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fcis Thompson s

Hound of Heaven

A STUDY

.1. F. X. O'CONOK. S..)

Copyright,

I
 A STUDY OF
FRANCIS THOMPSON'S

Hound of Heaven

REV. J. F. X. O'CONOR, S. J.
)>
ProiesEor of Philosophy, St. Francis Xavier College, N. Y
Founder of Brooklyn College, ,

Editor o[ Autobiography oi St. Ignatius,

of Life of St. Aloysius, etc.

Jltn)irunatur.

Joseph F. Hanselmann, S.J.

Jmprimalitr.

John ifi Cardinal Faui.ev

JJiI?il ©bfltat.

Remigius Lafort

'CU327H72
 ^ STUDY
OF

FRANCIS THOMPSON'S

HOUND OF HEAVEN
By Rev. J. F. X. O'Conor, SJ.

This great poem, strange to say, is comparatively little

known. It is the sweetest, deepest, strongest song ever

written in the English tongue.
Among some of the great odes are "Alexander's
Feast," Dryden, "Ode on the Nativity," Milton, "Intima-
tions of Immortality," Wordsworth. To say Thompson's
poem is one of the great odes is to place it unranked

among them. In my judgment it is greater.

I do not hesitate to say with the Bookman that "the
Hound of Heaven seems to us, on the whole, the most
wonderful lyric in the language. It fingers all the stops
of the spirit .but under all, the still sad music
. .

of humanity," and with the Times, that "people will still

be learning it by heart two hundred years hence, for it

has about it the unique thing that makes for immortality.

It is the return of the nineteenth century to Thomas a
Kempis."
With the Spectator, I ask, "is there any religious poem
carrying so much of the passion of penitence —an ode in
3
the manner of Crashaw, and in the comparison, it more
than holds its own."
With Coventry Patmore I marvel at the "profound
thoughts and far«fetched splendor of imagery, qualities
which ought to place him in the permanent ranks of
fame," while even Burne- Jones cries out "Since Gabriel's
me
Blessed Damosel no mystical words have so touched
as theHound of Heaven."
And may we not add the words of G. K. Chesterton,
"with Francis Thompson we lose the greatest poetic
energy since Browning. In his poetry as in the
poetry of the universe, you can work infinitely out and
and in. These two infinities are
out, but yet infinitely in
themark of a great poet, and he was a great poet."
"The great poetry of it (The Hound of Heaven) tran-
scended in itself and in its influence all conventions,"
says Wilfrid Meynell, "so that it won the love of a Catholic
Mystic Coventry Patmore; was included by Canon
like
Beeching in his Lyra Sacra among its older high com-
peers and gave new heart to quite another manner of
;

man, Edward Burne- Jones."

It would be difficult to find another poem in the lan-

guage that gives such food for thought, so satisfying, so

new, that can be read and reread, and always with a
relish and a discovery of a new application, or the glim-
mer of an unseen light. In many poems, one reading
suffices, and the mind is sated, for the whole depth is

plummeted and all is revealed in a single view. It is not

so in this poem. There is a depth that can be sounded,
and deeper depths are still there. The vision takes in the
view, but other details arise that charm, or surprise, or
startle, or evoke admiration at the spiritual insight into

the workings of the soul. It gives great and wide

range of thought within a small compass, and a deep

 —

knowledge of the human soul, of the meanings of life, of

the soul's relation to God and of other beings not God,
and of the hold of God's love upon the soul in spite of its

fleeing from Him to the creatures of His hand.

It is happiness the human soul is ever yearning for.
It never ceases its quest for happiness. Night and day,
year after year, it is grasping after happiness. The weary
days of labor are borne to gain tlie wealth with which
it thinks it may buy happiness. The days of suffering
and pain are spent watching and waiting for the agony
in
to pass, that happiness may come. It looks for it in every
creature, in the earth, in the sea, in the air. The soul
asks all these things —wherein is your liappiness —and
the answer of earth, air, sea is "He made us." "We are
for Him, for His glory." So the soul is looking for
happiness, and in all these things it will not find happi-
ness. It will find happiness only in God. And yet
instead of seeking God, it turns away from Him
it in
and seeks it in the creature, something that is not God.
And God is ever seeking that soul which is running away
from Him. Wherever it runs, the sound of those feet,
following ever after, is heard, and a voice, stronger than
the beat

But with unhurrying chase.

And imperturbed pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy
They beat —and a Voice beats
More instant than the feet,
"All things betray thee, who betrayest Me."
And this thought of the creature fleeing from God, and
ever pursued by His love, is most beautifully expressed
in the poem of Francis Thompson, the great Catholic poet:
He seems to sing in verse, the thought of St. Ignatius in

5
the spiritual exercises, —the thought of St. Paul in the-

tender, insistent love of Christ for the soul, and the

yearning of Christ for the love of that soul which ever
runs after creatitres, till the love of Christ awakens in

it a love of God, which dims and deadens all love of

its

creatures except through love for Him. This was the

love of St. Paul, of St. Ignatius, of St. Stanislaus, of St.
Francis of Assisi, of St. Clare, of St. Theresa.
 THE HOUND OF HEAVEN.
The name is strange. It startles one at first. It is so
bold, so new, so fearless. It does not attract at once,
rather the reverse. But when one reads the poem this
strangeness disappears. The meaning is understood.
As the hound follows the hare, never ceasing in its

running, ever drawing nearer in the chase, with unhur-

rying and imperturbed pace, so does God follow the
fleeing soul by His Divine grace. And though in sin or
in human love, away from God it seeks to hide itself.

