P R 
 
 4099 
 
 B125 
 
 S7 
 
 1896 
 
 MAIN 
 
LIBRARY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
 Class 
 
St. Augustine at Ostia: 
 
 Oxford Sacred Poem. 
 
 BY 
 
 THE REV. H. C. BEECHING, M.A., 
 
 Balliol College; 
 One of the Select Preachers before the University. 
 
 LONDON: JOHN LANE, THE BODLEY HEAD. 
 1896. 
 
... 
 
 St. Augustine at Ostia: 
 
 Oxford Sacred Poem. 
 
 BY 
 
 THE REV. H. C. BEECHING, M.A., 
 
 Balliol College; 
 One of the Select Preachers before the University. 
 
 ' Or THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
 LONDON: JOHN LANE, THE BODLEY HEAD. 
 1896. 
 

MATRI 
 DILECTISSIM^E 
 
 ET CARNIS ET CORDIS GENETRICI 
 
 APVD OSTIA SVA JAM COMMORANTI 
 
 HOS VERSICVLOS 
 
 15< 
 
" It came to pass that she [Monnica] and I stood alone, 
 leaning in a certain window, which looked into the garden 
 of the house where we now lay at Ostia ; where removed 
 from the din of men we were recruiting from the fatigues 
 of a long journey, for the voyage. We were discoursing 
 then together, alone, and enquiring between ourselves in 
 the presence of the Truth, which Thou art, of what sort 
 the eternal life of the saints was to be " etc. 
 
 Confessions, b, ix, Oxf. Tr. 
 
ST. AUGUSTINE AT OSTIA. 
 
 O AFTER leagues of dust and sweltering air 
 Like heaven to tired souls this garden green. 
 
 How its soft balm all trouble doth repair, 
 
 Bathed in the shadowy stillness of the scene ; 
 
 The shrunken mind grows to her wonted measure, 
 
 As all the senses find their fill of pleasure ! 
 
 In the beginning, for Creation's crown, 
 
 There was a garden Sabbath-wrought by God ; 
 
 Trees, bird-enchanted, stretched their light leaves down, 
 Rose-petals diapered the grassy sod ; 
 
 And there, a little while, a man and maid 
 
 Wandered in golden light and scented shade. 
 
 7 
 
Red roses, and white lilies, and green grass, 
 Some wind from Eden let your first seeds fall ! 
 
 Or haply, chrisom'd in innocence, we pass 
 Within that warder'd garden's viewless wall, 
 
 For ye are far more glorious since that day ! 
 
 And hark, God's footstep on its silent way ! 
 
 O happy Paradise of earthly bliss ! 
 
 Take heart of joy, children of God, and shout 
 Yet will that other garden better this 
 
 Which yonder singing planets ring about, 
 Sweet harbingers, whose love-enflamed breath 
 Lights us across the dusky sea of death. 
 
 They beckon us to unimagin'd bowers, 
 Beauty beyond desire, beyond decay, 
 
 Where summer parches not, nor rain deflowers, 
 And all Eternity is one To-day ; 
 
 No need of sun is there, or need of night, 
 
 For 'all is full of God,' l and God is Light. 
 8 
 
Light uncreated, insubstantial flame, 
 
 Who by our soul in soul, not sense, art found, 
 
 No more I do thee wrong, when LIGHT I name, 2 
 As though Thy waves beat through without a bound 
 
 The vast of space, its island worlds to thrill ; 
 
 Whose light is spirit, and Whose flame is will. 
 
 From Thee is every joy and loveliness : 
 
 When thou dost call, they wake to life and shine 
 
 As flowers, or sing as birds, and sweetly press 
 To their perfection, then as swift decline ; 
 
 Yet oft untimely fate cuts short their days, 
 
 Or chance dislimns, dislustres, disarrays. 
 
 But in our souls Thy spirit fashioneth 
 
 The perfect model of their beauty bright, 
 
 Which cannot suffer chance or change or death, 
 But lives eternal at its beauty's height ; 
 
 What though this lily's stem Time's scythe will sever, 
 
 In God and in our hearts it liveth ever. 
 
 9 
 
So when at last Thy great * Let be * is said, 
 And mortal stars crumble from mortal skies, 
 
 And mortal graves from their immortal dead, 
 The memory of our love shall with us rise, 
 
 And Thou shalt to our love Thy heaven display 
 
 The perfect form of what hath passed away. 
 
