Explore "A Charge" by Herbert Trench on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
If thou hast squander'd years to grave a gem / Commission'd by thy absent Lord, and while / 'Tis incomplete, / Others would bribe thy needy skill to them -- / Dismiss them to the street!
Shouldst thou at last discover Beauty's grove, / At last be panting on the fragrant verge, / But in the track, / Drunk with divine possession, thou meet Love -- / Turn, at her bidding, back.
When round thy ship in tempest Hell appears, / And every spectre mutters up more dire / To snatch control / And loose to madness thy deep-kennell'd Fears -- / Then, to the helm, O Soul!
Last; if upon the cold green-mantling sea / Thou cling, alone with Truth, to the last spar, / Both castaway / And one must perish -- let it not be he / Whom thou art sworn to obey!