Франческо Петрарка The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch
THE TRIUMPH OF TIME
Dell' aureo albergo con l' Aurora innanzi
Behind Aurora's wheels the rising sun His voyage from his golden shrine begun, With such ethereal speed, as if the Hours Had caught him slumb'ring in her rosy bowers. With lordly eye, that reach'd the world's extreme, Methought he look'd, when, gliding on his beam, That wingèd power approach'd that wheels his car In its wide annual range from star to star, Measuring vicissitude; till, now more near, Methought these thrilling accents met my ear:— "New laws must be observed if mortals claim, Spite of the lapse of time, eternal fame. Those laws have lost their force that Heaven decreed, And I my circle run with fruitless speed; If fame's loud breath the slumb'ring dust inspire, And bid to live with never-dying fire, My power, that measures mortal things, is cross'd, And my long glories in oblivion lost. If mortals on yon planet's shadowy face, Can match the tenor of my heavenly race, I strive with fruitless speed from year to year To keep precedence o'er a lower sphere. In vain yon flaming coursers I prepare, In vain the watery world and ambient air Their vigour feeds, if thus, with angels' flight A mortal can o'ertake the race of light! Were you a lesser planet, doom'd to run A shorter journey round a nobler sun; Ranging among yon dusky orbs below, A more degrading doom I could not know: Now spread your swiftest wings, my steeds of flame, We must not yield to man's ambitious aim. With emulation's noblest fires I glow, And soon that reptile race that boast below Bright Fame's conducting lamp, that seems to vie With my incessant journeys round the sky, And gains, or seems to gain, increasing light, Yet shall its glories sink in gradual night. But I am still the same; my course began Before that dusky orb, the seat of man, Was built in ambient air: with constant sway I lead the grateful change of night and day, To one ethereal track for ever bound, And ever treading one eternal round."— And now, methought, with more than mortal ire, He seem'd to lash along his steeds of fire; And shot along the air with glancing ray, Swift as a falcon darting on its prey; No planet's swift career could match his speed, That seem'd the power of fancy to exceed. The courier of the sky I mark'd with dread, As by degrees the baseless fabric fled That human power had built, while high disdain I felt within to see the toiling train Striving to seize each transitory thing That fleets away on dissolution's wing; And soonest from the firmest grasp recede, Like airy forms, with tantalizing speed. O mortals! ere the vital powers decay, Or palsied eld obscures the mental ray, Raise your affections to the things above, Which time or fickle chance can never move. Had you but seen what I despair to sing, How fast his courser plied the flaming wing With unremitted speed, the soaring mind Had left his low terrestrial cares behind. But what an awful change of earth and sky All in a moment pass'd before my eye! Now rigid winter stretch'd her brumal reign With frown Gorgonean over land and main; And Flora now her gaudy mantle spread, And many a blushing rose adorn'd her bed: The momentary seasons seem'd to fleet From bright solstitial dews to winter's driving sleet. In circle multiform, and swift career: A wondrous tale, untold to mortal ear Before: yet reason's calm unbiass'd view Must soon pronounce the seeming fable true, When deep remorse for many a wasted spring Still haunts the frighted soul on demon wing. Fond hope allured me on with meteor flight, And Love my fancy fed with vain delight, Chasing through fairy fields her pageants gay. But now, at last, a clear and steady ray, From reason's mirror sent, my folly shows, And on my sight the hideous image throws Of what I am—a mind eclipsed and lost, By vice degraded from its noble post But yet, e'en yet, the mind's elastic spring Buoys up my powers on resolution's wing, While on the flight of time, with rueful gaze Intent, I try to thread the backward maze, And husband what remains, a scanty space. Few fleeting hours, alas! have pass'd away, Since a weak infant in the lap I lay; For what is human life but one uncertain day! Now hid by flying vapours, dark and cold, And brighten'd now with gleams of sunny gold, That mock the gazer's eye with gaudy show, And leave the victim to substantial woe: Yet hope can live beneath the stormy sky, And empty pleasures have their pinions ply; And frantic pride exalts the lofty brow, Nor marks the snares of death that lurk below. Uncertain, whether now the shaft of fate Sings on the wind, or heaven prolongs my date. I see my hours