Divine grace follows after, unwearyingly follows ever

after, till the soul feels its pressure forcing it to turn to
Him alone in that never ending pursuit
 :

FRANCIS THOMPSON.
Francis Thompson was born at Preston in 1859, the
son of a physician. After seven years at Ushaw, he went
to Queens 'College to quaHfy for his father's profession.
He came to London ill and in great poverty, in reality
starving, and was saved by the act of one whom he has
immortalized
"She passed — O brave, sad, lovingest, tender thing,
And of her own scant pittance did she give
That I might eat and live:
Then fled, a swift and trackless fugitive."

He died in the hospital of St. John and St. Elizabeth, in

St. John's Wood, at the age of forty-eight, on November
13, 1907. His works are: Poems, Sister Songs, New
Poems, Selected Poems, The Hound of Heaven.
In prose he has written "Shelly," Health
and Holiness,
and "The Life of St. Ignatius Loyola." The last named
isedited, with notes, by
J. H. Pollen, S.J.
"History will certainly be busy with this remarkable
man's life," writes Alice Meynell, "as well as with
his
work; and this record will serve in the future, being
at
any rate, strictly true. As to the fate of his poetry in
the judgment of his country, I liave no misgivings.
For no reactions of taste, no vicissitude of language,
no
change in the prevalent fashions of the art, no altering
sense of the music of verse, can lessen the
height or
diminish the greatness of this poet's thought,
or undo
his experience, or unlive the life of this
elect soul, or
efface its passion. There is a call to our
time from' the
noble seventeenth century
and this purely English poet
;

cried "Adsum" to the resounding summons:

Come, and come strong
To the conspiracy of our spacious song.
8
 ; — ; ;

The Hound of Heaven

FLED Him, down the nights and down the days

I I Him, down the arches of the years
fled
I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways

Of my own mind and in the mist of tears

;

1 hid from Him, and under running laughter.

Up vistaed hopes, I sped;
And shot, precipitated,
Adown Titanic glooms of chasmed fears.
From those strong Feet that followed, followed after.
But with unhurrying chase,
And unperturbed pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy.
—
They beat and a Voice beat
More instant than the Feet
"All things betray thee, who betrayest Me."

I pleaded, outlaw-wise,
By many a hearted casement, curtained red,
Trellised with interwining charities
(For, though I knew His love Who followed.

Yet was I sore adread

Lest, having Him, I must have naught beside.)
But, if one little casement parted wide,
The gust of His approach would clash it to.

Fear wist not to evade as Love wist to pursue.

9,
 ; — — !

Across the margent of the world I fled,

And troubled the gold gateways of the stars,
Smiting for shelter on their clanged bars;
Efctted to dulcet jars
And silvern chatter the pale ports o' the moon.
I said to dawn: Be sudden; to eve: Be
soon
With thy young skyey blossoms heap me over
From this tremendous Lover!
Float thy vague veil about me, lest He see
I tempted all His servitors, but to find
IVIy own betrayal in their constancy.
In faith to Him their fickleness to me,
Their traitorous tr'ueness, and their loyal deceit.
To all swift things for swiftness did I sue;
Clung to the whistling mane of every wind.
But whether they swept, smoothly fleet.
The long savannahs of the blue;
Or
whether. Thunder-driven,
They clanged His chariot 'thwart a heaven,
Flashy with flying lightnings round the spurn
o' their
feet :—
Fear wist not to evade as Love wist to pursue.
Still with unhurrying chase.

And unperturbed pace.

Deliberate speed, majestic instancy.
Came on the following Feet,
And a Voice above their beat
"Naught shelters thee, who wilt not shelter Me."

I sought no more that after which I strayed

In face of man or maid
But still within the little children's eyes
Seems something, something that replies,
They at least are for me, surely for me!
10
 : —— ;

I turned me them very wistfully;

to
But just as young eyes grew sudden fair
their
With dawning answers there,
Their angel plucked them from me by the hair

"Come then, ye other children, Nature's —share

With me" (said I) "your delicate fellowship;
Let me greet you lip to lip.
Let me twine with you caresses.
Wantoning
With our Lady-Mother's vagrant tresses,
Banqueting
With her in her wind-walled palace,
Underneath her azured dais,
Quaffing, as your taintless way is,

From a chalice
Lucent-weeping out of the dayspring."
So it was done
/ in their delicate fellowship was one
Drew the bolt of Nature's secrecies.
/ knew all the swift importings
On the wilful face of skies;
Iknew how the clouds arise,
Spumed of the wild sea-snortings
All that's born or dies
Rose and drooped with; made them shapers
Of mine own moods, or wailful or divine
With them joyed and was bereaven.
I was heavy with the even.

