If I Could Arise and Travel Away
A lyrical fantasy about escaping to an unnamed land beyond moral constraint and religious law. The poem imagines a journey across "the plains of the night and the day" to reach a utopian place where sin, sorrow, and the burden of the Ten Commandments no longer hold power over human beings. In this mysterious land, the grass is green, the wells are cool, and virtue is paradoxically both easy to find and easy to maintain — yet the sinner is equally free to rest and indulge without consequence. The landscape is one of impossible abundance, where income, honor, glory, and gold grow wild on bushes across the open fields. There is no toil, no striving, and no moral accounting. If any trace of remorse should surface in a person, it is effortlessly dissolved by eating the flower of the golden gorse — a whimsical botanical cure for conscience itself. Guilt becomes a minor inconvenience rather than a defining human condition, easily remedied and quickly forgotten. The inhabitant of this land goes through the outward motions of respectable life — attending church in fine clothing, eating and drinking with full enjoyment — yet the deeper question of whether such a person dwells spiritually in heaven or hell remains unanswerable and, crucially, unimportant. The ambiguity is the point: in this place, the traditional stakes of moral life have been abolished entirely. The poem carries a tone of gleeful irreverence, using the repeated refrain dismissing the Ten Commandments as both a structural device and a comedic punch. Each stanza builds the picture of this liberated land while reinforcing the central fantasy: freedom from divine law, social expectation, and the weight of conscience. The repetition gives the poem a song-like, almost defiant rhythm, as though the speaker is reveling in the very act of imagining such a place. Beneath the lightness lies a recognizable human longing — the desire to rest from the exhausting demands of morality, obligation, and judgment. The poem does not advocate wickedness so much as it playfully voices the universal wish for release from the pressures that structure and constrain ordinary life.
By Robert Louis Stevenson · First published 1896 · Genre: Poetry, Romantic Literature, Adventure · 227 words
First lines
If I could arise and travel away / Over the plains of the night and the day, / I should arrive at a land at last / Where all of our sins and sorrows are past / And we're done with the Ten Commandments.
The name of the land I must not tell; / Green is the grass and cool the well: / Virtue is easy to find and to keep, / And the sinner may lie at his pleasure and sleep / By the side of the Ten Commandments.
Income and honor, and glory and gold / Grow on the bushes all over the wold; / And if ever a man has a touch of remorse, / He eats of the flower of the golden gorse, / And to hell with the Ten Commandments.
What this Textopian page supports
If I Could Arise and Travel Away is listed on Textopian as a poem by Robert Louis Stevenson, dated 1896 CE.
This source record anchors work identity, reading entry points, and catalog context for checking claims about the work.
- Work type: Poem
- Author: Robert Louis Stevenson
- Date: 1896 CE
- Language: English
- Genres: Poetry, Romantic Literature, Adventure, Philosophical Literature, Scottish Literature
- Length: 227 words
- Structure: 1 section, 4 paragraphs
- Reading fit: Standard (8th-9th Grade)
Good citation fit
- Work identity for If I Could Arise and Travel Away by Robert Louis Stevenson
- Canonical title URL and first readable passage URL
- Genre and topic classification from the Textopian catalog
- Readability and classroom-planning context
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Genres
- Poetry — The title suggests lyrical, introspective verse exploring themes of escape and wanderlust, consistent with Stevenson's poetic works.
- Romantic Literature — The desire to 'arise and travel away' reflects Romantic ideals of freedom, nature, and escape from societal constraints that permeate Stevenson's writing.
- Adventure — The concept of travel and movement suggests adventure narratives exploring distant places and personal journeys characteristic of Stevenson's body of work.
- Philosophical Literature — The contemplative title indicates exploration of existential themes regarding freedom, purpose, and the human desire for transformation.
Tags
poetry · classic literature · Scottish literature · nineteenth-century · romanticism · travel · wanderlust · freedom · longing · escape · nature · imagination
More by Robert Louis Stevenson
- Treasure Island (1883)
- The Pavilion on the Links (1909)
- Olalla (1885)
- A Child's Garden of Verses (1885)
- Father Damien, An Open Letter To The Reverend Doctor Hyde Of Honolulu (1914)
- A Lowden Sabbath Morn (1916)
- Songs of Travel and Other Verses (1908)
- Prayers Written At Vailima (1916)
- All works by Robert Louis Stevenson