run on with cruel speed, And in my doom the fate of all I read; A certain doom, which nature's self must feel When the dread sentence checks the mundane wheel. Go! court the smiles of Hope, ye thoughtless crew! Her fairy scenes disclose an ample view To brainless men. But Wisdom o'er the field Casts her keen glance, and lifts her beamy shield To meet the point of Fate, that flies afar, And with stern vigilance expects the war. Perhaps in vain my admonitions fall, Yet still the Muse repeats the solemn call; Nor can she see unmoved your senses drown'd By Circe's deadly spells in sleep profound. She cannot see the flying seasons roll In dread succession to the final goal, And sweep the tribes of men so fast away, To Stygian darkness or eternal day, With unconcern.—Oh! yet the doom repeal Before your callous hearts forget to feel; E'er Penitence foregoes her fruitless toil, Or hell's black regent claims his human spoil Oh, haste! before the fatal arrows fly That send you headlong to the nether sky When down the gulf the sons of folly go In sad procession to the seat of woe! Thus deeply musing on the rapid round Of planetary speed, in thought profound I stood, and long bewail'd my wasted hours, My vain afflictions, and my squander'd powers: When, in deliberate march, a train was seen In silent order moving o'er the green; A band that seem'd to hold in high disdain The desolating power of Time's resistless reign: Their names were hallow'd in the Muse's song, Wafted by fame from age to age along, High o'er oblivion's deep, devouring wave, Where millions find an unrefunding grave. With envious glance the changeful power beheld The glorious phalanx which his power repell'd, And faster now the fiery chariot flew, While Fame appear'd the rapid flight to rue, And labour'd some to save. But, close behind, I heard a voice, which, like the western wind, That whispers softly through the summer shade, These solemn accents to mine ear convey'd:— "Man is a falling flower; and Fame in vain Strives to protract his momentaneous reign Beyond his bounds, to match the rolling tide, On whose dread waves the long olympiads ride, Till, fed by time, the deep procession grows, And in long centuries continuous flows; For what the power of ages can oppose? Though Tempe's rolling flood, or Hebrus claim Renown, they soon shall live an empty name. Where are their heroes now, and those who led The files of war by Xanthus' gory bed? Or Tuscan Tyber's more illustrious band, Whose conquering eagles flew o'er sea and land? What is renown?—a gleam of transient light, That soon an envious cloud involves in night, While passing Time's malignant hands diffuse On many a noble name pernicious dews. Thus our terrestrial glories fade away, Our triumphs pass the pageants of a day; Our fields exchange their lords, our kingdoms fall, And thrones are wrapt in Hades' funeral pall Yet virtue seldom gains what vice had lost, And oft the hopes of good desert are cross'd. Not wealth alone, but mental stores decay, And, like the gifts of Mammon, pass away; Nor wisdom, wealth, nor fortune can withstand His desolating march by sea and land; Nor prayers, nor regal power his wheels restrain, Till he has ground us down to dust again. Though various are the titles men can plead, Some for a time enjoy the glorious meed That merit claims; yet unrelenting fate On all the doom pronounces soon or late; And whatsoe'er the vulgar think or say, Were not your lives thus shorten'd to a day, Your eyes would see the consummating power His countless millions at a meal devour." And reason's voice my stubborn mind subdued; Conviction soon the solemn words pursued; I saw all mortal glory pass away, Like vernal snows beneath the rising ray; And wealth, and power, and honour, strive in vain To 'scape the laws of Time's despotic reign. Though still to vulgar eyes they seem to claim A lot conspicuous in the lists of Fame, Transient as human joys; to feeble age They love to linger on this earthly stage, And think it cruel to be call'd away On the faint morn of life's disastrous day. Yet ah! how many infants on the breast By Heaven's indulgence sink to endless rest! And oft decrepid age his lot bewails, Whom every ill of lengthen'd life assails. Hence sick despondence thinks the human lot A gift of fleeting breath too dearly bought: But should the voice of Fame's obstreperous blast From ages on to future ages last, E'en to the trump of doom,—how poor the prize Whose worth depends upon the changing skies! What time bestows and claims (the fleeting breath Of Fame) is but, at best, a second death— A death that none of mortal race can shun, That wastes the brood of time, and triumphs o'er the sun.
