“Ye Brood Of Conscience--Spectres! That Frequent”

Ye brood of conscience--Spectres! that frequent The bad man’s restless walk, and haunt his bed-- Fiends in your aspect, yet beneficent In act, as hovering Angels when they spread Their wings to guard the unconscious Innocent-- Slow be the Statutes of the land to share A laxity that could not but impair Your power to punish crime, and so prevent. And ye, Beliefs! coiled serpent-like about The adage on all tongues, “Murder will out,” How shall your ancient warnings work for good In the full might they hitherto have shown, If for deliberate shedder of man’s blood Survive not Judgment that requires his own?

“The sixth sonnet adverts to the effect of the law in preventing the crime of murder, not merely by fear, but by horror, by investing the crime itself with the colouring of dark and terrible imaginations.” (Sir Henry Taylor.)--ED.

See Chaucer, The Nonnes Priestes Tale, l. 232.--ED.