 Then shall the soul's clear eye be satisfied 
 With seeing, nor its charmed ear be dull : 
 
 For every colour from One light is dyed, 
 And every cadence of One voice is full ; 
 
 And who in aught discerns that Light, that Voice, 
 
 Is lapped in deep content of heavenly joys. 
 
 But in Thy heaven, O Light, Thou dost not keep, 
 Though in Thine iris-splendour heaven be clad ; 
 
 And more than music is that Silence deep 
 
 Whose scattered melodies Thy saints make glad ; 
 
 Shall we that Silence hear, that Light descry 
 
 Singly Thyself? ah God, for Thee we sigh. 
 10 
 
To which high bliss He of His mercy bring, 
 My mother, thee ; and me, his new-born son ; 
 
 And one 4 much-wronged ; and him 5 whom, pitying 
 Our piteous lust, He gave to win us on 
 
 From lust to love ; to each vouchsafe a part 
 
 In the blest vision of the pure in heart. 
 
 name of mother, more than wife or friend 
 
 For whose dear love our hearts are drench'd in fire, 
 While thine we pierce with sorrows without end, 
 Returning disappointment for desire ; 
 
 1 know at last the school where thou hast learn'd 
 * More profiteth love given than love returned. 1 
 
 Eternal love of God which lives in loving, 
 
 And still th* unthankful thanks, th* unjust rewards ; 
 
 Our selfish love no less than hate reproving, 
 
 Our pruning-hooks of peace that bite like swords ; 
 
 Where can we find Thine image so exprest 
 
 In mortal clay, as in a mother's breast ! 
 
 II 
 
My mother, it is now the thirtieth year, 
 And thou hast laboured all the woful while 
 
 With my sad soul, as with my flesh whilere, 
 
 Still hoping for a day when thou shouldst smile ; 
 
 The day fore-told in dreams, the coming morrow 
 
 When she should reap in joy, that sowed in sorrow. 
 
 A son of sorrow I, who must have perish'd, 
 In such a parched ground so frail a stock, 
 
 But that God's grace in thy free tears had cherished 
 And thy large faith had shadowed like a rock ; 
 
 Expecting till thy wilful son should stand, 
 
 How late soever, at the Father's hand. 
 
 How shall I tell by what mysterious stairs 
 I rose from deeps of darkness into light ? 
 
 O but I know they were the unwavering prayers 
 (Whatever guise they bore to outward sight,) 
 
 That rose from thee, my mother, to God's throne ; 
 
 Faith blessed by grace makes a sure stepping-stone. 
 
 12 
 
First I rejoice that Christ's most holy Cross 
 Was signed in faith upon my infant brow, 
 
 With salt to season me from carnal loss ; 
 
 For though too late I love Thee, Saviour, now, 
 
 And loved too long the wanton dreams of youth, 
 
 Thy name I ever loved, and knew Thee truth. 
 
 So when my mind her feathers 'gan to preen, 
 And Tully bade her boldly weigh her wings 
 
 To soar aloft where in the light serene 
 
 Sat Wisdom, prouder than the state of kings, 
 
 She cried : * The greater light the less will dim ; 
 
 Who worships Christ can worship none but Him.' 
 
 Then questing for Thy shrine, I sought to Paul, 
 But found him, ah ! * contemptible of speech ' 9 
 
 As saith himself; and for the porch was small 
 I judged the temple mean and poor of reach ; 
 
 Nor knew I, Lord, the meekness of Thy ways, 
 
 Who from the lips of babes perfectest praise. 
 
 13 
 
Fain to be free, and yet a slave to Pride 
 
 Nine years I spurned the franchise of Thy yoke ; 
 
 For while the Church to all the nations cried 
 * Believe and know,' I0 and Mani counter-spoke 
 
 * Know and believe,' IX I bowed to Mani's rule 
 
 And willing to be wise became a fool. 
 
 For who can see, though it be highest day, 
 Till faith unbar the windows of the soul 
 
 And all the clotted dust be purged away 
 
 That thwarts the sunbeams' passage to their goal ? 
 
 The faithless heart takes pride to grope and peer 
 
 And misconstrue and nought discovers clear. 
 
