--- DICTIONARIES (in Dictionaries, in Quotes, in Chapters)

--- QUOTES [0 / 0 - 199 / 199] (in Dictionaries, in Quotes, in Chapters)

KEYS (10k)


NEW FULL DB (2.4M)

   9 Carl Sagan

   5 Emma Goldman

   4 Joseph Conrad

   4 H G Wells

   3 Tim Marshall

   3 Jason Fried

   3 Delia Owens

   3 Brittainy C Cherry

   2 Thomas Jefferson

   2 Steve Maraboli

   2 Robin S Sharma

   2 R A Salvatore

   2 Matthew Kelly

   2 Martin Luther King Jr

   2 Markus Zusak

   2 Lawrence M Krauss

   2 Jerry Spinelli

   2 Harlan Ellison

   2 Ernest Hemingway

   2 Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

   2 Edgar Albert Guest

   2 David Goggins

   2 Corrie ten Boom

   2 Arthur Koestler

   2 Albert Einstein

*** NEWFULLDB 2.4M ***

1:Handwriting is the shackle of the mind. ~ Plato

2:Bring on the shackles - I'm your prisoner ~ Stephenie Meyer

3:My parents had broken through the shackles of dogma ~ Franz Boas

4:Books break the shackles of time, proof that humans can work magic. ~ Carl Sagan

5:We are accustomed to look upon the shackled form of a conquered monster. ~ Joseph Conrad

6:The power of art can break the shackles that bind and divide human beings. ~ Daisaku Ikeda

7:Books break the shackles of time. A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic. ~ Carl Sagan

8:A grateful mindset can set you free from the prison of disempowerment and the shackles of misery. ~ Steve Maraboli

9:Five hundred years of science have liberated humanity from the shackles of enforced ignorance. ~ Lawrence M Krauss

10:I refuse to accept that the shackles of slavery can ever be stronger than the quest for freedom. ~ Kailash Satyarthi

11:Everyone knows marriage is hard work. So if you've chosen the shackles, quit whining and get on with it. ~ Karina Bliss

12:The shackles of belief, when reinforced by fear, are difficult to break free from and rarely done. ~ Richard Paul Evans

13:There's no room for anything but joy and fear, and joy ruled the house. Fear lived in the shack out back! ~ Stephen King

14:The new luxury is to shed the shackles of deferred living—to pursue your passions now, while you’re still working. ~ Jason Fried

15:escape the shackles of our prior experience to uncover profound and beautiful simplifications and predictions ~ Lawrence M Krauss

16:Never did a prisoner, released from his chains, feel such relief as I shall on shaking off the shackles of power. ~ Thomas Jefferson

17:for a people with a heritage of enslavement, evil is a concept of those who forged the shackles, not those who wore them. ~ Harlan Ellison

18:Do not let yourself be contaminated by others' ideas of what is best for you. Cast aside the shackles of destructive thinking. ~ Kai Greene

19:The only bombshells that strike my fancy are the ones that will free the proletariat from the shackles of wage slavery. ~ Steve Hockensmith

20:Unless you break free from the shackles of beauty as dictated by the media and society, true beauty will be elusive. ~ Khang Kijarro Nguyen

21:The shackles and the chains, the violence and aggression, the pettiness and scorn, the jealousy and hatred, the tempest and discord. ~ Joe Walsh

22:It is more difficult by far to be independent of our own inner shackles than it is of the shackles that others might place upon us. ~ R A Salvatore

23:I have to tell you I love living in a world without clocks. The shackles are gone. I’m a puppy unleashed in a meadow of time. -- Stargirl ~ Jerry Spinelli

24:Try not to live your life bound by the shackles of your schedule. Instead, focus on those things that your conscience and your heart tell you to do. ~ Robin S Sharma

25:The people find great solace in the idea of a personal God whose grace, obtained through devotion, can overpower the shackles of karma and samsara. The ~ Devdutt Pattanaik

26:There is little hope for us until we become tough-minded enough to break loose from the shackles of prejudice, half-truths, and down-right ignorance. ~ Martin Luther King Jr

27:The shack took on a different light, as though more windows had opened up. She stood back and stared at them--a miracle to have some of Ma's paintings on the walls. ~ Delia Owens

