the huge camel pass, [5] than the rich man

Enter the gates of heaven. “Ye cannot serve

Your God, and worship Mammon.”

“Missioned Maid!”

So spake the Angel, “know that these, whose hands

Round each white furnace ply the unceasing toil,

Were Mammon’s slaves on earth. They did not spare

To wring from Poverty the hard-earn’d mite,

They robb’d the orphan’s pittance, they could see

Want’s asking eye unmoved; and therefore these,

Ranged round the furnace, still must persevere

In Mammon’s service; scorched by these fierce fires,

And frequent deluged by the o’erboiling ore:

Yet still so framed, that oft to quench their thirst

Unquenchable, large draughts of molten gold [6]

They drink insatiate, still with pain renewed,

Pain to destroy.”

So saying, her he led

Forth from the dreadful cavern to a cell,

Brilliant with gem-born light. The rugged walls

Part gleam’d with gold, and part with silver ore

A milder radiance shone. The Carbuncle

There its strong lustre like the flamy sun

Shot forth irradiate; from the earth beneath,

And from the roof a diamond light emits;

Rubies and amethysts their glows commix’d

With the gay topaz, and the softer ray

Shot from the sapphire, and the emerald’s hue,

And bright pyropus.

There on golden seats,

A numerous, sullen, melancholy train

Sat silent. “Maiden, these,” said Theodore,

Are they who let the love of wealth absorb

All other passions; in their souls that vice

Struck deeply-rooted, like the poison-tree

That with its shade spreads barrenness around.

These, Maid! were men by no atrocious crime

Blacken’d, no fraud, nor ruffian violence:

Men of fair dealing, and respectable

On earth, but such as only for themselves

Heap’d up their treasures, deeming all their wealth

Their own, and given to them, by partial Heaven,

To bless them only: therefore here they sit,

Possessed of gold enough, and by no pain

Tormented, save the knowledge of the bliss

They lost, and vain repentance. Here they dwell,

Loathing these useless treasures, till the hour

Of general restitution.”

Thence they past,

And now arrived at such a gorgeous dome,

As even the pomp of Eastern opulence

Could never equal: wandered thro’ its halls

A numerous train; some with the red-swoln eye

Of riot, and intemperance-bloated cheek;

Some pale and nerveless, and with feeble step,

And eyes lack-lustre.

Maiden? said her guide,

These are the wretched slaves of Appetite,

Curst with their wish enjoyed. The epicure

Here pampers his foul frame, till the pall’d sense

Loaths at the banquet; the voluptuous here

Plunge in the tempting torrent of delight,

And sink in misery. All they wish’d on earth,

Possessing here, whom have they to accuse,

But their own folly, for the lot they chose?

Yet, for that these injured themselves alone,

They to the house of Penitence may hie,

And, by a long and painful regimen,

To wearied Nature her exhausted powers

Restore, till they shall learn to form the wish

Of wisdom, and Almighty Goodness grants

That prize to him who seeks it.”

Whilst he spake,

The board is spread. With bloated paunch, and eye

Fat swoln, and legs whose monstrous size disgraced

The human form divine, their caterer,

Hight Gluttony, set forth the smoaking feast.

And by his side came on a brother form,

With fiery cheek of purple hue, and red

And scurfy-white, mix’d motley; his gross bulk,

Like some huge hogshead shapen’d, as applied.

Him had antiquity with mystic rites

Ador’d, to him the sons of Greece, and thine

Imperial Rome, on many an altar pour’d

The victim blood, with godlike titles graced,

Bacchus, or Dionusus; son of Jove,

Deem’d falsely, for from Folly’s ideot form

He sprung, what time Madness, with furious hand,

Seiz’d on the laughing female. At one birth

She brought the brethren, menial here, above

Reigning with sway supreme, and oft they hold

High revels: mid the Monastery’s gloom,

The sacrifice is spread, when the grave voice

Episcopal, proclaims approaching day

Of visitation, or Churchwardens meet

To save the wretched many from the gripe

Of eager Poverty, or mid thy halls

Of London, mighty Mayor! rich Aldermen,

Of coming feast hold converse.