 How then I thought of God and thought of death, 
 Let this vain cry confess which once I wept 
 
 When my first manhood's friend gave up his breath; 
 And Christ have pardon'd it, in Whom he slept 
 
 Christ's lamb whom I was hindering from the fold 
 
 And when he entered, mock'd, profanely bold : 
 H 
 
* Soul of the world, in matter crucified, I3 
 
 We must not mourn when thou esc apest free 
 From one nail more with which thy spirit is wried i 
 
 Impaled upon the earth 's accursed tree; 
 Who hail with joy the happy omen given 
 In every drop of dew exhaled to heaven. 
 
 4 But was thy anguish Jierce in this my friend? 
 
 Was not thy lodging, Lord, a pleasant place? 
 His thoughts were pure, and such as aye imtend 
 
 Thy glory and thy woe; so that thy face 
 Looked stainless from his face, than flesh more fine, 
 As through its veil of glass the sacred wine. 
 
 * Why didst thou long to be released so soon 
 
 From him, and linger est still in wretched me? 
 Our heart was one, our pulses beat one tune, 
 
 Mingling twin thoughts in sweeter melody 
 When thou didst breathe as through a double flute ; 
 Now faints the other, because one is mute. 
 
 15 
 
' Well fare thy soul, my brother, whereso bound! 
 
 Voyagest thou ? the pinnace of the sun 
 The unfurrowed blue of heaverfs ethereal round 
 
 To make the port where separate souls are one, 
 Motes in the Great All-brightness, lost in God? 
 Would thou wert here, treading the path we trod! ' 
 
 Thus my sad heart through the thick mists would pore, 
 That brood above the irremeable wave, 14 " 
 
 And hide from longing eyes the further shore ; 
 Faith knew not yet the Pilot's skill to save ; 
 
 And though Love waved his torch to left and right 
 
 He scarce put back the re-encroaching night. 
 
 I loved Alcestis who sighed out her breath 
 To save her kingly husband from his doom, 
 
 I honoured Hercules who fought with Death 
 To bring the victim victor from the tomb, 
 
 I thought Christ phantom-born and phantom-slain, 5 
 
 And all -that woe but pageantry and vain. 
 16 
 
For still in Mani's house my soul would sit 
 
 Where all things made were pictured wondrously ; 
 
 Yet sometimes from her chamber taper-lit 
 Looking abroad the starry heavens to see, 
 
 Her wit would doubt his painted orbs, and cry 
 
 * Can then the Paraclete mistake, or lie ! ' I 
 
 And when thy wit too, Faustus, was at fault 
 
 So that for all thy grace and eloquence 
 Thou couldst not bid my thronging doubts to halt, 
 
 Nor wouldst true heart ev'n in a lie's defence 
 The ill-figur'd glories ceased to charm my mind ; 
 I journeyed forth another home to find. 
 
 Then Plato from his watch-tower pointed me 
 
 The Cause of Causes, only * THAT WHICH IS;' l? 
 
 Bidding me seek Him singly, for that He 
 
 Was very Truth, and very Fount of Bliss : 
 
 And my heart wept for rapture and dismay 
 
 Seeing the goal far off, but not the way. 
 
 17 
 
But Thou, the Way, didst lead me by Thy saint, 
 
 Whose name is in the church ' like ointment poured/ 
 
 Ambrose, whose songs ambrosial soar and faint 
 A sweeter incense round Thy throne, O Lord ; 
 
 Where now with heavenly choirs earth's voices vie, 
 
 Hymning the happy Light, the Trinity.' I9 
 
 From those firm lips I heard the holy Creed 
 The truth of truth that is God's boundless heart 
 
 Turn'd to child's words ; though if a child give heed 
 The smallest vowel sings an angel's part ; 
 
 As now to my still ear comes distantly 
 
 Beyond the river's voice the eternal sea. 
 
 
 O strong and sweet command my heart that won 
 
 To ope at last its barricadoed door ! 
 So speaks a mother to her dearest son ; 
 
 O grief, that I mistook her voice before ! 
 
 grief and shame that all those rebel years 
 
 1 filled her eyes (as thine, mother) with tears ! 
 
 18 
 
Now when love urged and doubt no more restrained, 
 Why from Christ's kingdom did I longer stray ? 
 
 prodigal desires that still complained 
 Plucked at my robe of flesh, and said me nay ; 
 
 Sighed ' Pity us ' ' must we be left behind ? ' 
 
 * We were thy darlings once ' ' nay, friend, be kind.' 
 