When she lit her glimmering tapers

Round the day's dead sanctities.
I laughed in the morning's eyes.
I triumphed and I saddened with all weather,
Heaven and I wept together,
11
 ;

And its sweet tears were salt with mortal mine;

Against the red throb of its sunset-heart
I laid my own to beat,
And share commingHng heat
But not by that, by my human smart!
that, was eased
In vam my were wet on Heaven's grey cheek.
tears
For ah we know not what each other
!^ says,
These things and I; in sound / speak—
Their sound is but their stir, they
speak by silences.
Nature, poor stepdame, cannot slake
my drouth;
Let her, if she would owe me.
Drop yon blue bosom-veil of sky,
and show me
The breasts o' her tenderness:
Never did any milk of hers once
bless
My thirsting mouth.
Nigh and nigh draws the chase,
With unperturbed pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy.
And past those noised Feet
A Voice comes yet more fleet
"Lo naught
Naked I wait Thy
!
contents thee, who content'st not Me "
love's uplifted stroke!
My harness piece by piece Thou hast hewn from me.
And smitten me to my knee;
I am defenceless
utterly.
I slept, methinks, and
woke,
And, slowly gazing, fmd me stripped
in sleep
In the rash lustihead of my
young powers,
I shook the pillaring hours
And pulled my life upon me; grimed
with smears
1 stand amid the dust o' the mounded years—
My mangled youthdead beneath the heap
lies
My days have crackled and gone
up in smoke
Have puffed and burst as sun-starts
on a stream
18
 — ;

Yea, faileth now even dream

The dreamer, and the lute the lutanist;

Even the linked fantasies, in whose blossomy twist

I swung the earth a trinket at my wrist,

Are yielding; cords of all too weak account

For earth, with heavy griefs so overplussed.
Ah ! is Thy love indeed
A weed, albeit an amaranthine weed,
Suffering no flowers except its own to mount?

Ah! must-
Designer infinite !

Ah ! must Thou char the wood ere Thou canst limn

with it?

My freshness spent its wavering shower i'the dust;

And now my heart is as a broken fount,
Wherein tear-drippings stagnate, spilt down ever
From the dank thoughts that shiver
Upon the sighful branches of my mind.
Such is; what is to be?
The pulp so bitter, how shall taste the rind?
I dimly guess what Time in mists confounds;
Yet ever and anon a trumpet sounds
From the hid battlements of Eternity:
Those shaken mists a space unsettle, then
Round the half-glimpsed turrets slowly wash again
But not ere him who summoneth
I first have seen, enwound

With glooming robes purpureal, cypress-crowned;

His name I know, and what his trumpet saith.
Whether man's heart or life it be which yields
Thee harvest, must Thy harvest fields
Be dunged with rotten death?
13
 Now of that long pursuit
Conies on at hand the bruit;
sea:
That Voice-is round me Uke a bursting
"And thy earth so marred,
'

is

Shattered in shard on shard?

Lo, all things fly thee, for thou fliest
Me
Strange, piteous, futile thing!
Wherefore should any set thee love apart?
naught" (He said),
Seeing none but I make much of
"And human love needs human meriting:

How hast thou merited—

Of all man's clotted clacy the dingiest clot?
Alack, thou knowest not
little worthy of any love
thou art!
How
Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee,

Save Me, save only Me?

did but take,

All which I took from thee I
Not for thy harms.
But just that thou might'st seek
it in arms. My
All which thy child's mistake
thee at home:
Fancies as lost, I have stored for
Rise, clasp My hand, and come."

Halts by me that footfall:

Is my gloom, after all,
caressingly?
Shade of His hand, outstretched
"Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest,

I am He Whom thou seekest

who dravest Me."
Thou dravest love from thee,

U
 —

THE HOUND OF HEAVEN.

Interpretation.

The poet begins with the idea of the soul fleeing from
God, "I fled Him down
the arches of the years," and
how it from Him in sorrow and joy, "in
strives to hide
the mist of tears and under running laughter." Nor can
it escape either in hope or fear from those feet "that

follow after" "up vistaed hopes" and "adown Titanic '

glooms of chasmed fears." For those feet ever follow

after and a voice beats "more instant than the feet" "with
unhurrying chase, and unperturbed pace, majestic in-
stancy."
"All things betray thee who betrayest me."
And when it came to plead for the love of other
hearts, "by many a hearted casement," although it knew
His love, yet it feared lest having him, it must have
naught beside.
The human heart is not generous enough to give up all,

and be satisfied witli the love of God. It wishes other

things besides God, and because God will have no other
love in His place, it fears the love of God which demands
this sacrifice, and it sacrifices God But He is
instead.
not satisfied with this. The Him, So
creature must love
when the "casement is parted wide" the "gust of His ap-
proach would clash it to."
The soul is in fear of Him. It flees, but love pursues
after fear. And though it flee to the stars across the
world, to the moon, love is there still pursuing. At dawn
and at eve it strives to hide, it calls upon the sky to drop
its veil lest He see.