Otherwhere,

For tho’ allied in nature as in blood,

They hold divided sway, his brother lifts

His spungy sceptre. In the noble domes

Of Princes, and state-wearied Ministers,

Maddening he reigns; and when the affrighted mind

Casts o’er a long career of guilt and blood

Its eye reluctant, then his aid is sought

To lull the worm of Conscience to repose.

He too the halls of country Squires frequents,

But chiefly loves the learned gloom that shades

Thy offspring Rhedycina! and thy walls,

Granta! nightly libations there to him

Profuse are pour’d, till from the dizzy brain

Triangles, Circles, Parallelograms,

Moods, Tenses, Dialects, and Demigods,

And Logic and Theology are swept

By the red deluge.

Unmolested there

He reigns; till comes at length the general feast,

Septennial sacrifice; then when the sons

Of England meet, with watchful care to chuse

Their delegates, wise, independent men,

Unbribing and unbrib’d, and cull’d to guard

Their rights and charters from the encroaching grasp

Of greedy Power: then all the joyful land

Join in his sacrifices, so inspir’d

To make the important choice.

The observing Maid

Address’d her guide, “These Theodore, thou sayest

Are men, who pampering their foul appetites,

Injured themselves alone. But where are they,

The worst of villains, viper-like, who coil

Around the guileless female, so to sting

The heart that loves them?”

“Them,” the spirit replied,

A long and dreadful punishment awaits.

For when the prey of want and infamy,

Lower and lower still the victim sinks,

Even to the depth of shame, not one lewd word,

One impious imprecation from her lips

Escapes, nay not a thought of evil lurks

In the polluted mind, that does not plead

Before the throne of Justice, thunder-tongued

Against the foul Seducer.”

Now they reach’d

The house of Penitence. Credulity

Stood at the gate, stretching her eager head

As tho’ to listen; on her vacant face,

A smile that promis’d premature assent;

Tho’ her Regret behind, a meagre Fiend,

Disciplin’d sorely.

Here they entered in,

And now arrived where, as in study tranced,

She sat, the Mistress of the Dome. Her face

Spake that composed severity, that knows

No angry impulse, no weak tenderness,

Resolved and calm. Before her lay that Book

That hath the words of Life; and as she read,

Sometimes a tear would trickle down her cheek,

Tho’ heavenly joy beam’d in her eye the while.

Leaving her undisturb’d, to the first ward

Of this great Lazar-house, the Angel led

The favour’d Maid of Orleans. Kneeling down

On the hard stone that their bare knees had worn,

In sackcloth robed, a numerous train appear’d:

Hard-featured some, and some demurely grave;

Yet such expression stealing from the eye,

As tho’, that only naked, all the rest

Was one close fitting mask. A scoffing Fiend,

For Fiend he was, tho’ wisely serving here

Mock’d at his patients, and did often pour

Ashes upon them, and then bid them say

Their prayers aloud, and then he louder laughed:

For these were Hypocrites, on earth revered

As holy ones, who did in public tell

Their beads, and make long prayers, and cross themselves,

And call themselves most miserable sinners,

That so they might be deem’d most pious saints;

And go all filth, and never let a smile

Bend their stern muscles, gloomy, sullen men,

Barren of all affection, and all this

To please their God, forsooth! and therefore Scorn

Grinn’d at his patients, making them repeat

Their solemn farce, with keenest raillery

Tormenting; but if earnest in their prayer,

They pour’d the silent sorrows of the soul

To Heaven, then did they not regard his mocks

Which then came painless, and Humility

Soon rescued them, and led to Penitence,

That She might lead to Heaven.

From thence they came,

Where, in the next ward, a most wretched band

Groan’d underneath the bitter tyranny

Of a fierce Daemon. His coarse hair was red,

Pale grey his eyes, and blood-shot; and his face

Wrinkled by such a smile as Malice wears

In ecstacy. Well-pleased he went around,

Plunging his dagger in the hearts of some,

Or probing with a poison’d lance their breasts,

Or placing coals of fire within their wounds;

Or seizing some within his mighty grasp,

He fix’d them on a stake, and then drew back,

And laugh’d to see them writhe.

