V
Claude to Eustace
Luther, they say, was unwise; like a half-taught German, he could notSee that old follies were passing most tranquilly out of remembrance;Leo the Tenth was employing all efforts to clear out abuses;Jupiter, Juno, and Venus, Fine Arts, and Fine Letters, the Poets,Scholars, and Sculptors, and Painters, were quietly clearing away theMartyrs, and Virgins, and Saints, or at any rate Thomas Aquinas:He must forsooth make a fuss and distend his huge Wittenberg lungs, andBring back Theology once yet again in a flood upon Europe:Lo you, for forty days from the windows of heaven it fell; theWaters prevail on the earth yet more for a hundred and fifty;Are they abating at last? the doves that are sent to explore areWearily fain to return, at the best with a leaflet of promise,—Fain to return, as they went, to the wandering wave-tost vessel,—Fain to re-enter the roof which covers the clean and the unclean,—Luther, they say, was unwise; he didn’t see how things were going;Luther was foolish,—but, O great God! what call you Ignatius?O my tolerant soul, be still! but you talk of barbarians,Alaric, Attila, Genseric;—why, they came, they killed, theyRavaged, and went on their way; but these vile, tyrannous Spaniards,These are here still,—how long, O ye heavens, in the country of Dante?These, that fanaticized Europe, which now can forget them, release notThis, their choicest of prey, this Italy; here you see them,—Here, with emasculate pupils and gimcrack churches of Gesu,Pseudo-learning and lies, confessional-boxes and postures,—Here, with metallic beliefs and regimental devotions,—Here, overcrusting with slime, perverting, defacing, debasing,Michael Angelo’s Dome, that had hung the Pantheon in heaven,Raphael’s Joys and Graces, and thy clear stars, Galileo!