15
 /

tempt God's creatures, but finds them con-

It tries to

stant, and itself betrayed. To everything swift it turns

to evade the Divine pursuer, to the wind of the
prairie, or to- the t^iunder-driven winds that sweep the
heavens mid thunder and Hghtning-, but its fear cannot
evade the swift following- of love. Its search is vain
in the face of man or maid, and it turns to the children,

thinking "they at least are for me, surely for me," again
to be undeceived. They answer not, for their angel takes
them away. Nature's children will guard their fellow-
ship, playing with the tresses of Mother Earth, in her
palace with walls of wind and her blue dais of the
heavens, drinking from a chalice out of the day-spring.
It learned the secrets of Nature, the changes in the sky
and the meaning thereof, the origin of the clouds from
the foam of the sea, the causes of life and death, and
made these tell his moods of lamentation or divine
exaltation,companions of joy or sorrow. It was heavy
with the evening, and radiant with laughter in the morn-
ing, and glad in bright and sad in stormy weather. It

wept with nature and throbbed in unison with its sunset

heart. But not all these things could fill the craving.
Nature felt the tears on her own cheek, but could not un-
derstand, or speak. Nature was but a stepmother, and
could not slake that thirst, nor did she once give to drink
of her breasts for the quenching of that burning thirst.
Nowhere can it find content.
Finally, when all has failed, when the armor
is broken

piece by piece and falls from the

and it is smitten
soul
and utterly defenceless, the soul that seemed sleeping,
awakes. It finds that in its sleep it has been stripped.
In the rash strength of its youth, it pulled down the
pillars of life in time. It stood amid the dust of its years
heaped up as a mound, all begrimed with smears.
IG
 — !

Its youth lies dead under that heap, the days of life

seem to have caught fire as chips, and crackled and gone

up in smoke, and seemed to puff up and burst, as the
sunlight flashes on rippling water.
And now even the dream is gone from the dreamer,
and the lute no more gives music for the lute-player.
Even the thoughts of poesy that seemed to make the
earth an enchanted toy are fading away; they were not
strong enough cords for the earth, and are overtaxed
by grief.
All is so full of sadness, and sorrow, and grief, and
failure to the heart seeking for love.
Ah ! is this His love ? Is it an immortal weed that will

letno flowers spring up but its own?

Must Thou, O infinite designer, char the wood before
Thou wilt draw any design with it?
Ah must !

Designer infinite

Ah must Thou
! char the wood ere Thou canst limn
with it?

Thisis what puzzles the world.

Must Thou char the wood?

Must the soul and life be burnt in bitter suffering, a

complete holocaust —before Thou canst limn with it?

Before God can draw, in the infinite design of His

Providence, and work with the soul as a fit instrument,
it must be charred in the furnace of suffering.

Upon the soul must be carved the image of Jesus

Christ and Him crucified.
In the Christian life must be reproduced the crucified.
The pride of human life must be charred by humilia-

tion deep and bitter.

The sensuality of man must be burnt to a charred stick

17
 I

by physical pain, intense suffering, denial of the senses, I

absolute.
The uncontrolled* affections of the human heart must
be bridled, subdued, conquered, and before Divine Love
can use that heart, all merely human dross must be burnt
away, and the heart purified of all earthly desire.
Ah must
!

Must Thou, Designer infinite, char the wood, before

Thou canst limn with it?
It is the history of the dealings of God with the human
soul.
All pride, sensuality, inordinate affection must be burnt
out of the heart before God works with it on His design.
And until that is done, after the soul there comes the beat
of insistent feet, and a voice more instant than the beat.
Deny thyself, leave all and follow Me.
And the voice will never cease till the soul gives up all

it loves, absolutely all, even though it persists in strug-

gling to hold, and yields nothing until forced by that
voice around it like a bursting sea, "Naught shelters thee,
who wilt not shelter Me."
"The cross, therefore, is always ready, and everywhere
waits for thee.
Thou canst not escape it whithersoever thou runnest
for whithersoever thou goest, thou carriest thyself with
thee,and shalt always find thyself.
thyself upwards, or turn thyself downwards
Turn
turn thyself without or turn thyself within thee, and
everywhere tjiou wilt find the cross.
Prepare thyself to suffer many adversities, and divers
evils, in this miserable life." (Imitation of Christ,
I. C, 12.)
My freshness has fallen down as a shower in the dust,

n^y heart is like a broken fountain, filled with stagnant

18
tears that drop from the moist-heavy thoughts, from the
sad branches of my mind.
If the inside of the fruit is so bitter, how will the
rind taste? I dimly guess at what is seen confusedly
through the mists of Time. Yet at times I hear a trum-
pet from Eternity, I catch a glimpse of those everlasting
battlements, for a moment
them through the half-
I see
and dim the view.
clearing mists that settle thick again
But not before I have seen him who calls, wrapped in
his purple robes of gloom and crowned with cypress. I

know death, and the meaning of his trumpet that calls an

end to all in life.