28:If forgiving depended on the culprit owning up, then the victim would always be at the mercy of the perpetrator. The victim would be bound in the shackles of victimhood. ~ Desmond Tutu

29:When one is deprived of ones liberty, one is right in blaming not so much the man who puts the shackles on as the one who had the power to prevent him, but did not use it. ~ Thucydides

30:For the day we accept that we have chosen to choose our choices is the day we cast off the shackles of victimhood and are set free to pursue the lives we were born to live. ~ Matthew Kelly

31:Forgiveness is the key that unlocks the door of resentment and the handcuffs of hatred. It is a power that breaks the chains of bitterness and the shackles of selfishness. ~ Corrie ten Boom

32:We have broken the shackles of conservative socialism. The growing middle classes want the kind of standard of living you enjoy in the West. So what I'm selling is a lifestyle. ~ Vijay Mallya

33:How much pleasure they lose (and even the pleasures of heroic poesy are not unprofitable) who take away the liberty of a poet, and fetter his feet in the shackles of a historian. ~ William Davenant

34:…She kissed me on my thin lips and all my words were pushed back into my mouth. “I don’t want to die,” she whispered, “but I need to lose the shackles of this multitude of hearts. ~ Andrew Davidson

35:Jesus' miracles provide us with a sample of the meaning of redemption: a freeing of creation from the shackles of sin and evil and a reinstatement of creaturely living as intended by God. ~ Randy Alcorn

36:although we have broken free from the shackles of gravity, we are still imprisoned in our own minds, confined by our suspicion of the ‘other’, and thus our primal competition for resources ~ Tim Marshall

37:Independence is what matters,” Wulfgar explained. “And it is more difficult by far to be independent of our own inner shackles than it is of the shackles that others might place upon us.” The ~ R A Salvatore

38:Even if the adults were free of the shackles that had held them fast, bondage had stolen too much time. Only the children could take full advantage of their dreaming. If white men let them. ~ Colson Whitehead

39:I wished that I were the owner of every southern slave, that I might cast off the shackles from their limbs, and witness the rapture which would excite them in the first dance of their freedom. ~ Thaddeus Stevens

40:The sight of it made the earth seem unearthly. They were accustomed to look upon the shackled form of a conquered monster, but there-- there you could look at a thing monstrous, beautiful, and free. ~ Joseph Conrad

41:Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people, citizens of distant epochs, who never knew one another. Books break the shackles of time, proof that humans can work magic. ~ Carl Sagan

42:The new luxury is to shed the shackles of deferred living—to pursue your passions now, while you’re still working. What’s the point in wasting time daydreaming about how great it’ll be when you finally quit? ~ Jason Fried

43:Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people who never knew each other, citizens of distant epochs. Books break the shackles of time. A book is proof that humans are capable of magic. ~ Carl Sagan

44:Getting lost was not a matter of geography so much as identity, a passionate desire, even an urgent need, to become no one and anyone, to shake off the shackles that remind you who you are, who others think you are. ~ Rebecca Solnit

45:Anarchism, then, really stands for the liberation of the human mind from the dominion of religion; the liberation of the human body from the dominion of property; liberation from the shackles and restraint of government. ~ Emma Goldman

46:Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people who never knew each other, citizens of distant epochs. Books break the shackles of time. A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic. ~ Carl Sagan

47:Science and reason liberate us from the shackles of superstition by offering us a framework for understanding our shared humanity. Ultimately, we all have the capacity to treasure life and enrich the world in incalculable ways. ~ Gad Saad

48:Now on a sloping meadow hours into a fresh day, he found himself a desperate man, struggling to free himself from the shackles of a life he had not pursued. And her voice trickled through him, an icicle perpetually melting. ~ Simon Van Booy

49:Sometimes she wished she could eat herself. She’d swallow everything—her soiled blue dress, the shackles on her wrists, her puffy face. If she could eat herself up, there’d be no trace left of her or the mistakes she had made. ~ Marie Rutkoski

50:Oh you Muslims! You have slept for a long time, long enough for the tyrants to take control over you. You accepted to live as slaves and submitted to tyrants. Now the time has come to revolt and destroy the shackle of slavery. ~ Sheikh Abdullah