Boyd.
THE TRIUMPH OF ETERNITY
Da poi che sotto 'l ciel cosa non vidi
When all beneath the ample cope of heaven I saw, like clouds before the tempest driven, In sad vicissitude's eternal round, Awhile I stood in holy horror bound; And thus at last with self-exploring mind, Musing, I ask'd, "What basis I could find To fix my trust?" An inward voice replied, "Trust to the Almighty: He thy steps shall guide; He never fails to hear the faithful prayer, But worldly hope must end in dark despair." Now, what I am, and what I was, I know; I see the seasons in procession go With still increasing speed; while things to come, Unknown, unthought, amid the growing gloom Of long futurity, perplex my soul, While life is posting to its final goal. Mine is the crime, who ought with clearer light To watch the winged years' incessant flight; And not to slumber on in dull delay Till circling seasons bring the doomful day. But grace is never slow in that, I trust, To wake the mind, before I sink to dust, With those strong energies that lift the soul To scenes unhoped, unthought, above the pole. While thus I ponder'd, soon my working thought Once more that ever-changing picture brought Of sublunary things before my view, And thus I question'd with myself anew:— "What is the end of this incessant flight Of life and death, alternate day and night? When will the motion on these orbs impress'd Sink on the bosom of eternal rest?" At once, as if obsequious to my will, Another prospect shone, unmoved and still; Eternal as the heavens that glow'd above, A wide resplendent scene of light and love. The wheels of Phœbus from the zodiac turn'd; No more the nightly constellations burn'd; Green earth and undulating ocean roll'd Away, by some resistless power controll'd; Immensity conceived, and brought to birth A grander firmament, and more luxuriant earth. What wonder seized my soul when first I view'd How motionless the restless racer stood, Whose flying feet, with winged speed before, Still mark'd with sad mutation sea and shore. No more he sway'd the future and the past, But on the moveless present fix'd at last; As at a goal reposing from his toils, Like earth unclothed of all its vernal foils. Unvaried scene! where neither change nor fate, Nor care, nor sorrow, can our joys abate; Nor finds the light of thought resistance here, More than the sunbeams in a crystal sphere. But no material things can match their flight, In speed excelling far the race of light. Oh! what a glorious lot shall then be mine If Heaven to me these nameless joys assign! For there the sovereign good for ever reigns, Nor evil yet to come, nor present pains; No baleful birth of time its inmates fear, That comes, the burthen of the passing year; No solar chariot circles through the signs, And now too near, and now too distant, shines; To wretched man and earth's devoted soil Dispensing sad variety of toil. Oh! happy are the blessed souls that sing Loud hallelujahs in eternal ring! Thrice happy he, who late, at last shall find A lot in the celestial climes assign'd! He, led by grace, the auspicious ford explores, Where, cross the plains, the wintry torrent roars; That troublous tide, where, with incessant strife, Weak mortals struggle through, and call it life. In love with Vanity, oh, doubly blind Are they that final consolation find In things that fleet on dissolution's wing, Or dance away upon the transient ring Of seasons, as they roll. No sound they hear From that still voice that Wisdom's sons revere; No vestment they procure to keep them warm Against the menace of the wintry storm; But all exposed, in naked nature lie, A shivering crowd beneath the inclement sky, Of reason void, by every foe subdued, Self-ruin'd, self-deprived of sovereign good; Reckless of Him, whose universal sway, Matter, and all its various forms, obey; Whether they mix in elemental strife, Or meet in married calm, and foster life. His nature baffles all created mind, In earth or heaven, to fathom, or to find. One glimpse of glory on the saints bestow'd, With eager longings fills the courts of God For deeper views, in that abyss