Unsated,—not unsatable,
As paradise gives proof. Deride
Their choice now, thou who sit'st outside!"
XXVII
I cried in anguish, "Mind, the mind,
So miserably cast behind,
To gain what had been wisely lost!
Oh, let me strive to make the most
Of the poor stinted soul, I nipped
Of budding wings, else now equipped
For voyage from summer isle to isle!
And though she needs must reconcile
Ambition to the life on ground,
Still, I can profit by late found
But precious knowledge. Mind is best—
I will seize mind, forego the rest,
And try how far my tethered strength
May crawl in this poor breadth and length.
Let me, since I can fly no more,
At least spin dervish-like about
(Till giddy rapture almost doubt
I fly) through circling sciences,
Philosophies and histories
Should the whirl slacken there, then verse,
Fining to music, shall asperse
Fresh and fresh fire-dew, till I strain
Intoxicate, half-break my chain!
Not joyless, though more favored feet
Stand calm, where I want wings to beat
The floor. At least earth's bond is broke!"
407
XXVIII
Then, (sickening even while I spoke)
"Let me alone! No answer, pray,
To this! I know what Thou wilt say!
All still is earth's,—to know, as much
As feel its truths, which if we touch
With sense, or apprehend in soul,
What matter? I have reached the goal—
'Whereto does knowledge serve!' will burn
My eyes, too sure, at every turn!
I cannot look back now, nor stake
Bliss on the race, for running's sake.
The goal's a ruin like the rest!—
And so much worse thy latter quest,"
(Added the voice) "that even on earth—
Whenever, in man's soul, had birth
Those intuitions, grasps of guess,
Which pull the more into the less,
Making the finite comprehend
Infinity,—the bard would spend
Such praise alone, upon his craft,
As, when wind-lyres obey the waft,
Goes to the craftsman who arranged
The seven strings, changed them and rechanged—
Knowing it was the South that harped.
He felt his song, in singing, warped;
Distinguished his and God's part: whence
A world of spirit as of sense
Was plain to him, yet not too plain,
Which he could traverse, not remain
A guest in:—else were permanent
Heaven on the earth its gleams were meant
To sting with hunger for full light,408—
Made visible in verse, despite
The veiling weakness,—truth by means
Of fable, showing while it screens,—
Since highest truth, man e'er supplied,
Was ever fable on outside.
Such gleams made bright the earth an age;
Now the whole sun's his heritage!
Take up thy world, it is allowed,
Thou who hast entered in the cloud!"
XXIX
Then I—"Behold, my spirit bleeds,
Catches no more at broken reeds,—
But lilies flower those reeds above:
I let the world go, and take love!
Love survives in me, albeit those
I love be henceforth masks and shows,
Not living men and women: still
I mind how love repaired all ill,
Cured wrong, soothed grief, made earth amends
With parents, brothers, children, friends!
Some semblance of a woman yet
With eyes to help me to forget,
Shall look on me; and I will match
Departed love with love, attach
Old memories to new dreams, nor scorn
The poorest of the grains of corn
I save from shipwreck on this isle,
Trusting its barrenness may smile
With happy foodful green one day,
More precious for the pains. I pray,—
Leave to love, only!"
409
XXX
At the word,
The form, I looked to have been stirred
With pity and approval, rose
O'er me, as when the headsman throws
Axe over shoulder to make end—
I fell prone, letting Him expend
His wrath, while thus the inflicting voice
Smote me. "Is this thy final choice?
Love is the best? 'Tis somewhat late!
And all thou dost enumerate
Of power and beauty in the world,
The mightiness of love was curled
Inextricably round about.
Love lay within it and without,
To clasp thee,—but in vain! Thy soul
Still shrunk from Him who made the whole,
Still set deliberate aside
His love!—Now take love! Well betide
Thy tardy conscience! Haste to take
The show of love for the name's sake,
Remembering every moment Who,
Beside creating thee unto
These ends, and these for thee, was said
To undergo death in thy stead
In flesh like thine: so ran the tale.
What doubt in thee could countervail
Belief in it? Upon the ground
'That in the story had been found
Too much love! How could God love so?'
He who in all his works below
Adapted to the needs of man,
Made love the basis of the plan,410—
Did love, as was demonstrated:
While man, who was so fit instead
To hate, as every day gave proof,—
Man thought man, for his kind's behoof,
Both could and did invent that scheme
Of perfect love: 'twould well beseem
Cain's nature thou wast wont to praise,
Not tally with God's usual ways!"
XXXI
And I cowered deprecatingly—
"Thou Love of God! Or let me die,
Or grant what shall seem heaven almost!
