IN. There is no greater god in heaven than he.
PR. Nor none more cruel nor more tyrannous.
IN. But what can man against the power of god?
PR. Doth not man strive with him? thyself dost pray.
IN. That he may pardon our contrarious deeds.
PR. Alas! alas! what more contrarious deed,
What greater miracle of wrong than this,
That man should know his good and take it not?
To what god wilt thou pray to pardon this?
In vain was reason given, if man therewith
Shame truth, and name it wisdom to cry down
The unschooled promptings of his best desire.
The beasts that have no speech nor argument
Confute him, and the wild hog in the wood
That feels his longing, hurries straight thereto,
And will not turn his head.
PR. Thou hast desired the good, and now canst feel How hard it is to kill the heart's desire.
IN. Shall Inachus rise against Zeus, as he
Rose against Cronos and made war in heaven?
PR. I say not so, yet, if thou didst rebel,
The tongue that counselled Zeus should counsel thee.
SEM. (maidens). This is strange counsel.
SEM. (youths).
A counsellor for gods or men.
IN. O that I knew where I might counsel find,
That one were sent, nay, were 't the least of all
The myriad messengers of heaven, to me!
One that should say 'This morn I stood with Zeus,
He hath heard thy prayer and sent me: ask a boon,
What thing thou wilt, it shall be given thee.'
PR. What wouldst thou say to such a messenger?
IN. No need to ask then what I now might ask,
How 'tis the gods, if they have care for mortals,
Slubber our worst necessities-and the boon,
No need to tell him that.
Zeus sends no messenger, but I am here.
IN. Thy speech is hard, and even thy kindest words Unkind. If fire thou hast, in thee 'tis kind
To proffer it: but thou art more unkind
Yoking heaven's wrath therewith. Nay, and how knowest thou
Zeus will be angry if I take of it?
Thou art a prophet: ay, but of the prophets
Some have been taken in error, and honest time
Has honoured many with forgetfulness.
I'll make this proof of thee; Show me thy fire-
Nay, give 't me now-if thou be true at all,
Be true so far: for the rest there's none will lose,
Nor blame thee being false-where is thy fire?
PR. O rather, had it thus been mine to give,
I would have given it thus: not adding aught
Of danger or diminishment or loss;
So strong is my goodwill; nor less than this.
My knowledge, but in knowledge all my power.
Yet since wise guidance with a little means
Can more than force unminded, I have skill
To conjure evil and outcompass strength.
Now give I thee my best, a little gift
To work a world of wonder; 'tis thine own
Of long desire, and with it I will give
The cunning of invention and all arts
In which thy hand instructed may command,
Interpret, comfort, or ennoble nature;
With all provision that in wisdom is,
And what prevention in foreknowledge lies.
IN. Great is the gain.
O king, the gain is thine,
The penalty I more than share.
I take thy gift; nor hast thou stood more firm
To every point of thy strange chequered tale,
Revealing, threatening, offering more and more,
And never all, than I to this resolve.
PR. I knew thy heart would fail not at the hour.
IN. Nay, failed I now, what were my years of toil
More than the endurance of a harnessed brute,
Flogged to his daily work, that cannot view
The high design to which his labour steps?
And I of all men were dishonoured most
Shrinking in fear, who never shrank from toil,
And found abjuring, thrusting stiffly back,
The very gift for which I stretched my hands.
What though I suffer? are these wintry years.
Of growing desolation to be held
As cherishable as the suns of spring?
Nay, only joyful can they be in seeing
Long hopes accomplished, long desires fulfilled.
And since thou hast touched ambition on the side
Of nobleness, and stirred my proudest hope,
And wilt fulfil this, shall I count the cost?
Rather decay will triumph, and cold death
Be lapped in glory, seeing strength arise
From weakness, from the tomb go forth a flame.
PR. 'Tis well; thou art exalted now, the grace
Becomes thy valiant spirit.
IN.
Lo! on this day
Which hope despaired to see, hope manifests
A vision bright as were the dreams of youth;
When life was easy as a sleeper's faith
Who swims in the air and dances on the sea;
When all the good that scarce by toil is won,
Or not at all is won, is as a flower
Growing in plenty to be plucked at will:
Is it a dream again or is it truth,
This vision fair of Greece inhabited ?
A fairer sight than all fair Iris sees,
Footing her airy arch of colours spun
From Ida to Olympus, when she stays
To look on Greece and thinks the sight is fair;
Far fairer now, clothed with the works of men.
PR. Ay, fairer far: for nature's varied pleasaunce
Without man's life is but a desert wild,
Which most, where most she mocks him, needs his aid.
She knows her silence sweeter when it girds
His murmurous cities, her wide wasteful curves
Larger beside his economic line;
Or what can add a mystery to the dark,
As doth his measured music when it moves
With rhythmic sweetness through the void of night?
Nay, all her loveliest places are but grounds
Of vantage, where with geometric hand,
True square and careful compass he may come
To plan and plant and spread abroad his towers,
His gardens, temples, palaces and tombs.
And yet not all thou seest, with tranced eye
Looking upon the beauty that shall be,
The temple-crownèd heights, the walled towns,
Farms and cool summer seats, nor the broad ways
That bridge the rivers and subdue the mountains,
Nor all that travels on them, pomp or war
Or needful merchandise, nor all the sails
Piloting over the wind-dappled blue
Of the summer-soothed Ægean, to thy mind
Can picture what shall be: these are the face
And form of beauty, but her heart and life
Shall they be who shall see it, born to shield
A happier birthright with intrepid arms,
To tread down tyranny and fashion forth
A virgin wisdom to subdue the world,
To build for passion an eternal song,
To shape her dreams in marble, and so sweet
Their speech, that envious Time hearkening shall stay
In fear to snatch, and hide his rugged hand.
Now is the birthday of thy conquering youth,
O man, and lo! thy priest and prophet stand
Beside the altar and have blessed the day.
IN. Ay, blessed be this day. Where is thy fire?
Or is aught else to do, ere I may take?
PR. This was my message, speak and there is fire.
IN. There shall be fire. Await me here awhile.
I go to acquaint my house, and bring them forth.
Hearken, O Argos, hearken!
There will be fire.
And thou, O Earth, give ear!
There will be fire.
SEM. (maidens). Who shall be sent to fetch this fire for
SEM. (youths). Shall we put forth in boats to reap, And shall the waves for harvest yield
The rootless flames that nimbly leap
Upon their ever-shifting field?
SEM. (maidens). Or we in olive-groves go shake And beat the fruiting sprays, till all
The silv'ry glitter which they make
Beneath into our baskets fall?
SEM. (youths). To bind in sheaves and bear away The white unshafted darts of day?
SEM. (maidens). And from the shadow one by one Pick up the playful oes of sun?
SEM. (youths). Or wouldst thou mine a passage deep
Until the darksome fire is found,
Which prisoned long in seething sleep
Vexes the caverns underground?
SEM. (maidens). Or bid us join our palms perchance,
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