University of Virginia Library

PYTHAGORAS.

SON.
Father, who was Pythagoras?

FATHER.
I think
Thyself should'st know—an old philosopher
In Samos born, one of those sunny isles
That gem the mid-sea, where the Ægean tide
Laves Lesser Asia. But what reason moves
The question?

SON.
In a book I read to-day,
Where was much talk of strange old things, the writer
Said that Pythagoras had a golden thigh.

FATHER.
O yes! they say he had a golden thigh,
And of its beauty made a rare display
At the Olympic games, and that his body
Shone with a gleaming glory, like a god's,
And that no space could bind him, being seen
I' the self-same hour in places far apart,
And that his word was music, and his breath
Brought healing, and that he held mystic converse
With Abaris, the Hyperborean priest,
Who from the frosted Caucasus to Greece
Rode through the air, upon a golden arrow;
All this they say, and more.

SON.
But is it true?

FATHER.
As true as many tales that many men
Believe, and are much honoured for believing.

SON.
But surely such things can't be true: you don't
Believe them, father.

FATHER.
No, boy; they are false.

SON.
I wonder who could sit down, and invent
Such lies.

FATHER.
The Greeks.

SON.
I thought the Greeks were wise.

FATHER.
Yes! very wise. But, as the fattest loam
Sends forth both nurturing grain, and worthless weeds,
In rank abundance, so by Wisdom's throne
A subtle fool sits tinkling curious bells,
And mocks the sage. No land, like eloquent Greece,
Voiced deepest truth, or forged more monstrous lies.

SON.
Do other nations lie?

FATHER.
Yes: every nation;
Some less, some more. All peoples, parties, schools,
Conventions, convocations, churches lie,
Being human; perfect truth belongs to God.
Nor needs a conscious purpose to deceive,
But what they wish to see fond eyes invent,
And hearts more fond do hug the dear deceit.
But chiefly wonder hath a witching power
To beget lies; for each new portent strikes
The untutored gaze, with wit-confounding awe,
And every fool, that gapes for marvel, finds
A ready conjurer in his startled eye.
For the which cause, great thinkers, who do ride
Like new-born Suns, through our dull firmament,
Do mostly gather round them motley mists,
From the hot fumes of ignorant fancy bred,
Which hide their glory; and the many see
The shifting colours flashed from earth-born clouds,
Not the pure heavenly light. Thus Solomon
Was made a wizard; and the most learned Virgil
A necromancer; and Pythagoras
A juggling priest; and every maundering fool
Wears badges filched from sage philosophy.

SON.
But what rare wisdom did the Samian teach?

FATHER.
He saw the open mystery of Number,
That makes the world a world, and doth redeem
All things from chaos.

SON.
Then, should Number be
A name for God?

FATHER.
Yes! or an attribute,
Function, or form of uncreated MIND.

SON.
But God is one.

FATHER.
One power with many names.

SON.
Then let me hear the mystery of Number.

FATHER.
Bring me a flower.

SON.
Take this: it is a plant,
Which on the top ridge of steep Loch-na-Gar
I plucked but yesterday, beside the snow,
With which I pelted Fanny.

FATHER.
A delicate flower:
Knowest thou its name?

SON.
The learned schoolmaster,
Who clomb the hill with us, and slept all night
On Ben Muicdhui, 'neath the Shelter stone,
He said, I think, it was a Saxifrage—
Saxifraga stellaris.

FATHER.
So it is.
Count now the petals.

SON.
What are petals?

FATHER.
The segments of the blossom.

SON.
They are five.

FATHER.
Then count the stamens, that, like satellites,
Keep circular guard around the central germ.

SON.
I've told them twice. I think they number ten.

FATHER.
Right; and twice five make ten; and so this flower
Divides by five. The maker of the flower
Shaped the proportion; this Pythagoras saw.

SON.
And have all flowers a number?

FATHER.
Yes! all things
Are numbered, in a calculation far
Beyond the reach of Newton or Laplace.

SON.
Has grass a number?

FATHER.
Grass, and every grain
That yields sweet nurture to food-eating men,
Is measured by the perfect number THREE.

SON.
Hath THREE a special virtue?

FATHER.
Every number
Hath its own virtue; and the number THREE
Is the first number that contains the parts,
Which make a perfect whole.

SON.
I understand
This scarcely. What parts make a perfect whole?

FATHER.
A whole—'tis written thus in Aristotle—
Is that which hath beginning, middle, and end.

SON.
Ha! ha! now I remember, uncle John
Said that the Doctor preached a bad discourse,
Last Sunday; for he made so fierce a plunge
At first, he had no breath to follow on,
But stumbled through the middle course, and limped,
Like a poor jaded racer, to the end.

FATHER.
A common blunder. Preachers, poets, painters,
Against the virtue of the perfect THREE
Do oft offend.

SON.
And novel writers?

FATHER.
Yes.
They are the Pharisees that keep the letter,
But sin against the spirit of the law.

