University of Virginia Library

So spake the wise. Upon Athenian streets
Each man his ample tunic wore, confined
By golden clasp, self-satisfied and built
In the proud arrogance of kingliest rights;
While the large cubs beside the Tyber nursed,
Strengthened into ungovernable wolves.
Everywhere gods—but gods like men—and men
Aspiring to be gods, Lyremmos saw,—
Saw, and was wildered by the depths of things;
For is it not the partial truth that swims
Beneath, or gilds the surface of all creeds,
Laws, arts, which fights against the absolute truth?
Truth, and not error, is our enemy—
A relative and half-seen truth, which seems
Perfect, because the flower of its own age,—
Because it is more fair than all the past,
And burns against the blackness of the future.
White tunics, brazen arms, and cinctured brows,
In charioteered array, are thronging past.
Oxen, milk white and filleted with flowers,
Follow the small bright axes of the priests.
Thickens the hum in the dense theatre,—
The rushing wheels are heard, and rival steeds
Pawing the crimson dust—both gods and men
Pause, breathless; crownéd heads bend o'er the poles,
And shake the impetuous lash. The sinewy-armed
Leap into the arena, and contend
With measured grasp and sudden artifice;
A stately nation deifies the victor,
And an imperious poetry uplifts
Her wondrous torch, and on the poet's brow
The evergreen of honorable fame
Alights, and he, too, is a god: behold,
The incense is before him, and its breath
Intoxicating floats around his throne.
The Teian lyre at intervals is heard,
And to its call the fair-limbed dancers throng.
The sweet pipe wanders through its high discourse,
Tongued softly,—now a louder measure stirs
The languid blood, like quivering lightning: hushed
At once, as the choragus strikes the ground,
Silence leads in the terrors of the scene,
With its grand argument of fate and death,
Heroic passions, mortal demigods.
Everywhere shines the sun on marble shrines,
Everywhere on the emblems of the gods.
Oh, fairest work that yet the soul and hand
Jointly have realized, advancing even
Up to the speechless presence of the perfect;
Even to the Idea by which power
Is one with rest: the casual and the false,
And the express annulled! With golden staff
And crimson mantle stands the honored sculptor.

A sense of change creeps through the earth like spring;
Another change; the Journey lies still on,
And the refreshéd traveller from the Porch,
Whither with hope and joy he had repaired,
Hurries to meet the birth of coming years.
The giant of the Tyber towards all shores
Thrusts his insatiate spear; no more the waste
Harbours chimeras, or a ridge of hills
Bounds the known world. Is not the strongest king?
The sword interrogates, nor waits reply,
But ruthlessly affirms his right with blood.
Isis appears in Rome, and Roman gods
Share with Osiris Alexandria's fanes,—
Adonis is forgot by Syrian maids
With annual outgoings and lamentings sweet,—
The voice from Delphi's cavern faltering fails,—
Mithras bewails th' unfrequent sacrifice,
As magi gaze upon propitious stars,
And with mute confidence await their Lord;
The Hebrew groans beneath the iron hand
Of the sword-bearer, and prophetic shrieks,
With gnostic mysticism by the gates
Of Solomon, have long been heard: all eyes
Wait for the advent of the Holy One.
Who shall describe Him, the new conqueror,
The promised one of old? With greater force
Opposing force, shall he with sound of trump
Be a triumphant swordsman? Shall he come
Learnéd and wise, a sage among the sage,
Illumining the great profound. He comes!
“Great Pan is dead,” the pilot hears becalmed;
“Great Pan is dead,” he hears repeated thrice
On the wide sea, as if it were the moon
Uttering to the deep this mystery.
Crumble all temples, and expire all flames
Hitherto ever burning on the shrines:
Let the white smoke upon all altars cease;
Free ye the filleted heifer and the lamb!

A youth sits singing on a fair flower-field,
Of marvellous beauty and of strength unknown.
Naked as at his birth, save that his neck,
His ancles, and his wrists, bore many strings
Of diamond and of amber, and his hair
Fell black unto his loins, with fragrant oil
Anointed. Through this hair his gracious eyes
Looked lovingly around upon all things;
Albeit the long eyelash seemed to lend
An indolence, and threaten hasty night
To each emotion, and his parted lips
Wavered between a sorrow and a joy,
As if surprise was their continual guest.
Upon the green earth, thick with flowers, he sat:
But chief of all these flowers narcissus grew,
And by the Nile, which kissed that flowery mead,
The lotus. With a subtle active hand
Wrought he in red clay from the caverned ground,
Small lares and penates infinite
In symbols and device, and as he wrought,
Orphic rhapsodies to the earth sang he,
And the sweet tale of Psyche lately taught
By the great sage.