51:She is reading Zen, Krishnamurti, and Jung, asking herself questions she has never had the courage to explore. Suddenly, the shackles which have bound her are beginning to snap, as personal revelation replaces orthodoxy. ~ Terry Tempest Williams

52:To be free, with him, signifies to escape from all the shackles of society. As he delights in this barbarous independence, and would rather perish than sacrifice the least part of it, civilization has little power over him. ~ Alexis de Tocqueville

53:He sees the conflict within them: tradition against progress, the known past against the unknown future. They have come so far, as a species; they have the intellect to break from the shackles of yesterday. But it will be hard. ~ Adrian Tchaikovsky

54:Horty relished the gnar. To him, true adventure should be steeped with elements of failure, risk, and even death, preferably all three. He was especially fond of the Shackleton quote "I love the fight and when things are easy I hate it. ~ Scott Jurek

55:I wondered if we lose the best parts of ourselves in the mad dash to loosen the shackles of childhood. We were in such a hurry to be free of Willow Heights that we both somehow forgot to take the best parts of who we were with us when we left. ~ Eden Butler

56:The shackles." She stirred. "Aryal has both sets of chains, and the key," she told him, muffled against his skin. "She swears she'll find a way to destroy them. She's saying 'My Precious' a lot and talking about dropping them into a volcano. ~ Thea Harrison

57:For the day we accept that we have chosen to choose our choices is the day we cast off the shackles of victimhood and are set free to pursue the lives we were born to live. Learn to master the moment of decision and you will live a life uncommon. ~ Matthew Kelly

58:Breaking the shackles and stretching beyond our own perceived limits takes hard fucking work—oftentimes physical work—and when you put yourself on the line, self doubt and pain will greet you with a stinging combination that will buckle your knees. ~ David Goggins

59:We are accustomed to look upon the shackled form of a conquered monster, but there—there you could look at a thing monstrous and free. It was unearthly, and the men were—No, they were not inhuman. Well, you know, that was the worst of it—this suspicion ~ Joseph Conrad

60:Forgiveness is the key which unlocks the door of resentment and the handcuffs of hatred. It breaks the chains of bitterness and the shackles of selfishness. The forgiveness of Jesus not only takes away our sins, it makes them as if they had never been. ~ Corrie ten Boom

61:hurts. Breaking the shackles and stretching beyond our own perceived limits takes hard fucking work—oftentimes physical work—and when you put yourself on the line, self doubt and pain will greet you with a stinging combination that will buckle your knees. ~ David Goggins

62:Sometimes we are our own worst enemies. One must learn to be discerning with one’s own thoughts. We must be able to decipher the truth versus the lies of our minds. Otherwise, we become enslaved to the shackles of struggle we place on our own ankles. ~ Brittainy C Cherry

63:Out of the lions' den for Daniel, the prison for Peter, the whale's belly for Jonah, Goliath's shadow for David the storm for the disciples, disease for the lepers, doubt for Thomas, the grave for Lazarus, and the shackles for Paul. God gets us through stuff. ~ Max Lucado

64:You must reflect that fettered prisoners only at first feel the weight of the shackles on their legs: in time, when they have decided not to struggle against but to bear them, they learn from necessity to endure with fortitude, and from habit to endure with ease. ~ Seneca

65:Sometimes, we are our own worst enemies. One must learn to be discerning with one's own thoughts. We must be able to decipher the truth versus the lies in our minds. Otherwise, we become enslaved to the shackles of struggles we place on our own ankles. ~ Brittainy C Cherry

66:Such a catastrophe cannot threaten if the Nordic race will gather itself together in time, shake off the shackles of an inveterate altruism, discard the vain phantom of internationalism, and reassert the pride of race and the right of merit to rule. The ~ T Lothrop Stoddard

67:We have even broken the shackles of the Earth’s gravity. In our newly globalised world we can use that technology to give us all an opportunity in the Arctic. We can overcome the rapacious side of our nature, and get the great game right for the benefit of all. ~ Tim Marshall

68:Awakenings are always terrifying as they force you to realize your past has been lived in confinement, the most disturbing part is when you recognize that the shackle holding you down are largely once you have placed upon yourself, the prison is self constructed ~ Dean Karnazes