SON.
Father, I think you said, all things have number;
Some things, meseems, I know, that scorn control,
And riot in confusion. Who hath measured
The cloud, the tempest, and the waterfall?

FATHER.
God measures all things, is himself the measure
Of all that hath been, is, or yet shall be.
The headlong waterfall that o'er the cliff
Flings its full-flooded force, and fiercely smites
The black rocks with its many-sundered spray,
And in the rocky cauldron boils below,
With sleepless-whirling eddies, and white foam
Of bubbles bursting still, and still re-born;
This water hath a number men shall count
When moths shall measure mountains. Take that crust
Of curled black lichen, creeping o'er the face
Of the quartz rock—thou seest no order there;
But arm thine eye with scientific glass,
And probe the throbbing alleys of its life,
And mark its lines and surfaces, thou'lt find
A mustered and a marshalled beauty there,
As perfect as the ordered strategy
Of that French conqueror, who mapped all Europe
With battle fields, and played with human lives,
As children play with bowls, and made the world
The chess-board of his vast Imperial scheme.
His battles seemed confused, at times; but well
He knew the portioned number of his host,
And with one glance from him, they from afar
Gathered the seeming looseness of their ranks,
And, with concentric curious-numbered speed,
Bore on the spot well-marked for doom, and burst
In calculated thunder—Dost thou see
This small brown hillock?

SON.
Yes! what is it?

FATHER.
An ant-hill.

SON.
O how strange! up to this hour
I never saw one.

FATHER.
Learn to use your eyes.

SON.
O how they dive, and run, and wheel about!
Some here, some there, o'er one another's heads!
And some creep into holes, and some creep out,
And some are galloping with straws, and some
With little sticks are hobbling, and some push
A small white roll before their tiny snouts;
'Tis very strange!

FATHER.
Take care you don't intrude
Too close on their domain, or you may find
Bustling betwixt your stockings and your skin
No pleasant guests.

SON.
They're swarming still—I wonder
If evermore they make this moving medley;
Their reeling makes me dizzy, as the light
Far-shimmering o'er the million-pointed wave
Confounds the eye.

FATHER.
Man's eye is oft confounded,
Where no confusion is.

SON.
Is there none here?

FATHER.
No; more order than in your weak brain, or mine,
Or any brain that harbours human thoughts.
As well as sage Pythagoras, I trow,
These puny craftsmen know what number means.

SON.
Have they a plan?

FATHER.
Doubt not; as much as he,
Who piled the granite tower, whose turrets nod
High o'er the light-plumed birches of Balmoral.

SON.
'Tis wondrous strange!

FATHER.
Far stranger, if thou knew
The secrets of that sphered metropolis,
Whereof thou dost but see the outer posts,
And a few hundred peaceful citizens,
By our ungracious intrusion frayed:
Not fair Turin, or Berlin, or the pomp
Of high Dunedin's breezy palaces,
Hath streets more orderly; every lane, I wis,
Is numbered here, and every cross-way swept.
This busy people, as their skill may be,
Have, each his portioned work; some delve and burrow,
And make huge tunnels where a passage fails;
Some span the void with arches, and some scoop
A drain for water, whose untimely swell
Might flood the colony: some are sent abroad
To gather stores for winter's use; and some
Pile the new-plundered grains. Some run, some wait;
Some sweat and serve, some hold a high command;
But each a needful task fulfils; and all,
By mystic number's harmony, combine
The swarming units to a marshalled whole.

SON.
I think I've read somewhere that bees no less
Are cunning engineers, and captained well.

FATHER.
All things are full of cunning; even fools
Have wisdom for their need; and multitude
By number grouped, and by discretion used
Is power.

SON.
Well, now, I think I understand
What NUMBER means, and what Pythagoras taught.

FATHER.
'Tis well to understand; remains to make
Each worthy thought sire to a worthier deed.
Dear boy, a delicate work before thee lies,
Even mortal life: there too must mumber reign,
The fore-thought system, and sure-ordered plan,
Where every counted faculty must ply
Its special work, and rule its known domain;
Else chaos and disharmony shall seize
Thy mutinous state, and in the whirl of Time
Thy helmless bark go down.—Pythagoras,
Vexed with the Samian despot's lawless sway,
(For tyrants ne'er loved wisdom) crossed the seas,
And found a home on the Hesperian shore,
Then when the Tarquin arched the infant Rome
With vaults, the germ of Cæsar's golden hall.
There, in Crotona's state, he held a school
Of wisdom and of virtue, teaching men
The harmony of aptly-portioned powers,
And of well-numbered days: whence as a god
Men honoured him: and, from his wells refreshed,
The master builder of pure intellect,
Imperial Plato piled the palace, where
All great true thoughts have found a home for ever.
These men thy teachers make, and thou art wise.
We moderns are sharp-eyed; but keep thou far
From clear cold microscopic men, who sneer
At Plato sage, and wise Pythagoras.