Let me not know that all is lost,
Though lost it be—leave me not tied
To this despair, this corpse-like bride!
Let that old life seem mine—no more—
With limitation as before,
With darkness, hunger, toil, distress:
Be all the earth a wilderness!
Only let me go on, go on,
Still hoping ever and anon
To reach one eve the Better Land!"
XXXII
Then did the form expand, expand—
I knew Him through the dread disguise
As the whole God within His eyes
Embraced me.
XXXIII
When I lived again,
The day was breaking,—the grey plain
I rose from, silvered thick with dew.
Was this a vision? False or true?
411 Since then, three varied years are spent,
And commonly my mind is bent
To think it was a dream—be sure
A mere dream and distemperature—
The last day's watching: then the night,—
The shock of that strange Northern Light
Set my head swimming, bred in me
A dream. And so I live, you see,
Go through the world, try, prove, reject,
Prefer, still struggling to effect
My warfare; happy that I can
Be crossed and thwarted as a man,
Not left in God's contempt apart,
With ghastly smooth life, dead at heart,
Tame in earth's paddock as her prize.
Thank God, she still each method tries
To catch me, who may yet escape,
She knows,—the fiend in angel's shape!
Thank God, no paradise stands barred
To entry, and I find it hard
To be a Christian, as I said!
Still every now and then my head
Raised glad, sinks mournful—all grows drear
Spite of the sunshine, while I fear
And think, "How dreadful to be grudged
No ease henceforth, as one that's judged.
Condemned to earth for ever, shut
From heaven!"
But Easter-Day breaks! But
Christ rises! Mercy every way
Is infinite,—and who can say?
Эта поэма часто цитировалась как доказательство собственной веры Браунинга в историческое христианство. Ее едва ли можно назвать чем-то большим, чем сомнительным доказательством, ибо она зависит от субъективного видения, в истинности которого сомневается сам рассказчик. Рассказчик в этой поэме принадлежит к той же категории, что и епископ Блауграм. Вера в бесконечную Любовь может прийти к нему только через догмат воплощения, поэтому он придерживается его, как бы его ни бросало из стороны в сторону сомнениями. Неспособность всех человеческих усилий достичь Абсолюта и, как следствие, вера в Абсолют за пределами этой жизни является доминирующей нотой в собственной философии Браунинга. Природу этого Абсолюта он далее развивает из интеллектуального наблюдения силы, которая превосходит человеческое понимание, и еще более глубоко укоренившегося чувства любви в человеческом сердце.
Многое из его мышления напоминает мышление английского ученого Герберта Спенсера. Относительность знания и относительность добра и зла являются кардинальными доктринами для них обоих. Тайна Герберта Спенсера за всеми явлениями и неспособность человеческого знания у Браунинга идентичны — это негативное доказательство абсолютного, — но там, где Спенсер довольствуется утверждением, что, хотя мы не можем познать Абсолют, все же он должен превосходить все, что человеческий ум когда-либо представлял себе о совершенстве, Браунинг, как мы уже видели, заявляет, что мы можем знать кое-что о природе этого Абсолюта через любовь, которую мы знаем в человеческом сердце, а также через силу, которую мы видим проявленной в Природе.
В связи с этой темой, которую из-за нехватки места в настоящем томе можно лишь затронуть, будет поучительно дополнить рассуждения Браунинга о его собственном вкладе в мысль девятнадцатого века двумя цитатами: одной из «Бесед» («С Бернардом де Мандевилем») и одной из стихотворения «Грезы» из его последнего сборника. В первой человеческая любовь символизируется как изображение солнца, созданное линзой, причем само солнце символизирует Божественную Любовь.
БЕРНАРД ДЕ МАНДЕВИЛЬ
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
IX
Boundingly up through Night's wall dense and dark,
Embattled crags and clouds, outbroke the Sun
Above the conscious earth, and one by one
Her heights and depths absorbed to the last spark
His fluid glory, from the far fine ridge
Of mountain-granite which, transformed to gold,
Laughed first the thanks back, to the vale's dusk fold
On fold of vapor-swathing, like a bridge
414 Shattered beneath some giant's stamp. Night wist
Her work done and betook herself in mist
To marsh and hollow there to bide her time
Blindly in acquiescence. Everywhere
Did earth acknowledge Sun's embrace sublime
Thrilling her to the heart of things: since there
No ore ran liquid, no spar branched anew,
No arrowy crystal gleamed, but straightway grew
Glad through the inrush—glad nor more nor less
Than, 'neath his gaze, forest and wilderness,
Hill, dale, land, sea, the whole vast stretch and spread,
The universal world of creatures bred
By Sun's munificence, alike gave praise—
All creatures but one only: gaze for gaze,
Joyless and thankless, who—all scowling can—
Protests against the innumerous praises? Man,
Sullen and silent.
