Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The Light of Stars

{{smallcaps|The}} night is come, but not too soon;
And sinking silently,
All silently, the little moon
Drops down behind the sky.
There is no light in earth or heaven
But the cold light of stars;
And the first watch of night is given
To the red planet Mars.

Venus vs. Mars

Venus is the 'star of love'—but it's not visible tonight. Mars gets the watch instead. Longfellow's switching from romance to warfare.

Is it the tender star of love?
The star of love and dreams?
Oh no! from that blue tent above
A hero's armor gleams.
And earnest thoughts within me rise,
When I behold afar,
Suspended in the evening skies,
The shield of that red star.
O star of strength! I see thee stand
And smile upon my pain;
Thou beckonest with thy mailèd hand,

Military imagery

Mars wears 'mailèd' (chain mail) armor. The planet's reddish glow becomes a warrior's hand gesture, beckoning the speaker to endure.

And I am strong again.

Internal astronomy

The cold starlight from line 6 now mirrors his emotional state. He's mapping the night sky onto his own chest—no warmth, just resolve.

Within my breast there is no light
But the cold light of stars;
I give the first watch of the night
To the red planet Mars.
The star of the unconquered will,
He rises in my breast,
Serene, and resolute, and still,

Stoic virtues

Four adjectives in a row: serene, resolute, still, calm, self-possessed. This is the Roman ideal of *gravitas*—Mars as philosophy, not just war god.

And calm, and self-possessed.
And thou, too, whosoe'er thou art,

Psalm structure

He calls it a 'psalm'—a sacred song of instruction. The shift to 'thou' makes this a sermon, not just personal meditation.

That readest this brief psalm,
As one by one thy hopes depart,
Be resolute and calm.
Oh, fear not in a world like this,
And thou shalt know erelong,
Know how sublime a thing it is

Suffering as sublime

'Sublime' meant elevated, awe-inspiring—the aesthetic category for mountains and storms. He's making endurance into high art.

To suffer and be strong.
Source Wikipedia Poetry Foundation

Reading Notes

The Roman Mars, Not the Greek Ares

Longfellow wrote this in 1838, during a period of personal grief—his first wife Mary had died in 1835. But instead of Venus (love, loss, mourning), he turns to Mars for consolation. This matters because Roman Mars was different from Greek Ares. Ares was chaotic violence; Mars was *disciplina militaris*—military discipline, civic duty, the virtue of endurance. When Longfellow sees Mars's 'shield' and 'mailèd hand,' he's not invoking bloodlust but Stoic fortitude.

The poem's structure reinforces this. It opens with absence: no moon, no earthly light, Venus not visible. What remains is 'the cold light of stars'—distant, impersonal, but reliable. Mars doesn't offer warmth or comfort. It offers constancy. The repetition of 'the first watch of night' (lines 7 and 23) frames this as a vigil, a military guard duty. Grief becomes a station to man, not a wound to heal.

The turn at line 25 ('the star of the unconquered will') makes the metaphor internal. Mars 'rises in my breast'—the external planet becomes an internalized principle. This is Stoicism as astronomy: the universe's order (stars keeping their courses) models the order you impose on yourself. By line 29, he's addressing 'thou,' the reader, turning private meditation into public instruction. The 'brief psalm' becomes a manual for endurance.

Why 'Sublime' Matters

The final word—'sublime'—is the poem's philosophical anchor. In 1838, 'sublime' was a technical term from Edmund Burke and Immanuel Kant: the aesthetic experience of something vast, powerful, even terrifying that elevates rather than destroys you. Mountains. Storms. God's power. Longfellow applies it to suffering.

Know how sublime a thing it is / To suffer and be strong.

This isn't 'suffering builds character' platitude. It's claiming that endurance has the same aesthetic status as natural grandeur. The poem's imagery supports this: Mars 'suspended in the evening skies' like a shield is visually sublime—distant, immense, armored. The speaker doesn't overcome pain; he positions himself in relation to it, the way you position yourself before a mountain. The cold starlight, the red planet, the 'unconquered will'—these are all vast, impersonal forces. Aligning yourself with them makes you vast too.

The final couplet's syntax is worth noticing: 'Know how sublime a thing it is / To suffer and be strong.' The enjambment delays 'sublime,' making you wait for the revelation. And 'suffer and be strong' uses the infinitive—not 'I suffered' or 'you will suffer,' but the timeless, abstract act. He's not describing his grief. He's describing a permanent human possibility, written in the stars.