of light, While mortals slumber here, content with night: Though nought, we find, below the moon, can fill The boundless cravings of the human will. And yet, what fierce desire the fancy wings To gain a grasp of perishable things; Although one fleeting hour may scatter far The fruit of many a year's corroding care; Those spacious regions where our fancies roam, Pain'd by the past, expecting ills to come, In some dread moment, by the fates assign'd, Shall pass away, nor leave a rack behind; And Time's revolving wheels shall lose at last The speed that spins the future and the past; And, sovereign of an undisputed throne, Awful eternity shall reign alone. Then every darksome veil shall fleet away That hides the prospects of eternal day: Those cloud-born objects of our hopes and fears, Whose air-drawn forms deluded memory bears As of substantial things, away so fast Shall fleet, that mortals, at their speed aghast, Watching the change of all beneath the moon, Shall ask, what once they were, and will be soon? The time will come when every change shall cease, This quick revolving wheel shall rest in peace: No summer then shall glow, nor winter freeze; Nothing shall be to come, and nothing past, But an eternal now shall ever last. Though time shall be no more, yet space shall give A nobler theatre to love and live The wingèd courier then no more shall claim The power to sink or raise the notes of Fame, Or give its glories to the noontide ray: True merit then, in everlasting day, Shall shine for ever, as at first it shone At once to God and man and angels known. Happy are they who in this changing sphere Already have begun the bright career That reaches to the goal which, all in vain, The Muse would blazon in her feeble strain: But blest above all other blest is he Who from the trammels of mortality, Ere half the vital thread ran out, was free, Mature for Heaven; where now the matchless fair Preserves those features, that seraphic air, And all those mental charms that raised my mind, To judge of heaven while yet on earth confined. That soft attractive glance that won my heart When first my bosom felt unusual smart, Now beams, now glories, in the realms above, Fed by the eternal source of light and love. Then shall I see her as I first beheld, But lovelier far, and by herself excell'd; And I distinguish'd in the bands above Shall hear this plaudit in the choirs of love:— "Lo! this is he who sung in mournful strains For many years a lover's doubts and pains; Yet in this soul-expanding, sweet employ, A sacred transport felt above all vulgar joy." She too shall wonder at herself to hear Her praises ring around the radiant sphere: But of that hour it is not mine to know; To her, perhaps, the period of my woe Is manifest; for she my fate may find In the pure mirror of the eternal mind. To me it seems at hand a sure presage, Denotes my rise from this terrestrial stage; Then what I gain'd and lost below shall lie Suspended in the balance of the sky, And all our anxious sublunary cares Shall seem one tissue of Arachne's snares; And all the lying vanities of life, The sordid source of envy, hate, and strife, Ignoble as they are, shall then appear Before the searching beam of truth severe; Then souls, from sense refined, shall see the fraud That led them from the living way of God. From the dark dungeon of the human breast All direful secrets then shall rise confess'd, In honour multiplied—a dreadful show To hierarchies above, and saints below. Eternal reason then shall give her doom; And, sever'd wide, the tenants of the tomb Shall seek their portions with instinctive haste, Quick as the savage speeds along the waste. Then shall the golden hoard its trust betray, And they, that, mindless of that dreadful day, Boasted their wealth, its vanity shall know In the dread avenue of endless woe: While they whom moderation's wholesome rule Kept still unstain'd in Virtue's heavenly school, Who the calm sunshine of the soul beneath Enjoy'd, will share the triumph of the Faith. These pageants five the world and I beheld, The sixth and last, I hope, in heaven reveal'd (If