Stand thou forth then, state
Thy wrong, thou sole aggrieved—disconsolate—
While every beast, bird, reptile, insect, gay
And glad acknowledges the bounteous day!
X
Man speaks now:—"What avails Sun's earth-felt thrill
To me? Sun penetrates the ore, the plant—
They feel and grow: perchance with subtler skill
He interfuses fly, worm, brute, until
Each favored object pays life's ministrant
By pressing, in obedience to his will,
Up to completion of the task prescribed,
So stands and stays a type. Myself imbibed
Such influence also, stood and stand complete—
The perfect Man,—head, body, hands and feet,
415 True to the pattern: but does that suffice?
How of my superadded mind which needs
—Not to be, simply, but to do, and pleads
For—more than knowledge that by some device
Sun quickens matter: mind is nobly fain
To realize the marvel, make—for sense
As mind—the unseen visible, condense
—Myself—Sun's all-pervading influence
So as to serve the needs of mind, explain
What now perplexes. Let the oak increase
His corrugated strength on strength, the palm
Lift joint by joint her fan-fruit, ball and balm,—
Let the coiled serpent bask in bloated peace,—
The eagle, like some skyey derelict,
Drift in the blue, suspended glorying,—
The lion lord it by the desert-spring,—
What know or care they of the power which pricked
Nothingness to perfection? I, instead,
When all-developed still am found a thing
All-incomplete: for what though flesh had force
Transcending theirs—hands able to unring
The tightened snake's coil, eyes that could outcourse
The eagle's soaring, voice whereat the king
Of carnage couched discrowned? Mind seeks to see,
Touch, understand, by mind inside of me,
The outside mind—whose quickening I attain
To recognize—I only. All in vain
Would mind address itself to render plain
The nature of the essence. Drag what lurks
Behind the operation—that which works
Latently everywhere by outward proof—
Drag that mind forth to face mine? No! aloof
I solely crave that one of all the beams
Which do Sun's work in darkness, at my will
416 Should operate—myself for once have skill
To realize the energy which streams
Flooding the universe. Above, around,
Beneath—why mocks that mind my own thus found
Simply of service, when the world grows dark,
To half-surmise—were Sun's use understood,
I might demonstrate him supplying food,
Warmth, life, no less the while? To grant one spark
Myself may deal with—make it thaw my blood
And prompt my steps, were truer to the mark
Of mind's requirement than a half-surmise
That somehow secretly is operant
A power all matter feels, mind only tries
To comprehend! Once more—no idle vaunt
'Man comprehends the Sun's self!' Mysteries
At source why probe into? Enough: display,
Make demonstrable, how, by night as day,
Earth's centre and sky's outspan, all's informed
Equally by Sun's efflux!—source from whence
If just one spark I drew, full evidence
Were mine of fire ineffably enthroned—
Sun's self made palpable to Man!"
XI
Thus moaned
Man till Prometheus helped him,—as we learn,—
Offered an artifice whereby he drew
Sun's rays into a focus,—plain and true,
The very Sun in little: made fire burn
And henceforth do Man service—glass-conglobed
Though to a pin-point circle—all the same
Comprising the Sun's self, but Sun disrobed
Of that else-unconceived essential flame
Borne by no naked sight. Shall mind's eye strive
417 Achingly to companion as it may
The supersubtle effluence, and contrive
To follow beam and beam upon their way
Hand-breadth by hand-breadth, till sense faint—confessed
Frustrate, eluded by unknown unguessed
Infinitude of action? Idle quest!
Rather ask aid from optics. Sense, descry
The spectrum—mind, infer immensity!
Little? In little, light, warmth, life are blessed—
Which, in the large, who sees to bless? Not I
More than yourself: so, good my friend, keep still
Trustful with—me? with thee, sage Mandeville!
Вторые «Грезы» производят впечатление триумфальной лебединой песни, особенно заключительные строфы, поскольку стихотворение было написано уже на закате жизни поэта.
"In a beginning God
Made heaven and earth." Forth flashed
Knowledge: from star to clod
Man knew things: doubt abashed
Closed its long period.
Knowledge obtained Power praise.
Had Good been manifest,
Broke out in cloudless blaze,
Unchequered as unrepressed,
In all things Good at best—
Then praise—all praise, no blame—
Had hailed the perfection. No!
As Power's display, the same
Be Good's—praise forth shall flow
Unisonous in acclaim!
