"But let my falling limbs beneath My Mother's smile recline, And prayers sustain my laboring breath From out her sacred shrine.
"And let the cross beside my bed In its dread presence rest; And let the absolving words be said To ease a laden breast.
"Thou, Lord, where'er we lie, canst aid; But He who taught His own To live as one, will not upbraid The dread to die alone."
The death of Gerontius was Newman's ideal Christian death, and Gerontius does not die alone; he is upborne, refreshed by the prayers of his friends. Of Newman's sacred songs, "The Pillar of the Cloud" is, as we know, put first by some critics. And yet for musical diction, for sweetness and all the beauty of artistic technique, the song of the soul in "The Dream" equals if not surpasses it.
"Take me away, and in the lowest deep, There let me be, And there in hope the lone night-watches keep, Told out for me."
In "Verses on Various Occasions" there is the picture of the resigned souls expecting the Blessed Vision. "Waiting for the Morning" was written at Oxford, 1835. It begins:
"They are at rest; We may not stir the heaven of their repose With loud-voiced grief, or passionate request, Or selfish plaints for those Who in the mountain grots of Eden lie, And hear the fourfold river as it passes by."
By "Eden" Newman symbolized the paradise--the resting-place of souls--of the fourfold rivers. Here they patiently abide,
"And soothing sounds Blend with the neighboring waters as they glide; Posted along the haunted garden's bounds Angelic forms abide, Echoing as words of watch, o'er lawn and grove, The verses of that hymn which seraphs chant above."
The fulness of higher meditation and knowledge is in the triumphant song of the Soul, but "Waiting for the Morning" contains its suggestion, just as "The Lady of Shalott" by Lord Tennyson contains the germ of the exquisite "Elaine."
The dedication of "The Dream of Gerontius" reads, in English: "To the Most Beloved Brother, John Joseph Gordon, Priest of the Order of St. Philip de Neri, whose soul is in the Place of Refreshment.[10] All Souls' Day, 1865."
The Rev. John Joseph Gordon, of the Oratory, was very dear to Newman, and his death was a great blow to him. But of all the Oratorians, the Cardinal especially loved Father Ambrose St. John, whose name he accentuates on the last page of the "Apologia." Father St. John, who was of the Gordon family, died in 1875, and Newman suffered what he held to be his saddest bereavement. Ambrose St. John had been with him at Littlemore. Writing to Mr. Dering of the death of Father Ambrose St. John, he said: "I never had so great a loss. He had been my life under God for twenty-two years." The dread of dying alone and the deep affection for friends--an affection that reaches the throne of God by prayer--tinge the whole structure of "The Dream." They are part of Newman himself.
Cardinal Newman died at Edgbaston Oratory, August 11, 1890; he was buried, at his own request, in the grave with Father Ambrose St. John. "'The Dream of Gerontius' was composed in great grief after the death of a dear friend."
A careful study of "The Dream of Gerontius" will show how musical it is, and how delicately the music of the verse changes with the themes. The form of poetry, as we know, approaches music. If a poem is not musical in expression, its metres fail of producing the effect they are intended to produce. So musical is "The Dream of Gerontius" and so capable of being treated by the musicians, that various composers suggested the making of an oratorio of it. Dr. Elgar has done it. "An Ursuline," in The Catholic World, for June, 1903, says: "Dr. Elgar, when a child, sat Sunday after Sunday in the organ-loft of St. George's Roman Catholic Church, Worcester, England, where his father had been organist for the long period of thirty-seven years. Subtly the spirit of the grand old church music was instilled into the boy." Of "The Dream" Dr. Elgar said: "The poem has been soaking in my mind for at least eight years. All that time I had been gradually assimilating the thoughts of the author into my musical promptings." In 1889 a copy of the poem, with the markings made by General Gordon, was presented to Dr. Elgar as a wedding gift. The markings of the heroic and devout Gordon especially interested him. The reading of this little book helped to make Dr. Elgar's fame, which is based solely on his masterpiece, the oratorio performed in London on June 6, 1903, in Westminster Cathedral. Richard Strauss is looked on by musicians as the master of what is called "tone-color"--a perfect harmony between the tone of the instrument and the music arranged for it. But the German and English critics declare that in "The Dream of Gerontius" Dr. Elgar has surpassed Richard Strauss. "The Demons' Chorus," says The Pall Mall Gazette, "may be regarded as one of the last words of musical audacity." For the study of the music we suggest Dr. Jaeger's Analysis, printed by Novello in London and New York. Mr. Theodore Thomas, speaking of Dr. Elgar's "Dream of Gerontius," said that it is the most important oratorio of recent times, not excepting Brahms' Requiem. "'Gerontius,'" he added, "is a lofty work, and, from a technical point of view, more masterly than Brahms ever dreamed of. It is by far the most important and satisfying modern work written for voices and orchestra."
It is understood that Cardinal Newman himself suggested that his poem should be set to music. The delicacy of his ear as to sounds is shown by the changes of the verse-music,--which is made up of accent, pause, and rhythm,--to fit the varying feeling of the work. If the student will scan the lines and reduce them to musical expression,--leaving out, of course, the quality of pitch, he can easily corroborate this.
This is in two-beat rhythm:
The first syllable of "Jesu" is the anacrusis; the measure of the metre begins with the first accent. Whether this system of verse-notation or that of the usual scansion be followed, the meaning of the changing forms will be made plain. The system of verse-notation will be found more satisfactory in the metrical study of the poem. The second form of primary rhythm--that based on three beats in the measure--is effectively used. We find it in the Song of the Demons:
Low-born clods Of brute earth, They aspire,--]
[1] From Merlin's song in Tennyson's "Coming of Arthur."
[2] Coventry Patmore's "Ode to the Body."
[3] From the Psalm, "De profundis clamavi ad te, Domine."--"Out of the depths have I cried to Thee, O Lord."
[4] "Come to his assistance, ye saints of God; come forth to meet him, ye angels of the Lord: Receiving his soul: Offering it in the sight of the Most High."
[5] This passage in "The Dream of Gerontius" calls to mind Tennyson's lines in "The Princess":
"Ah, sad and strange, as in dark summer dawns The earliest pipe of half-awakened birds To dying ears, when unto dying eyes The casement slowly grows a glimmering square."
[6] La Psychologie du Purgatoire (The Psychology of Purgatory): Abbé Chollet, Doctor of Theology at Lille.