69:I spent centuries I your arms. This time our joining will be controlled by me, and you will revel in the pleasure I can bring you. Throw off the shackles of your distant goddess and come to me. Be my love, truly, in body as well as soul and I will give you the world! ~ P C Cast

70:THE SHACK SAT BACK from the palmettos, which sprawled across sand flats to a necklace of green lagoons and, in the distance, all the marsh beyond. Miles of blade-grass so tough it grew in salt water, interrupted only by trees so bent they wore the shape of the wind. ~ Delia Owens

71:Ain’t they people too, though?” muttered Beck, thinking of the face of that Union man lying dead in the shack yesterday. “Just like us?” Whirrun squinted across at him. “More than likely they are. But if you start thinking like that, well… you’ll get no one killed at all. ~ Joe Abercrombie

72:I went to give this back to the—the lady. She wasn’t there, but you left Elgar.” I snatched the pieces from Jurij’s hands. “You went back to the shack? What were you going to say? ‘Sorry we were spying on you pretending you were a monster, thanks for the dirty old rag? ~ Amy McNulty

73:Anarchism stands for the liberation of the human mind from the dominion of religion and liberation of the human body from the coercion of property; liberation from the shackles and restraint of government. It stands for a social order based on the free grouping of individuals. ~ Emma Goldman

74:Anarchism stands for the liberation of the human mind from the dominion of religion and liberation of the human body from the coercion of property; liberation from the shackles and restraint of government. It stands for a social order based on the free grouping of individuals… ~ Emma Goldman

75:Now they stumbled in the shackles of humanity, lived in a fear that never died, fretted by a law they could not understand; their mock-human existence began in an agony, was one long internal struggle, one long dread of Moreau - and for what? It was the wantonness that stirred me. ~ H G Wells

76:Social constantly exerts pressure on individuals to conform to the moral code of conduct and the individual always tries to free himself from the shackles of morality. Astrong person redefines the morality of society while a weak person is crushed by the society’s moral pressure. ~ Awdhesh Singh

77:They were all down there trying to wire the shackle. Each one of them alone, clinging to the stem of a mushroom anchor with one breath inside. One breath. It didn't matter if you got the shackle wired or not. There was no up. When your breath was done, no up." John Casey, Spartina ~ John Casey

78:You keep getting more wonderful,” I whispered. “Baby, it’s not yet seven, got my girl who hates to get up early in my arm, a coffee from The Shack she got for me, and I’m gonna get me some in about two hours. I’m thinkin’ you keep gettin’ more wonderful too.” “Good answer,” I replied. ~ Kristen Ashley

79:Hate has always been the blinder used by those who own slaves. It allows those they enslave to only see those who escaped the yoke, and not the one that sits holding the reins. The moment you hear anyone fear-mongering and pointing fingers, you should look for the shackle on your ankle.” “Don’t ~ Wen Spencer

80:It is a fallacy to believe that a Republic of any kind can be won through the shackled Free State. You can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. The Free State is British created and serves British Imperialist interests. It is the buffer erected between British Capitalism and the Irish Republic. ~ Liam Mellows

81:What religion has always done is pander to biases, achieving success not by challenging people with something new but by reinforcing what they already believe, no matter how wrong it is. By contrast, science shines by breaking the shackles of our preconceptions and letting us work with what really is. The ~ P Z Myers

82:To escape consumerism and conformity, you must turn your back and ignore the mainstream culture. The shackles when then fall away, the machines will grind to a halt, the filters will dissolve, and you will see the world for what it really is. The illusory nature of existence will end and we will all, finally, be real. ~ David McRaney

83:What they then wanted was an authoritarian Germany which at home would put an end to democratic “nonsense” and the power of the trade unions and in foreign affairs undo the verdict of 1918, tear off the shackles of Versailles, rebuild a great Army and with its military power restore the country to its place in the sun. These ~ William L Shirer

84:An organizer working in and for an open society is in an ideological dilemma to begin with, he does not have a fixed truth - truth to him is relative and changing; everything to him is relative and changing.... To the extent that he is free from the shackles of dogma, he can respond to the realities of the widely different situations. ~ Saul Alinsky