418 Even as the world its life,
So have I lived my own—
Power seen with Love at strife,
That sure, this dimly shown,
—Good rare and evil rife.
Whereof the effect be—faith
That, some far day, were found
Ripeness in things now rathe,
Wrong righted, each chain unbound,
Renewal born out of scathe.
Why faith—but to lift the load,
To leaven the lump, where lies
Mind prostrate through knowledge owed
To the loveless Power it tries
To withstand, how vain! In flowed
Ever resistless fact:
No more than the passive clay
Disputes the potter's act,
Could the whelmed mind disobey
Knowledge the cataract.
But, perfect in every part,
Has the potter's moulded shape,
Leap of man's quickened heart,
Throe of his thought's escape,
Stings of his soul which dart
Through the barrier of flesh, till keen
She climbs from the calm and clear,
Through turbidity all between,
From the known to the unknown here,
Heaven's "Shall be," from Earth's "Has been"?
419 Then life is—to wake not sleep,
Rise and not rest, but press
From earth's level where blindly creep
Things perfected, more or less,
To the heaven's height, far and steep,
Where, amid what strifes and storms
May wait the adventurous quest,
Power is Love—transports, transforms
Who aspired from worst to best,
Sought the soul's world, spurned the worms'.
I have faith such end shall be:
From the first, Power was—I knew.
Life has made clear to me
That, strive but for closer view,
Love were as plain to see.
When see? When there dawns a day,
If not on the homely earth,
Then yonder, worlds away,
Where the strange and new have birth,
And Power comes full in play.
420
ГЛАВА VI
МУЗЫКАЛЬНО-КРИТИЧЕСКИЕ ЭССЕ, ВДОХНОВЛЕННЫЕ АНГЛИЙСКИМ МУЗЫКАНТОМ ЭВИСОНОМ
В «Беседе» «С Чарльзом Эвисоном» Браунинг погружается в обсуждение проблемы эфемерности музыкального выражения. Он выбирает Эвисона для своего диалога, потому что ему на ум пришел марш этого музыканта, а пришел он ему на ум не по какой-то особой причине, а просто потому, что был месяц март. Эвисон представлял бы интерес хотя бы потому, что был органистом церкви Святого Николая в Ньюкасл-апон-Тайне. В самых ранних записях церковь Святого Николая называлась просто «Церковь Ньюкасл-апон-Тайна», но в 1785 году она стала собором. Это произошло уже после смерти Эвисона в 1770 году. Все, что мы знаем об органе, на котором играл Эвисон, почерпнуто из любопытной старинной истории Ньюкасла, написанной Брэндом. «Я не нашел, — пишет он, — никаких упоминаний об органе в этой церкви во времена папизма, хотя весьма вероятно, что он там был. Примерно в 1676 году корпорация Ньюкасла выделила 300 фунтов стерлингов на установку нынешнего органа. 22 июня 1699 года они добавили к нему трубу».
В год рождения Эвисона, 1710-й, также зафиксировано, что «задняя часть этого органа была закончена, что обошлось упомянутой корпорации в 200 фунтов стерлингов, включая расходы на чистку и ремонт всего инструмента».
26 июня 1749 года городской совет Ньюкасла распорядился добавить к органу «нежный регистр» (sweet stop). Это произошло уже после того, как Эвисон стал органистом, поскольку на эту должность он был назначен в 1736 году. Таким образом, мы знаем, что у него, по крайней мере, были «трубный регистр» и «нежный регистр», которыми он мог украшать свою игру на органе.
Церковь особенно примечательна количеством и красотой своих приделов, и те, кто любит изучать гербы, найдут два увесистых тома, посвященных их описанию в этой церкви, составленных Ричардсоном. Не меньшей известностью церковь пользуется благодаря красоте своего шпиля, который называют гордостью и славой Северного полушария. По словам восторженного Ричардсона, благодаря своей особой изысканности дизайна и тонкости исполнения он по праву считается одним из прекраснейших образцов архитектурного искусства в Европе. Этот шпиль является такой же приметной чертой Ньюкасла, как купол Капитолия для Бостона, поскольку он расположен почти в центре города. Ричардсон дает следующее подробное описание этого чуда: «Он состоит из квадратной башни шириной сорок футов, имеющей большие и малые башенки с остроконечными завершениями по углам и в центре каждого фасада башни. От четырех угловых башенок отходят две арки, которые пересекаются и несут на своем центре эффективный перфорированный фонарь, увенчанный высоким и красивым шпилем: углы фонаря имеют остроконечные завершения, подобные тем, что на башенках, и все эти двенадцать завершений, а также сам шпиль, украшены краббами и флюгерами».