NO. 43. TWENTIETH CENTURY LIBRARY, NEW YORK, JULY 30o x89i. [Entered at the New York post-office as second-class matter.] Zbe Gothic Minster A POEM -BYHARRY LYMAN KOOPMAN NEW YORK TWENTIETH CENTURY PUBLISHING COMPANY 7 CLINTON PLACE 1891 2ln-d ~L/e~~D-;v h~~ '7en~ ~ j~ cc~-2 1' 7v 9 `mo ItTH V~TtR 7ro~lT E9 A WEEKLY RADICAL MAGAZINE. * HUGH0. PPENTECOST, EDITOR. J. W. SULLIVAN, ASSOCIATE EDITOR. Motto: "HEAR THE OTHER SIDE." AIM: To go to the root of Religion and Sociology. METHOD: To offer a free platform for the discussion of every phase of Religious and Sociologic thought. ATTITUDE: The Spirit of Truth as contrasted with the Spirit of Triumph. CONTRIBUTORS: Representatives of all creeds and movements. CONTENTS: Editorials, Contributed Articles, Sermon by the Rev. Cater Totherich, Correspondence, Fiction, Poetry, " Working of the Yeast," Current News of all Movements, Book Reviews, etc. SUBSCRIPTIONS-For fifty-two weeks, $2; twenty-six weeks, $i; thirteen weeks, 60 cents. Single copies, 5 cents. For sale at news stands or at office of publication. To foreign countries in the postal union, one year, $3. SAMPLE COPY FREE. TWENTIETH CENTURY PUBLISHING CO., 7 CLINTON PLACE, NEW YORK CITY. FRED. C. LEUBUSCHER, ALBERT L. LEUBUSCHER, PRESIDENT AND TREASURER. BUSINESS MANAGER. CHICAGO BRANCH OFFICE: Room ITo3, Chamber of Commerce Building, corner La Salle and Washington streets. W. H. VAN ORNUM, Manager. pg2W All remittances should be minade to the New York office. Zbe 3othic AiMinster HARRY LYMAN KOOPMAN Read before the Alumni of Colby University [,0 J NE is89 NEW YORK TWENTIETHfl CENT'?URY PUBLISHING; COMPANY CIAINTON PLACE 1Iol OTHER WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR: 7HE GREA 7 ADJzMIRAL. 16 pages, handsomely printed. Paper cover. Price, 25 cents. A poetical tribute to Admiral Farragut. ORESTES. A Dramatic Sketch; and Other Poems. 192 pages. Cloth, beveled edges. Price, one dollar. WOMAN 'S IVILL. A Love-Play in Five Acts; with Other Poems. 63 pages. Parchment cover, with gilt title. Price, 75 cents. THE CRIME OF THE CULPRIT FA Y. Introductory to Drake's Poem. 22 pages. Paper cover. Price, 25 cents THE ANOINVTED. A Novel of the Twenty-fifth Century. 3 pages, beautifully printed. Paper cover. Price, io cents. The outline of an imaginary novel; containing a statement of the author's idea of what literary expression may have attained to six centuries hence. Colby University in the early morning, after Commencement, 18,T. The.morning mist enwraps thee like a dream,The river's warm breath whitened by the dawn; Still as deep sleep, the elms about thy lawn Mix with the vapor; on the veiled stream The sliding, slumberous ripples roll and gleam. The morn shall wake; winds woo and sunbeams fawn To rouse thee, vainly, in thy rest withdrawn, Where summer's moons of quiet reign supreme. Meanwhile the woods are storing- up their dyes, The clematis twines wreaths of later snow, The sumacs drain the sunset's fieriest glow, The ferns catch every sweetest breath that flies; And all, that when thou opest again thine eyes, Autumn's romance its web may round thee throw. Burlington, Vt., 2 July, 1891. IThe fofllowing P.oevi is znot a study of any one cathedral; but for the descrpftion of the outside it follows somewhat the lines of the ininster at Ulm with its single spire, among the spires of earth peerless in heJiht and beauty; while the colors of the interior it has dr-awn from the more gorgeous cathedrals of the Ile-de-France, the cradle andl the throne of Gothic ar-chitecture. tbe Gotbic Minster. A symphony in stone; wherein all notes Wrung or upleaping from man's ruddy heart, The low, the loud, the dull, the penetrating, As up to heaven thronging they ascend, In labyrinthean intertanglement, O'ertaken in mid-harmony by form, Stand bodied forth, eternized, visible. No thin Memnonian murmur, faintly heard At dawn or dusk with glad or plaintive strain, Here swells a chorus never still, a vast Millennial antiphon absolved from sound, Which thrills and thunders on the eye alone. The music of the world-wide life of man, Its hopes and fears and sins and sacrifices, Unfaltering faith, rapt adoration, Keen questioning, jaw-dropt credulity, Death-scorning courage daunted by the dark, Love barred with hate, with grossness purity, Red-slipping war, the hammering hum of peace, Hand-clasping brotherhood and manliness, The joy of handiwork, whose rest is toil, The joy of breathing, moving, loving life Immortalized and eloquent in stone. Stand here at night in storm, when, through the gloom, The great bulk seems a wall across the world, 0 THE GOTHIC MINSTER. Uprising jagged to the very sky, And you could deem a horned Alp, rebellious Against the encircling conclave of his peers, Had by their doom been banished here to dwell, With all his fretting pines and pinnacles. But let the moon break