“These,” said the Spirit,

Are taught by Cruelty, to loath the lives

They led themselves. Here are those wicked men

Who loved to exercise their tyrant power

On speechless brutes; bad husbands undergo

A long purgation here; the traffickers

In human flesh here too are disciplined.

Till by their suffering they have equall’d all

The miseries they inflicted, all the mass

Of wretchedness caused by the wars they waged,

The towns they burnt, for they who bribe to war

Are guilty of the blood, the widows left

In want, the slave or led to suicide,

Or murdered by the foul infected air

Of his close dungeon, or more sad than all,

His virtue lost, his very soul enslaved,

And driven by woe to wickedness.

These next,

Whom thou beholdest in this dreary room,

So sullen, and with such an eye of hate

Each on the other scowling, these have been

False friends. Tormented by their own dark thoughts

Here they dwell: in the hollow of their hearts

There is a worm that feeds, and tho’ thou seest

That skilful leech who willingly would heal

The ill they suffer, judging of all else

By their own evil standard, they suspect

The aid be vainly proffers, lengthening thus

By vice its punishment.”

“But who are these,”

The Maid exclaim’d, “that robed in flowing lawn,

And mitred, or in scarlet, and in caps

Like Cardinals, I see in every ward,

Performing menial service at the beck

Of all who bid them?”

Theodore replied,

These men are they who in the name of CHRIST

Did heap up wealth, and arrogating power,

Did make men bow the knee, and call themselves

Most Reverend Graces and Right Reverend Lords.

They dwelt in palaces, in purple clothed,

And in fine linen: therefore are they here;

And tho’ they would not minister on earth,

Here penanced they perforce must minister:

For he, the lowly man of Nazareth,

Hath said, his kingdom is not of the world.”

So Saying on they past, and now arrived

Where such a hideous ghastly groupe abode,

That the Maid gazed with half-averting eye,

And shudder’d: each one was a loathly corpse,

The worm did banquet on his putrid prey,

Yet had they life and feeling exquisite

Tho’ motionless and mute.

“Most wretched men

Are these, the angel cried. These, Joan, are bards,

Whose loose lascivious lays perpetuate

Who sat them down, deliberately lewd,

So to awake and pamper lust in minds

Unborn; and therefore foul of body now

As then they were of soul, they here abide

Long as the evil works they left on earth

Shall live to taint mankind. A dreadful doom!

Yet amply merited by that bad man

Who prostitutes the sacred gift of song!”

And now they reached a huge and massy pile,

Massy it seem’d, and yet in every blast

As to its ruin shook. There, porter fit,

Remorse for ever his sad vigils kept.

Pale, hollow-eyed, emaciate, sleepless wretch.

Inly he groan’d, or, starting, wildly shriek’d,

Aye as the fabric tottering from its base,

Threatened its fall, and so expectant still

Lived in the dread of danger still delayed.

They enter’d there a large and lofty dome,

O’er whose black marble sides a dim drear light

Struggled with darkness from the unfrequent lamp.

Enthroned around, the Murderers of Mankind,

Monarchs, the great! the glorious! the august!

Each bearing on his brow a crown of fire,

Sat stern and silent. Nimrod he was there,

First King the mighty hunter; and that Chief

Who did belie his mother’s fame, that so

He might be called young Ammon. In this court

Cæsar was crown’d, accurst liberticide;

And he who murdered Tully, that cold villain,

Octavius, tho’ the courtly minion’s lyre

Hath hymn’d his praise, tho’ Maro sung to him,

And when Death levelled to original clay

The royal carcase, Flattery, fawning low,

Fell at his feet, and worshipped the new God.

Titus was here, [7] the Conqueror of the Jews,

He the Delight of human-kind misnamed;

Cæsars and Soldans, Emperors and Kings,

Here they were all, all who for glory fought,

Here in the Court of Glory reaping now

The meed they merited.

As gazing round

The Virgin mark’d the miserable train,

A deep and hollow voice from one went forth;

“Thou who art come to view our punishment,

Maiden of Orleans! hither turn thine eyes,

For I am he whose bloody victories

Thy power hath rendered vain. Lo! I am here,

The hero conqueror of Azincour,

Henry of England!—wretched that I am,

I might have reigned in happiness and peace,

My coffers full, my subjects undisturb’d,

And Plenty and Prosperity had loved

To dwell amongst them: but mine eye beheld

The realm of France, by faction tempest-torn,

And therefore I did think that it would fall

An easy prey. I persecuted those

Who taught new doctrines, tho’ they taught the truth:

And when I heard of thousands by the sword

Cut off, or blasted by the pestilence,

I calmly counted up my proper gains,

And sent new herds to slaughter. Temperate

Myself, no blood that mutinied, no vice

Tainting my private life, I sent abroad

Murder and Rape; and therefore am I doom’d,

Like these imperial Sufferers, crown’d with fire,

Here to remain, till Man’s awaken’d eye

Shall see the genuine blackness of our deeds,

And warn’d by them, till the whole human race,

Equalling in bliss the aggregate we caus’d

Of wretchedness, shall form One Brotherhood,

One Universal Family of Love.”

[5] In the former edition I had substituted cable instead of camel. The alteration would not be worth noticing were it not for the circumstance which occasioned it. Facilius elephas per foramen acus, is among the Hebrew adages collected by Drusius; the same metaphor is found in two other Jewish proverbs, and this appears to determine the signification of καμηλος Matt. 19. 24.

[6] The same idea, and almost the same words are in an old play by John Ford. The passage is a very fine one:

Ay, you are wretched, miserably wretched,

Almost condemn’d alive! There is a place,

(List daughter!) in a black and hollow vault,

Where day is never seen; there shines no sun,

But flaming horror of consuming fires;

A lightless sulphur, choak’d with smoaky foggs

Of an infected darkness. In this place

Dwell many thousand thousand sundry sorts

Of never-dying deaths; there damned souls

Roar without pity, there are gluttons fed

With toads and adders; there is burning oil

Pour’d down the drunkard’s throat, the usurer

Is forced to sup whole draughts of molten gold;

There is the murderer for ever stabb’d,

Yet can he never die; there lies the wanton

On racks of burning steel, whilst in his soul

He feels the torment of his raging lust.

(’Tis Pity she’s a Whore.)

I wrote this passage when very young, and the idea, trite as it is, was new to me. It occurs I believe in most descriptions of hell, and perhaps owes its origin to the fate of Crassus.

    After this picture of horrors, the reader may perhaps be pleased with one more pleasantly fanciful:

O call me home again dear Chief! and put me

To yoking foxes, milking of he-goats,

Pounding of water in a mortar, laving

The sea dry with a nutshell, gathering all

The leaves are fallen this autumn—making ropes of sand,

Catching the winds together in a net,

Mustering of ants, and numbering atoms, all

That Hell and you thought exquisite torments, rather

Than stay me here a thought more. I would sooner

Keep fleas within a circle, and be accomptant

A thousand year which of ’em, and how far

Outleap’d the other, than endure a minute

Such as I have within.

(B. Jonson. The Devil is an Ass.)

[7] During the siege of Jerusalem, “the Roman commander, with a generous clemency, that inseparable attendant on true heroism, laboured incessantly, and to the very last moment, to preserve the place. With this view, he again and again intreated the tyrants to surrender and save their lives. With the same view also, after carrying the second wall the siege was intermitted four days: to rouse their fears, prisoners, to the number of five hundred, or more were crucified daily before the walls; till space, Josephus says, was wanting for the crosses, and crosses for the captives.”—Churton’s Bampton Lectures.

    If any of my readers should enquire why Titus Vespasian, the Delight of Mankind, is placed in such a situation,—I answer, for this instance of “his generous clemency, that inseparable attendant on true heroism!”