For the harvest field, whether it is of man's life or

man's heart, must be dunged with death before they yield
Him a harvest.
Life, before its harvest is given to the Divine Harvester
must meet with death so too, the harvest of the human
;

heart must meet with the death of all it loves, must die
to self before it gives the harvest to the harvester of love.
The noise of the long pursuit is at hand, and that
Voice is around me like a bursting sea.
Is that earth which thou didst so love, now so utterly
spoiled that it lies like a broken jar in pieces on the
ground? Lo! all things fly thee, for thou fliest me.
O strange, pitiful object, so helpless. Why should it

thus think that anything should love thee ? No one but

I loves such a wretched thing as thou art.
There should be some merit to deserve human love.
What hast thou done tO' merit ? Thou, the most dingy
clot of all mortal-clotted clay.
Alas, thou dost not know how little worthy thou art of
any love. Thou art so ignoble, whom wilt thou find to
love thee, but Me ? Whatever I took from thee, I did not
take to harm thee by the loss, but that thou mightst look
19
for it in my arms. By a child's mistake, what thou didst
imagine was lost, I have kept all stored for thee at

home. .
«,

Rise, clasp my hand and come. That footstep is be-

side me.
Is it true that what I thought was my gloom, was only

the shadow of His hand outstretched to caress me?

I hear him say to me now, and oh, how true it is
Ah! fondest, blindest, weakest, I am He whom thou
seekest. Thou dravest love from Thee, who dravest Me.

20
 —

SEPARATE TOPICS.
The Soul pursued by God.
The soul flees from Him —
nights, days, years in wan- —
dering of thought, in tears and laughter, in hopes and
fears
Those feet — follow —and a Voice
More instant than the feet
"All things betray thee, who betrayest Me."

The love of creatures.

They elude him, evade him, are not true to him. for
he is not true to God. "Naught shelters thee, who wilt
not shelter me."

The love of children.

When their love seems to answer, their angels pluck
them from him by the hair.
The love of nature.
Nature, poor stepdame. cannot slake my drought.
"Lo! naught contents thee, who content' st not me."
— —
Shorn of armor defenceless asleep awake, my man- —
gled youth lies dead.
My days have gone up in smoke.
Puffed and burst as sun-starts on a stream.
The dream fails the dreamer, the lute the lutanist.
—
The soul sought human love, and though I knew His
love who followed, yet I was sore adread, lest having
Him, I must have naught beside.
—
The soul knows His love and knows it is a jealous
love, and is afraid that if it accepts that love and answers
it as it should be answered, there could be no room for

any creature.
And flying from that love, every human love was dis-
21
 loyal,false—false to the love that was false to
God— true
to God and
in its trueness to God—untrue
to the love
untrue to God. ^
And the children just as their love answers— their
angel plucked them by the hair.
Come, then, ye other children— Nature's— share with
me your delicate fellowship.
I drew the bolt of Nature's secrecies.
Knew the importings of the wilful face
of skies.
How clouds arise— from the foam of the wild sea
snortings.
Knew all that's born or dies.
I was heavy with the even.
When she lit her glimmering tapers.
Round the day's dead sanctities.
I laughed in the morning's eyes.
I triumphed and I saddened
in all weather.
But Ah We know not what each other says.
!

In sound I speak— they speak in silences.

Whether man's heart or life it be which yields Thee
harvest—must thy "harvest fields be dunged with rotten
death.
Now after that long pursuit comes a noise.
That Voice is round me like the bursting sea.

"And is thy earth so marred

Shattered in shard on shard."

Lo all things iiy Thee, for thou iiiest me.

Wherefore should any set thee love apart?
Seeing none, but I make much of naught.
"How little worthy of any love thou art."
"Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee, save Me
save only Me?"
22
 All which I took for thee I did but take not for thy
harms.
But just that thou mightest seek it in my arms.
All that thou didst fancy lost, I have stored for thee
at home.
Rise, clasp my hand and come.
Halts by me, that footfall.
Is my gloom after all
Shade of His hand, outstretched caressingly,
Ah! fondest, blindest, weakest,
I am He whom thou seekest^
Thou dravest love from thee, who dravest Me."

23
 :

MYSTICAL APPLICATION.

I.

THE SOUL FLEES FROM GOD.

The soul flees from God by the love of creatures, by

sin, by self-love, by turning from God, by refusing to
listen to the inspirations of grace.

Turning away from God.

1. "All things betray thee, zuho betrayest Me."
Fear wist not to evade, as Love wist to pursue.
2. "Naught shelters thee, who wilt not shelter Me."
Children and nature.
3. "Lo! naught contents thee, zvho content' st not Me."
Naked I wait Thy love's uplifted stroke.
4. "Lo! all things iiy thee, for thou Uiest Me."
Strange, piteous, futile thing!
5. "IVhoni zvilt thou find to love ignoble thee, Save Me,
Save only Me?"
All which I took from thee I did but take, not for
thy harms.
6. "Rise, clasp my hand, and come."
Halts by me, tbat footfall
7. "Ah, fondest, blindest, zvcakest,
"I am He Whom thou seekest!"
"Thou dravest love from thee, who dravest Me."
The soul seeks for happiness
In creatures.
In human sympathy.
In knowledge and study and science.
35
 In nature.
All is failure.