forth, and through swift scud Flicker and float upon these carven walls, The mountain vanishes, and in its place A structure gleams without a stain of earth, A temple heaven-descended, or, as if A convoy of blest angels chorusing, As back to heaven they bore a saint's white soul, Had ravished so the moonlight with their song, That, where their notes fell, there the beams, transformed, Had stood upstriving, and, as rose the hymn, So rose the'silver fane, until the sound Was muffled by the stars; while far below, Though far aloft, to men, the snowy cross Hung yearning for that vanished melody. But stand before the minster when high noon Throws its revealing light on tower and wall, The airy structure hardens into stone; Not all forgetful of the mountain form It wore in darkness, nor the winged grace And lightness of that moony masonry; Yet plainly work of man, man at his best, Highest aspiring and most self-forgetful, Therefore most self-revealing. Then, what self? The genius of what master intellect Shines here by baser hands wrought visibly? No mighty genius, and no baser hands, But common lives by faith and art exalted; THE GOTHIC MINSTER. 7 Such workmen reared these walls, and carved these spires, And shot yon shaft of beauty into air Till the eye aches that follows, and the heart I eels itself snatched from earth and swept on high, As by the current of a soaring flame. But, if the greatness was not theirs that wrought What mastering motive so informed their lives As through such lowly means to win expression? Religion 'twas, and art its ministrant, The records answer; but the question comes, If unto them the word religion spake As in our ears today? In every age Bears not the word its new significance, Or meanings manifold, though under all Abide the root and spring of all religion, The loneliness and longing of the soul Orphaned of its ideal? The eye within Beholds an image of perfection; But in the outer and embodied world Sees only crudeness, failure, death, decay; No circle round, no angle true, no life But bears within the seeds of its own death; The redeless riddle of the universe: The rain descending on the evil man As on the good, and on the good as oft The hail and lightning; nothing justified Within the span of life; the heart awarding Men's lot by merit, and aggrieved to find That force on earth usurps the place of right; Nor satisfied that with the ages' lapse Wrong slowly is made right, if this man's hurt 8 THE GOTHIC MINSTER. Is never healed, nor that man's pride put down. The heart has vision in its inmost shrine Of love illimitable, its native air, Its birthplace and its bourne; but sees on earth Man's hand against his brother, hate and greed Making the world a shambles, or a den Of famine and of torture; yea! the lesson, Learned after centuries, that 'tis thriftier To coin a brother's heart's-blood, drop by drop, Than spill it wastefully by the swift sword. But heart and mind refuse to answer no To the enigma of the -universe. Though earth and air and sea and human life, With all their voices, howl a ucgative, Deep in the soul resounds eternal y ea. Therefore the soul back on itself returns, And through itself, as though a glass, beholds The infinite brought down to human ken, The dateless, boundless, beauty, goodness, truth. But not in all its hours can the, soul scale Those dizzy heights of contemplation, Descend those depths and breathe with mortal breath; Nor have all souls that strength to climb and dive. So, that the blind might share the seer's sight, And that the seer in his hours of gloom Might not forget the vision wonderful, Men wrought them symbols that should reproduce The shadowed glory, as the picture's lines Recall the absent loved one. Yea, they strove By strong suggestions so to realize The world unseen, that o'er the symbol seen The unseen through the parted heaven should burst THE GOTHIC MINSTER. 9 Many the symbols that in many lands Throughout the ages have moved human hearts With heavenly persuasion; but with some An age, a race, drank all the meaning dry, And left a rocky channel to our thirst. Yet other symbols spake to all men's hearts And speak to after ages. Such are those Vast emblems of the life of man in God And of God's life with men, that, long perfecting, After the opening of the new millennium For half a thousand years ceased not to break Flower-like on Europe's air, as if the rocks Had risen in worship, and the forest aisles Had joined them in uplifted adoration. For him who from our naked shore brings eyes Of unblest innocence, which never saw Beauty in stone or vaulted awfulness, Yet brings a heart that thrills to grace and gloom, What ravishment awaits! On him unwarned, In all their beauty and their fragrance, burst These fadeless blossoms of the centuries. Upon his ears not dulled by frequency The mighty chords of these vast instruments Shatter full diapason. O'er his soul The symbol once again breaks up the depths Of the unfathomed blue to melt beneath The glory of the infinite descending. Man's life in God, so mounts the soaring pile; Foundations vast and broad laid far below In sunless depths of unseen sacrifice; The walls arising, buttressed all about With m.twel support; oft scarcely more (I 10 THE GOTHIC MINSTER. Than buttresses, so precious is the room For inward light; then shrinking in the roof, Then, as if taking heart, once more the walls Rise heavenward, many-windowed, through a maze Of buttresses that spring to meet the lower, Then leap in upward flame for very joy Of help received and given; while, through all The length and breadth of the vast edifice, No line but upward strives, no stone but lifts, No smallest spire and finial but stands On tiptoe to ascend. But not so broad Can mount the highest life. The roof shuts in; And all the upward impulse of the pile Narrows into the tower, which climbs and climbs, But though so far from earth not yet finds heaven; Too earthly still, it throws more weight away; A flying cloud is scarce so airy now; But still the vision waits, and still the spire, Now narrowed to a staff, holds on its aim, Will not give o'er until the blessing fall; And see, the stone begins to bud with hope; Swifter the spire shoots up, then suddenly Stops, and in the rose-cross blossoms forth For rapture of the beatific vision. So finds the life of man its rest in God, After long toil, repose, long warfare, peace. Where finds it? Yonder, never here on earth, The upward-pointing answers. Finds what life? The heart still urges, and for answer given Receives the beckoning of the sculptured portal. With heart upturned and chastened soul go in; The world shuts down behind, and thou art left THE GOTHIC MINSTER. II Alone in presence of the ineffable. The very light is not the light of day; For here the sun shines not, but living light With its effulgence glorifies the air, As if the rainbow's promise filled the world. All vistas end in light; past range on range Of columns down the illimitable aisle A glory shuts the vision; while, above, From gloom to splendor soar the vaulted heights. To right, to left, the air is dyed with hues, Rich, darkling, solemnly magnificent, Like the deep organ tones that from aloft Roll under the huge vaults, and die away Along the lessening arches dim and far. Hours here are ages; time has oped his hand And let the soul fly free; the bounds of space Hem its light wings no longer. Where and when Have lost their meaning to the mind entranced. Yea, self itself is lost; the weary soul, After long flight, within the bosom rests Of the eternal, as the spray-flung drop Sinks back in ocean's immensity. What shall bring back the soul to earthly life, After such heavenly ravishment, lest it faint, Being clothed upon with flesh, in that fine air? Beauty: which links the human and divine, And lures the soul on heavenly meads astray, Down its bright pathways to humanity. At last the eye begins with separate sight To mark what wholly had but dazzled it. The mind, by suddenness of the splendor stunned, Now step by step and slowly traverses I2 THE GOTHIC MINSTER. The strange new world revealed; and finds it all Not wholly new or strange. The forms are here That build the forest's awe, the cavern's dread, And, more familiar still, the lowlier shapes Of leaf and bud and flower, with vines that cling And coil and twine and creep and nestle or climb; All wrought with faithfulness that comes alone To love, a love that cherishes the life, Not merely the dead forms. Then the mind's eye Pictures the workman of that elder time On Sunday with his children wandering In wood and field, and noting form and poise Of flower and leaf and stem, while constantly His children bring him brighter, sweeter blooms For his approval. Wearying at last, They lighteh with their songs the homeward way No man might hope to see the pile complete, But yet his daily, weekly, yearly task He wrought and finished, and in doing it Found happiness. Toil might his body tire, But in his heart was never any wish Save to renew his task with the new day; So much he loved the work. His toil to him Was recreation, for it ministered To mind and heart; in it his thought and will Wrought their creative impulse, and he knew The artist's joy, finding in art his life. Men build no more cathedrals;-walls may rise, With tower and window, and be consecrate To the old purpose, but the soul is fled. Small need the cause to question. Who toils now For love of art, with high creative joy? THE GOTHIC MINSTER. I3 No laborer. Then in vain the master plans, Or, rather, vain his plan, and void of soul. Art knows no sundering of the hand and brain; The two as one must labor, for in art The greater sinks or rises with the less. But, given the art, should we be able still To lift such clouds of incense to the sky, By marble less than faith made permanent? The question holds its answer; for the faith That bade these mountains be removed and wrought Into new shapes of heavenlier loveliness, Is dead on earth, never to live again. That faith is dead; light slew it; when men came To know the world they live in, and themselves, The faith that pointed them away from earth And bade them scorn and flee it, could not live. With all the beauty and the nameless charm And soothing of the soul and inspiration And lessons, which their monuments retain, The old beliefs of twilight, when day dawned, Must needs grow thin and vanish like the night. That faith is dead which made the earth a waste, And man's life but a desert pilgrimage O'er burning sands and flinty shards to find Beyond its bounds a Paradise and rest. That faith is dead which in the body saw Only the spirit's prison, a house of sin, To be escaped from, not indwelt with joy. That faith is dead, with its black pessimism, Which deemed this world the devil's world, and then, That men might not die wholly in despair, Fashioned a heaven for earth's apology. That faith is dead, but its dark influence 16 THE GOTHIC MINSTER. At last, with change of times, the order changed: The windows robbed the wall's supremacy, Grown wider, yet aspiring far aloft In slender shafts that broke the restful lines Of level, broken further by supports To prop the weakened sides. The roof, upheaved As byv a strong convulsion, cleft the air A welge, no more a shelter. Losing power To lift great domes in air, men reared instead Dizzy and toppling spires. Even the round Of tle strong arch was broken, and the whole, To hide its death, was draiped with carven flowers. So, when at Amiens change had wrought its worst, In the completed pile no trace was left Of the ol(1 mneaning; and to eyes that saw After the ancient order seemred alone Ruin, 'where we behold the full-blown rose Of Gothic Ieautv, and discern therein lMeanings that more transcend what they displaced Than those the coldness of the Roman hall. The elder order built with lifeless weight (f stone on stone against the outer light; With all it' strength it perished; but the new V Ab)ides, which builds with life and light a nd.(, r A NE\ ) EDITION10 -OF - VOLTAIRE'S ROMANCES! Translated from the French. Complete in one volume. WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS, including three authenticated Portraits of the author. A handsome volume of 448 pages, printed on fine laid paper, and with the best modern presswork. Bound in cloth and half calf, library style; 67 engravings. Price, cloth, $1.50; half calf or half morocco, marbled edges, $4; paper, $i. Address TWENTIETH CENTURY PUBLISHING CO. "NEWS FROM NOWHERE." A Romance of Voluntary Socialism. By WILLIAM MORRIS, Poet, Novelist, and Social Agitator. Paper, 50 Cents; Cloth, 81. -"S Every reader of " Looking Backward" should read the best reply yet made to it. ' Mr. Morris is infinitely removed from all other imitators of Bellamy's book. He is as much aloof from them in the matter of his story as he is superior to Mr. Bellamy himself in the manner of relating it. "-Philadelphia Press. Twentieth Century Publishing Co., New Yok. HARRY Lyman Koopman. "THE ANOINTED". - %eprint from Ariel, Burlington. Vt. May, 1891. panes 113-115. A Novel of the Twenty-fifth Century.( Imagined) " THE GOTHIC MINSTER," -A Poem. Read before the Alumni of Colby Univ. June 30th. 1891. Published by th Twentieth Century Publishing Company. N.Y. 1891. -Twentieth Century Library. N.Y.July 30th.1891. No 43. Reprinted as a 15 page booklet. Letter written to Tenj.R.Tucker from Harry Lyman Koopman, of Burlington. Vt. dated January 26th. 1892. in which he sends his translat ion of a poem on page 30 of " STUJRM". This is the poem " ANARCHIE. by John Henry iackay. This poem as thanslated by Harry Lyman Koopman is printed in "LIBERTY" January 30th. 1892. ( Vol. VIII. No 34. Whole no. 216) It is traslated from the Germrna. Tucker, thereupon showed his skill at anslatinq frvm the German, and LIPERTY" for February 6th, 1892, ( 9 WThole nnmber2I7) published another poem from "STURNl" entitled THTE POETRY of the FTTTTURB".#### # "LIPERTY" February 13th. 1892, ( Vol.VIII. No. 36 Whole no. 218) reprints " VORLD- CITIZENSHIP" by John Henry Mackay. translated from the German by Harry Lyman Koopman, Folllowinc these translations LIDERTY prints a poem entitled " WHEN" by Harry Lyman Koopman. ***** " 11 LIERTY" June 4th. 1892. ( Vol.VIII. No. 42 Whole no. 224) A Review of Harry Lyman Koopman's " G-OTHIC MINSTER " written by Miriam Daniell appears in "LIJERTY" July 2, 1892. 2Vol.VIII. No. 42. Whole no, 228) A few other poems p### *# fottow wiritten by IHarry Lyman Kooppan. as in July 23, and Itly 30th and Sept. 17th. It I ~D