 And still I scorned their suit ; and still and still 
 Was bound ; till one day desperate to be freed, 
 
 1 heard a voice importunate and shrill, 
 
 Chant * Take and read ' and ever ' take and read ; ' 
 And taking Paul I read (one word sufficed) 
 
 * Thy flesh put off, put on the new man, Christ.' 
 
 Then knew I that it was God's oracle 
 
 Calling to cleanness by a clean-lipt child ; 
 
 And I made answer ' In thy hallowed well 
 
 Dip my soul's torch, whose flame is flesh-defiled 
 
 (As in that magic fount the Epirots praise 20 ) 
 
 To kindle the quench'd light to purer rays. 
 
 19 
 
Mother, thou saw'st the end of all the strife : 
 The waters brooded over by the dove ; ll 
 
 The sob of death, the cry of new-born life 
 Speechless with ecstacy of faith and love : 
 
 The over-shadowing hands of blessing, 22 then 
 
 The thunder of the thousandfold Amen. 
 
 Last the atoning Sacrifice, * 3 that rose 
 
 So suppliant, so triumphal, to God's throne : 
 
 Bearing upon its buoyant wings the woes 
 Wherewith a thousand hearts did inly groan : 
 
 Until in highest heaven they faded quite : 
 
 And God's peace fell as falls the deepening night. 
 
 What now remains? Heaven stoops to-night so near 
 Ev'n now it seems the starry gates must turn 
 
 Upon their hinges, and the King appear 
 
 To judge the quaking world, and bid it burn : 
 
 Or (dare I hope) to pluck one soul on high 
 
 Before its dew of baptism be dry. 
 
 20 
 
But that were thankless cowardice to ask ! 
 
 Rest before toil, nay, wage for working ill. 
 Rather let twice ten years bring each his task 
 
 Of sowing truth the ten years' weeds to kill 
 I sowed full-handed ; and weeds prosper well 
 In our quick soil, warmed by the fires of hell. 
 
 All that I have, I give ; and oft in dreams 
 One stands upon a shore and beckons me 
 
 Whose mitred neck is ringed with blood, and seems 
 The holy Cyprian ; and I vow to thee, 
 
 Martyr of God who heard'st my mother's vows, 
 
 That day I left her, weeping in thy house 24 
 
 To heed thy law, and love our Mother Church 
 As Father God ; 2 * and dry the tears that dim 
 
 Her virgin beauty, if by painful search 
 
 Her wanderers may be gathered ; not like him 
 
 Wander, thy best loved Master, wilful-wild, 
 
 God's dear, devoted, disobedient child. z 
 
 21 
 
And thou, great monk, 27 who found'st the Happy Life 
 Which all men seek with feverish desire 
 
 Not in a home, or wealth, or friend, or wife, 
 But solely in the spirit's naked fire, 
 
 Teach me the same rich poverty to essay, 
 
 Though hard the lesson be for human clay. 
 
 But chiefly Thou, whom my faint spirit pursu'th 
 (Ev'n while my faithful heart embraceth Thee) 
 
 Along the narrow, thorny, steep of Truth, 
 Be aiding ; mind to mind, O speak to me ! 
 
 Shew me Thyself, nor let the vision fade 
 
 As from the Trojan sad Creusa's shade. 2 
 
 And shew the model of Thy glorious city 
 As Thou hast graven it in heaven ; for here 
 
 Tho* 'tis the middle age of time, 29 'tis pity 
 How lowly still the walls and towers appear ; 
 
 The builders leave to build and ply their hate ; 
 
 Some cry * Too vast the plan,' and some * Too strait.' 3 
 22 
 
' Build THOU Jerusalem,' 3I Thy people sue ; 
 
 'Tis for Thy praise, and Thou art architect ; 
 Yea, if one seem a builder good and true, 
 
 Thy hands, O Lord, not his, the work effect ; 
 Work through us in this transitory light, 32 
 Till we have built the city to its height. 
 I 
 
 Yattenden Rectory, 
 June, 1895. 
 
NOTES. 
 
 1 Verg. Eel. iii, 60. *Jovis omnia plena,' a favourite 
 quotation with St. Augustine. 
 
 2 Manicheanism, which was the form of Christianity that 
 first attracted Augustine, was a materialist faith, whose only 
 notion of Spirit was finely attenuated substance. See Con- 
 fessions iv, 31; vii, 2, 7, etc. 
 
