Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Asia: Vols. XXI–XXIII. 1876–79.
A Hymn of True Happiness
By William Drummond of Hawthornden (1585–1649)A
Of Jordan’s sacred streams,
Jordan, of Libanon the offspring dear,
When zephyr’s flowers unclose,
And sun shines with new beams,
With grave and stately grace a nymph arose.
Of amaranths a crown,
Her left hand palms, her right a brandon bare;
Unveiled skin’s whiteness lay,
Gold hairs in curls hung down,
Eyes sparkled joy, more bright than star of day.
Of waves, most like that heaven
Where beaming stars in glory turn ensphered;
The air stood calm and clear,
No sigh by winds was given,
Birds left to sing, herds feed, her voice to hear.
Whom nothing can content
Within those varying lists of days and nights,
Whose life, e’er known amiss,
In glittering griefs is spent,
Come learn, said she, what is your choicest bliss;
How ye may respite find,
A sanctuary from soul-thralling snares,
A port to harbor sure
In spite of waves and wind,
Which shall, when Time’s hour-glass is run, endure.
Which ye as happy hold,
No, but a sea of fears, a field of strife,
Charged on a throne to sit
With diadems of gold,
Preserved by force, and still observed by wit;
Of all her gems spoil Ind,
All Seres’ silk, in garments to employ,
Deliciously to feed,
The Phœnix’ plumes to find
To rest upon, or deck your purple bed.
No, but blest life is this,
With chaste and pure desire,
To turn unto the loadstar of all bliss,
On God the mind to rest,
Burnt up with sacred fire,
Possessing him, to be by him possest.
Swift is your mortal race,
And glassy is the field;
Vast are desires not limited by grace;
Life a weak taper is;
Then, while it light doth yield,
Leave flying joys, embrace this lasting bliss.
She dived within the flood,
Whose face with smiling curls long after staid;
Then sighs did zephyrs press,
Birds sang from every wood,
And echoes rang, This was true happiness!