85:The unconscious does not coo sweet lyrics or unroll immaculate and measured prose, it howls and raves like the shackled and tortured beast that our civilization has made of it, and when the fetters are momentarily loosened the unconscious does not thank the ego for this meagre relief, but hisses, spits, and bites, as any wild thing would. ~ Nick Land

86:free as he was from the shackles imposed on many other men by honesty, decency, and plain good manners, he moved through the jungle of life with the confidence of an elephant which advances in a straight line, rooting up trees and trampling down lairs, without even noticing scratches of thorns and moans from the crushed. ~ Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa

87:Remember, nothing can stop a person who refuses to be stopped. Most people don’t really fail, they simply give up trying. And most of the limitations that hold you back from your dreams are self-imposed. So shed the shackles of “tiny thinking,” have the bravery to dream big for a change and accept that failure is not an option for you. ~ Robin S Sharma

88:On the Churchgate train, past Charni Road station as it sees the sea, past the gymkhanas—Islam, Catholic, Hindu, Parsi—as the shacks fade away, Bombay becomes a different city, an earlier city, a beautiful city. All of a sudden there is the blue sky and the clear water of Marine Drive, and everybody looks toward the bay and starts breathing. ~ Suketu Mehta

89:Before, they had been beasts, their instincts fitly adapted to their surroundings, and happy as living things may be. Now they stumbled in the shackles of humanity, lived in a fear that never died, fretted by a law they could not understand; their mock-human existence, begun in an agony, was one long internal struggle, one long dread of Moreau — ~ H G Wells

90:sometimes when sitting by your lonesome, your thoughts wander to places they shouldn’t. Sometimes we are our own worst enemies. One must learn to be discerning with one’s own thoughts. We must be able to decipher the truth versus the lies of our minds. Otherwise, we become enslaved to the shackles of struggle we place on our own ankles. ~ Brittainy C Cherry

91:Once I was free in the shackles of sin: Free to be tempted, just bound to give in; Free to be captive to any desire; Free to eternally burn in hell’s fire. ‘Til Someone bought me and called me His slave: Bound by commands I am free to obey; Captive by beauty I’m free to adore-- Sentenced to sit at His feet evermore. ~ John F MacArthur Jr

92:The only chains God wants us to wear are the chains of righteousness--not the chains of hopeless subjectivism, not the shackles of risk-free living, not the fetters of horoscope decision making--just the chains befitting a bond servant of Christ Jesus. Die to self. Live for Christ. And then do what you want, and go where you want, for God's glory. ~ Kevin DeYoung

93:What an astonishing thing a book is. It’s a flat object made from a tree with flexible parts on which are imprinted lots of funny dark squiggles. But one glance at it and you’re inside the mind of another person, maybe somebody dead for thousands of years. ... Books break the shackles of time. A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic. ~ Carl Sagan

94:Perfection. Excellence. What a passionate lover. But once having tasted the lips of excellence, once having given oneself to its perfection, how dreary and burdensome and filled with anomie are the remainder of one's waking hours trapped in the shackled lock-step of the merely ordinary, the barely acceptable, the just okay and not a stroke better. ~ Harlan Ellison

95:While Grant was celebrated as a victorious wartime general and the president who had peacefully settled the Alabama claims, most gratifying to him was being honored as the protector of freed people. A delegation of painters marched by, hoisting a picture that depicted the shackles of slavery being struck off beside the words “Welcome to the Liberator. ~ Ron Chernow

96:...in their millenial and long-lived patience they knew quite well how, in a hundred years, or a thousand years' time, or else, perhaps, tomorrow, in an hour's time, for it was all a gamble, a million to one chance, but all the same there was a chance that if they kept on shaking their chains, one day, some day, the clasps upon the shackles would part. ~ Angela Carter

97:Days rolled into weeks, weeks into months. Our realities were one. We tried, though. We tried to brave it through. Why, I don’t know. We had the power to release ourselves from the shackles that held us, but we didn’t. Were we there for each other, so we didn’t leave one to fend for itself alone? Or were we there because we were just there? I don’t know. ~ Kirthi Jayakumar