It can find -it only in God.

Without Whom all is emptiness.

The very unloveableness of all is to teach the loveable-

ness of God.
He has recompense for all.
loved.
Only He loves—He only is worthy of being ^

drives Him away it drives away

happi-
When the soul
ness.
God—true happiness—to look for happi-
It turns from
ness in something that is not God.
runs away from God— and God ever pursues the
It

soul—yearning to win it back to true happiness, while it

pursues false happiness.
This false happiness it looks for in creatures.

In human beings—in human sympathy and love.

In the love of little children.

In the love of nature.
knowledge—earth, sea and sky, the
In the love of
stars— in the seasons—they all speak not.

20
 MYSTICAL APPLICATION.
II.

GOD PURSUES THE SOUL.

When the soul turns from God to love creatures inor-

dinately instead of loving God, He places disappointment
in the object loved, to make it turn back to God, who
alone can satisfy the capacity of the soul. He follows
and reproaches the disloyalty of the soul, and creatures
are disloyal to it, at the time they seem loyal, with "trait-
orous trueness" and "loyal deceit."
God reproaches the soul, chides it, pleads with it.
Sends it many inspirations, by means of a word, a ser-
mon, a line, a sorrow of life, a sickness, a suffering.
The soul finds all a failure — ^bitterness, with despond-
ency and occasional glimpses of Eternity, and the thought
of decay and death.
—
Then sounds a voice like a bursting sea. The love
thatwas sought is broken in pieces like a vessel of clay.
All things fail to answer the yearning for love of the
human soul — which only God can fill.

Why should I find anything in thee to love, and yet I,

only I, love thee — worthy of little love.

Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee, save Me,
save only Me?
"That which I took — thou'lt find it in my arms,
It's stored for thee at home, not lost.

Rise, clasp my hand and come."

"Halts by me that footfall
Is my gloom after all
Shade of His hand outstretched caressingly?
27
 Ah fondest, blindest, weakest,
!

I am He whom thou seekest,

Thou dravest Ioa^^ from thee, wTio dravest Me."

Francis Thompson wrote the Life of St. Ignatius and

knew his ideas.
From the Poem we may draw a parallel with the
Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius

28
 Spiritual Exercises. Poem.
I Week. I.

End of man, end of creatures, The soul fleeing from God to

sin, hell, death. every creature.
The soul turns from God by Resisting grace.
the wrong love of creatures. Returning to God.
Chooses them instead of God. Rise, clasp My hand and come.
Repentance. Conversion of
Soul to God.

II Week. IL
Knowledge and Love of Our Humility, surrender.
Lord. The Kingdom of Naked I wait Thy love's up-
Christ. The Incarnation. lifted stroke. My mangled
The Nativity. Hidden Life. youth lies dead beneath the
Public Life. Two standards. heap. How little worthy of

Three classes of Men. Three any love thou art. Whom

Degrees of Humanity. wilt thou find to love ignoble
thee save Me, save only Me ?
III Week. IH.
The Passion of Christ. The Mystery of Suffering.
The Agony, the Scourging, the Is Thy love indeed a weed, an
The Passion of Christ. amaranthine weed?
Crowning with Thorns. Be- Ah designer infinite.
!

fore Pilate. The Death in Oh must Thou char the wood

!

shame on the Cross in the before Thou burn with it.

Crucifixion. Desolation of soul, sorrow,

humiliation. Self Sacrifice
with Christ Crucified.
IV Week. IV.
The Resurrection. Rise, clasp My hand and come.
Contemplation on Divine Love. All which thy child's mistake
The creatures of God that
29
 were means before, are now fancies as lost, I have stored

as gifts from God to the for thee at home.

soul. The creatures oi. God Is my gloom after all shade of
which He has made, lives in, His hcind outstretched ca-
operates in, for man, are ressingly? Thou dravest Love
broken reflections of the Di- from thee, when thou dravest
vine beauty. Me.

I Week. I.

In the First Week of the In the poem by Francis

Spiritual Exercises of St. Ig- Thompson the soul turns away
natius the soul meditates oij frorri God, and strives to find
Man and the end for which he itshappiness in creatures, love,
and other creatures were made, children, nature, knowledge,
God. He can find happiness in poetry — it finds that all things
God alone. He turns from betray it who betrays God,
God to creatures, and loves naught contents it, who con-
them for themselves, instead of tents not God. — It can find a
as means to help him to God. return of love in no creature
This is sin. Sin turns man not in man — nor in children,
from God, and leads him nor in nature — until stripped of
to love creatures instead of all, it turns to God. — In Him
God. He meditates on the alone it can find what it seeks.
evil ofwhich separates
sin —Yet God loves it — unworthy
the soul from God and casts of love. —Only God loves the
it into hell. Knowing the soul —who had driven away
evil and malice of sin, the soul His love.
turns back to God. God in His
mercy pardons the repentant
sinner and receives him back
to His friendship and His love.
II Week. II.

