Consolation

All are not taken; there are left behind
Living Beloveds, tender looks to bring,
And make the daylight still a happy thing,
And tender voices, to make soft the wind:
But if it were not so- if I could find
No love in all the world for comforting,
Nor any path but hollowly did ring
Where ‘dust to dust’ the love from life disjoined,
And if, before those sepulchers unmoving
I stood alone, (as some forsaken lamb
Goes bleating up the moors in weary dearth,)
Crying ‘Where are ye, O my loved and loving?’-
I know a Voice would sound, ‘Daughter, I AM.
Can I suffice in HEAVEN and not for earth?’ -Elizabeth Barrett Browning
from The Seraphim and other Poems 1838

Con`so*la"tion (?), n. [L. consolatio: cf. F. consolation.]

The act of consoling; the state of being consoled; allevation of misery or distress of mind; refreshment of spirit; comfort; that which consoles or comforts the spirit.

Against such cruelties With inward consolations recompensed. Milton.

Are the consolations of God small with thee? Job xv. 11.

Syn. -- Comfort; solace; allevation. See Comfort.

 

© Webster 1913.