Heaven so will), when Time with speedy hand The scene despoils, and Death's funereal wand The triumph leads. But soon they both shall fall Under that mighty hand that governs all, While they who toil for true renown below, Whom envious Time and Death, a mightier foe, Relentless plunged in dark oblivion's womb, When virtue seem'd to seek the silent tomb, Spoil'd of her heavenly charms once more shall rise, Regain their beauty, and assert the skies; Leaving the dark sojourn of time beneath, And the wide desolated realms of Death. But she will early seek these glorious bounds, Whose long-lamented fall the world resounds In unison with me. And heaven will view That awful day her heavenly charms renew, When soul with body joins. Gebenna's strand Saw me enroll'd in Love's devoted band, And mark'd my toils through many hard campaigns And wounds, whose scars my memory yet retains. Blest is the pile that marks the hallow'd dust!— There, at the resurrection of the just, When the last trumpet with earth-shaking sound Shall wake her sleepers from their couch profound; Then, when that spotless and immortal mind In a material mould once more enshrined, With wonted charms shall wake seraphic love, How will the beatific sight improve Her heavenly beauties in the climes above!
Boyd.
[LINES 82-99.]
Happy those souls who now are on their way, Or shall hereafter, to attain that end, Theme of my argument, come when it will; And, 'midst the other fair, and fraught with grace, Most happy she whom Death has snatch'd away, On this side far the natural bound of life. The angel manners then will clearly shine, The meet and pure discourse, the chasten'd thought, Which nature planted in her youthful breast. Unnumber'd beauties, worn by time and death, Shall then return to their best state of bloom; And how thou hast bound me, love, will then be seen, Whence I by every finger shall be shown!— Behold who ever wept, and in his tears Was happier far than others in their smiles! And she, of whom I yet lamenting sing, Shall wonder at her own transcendant charms, Seeing herself far above all admired.
Charlemont.
SONNET FOUND IN LAURA'S TOMB
Qui reposan quei caste e felice ossa
Here peaceful sleeps the chaste, the happy shade Of that pure spirit, which adorn'd this earth: Pure fame, true beauty, and transcendent worth, Rude stone! beneath thy rugged breast are laid. Death sudden snatch'd the dear lamented maid! Who first to all my tender woes gave birth, Woes! that estranged my sorrowing soul to mirth, While full four lustres time completely made. Sweet plant! that nursed on Avignon's sweet soil, There bloom'd, there died; when soon the weeping Muse Threw by the lute, forsook her wonted toil. Bright spark of beauty, that still fires my breast! What pitying mortal shall a prayer refuse, That Heaven may number thee amid the blest?
Anon. 1777.
Here rest the chaste, the dear, the blest remains Of her most lovely; peerless while on earth: What late was beauty, spotless honour, worth, Stern marble, here thy chill embrace retains. The freshness of the laurel Death disdains; And hath its root thus wither'd.—Such the dearth O'ertakes me. Here I bury ease and mirth, And hope from twenty years of cares and pains. This happy plant Avignon lonely fed With Life, and saw it die.—And with it lies My pen, my verse, my reason;—useless, dead. O graceful form!—Fire, which consuming flies Through all my frame!—For blessings on thy head Oh, may continual prayers to heaven rise!
Capel Lofft.
Here now repose those chaste, those blest remains Of that most gentle spirit, sole in earth! Harsh monumental stone, that here confinest True honour, fame, and beauty, all o'erthrown! Death has destroy'd that Laurel green, and torn Its tender roots; and all the noble meed Of my long warfare, passing (if aright My melancholy reckoning holds) four lustres. O happy plant! Avignon's favour'd soil Has seen thee spring and die;—and here with thee Thy poet's pen, and muse, and genius lies. O lovely, beauteous limbs! O vivid fire, That even in death hast power to melt the soul! Heaven be thy portion, peace with God on high!