| Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). A Victorian Anthology, 1837–1895. 1895. |
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| R. B. |
| | | George Meredith (1828–1909) |
| | | | | 12 December, 1889 |
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| NOW dumb is he who waked the world to speak, | |
| And voiceless hangs the world beside his bier; | |
| Our words are sobs, our cry of praise a tear; | |
| We are the smitten mortals, we the weak. | |
| We see a spirit on earth’s loftiest peak | 5 |
| Shine and wing hence the way he makes more clear; | |
| See a great tree of life, that never here | |
| Dropped leaf for aught that rage of storms might wreak. | |
| Such ending is not death, such living shows | |
| What wide illumination brightness sheds | 10 |
| From one big heart to conquer man’s old foes, | |
| The coward and the tyrant and the force | |
| Of all these weedy monsters’ rising heads, | |
When song is talk from springs of turbid source.
GEORGE MEREDITH. | |
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