 3 ' Measure for Measure,' iii, I : * this habitation where 
 thou keepst.' 
 
 4 His mistress. 
 
 5 His son, Adeodatus. 
 
 6 See Genesis xxxv, 18, allegorised in St. Augustine's 
 manner. 
 
 7 Conf. i, II. 'Even from the womb of my mother, 
 who greatly hoped in Thee, I was sealed with the mark of 
 His cross, and salted with His salt.' 
 
 8 Conf. x, 27. ' Sero te amavi.' 
 
 9 2 Cor. x, 10. 
 
 10 Intellectus merces est fidei. Ergo noli quasrere in- 
 telligere ut credas, sed crede ut intelligas. In Joan. Ev. 
 Tract., xxix, 6. 
 
 11 ' For what else led me, for nearly nine years, to follow 
 and be a diligent hearer of these men, but their saying that 
 we were the sport of superstitious fears, and that faith was 
 incumbent on us before reason, whereas they urged no one 
 to believe, until the truth had been first elicited.' (On the 
 Benefit of Believing, pref.) 
 
 H 
 
12 A friend of Augustine's, by him seduced to the 
 Manichean heresy, was converted to the Catholic faith by 
 being baptized when in a swoon. See Conf. iv, 4. 
 
 13 This elegy follows the Manichean ideas about God 
 and death. 
 
 14 Verg. Aen. vi, 425. ' Ripam irremeabilis undae.' 
 
 15 Cant, v, 9-10. 
 
 16 Mani claimed to be the Paraclete foretold by Christ. 
 Augustine's faith in this pretended revelation received its 
 first blow from the impossibility of reconciling what Mani 
 had written on the Universe with the ascertained principles 
 of astronomical science. He was urged to suspend his 
 judgment till Faustus the chief Manichean bishop should 
 visit Carthage ; but Faustus proved a mere rhetorician, 
 * utterly ignorant of the liberal sciences,' and candidly con- 
 fessed as much. See Conf. v, 6-7. 
 
 *7 Conf. viii, 17. "With the flash of one trembling 
 glance it arrived at THAT WHICH IS." 
 1 8 Cant, i, 3. 
 
 *9 * O Lux beata, Trinitas ' a well-known hymn by St. 
 Ambrose. 
 
 20 See De Civitate Dei xxi, 5. * There is in Epirus a 
 fountain in which lighted torches are quenched, but 
 quenched torches lighted.' 
 
 21 His baptism. 
 
 22 Confirmation. 
 
 23 And First Communion. 
 
 24 This was when Augustine left Carthage for Rome. 
 See Conf. v, 8. ' She refusing to return without me, I 
 
scarcely persuaded her to stay that night in a place hard by 
 our ship, where was an oratory, in memory of the blessed 
 Cyprian* That night I departed privily, but she was left 
 behind in weeping and prayer.' 
 
 25 Cypr. Ep. Ixxiv, 7. * He who would have God for 
 his father, must have the Church for his mother.' 
 
 * 6 St. Cyprian drew most of his controversial weapons 
 from the armoury of Tertullian's writings. He used to speak 
 of him as his Master. Tertullian became the head of the 
 Montanist party in Africa. 
 
 27 Antony. The Story of Antony's austerities played 
 no small part in Augustine's conversion ; see Conf. viii, 6. 
 
 28 Verg. Aen. ii, 772. How deeply Virgil's lines about 
 Creusa had sunk into Augustine's mind is proved by his 
 impatient reference to them in Conf. i, 13 a reference 
 which with splendid rhetorical effect becomes a quotation. 
 " Dulcissimum spectaculum vanitatis equus ligneus plenus 
 armatis, et Trojae incendium atque ipsius umbra Creuste." 
 
 29 De Civ. xxiv. * In hoc interim seculo.' 
 
 3 St. Augustine's chief controversies were with the 
 Donatists on the one hand who thought the Catholic church 
 too lax in its discipline, and on the other with the Pelagians 
 who practically denied original sin and so the need of any 
 church at all. 
 
 31 Psalm li, 1 8. 
 
 3 2 Conf. ix, 4. ' In hac luce transitoria.' 
 
 ,26 
 
By the same Author. 
 
 IN A GARDEN: 
 
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 Poems, with title page and cover design by Roger Fry, 
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