He has been expelled from
Rome by the people, eager for the opening of their churches, and he
soliloquizes upon his fate in language that subtly hints all his
passing moods, and paints the struggle of his soul. It appears to me
that it is a wise thing to make him almost regret the cloister in
the midst of his hatred of it, and then shrink from that regret with
horror; and there is also a fine sense of night and loneliness in the
scene:
Like this sand
Is life itself, and evermore each path
Is traced in suffering, and one footprint still
Obliterates another; and we are all
Vain shadows here that seem a little while,
And suffer, and pass. Let me not fight in vain,
O Son of God, with thine immortal word,
Yon tyrant of eternity and time,
Who doth usurp thy place on earth, whose feet
Are in the depths, whose head is in the clouds,
Who thunders all abroad, _The world is mine!_
Laws, virtues, liberty I have attempted
To give thee, Rome. Ah! only where death is
Abides thy glory. Here the laurel only
Flourishes on the ruins and the tombs.
I will repose upon this fallen column
My weary limbs. Ah, lower than this ye lie,
You Latin souls, and to your ancient height
Who shall uplift you? I am all weighed down
By the great trouble of the lofty hopes
Of Italy still deluded, and I find
Within my soul a drearer desert far
Than this, where the air already darkens round,
And the soft notes of distant convent bells
Announce the coming night.
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