Tennyson

Published 1832. T. noted: ‘Addressed to James Spedding, the biographer of Bacon. His brother was Edward Spedding, a friend of mine, who died in his youth.’ Edward died 24 Aug. 1832. Hallam wrote to T., 4 Sept. 1832: ‘E[mily] has probably told you of the death of Edward Spedding, cut off in the prime of life & the freshness of ardent feelings. He was more sensitive than his brother, but tempered that susceptibility with something of James’ calmness. He looked to a future life, I should think, as calmly as to a future day. His epitaph is “Peace”’ (AHH, p. 638; cp. l. 69below). Hallam wrote to T. in Oct.: ‘The lines to J.S. are perfect. James, I am sure, will be most grateful’ (31 Oct.–3 Nov.; AHH, p. 678; Mem. i 88). T. may have remembered Hallam’s praise when he came to write In Memoriam, which is comparable in style and gravity. The belief that the dead ‘sleep sweetly’ is discussed in In Memoriam xliii (p. 386): ‘If Sleep and Death be truly one’. For the opening of To J.S. T. adapted the opening (all he had written) of part ii of a poem which he had already sent to James Spedding; Dear friend (III 614) was quoted by Spedding in a letter to his brother Edward, 9 March 1831 (copy at Lincoln), and so will have been particularly appropriate. P. Allen shows ‘how distasteful Spedding found the traditional modes of Christian consolation’; a month after his brother died, his uncle died, and Spedding wrote, 8 Sept. 1832: ‘I suppose the first thing the good Garden [Francis Garden] would have done would have been to administer religious consolation after his own fashion – and I have already had some religious consolation from Blakesley, – which would have been amusing enough to any one not the object of it’ (The Cambridge Apostles, 1978, p. 167).

The wind, that beats the mountain, blows

More softly round the open wold,

And gently comes the world to those

That are cast in gentle mould.

And me this knowledge bolder made,

Or else I had not dared to flow

In these words toward you, and invade

Even with a verse your holy woe.

’Tis strange that those we lean on most,

Those in whose laps our limbs are nursed,

Fall into shadow, soonest lost:

Those we love first are taken first.

God gives us love. Something to love

He lends us; but, when love is grown

To ripeness, that on which it throve

Falls off, and love is left alone.

This is the curse of time. Alas!

In grief I am not all unlearned;

Once through mine own doors Death did pass;

One went, who never hath returned.

He will not smile – not speak to me

Once more. Two years his chair is seen

Empty before us. That was he

Without whose life I had not been.

Your loss is rarer; for this star

Rose with you through a little arc

Of heaven, nor having wandered far

Shot on the sudden into dark.

I knew your brother: his mute dust

I honour and his living worth:

A man more pure and bold and just

Was never born into the earth.

I have not looked upon you nigh,

Since that dear soul hath fallen asleep.

Great Nature is more wise than I:

I will not tell you not to weep.

And though mine own eyes fill with dew,

Drawn from the spirit through the brain,

I will not even preach to you,

‘Weep, weeping dulls the inward pain.’

Let Grief be her own mistress still.

She loveth her own anguish deep

More than much pleasure. Let her will

Be done – to weep or not to weep.

I will not say, ‘God’s ordinance

Of Death is blown in every wind;’

For that is not a common chance

That takes away a noble mind.

His memory long will live alone

In all our hearts, as mournful light

That broods above the fallen sun,

And dwells in heaven half the night.

Vain solace! Memory standing near

Cast down her eyes, and in her throat

Her voice seemed distant, and a tear

Dropt on the letters as I wrote.

I wrote I know not what. In truth,

How should I soothe you anyway,

Who miss the brother of your youth?

Yet something I did wish to say:

For he too was a friend to me:

Both are my friends, and my true breast

Bleedeth for both; yet it may be

That only silence suiteth best.

Words weaker than your grief would make

Grief more. ’Twere better I should cease

Although myself could almost take

The place of him that sleeps in peace.

Sleep sweetly, tender heart, in peace:

Sleep, holy spirit, blessèd soul,

While the stars burn, the moons increase,

And the great ages onward roll.

Sleep till the end, true soul and sweet.

Nothing comes to thee new or strange.

Sleep full of rest from head to feet;

Lie still, dry dust, secure of change.

183 To J.S.