The music stopped, and passed into a smile
Of tenderness, which she impressed to guile
Her pain from me: I gazed as one awhile
Escaped, who sees twin rainbows shine
O'er his wrecked ship gulfed in brine.

My lost soul sank adown in soundless seas
To ruined heaps besprent with ancient lees
Of wealth: by soft stupendous ocean-trees;
By anchors forged in early time,
Changed to trails of rusted slime:

To where, what seemed a tomb, in this deep hell
Of night, bore a dim name I dread to tell:
And there I heard sound some gigantic bell,
Whose thunder laughing through my brain
Mocked me back to flesh again.

Here all was emptier than the empty shade
Of mist before a midnight moon decayed:
Here life was strange as death, and more dismayed
My spirit, now scarce conscious she
Urged entreaty yet to me.

"'Tis life in life to know the King is just,
And will not animate his helpless dust
With fire unquenchable whose ardour must
Achieve majestic deeds that raise
Universal shouts of praise: