Master and Scholar, Etc (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1866. Excerpt: ... MASTER AND SCHOLAR. I. SCENE--A Franciscan House. St Ebbe's, Oxford. A winter sunrise, 1267. ROGER BACON sitting at a desk, dressed as a Franciscan friar, barefooted. '"PHE dawn is breaking, thick and gray the mists Float upward from the meadows, and the frost Hangs, silver crystalled, on each feathery bough; Slowly the river creeps through banks of ice, Itself half frozen; and the cold clear moon Still lingers in the west, while golden rays Light up the spires and towers of yonder town, Transfigured into beauty. Others wake From wonted slumbers. Priests and students flock To chant their matins, and the peasant churl Seeks fuel in the forest; but to me Sleep comes not yet. I keep my vigil late, And through the cold long night I labour still, For, lo the night comes on when none can work. Writes, and then pauses. And so my task is ended, and I close The labour of my life. This worn-out pen Has done good service. All my search for truth, The search through this wide-spreading universe, The wonders of the earth and of the deep, The glories of yon star-decked firmament, The search within through all the maze of life, The thoughts that come and go, the subtle law By which men pass from ignorance to doubt, From doubt to truth, from truth in lower things To truth in higher, onward, onward still, Till knowledge ends in wonder, and the soul, Sated yet craving, stops in weariness, And then we kneel before the throne, and veil Our faces, like the Cherubim who stand, Their rainbow wings enwrapping face and feet, And evermore cry " Holy is the Lord "--All this has reached its end, and what I know, The treasure God has given me from His store, Lies here within this casket. So my work, This greater work than all my former toils, Shall live throughout the ages. Now I f...