In the Spiritual Exercises In the Poem

the thought re-
the soul listens to the Voice of sponding to the Second Week
the King in the Kingdom of of the Exercises is the virtue of
Christ, who calls His noble humility, and the surrender of
followers about Him — asking self as the result of failure to
them to make themselves re- find love in creatures to satisfy
markable in the service of their the yearnings of a soul meant
King. None but a cowardly for God. The soul is sought
30
 ;

knight would refuse such a for by God, kept from finding

call. rest in creatures by their in-
None but a cowardly soul capacity to respond to the
would refuse to follow his yearning of the soul whose
kingly leader Christ. happiness can be filled by God
He must follow him, and alone.
prove his love by imitating So it must not seek that
Christ which and gives
gratifies pride,
In the humility of the Incar- glory to self instead of to God,
nation, by fame and reputation, nor
In the poverty of the Nativ- rest, nor leisure in the mere
ity at Bethlehem, enjoyment of the things of the
In the obscurity of the Hid- earth, but make all things a
den Life Nazareth,
at means of bringing the soul
In the toil of the Public Life closer toits Lord and Master.

in Judea. So there must be humility and

If we wish to be like Christ surrender of self to God. "I wait
we must learn from Him and Thy love's uplifted stroke."
H'is example the virtues of hu-
mility, poverty of spirit, the
retirement of the Hidden Life
and the incessant toil of the
Public Life.We must do good
not only for ourselves, but for
others and for the glory of
God.
HI Week. in.
The Third Week is given to Ah Designer Infinite, must
!

the Meditations on the Passion, thou char the wood before thou
and death of Christ.
sufiferings canst limn with it?
After the Supper at Bethany For the soul to be made an
and the institution of the Eu- instrument of the Infinite De-
charist, the follower of Christ signer it must be tried in the

fed by the bread of Angels, fire of suffering until it is

must go with his King in the charred, and its self-love and
way of suffering. He will share imperfections removed by pain.
in the anguish of His Divine Why should it be so? The In-
Heart —in the Agony in the finite Designer has so ordained.
Garden, he will feel the bitter He has given the example of
pangs of His Sacred Body in — suffering. "He was wounded
the scourging by the soldiers for our iniquities, and "by His
31
 he will know the pangs of His bruises we are healed." But
Divine mind in the cruel . we must apply His sufferings
crowning of thorns, an^J will to our own souls. He merited,
taste the fdll bitterness of the but we must individually apply
holocaust of suffering on the His merit. It would be easier
road toCalvary and in the for Him to bear all, and for us
three hours on the cross, and to bear none, but He has borne
the death of the Crucified. more, we must bear, at least,
The soul penetrates the depths some suffering. He gave the
of Divine suffering and learns greatest proof of love. He laid
that to be like the Lord it, too, down His life for His friend.
must share the bitterness of He was not obliged to do so,
the sufferings of the Master. His • love constrained Him.
Shall we be so unselfish as not
to wish to suffer something for
Him who suffered so much for
us. He gave up all for us.
Love dictates that we should
give up all for Him, even were
it The proof of
not necessary.
our love will be our likeness to
our Crucified Lord.
Ah Designer Infinite, must
!

Thou char the wood ere Thou

canst hmn with it?

IV Week. IV.
The spirit of Fourththe "Rise, clasp my hand, and
Week of the Spiritual Exer- come." The despondency and
cises is joy with our Risen gloom brought on by the fail-

Lord. Gladness and happiness ure of creatures to respond to

at His Resurrection are to be the seeking for happiness, by
the keynote of all our thoughts. the failure of everything in life
We are rejoicing because He to bring content and happiness,
our Master and King who suf- now gives way to the consoing
fered pain and died, now suf- thought
fers no more, but has risen to "I, your God, am near. You
life by His own power to die thought all things were lost, but
no more. He will receive in
His Sacred Humanity the re-
I have kept them stored up for

you at home." The gloom that

I
ward ef all His sufferings and seemed to darken each joy and
3^
 !

merits. We rejoice, also, be- to take away all happiness in

cause by His resurrection we life, was it after all the shade
are assured of our resurrection of His hand caressing me? Is
from the dead, and freedom it not now all brightened by the

from sin, pain and sorrow for- joy and glory of the love that
evermore. The creatures which has come? The love that I
God gave as means are now drave away, when I drave my
gifts of H'is goodness to us, re- Lord away, I drave Love from
flections of His Divine Beauty. me, when I drave Him. Ah
Where we made sacrifices for Love Divine. Stay with me
His love, He has given us a forevermore to be my joy.
hundredfold in return and life Now that I know Thee, Divine
eternal. Love, shall I ever drive this
Love from me? May it not
be said of me "Thou dravest
Love from thee when thou
dravest Me."

33
 TOPICS FOR STUDY.

In this poem we may consider separately

The Thought.
The mystical thought.
The diction.
The imagery.
The wonderfully expressive words.
The vistas of thought opened up.
The soundness of the views of life.