So sat he and so sang,
While the world went rejoicing through the heaven,
And the sun passed from sign to sign, and they,
The Man, the Woman, and the Child, appeared,
Pilgrims from Bethlehem. On an ass sat she,
And in her arms the child; her innocent hair
Drawn smoothly back beneath a dark blue hood,
Her meek eyes resting on her child's head: He,
The God and man at once, and yet a child,
Clad in a white shirt with a hem of gold;
Over his head a circle in the air,
An orbit as it seemed of subtlest lightning,
And holding in his hand a golden ball,
Looked with calm eyes right forth unto the youth
Singing beneath the curtain of his hair
Hymns to the earth, and carving symbol-gods.
While yet far off the influence of those eyes
So penetrated him — he stayed his work.
The old man led the ass straight on, intent
As it would seem on nought but harborage
At fitting hour at eve, but it stood still.
Throwing his wild head back, the vehement youth
And the calm child converséd, eye with eye.
“Who passes through this land from pyramid
To pyramid; from the gray distant east,
By lotus-bearing waters, to the west
Gray distant; from the golden gate of birth,
Where the sphynx watches, to the ebon doors
Where likewise sits she, though with closed eyelids.
Who can so journey by my flowery field,
Seeing me, whom mortal vision worships,
Without a votive or a suppliant sign,—
Belongeth he to water, or to air,—
Is he a brother? yet I know him not.”—
“Brother, in sooth,” replied the child, “in sooth
A brother, come to help thee. From all time
I have been coming; from the Infinite
I have been coming, and behold me now
Passing with tears into the Infinite.
Thy eyes are not as my eyes, yet behold
Thou understandest me, and seest the light
That burns around my head.”—“I see thee fair,
But not the fairness of our mighty mother
See I in thee; I feel thou art much love,
Yet art thou not the quiver-bearing god
With whom I fly into Elysium oft:
Still art thou great, for I, the Vigorous,
Before thy humble presence hold my breath;
But how canst thou be feared,—a nurse-borne child,—
An ass,—an old man? I am strong; these arms
Strong against all that live; am rich in shrines
Numberless; rich in arts, albeit live
Like the wild bee; but in thy nerveless arms
I see no ægis, no caduceus, staff,
Sceptre, nor club.”—“Thou sayest well; I know
That thou art strong as life, that never fails,
But is reborn of death; that thou art strong
Against the wind and wave and all that is:
Strong am I, also, as that life that flows
Outward from all minds, inward from all things,
To death unknown; strong not against but with.
For love most surely makes the mightiest serve
With sweet consent of soul, but not with bonds.
And for the signs of rule that thou hast named,
Are they not each peculiar to some act
Of force or knowledge all unfit for me?
But in their place behold this cross-crowned ball,
Sign of supremacy on earth; a sign
Thou knowest not, of sorrow dominant.”—
“Such speech is Typhon's: speakest thou of love,
Yet rulest thou by suffering? saidst thou not,
Thou wert my brother,—mine,—the singer ever
Of varied hymns unto the procreant earth
From whom I sprang, from whom sprang gods and men,
Who ordereth power, from whom flows happiness;
Who giveth laws to wisdom, by which laws
The souls of men ascend, becoming gods?”—
“I am thy brother, not alone of earth,
Which is as nothing, but because of spirit:
Spirit alike in all, for of himself
Man is but evil, and all men the same.
The universal Spirit I adore,
In Him I live, nor are there any gods
Save Him. The earth is manifold, but he
Is one; the mind of man hath many joys,
And of these joys the gods are fancied wards;
But there is one thing needful, one alone,
Which is to know the truth that all can learn,
And to have faith therein:—so that all joy,
All sorrow, learning, power, will be but seeming.”—
“Of Demogorgon I have heard, the spirit;
Com'st thou from him? if so, pass on thy way,
For I can never see his terrible sphere,
But shrink with fear extreme even at his name.
Pass on, dread child, who sing'st of unity:
In multitude I live with constant change,
With beauty everywhere, deformity
Everywhere also, and the ideal poised
In still recurring orbit overhead—
Many ideals, many orbits, lo!
I fashion them in pliant clay. And oft
An ear reluctant have I given to those
Who speak of Demogorgon, but no joy
Have they yet added to mine own. First came
An obscure utterance from the east, a voice
From the great Ganges, saying,—Energy,
Why livest thou so bold in good and ill,
In pain and pleasure; hold thyself retired;
Deny, be still, within the cause perceive
The action and result: content thyself
Without them; they are transient, turn thyself
Into the permanent within? I tried
With many pains, and with obliviousness,
Nor found I permanence. Then many came;
Voices from Egypt; voices from the schools
Hear I even now, in which rejoice I much,
Yet fear I more—for speak they not of spirit?
Pass on, dread child, who sing'st of unity.”—
“Pass I not on, for I have come to thee;
And this is what I bear from the great God,
Who made the creature man, to whom I speak.
That not by learning shall he reascend
Into the primal quiet of his being,
But as a little child he must become:
That not by sensuous pleasure shall he step
Within the circle of his happiness,
But as a virgin, with simplicity
Shielding her round and round, he must become.
Not by the rule of sceptre shall he gain
Nearer to sov'reignty, but by the heart
Shall he find rest in life; for happiness
Is an outgoing sympathy, and he
Who giveth most receiveth most: yea, He
Who giveth life receiveth life eternal.
Even for this cause came I into the world.”
The youth turned down his supplicating eyes
Unto the earth, as if to ask for help.
No answer did the earth return; those strange
And cunning figures that his hand had made
Melted away, the likeness of a cross
Remaining only; on his knees the youth
Bent humbly to the child with clasped hands.

