Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

William Stanley Braithwaite, ed. The Book of Restoration Verse. 1910.

On News

Thomas Traherne (1637?–1674)

NEWS from a foreign country came,

As if my treasure and my wealth lay there:

So much it did my heart enflame

’Twas wont to call my soul into mine ear,

Which thither went to meet

The approaching sweet,

And on the threshold stood,

To entertain the unknown Good.

It hovered there

As if ’twould leave mine ear,

And was so eager to embrace

The joyful tidings as they came,

’Twould almost leave its dwelling-place,

To entertain that same.

As if the tidings were the things,

My very joys themselves, my foreign treasure,

Or else did bear them on their wings;

With so much joy they came, with so much pleasure.

My Soul stood at that gate

To recreate

Itself with bliss: and to

Be pleased with speed. A fuller view

It fain would take,

Yet journeys back would make

Unto my heart: as if ’twere fain

Go out to meet, yet stay within

To fit a place, to entertain,

And bring the tidings in.

What sacred instinct did inspire

My Soul in childhood with a hope so strong?

What secret force moved my desire

To expect my joys beyond the seas, so young?

Felicity I knew

Was out of view:

And being here alone,

I saw that happiness was gone

From me! For this,

I thirsted absent bliss,

And thought that sure beyond the seas,

Or else in something near at hand

I knew not yet, (since nought did please

I knew) my Bliss did stand.

But little did the infant dream

That all the treasures of the world were by:

And that himself was so the cream

And crown of all which round about did lie.

Yet thus it was: The gem,

The diadem,

The ring enclosing all

That stood upon this earthly ball;

The Heavenly Eye,

Much wider than the sky,

Wherein they all included were,

The glorious Soul that was the King

Made to possess them, did appear

A small and little thing!