The solidity of the doctrine.

The depths of divine love sounded.
The compassion of divine mercy portrayed.
The contrast of finite and infinite flashed forth.
The gentleness of Divine Providence in life's sorrows.
The recompense to the soul that turneth 'back to God.
The insight into the Spiritual Life.
The knowledge of the human heart.
The emptiness of all save God.
The subterfuges of the heart in evading God's love.
The futility of the flight of the soul from God,

34
 SELECTED WORDS— THOUGHTS—IDEAS.

Down the arches of the years.

I hid from Him in the mist of tears and under running
laughter,
Vistaed hopes.
Shot adown Titanic glooms of chasmed fears.
Imperturbed pace, majestic instancy, deliberate speed.
Hearted casement.
Trellised with intertwining charities.

The margent of the world.

Gold gateways of the stars.
Fretted to dulcet jars.
And silvern chatter.
The pale ports of the moon.

Young skyey blossoms.

Tremendous lover.
Traitorous trueness.
Loyal deceit.

Whistling mane of every wind.

Long savannahs of the blue.
Thunder driven
Clanged His chariot 'thwart a heaven.
Plashy with flying lightnings round the spurn of their
feet.

Plucked them from me by the hair.

Delicate fellowship.
Wind-walled palace.
35
Azured dais.
Taintless way is.

Lucent weeping. «

Drew the bolt of Nature's secrecies.

Swift importings in the wilful face of skies.
Knew how the clouds arise, spumed of the wild sea
snortings,
Shapers of mine own words.
With them joyed and was ibereaven.

The day's dead sanctities,

I laughed in the morning's eyes.
Heaven and wept together.
I

Its sweet tears were salt with mortal mine.

Red throb of its sunset heart.
My were hot on Heaven's grey cheek.
tears
Their sound is but their stir.
They speak by silences.

Blue bosom veil of sky,

I shook the pillaring hours.
Pulled my life upon me.
My days have crackled and gone up in smoke.
Puflfed and burst as sun-starts on a stream.

Now fails the dream the dreamer,

And the lute the lutanist.
Blossomy twist,

Iswung the earth a trinket at my wrist.

With heavy griefs so overplussed.
An amaranthine weed.
Designer infinite.

36
Must thou char the wood to limn with it?
My freshness spent its wavering shower in the dust,
where tear-drippings stagnate.
Dank thoughts that shiver upon the sighful branches
of the mind.
Those shaken mists a space unsettle.
Round the half-glimpsed turrets slowly wash again.
With glooming robes.

Must thy harvest fields be dunged with rotten death?

That voice is round me like a bursting sea.
Shattered in shard on shard.
Seeing none but I make much of naught.
Of all man's clotted clay, the dingiest clot.
Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee, save Me, save
only Me?

I did but take, not for thy harms.

Is my gloom after all, shade of His hand outstretched
caressingly?
Thou dravest love from thee, who dravest Me.

'A7
 EXPRESSIVE WORDS.

Amaranth —Purple Immortal weed.

flower.
Amaranthine — Immortal, unfading.
Bruit — noise.
Casement—window.
Clotted clay —clay with moisture.
in clots
Dank—moist, heavy.
Dulcet jars — Sweet discords.
Fret — High notes held down on stringed instruments,
guitar, etc.
Fret— Means to also to
tease, metal shapes
strike into
and bars.
Fretted to dulcet jars.
Instancy —urgent pressure.
Limn — ^paint, draw.
Margent — ^border.
Owe— own.
Pulp — inside.
—
Rind shell.
—
Savannahs meadows, low, level, treeless plains.

—
Shard piece of broken pottery.
Sun-starts — water flashing in the sunlight.

Wantoning—playing.
Wash — the
rise against, like tide waters.
Wist— know,to wit.

38
 : :

In his article on Francis Thompson, Albert Cock

says
"Who, knowing the 'Hound of Heaven,' will assert
that the Catholic Church no longer voices the spiritual
yearnings of the age? Francis Thompson is,
. . .

in some respects, the greatest achievement of Catholic-

ism in the nineteenth century. His poetry is resident in

man. It is the repetition of the centuries."
And he continues
"No wonder this moved the literary world to enthusi-
asm. It has been said that people will be learning it by
heart two centuries hence. In truth its qualities hardly
need analyzing. Many are the odes in our language which
drag out a weary length and lack an inevitable finish, but
not of this can it be said:
Time is. Our tedious song should here have ending.
For immediacy of appeal and perfect conformity of
soul with Force, it has no superior; in its astounding

speed of phrase it reaches a new goal in our literature;

its subtle and intricate rhymes are the secret rivets which

bind together a poem unique in the singleness and great-

ness of its theme as a religious poem it stands for all the
;

world and for all time, and, by a right royal of its own
claims peerage with the Psalmist for range, with St. Paul
for virility of argument and with St. Augustine for great-
ness of thought and diction."

39
I 8 1912
THE MSANY FRIKTING CO., NEW YORK.