Whence is this novel doctrine, spiritual theme
Of strange equality, renouncing state,
Order, subordination, war, and gain?
Who is the king they place above us all,
So honoring his speech beyond our edicts?
Bring him forth, those who follow him bring forth—
That they may die, and so our power, whom Jove
Doth make to rule on earth may firm remain.
Do they not hold by him whose shameful end
Was prayed for by his tribe; do they not hold
That sacred Delphi is a demon-voice,
That all the gods are demons or mere dreams?
Atheists are they not, unheard-of men,
Who are as beasts, whom reason cannot reach?
Bring them before us, that by their just death
The pure theocracy be sacred held.

Citizens! what impiety appears
Amongst us, knocking even at our doors,
Unveiling women, drinking children's blood!
Shall we have games and festivals no more?
Triumphs no more, nor arts, nor capitols,
Nor golden tissue for the weavers' trade?
All learning and all knowledge,—shall they cease,
And we stand naked to barbarians' swords?
The people's voice hath said that they must die.

Such were the loud responses to those hymns,
Heard with sweet concords through the under paths
Of social life; and such the fierce reply
To the love-prompted utterers of the word.
They died, but perished not. Above all pain,
By which antagonism strives for power,
Those sweet concords increased: with changing words
Increaséd they; alas! with changeful words:
With words which are the mortal vestments thought
Appears in at the altar of the mind,—
Thought, the immortal and untangible,
The ruler of the act;—with changeful words
Those sweet concords increased upon the ear,
And left the heart as barren as before.
Too simple for the learning of the past,
Too unadorned to reign above the senses,
Too naked for the buskined pride of youth,
Which then was this world's epoch; gnostic lore
Came with its theologic fantasy,
Building hierarchies, and seven heavens
With their degrees of beatific joys,
And a like mystic number of dark hells.
Initiatory sacrament and sign
Drew the hushed flocks together in the night.
Missives of shepherds become canons holy:
The shepherds tribute-gifted, and their crooks
Gem-crusted gold!

Away unto the waste,
In sackcloth with a girdle of horsehair,
Flies the ascetic from the growing honors;
No sandal and no linen and no food,—
He trusts unto the hand that bird and beast
Feeds ever. In high places shines the cross,
The sign that aided the imperial arms—
Strangest of aids!—upon the battle field.
In highest places, and on altars girt
With princes, and in councils:—for the priests
Have this most wondrous duty, to sift out
The God's word from the scribe's word. Shall we not
Be one in faith? Yea, he who otherwise
Than that believes—pursue him from the fold,
Unto Gehenna: never more let men
Reason on that, for it shall not be changed.
And thus the modern world grew up to flower:
One God, one bishop, and one creed — one man
To rule—let every state have its own king:
A hierarchy in heaven, and in the church
A hierarchy; another in the state.
The outstretched basis of this pyramid,
A feudal serfdom cleaving to the soil,
Yet reaching freely up from class to class,
For all souls are the same with God, all powers
His instruments. The Idea everywhere—
Of God, of man, of nature, of creation—
Without which there is no rest for the worker,
No aim towards which to work—this general scheme
By revelation fixed: the modern mind
Concentrated within the narrow sphere
Of Understanding, Science substitutes
For Reasoning, and beneath the wings of Faith
Sits in the school of Knowledge patiently;
Investigates, explores, even to the core
And centre of the sensuous, to the depth
Where soul and sense unite; till step by step
He shall come out into another sphere,
From Faith and Knowledge equally removed—
Evolve the resurrection of the real,
And be at last the master!