98:Before, they had been beasts, their instincts fitly adapted to their surrounds. Now they stumbled in the shackles of humanity, lived in a fear that never dies, fretted by a law they could not understand; their mock-human existence, begun in agony, was one long internal struggle, one long dread of Moreau--and for what? It was the wantonness of it that stirred me. ~ H G Wells

99:Liberty is the first condition of growth. Your ancestors gave every liberty to the soul, and religion grew. They put the body under every bondage, and society did not grow. The opposite is the case in the West - every liberty to society, none to religion. Now are falling off the shackles from the feet of Eastern society as from those of Western religion. ~ Swami Vivekananda

100:There is little hope for us until we become tough-minded enough to break loose from the shackles of prejudice, half-truths, and downright ignorance. The shape of the world today does not permit us the luxury of soft mindedness. A nation or a civilization that continues to produce soft minded men purchases its own spiritual death on an installment plan. ~ Martin Luther King Jr

101:Just sleep here.” At my sharp look he laughs. “I’ll take the floor, and I’ll get you to your job on time. I promise.” “You’re full of promises.” But the thought of sleeping in a soft bed with warm blankets is appealing. And I understand Jannik now. I’m his symbol of hope, his reason to believe that one day he too can throw off the shackles of his family. ~ Cat Hellisen

102:Around about now, young John Owen comes out of the shack lugging my old musket from the War. At six years of age, our youngest boy already knew his business. Not a word, just brings the shooting iron somewhat closer so's he don't waste powder, then hoists her up, set to haul back on the trigger. I believe his plan was to shoot this feller, get the story later. ~ Peter Matthiessen

103:A woman must wait for her ovaries to die before she can get her rightful personality back. Post-menstrual is the same as pre-menstrual; I am once again what I was before the age of twelve: a female human being who knows that a month has thirty day, not twenty-five, and who can spend every one of them free of the shackles of that defect of body and mind known as femininity. ~ Florence King

104:Don’t call me Bistle, yeh sodding half-wit,” said the gravely voice, which belonged to a particularly grizzly goblin in black shirt and trousers. “I’m Mr. Saffron when we’re on the job. And blast yehr sixth sense. Yeh’re just a great coward whenever yeh get in an unfamiliar place. The sooner we get on, the sooner it’ll be over and we’ll be back to the shack to celebrate. ~ G Norman Lippert

105:One glance at (a book) and you hear the voice of another person - perhaps someone dead for thousands of years. Across the millenia, the author is speaking, clearly and silently, inside your head, directly to you. Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people, citizens of distant epochs, who never knew one another. Books break the shackles of time. ~ Carl Sagan

106:You’ll get used to it,” he says. “In any case, I find it interesting that you think of this as the past.” “What do you mean?” Suleyman gestures, drawing her gaze over the shacks of organic material, the sand-and-scrub wasteland, the distant evaporation plant, the images painted on brick that provide intel and entertainment. “This could just as easily be the future. ~ Malka Ann Older

107:After having so nobly disentangled themselves from the shackles of Parental Authority, by a Clandestine Marriage, they were determined never to forfeit the good opinion they had gained in the World, in so doing, by accepting any proposals of reconciliation that might be offered them by their Fathers – to their farther trial of their noble independence however they never were exposed. ~ Jane Austen

108:In the pits of our souls - if I amuse myself with the notion that I have a soul - Elian and I aren't so different. Two kingdoms that come with responsibilities we each have trouble bearing. Him, the shackles of being pinned to one land and one life. Me, trapped in the confines of my mother's murderous legacy. And the ocean, calling out to us both. A song of freedom and longing. ~ Alexandra Christo

109:As the events of 2011 reveal, the age of revolutions is by no means over. The human imagination stubbornly refuses to die. And the moment any significant number of people simultaneously shake off the shackles that have been placed on that collective imagination, even our most deeply inculcated assumptions about what is and is not politically possible have been known to crumble overnight. ~ David Graeber

110:I follow the path we’ve taken so many times this summer – across the front, down the street, cut back through a neighbor’s yard, down the stairs to the beach, past the pier, through the campfire labyrinth, up to the deck of the Shack, and straight into Sam’s arms. Without speaking, he kisses me hard on the mouth and I kiss him back, sobbing and crumpling into his chest like a broken puppet. ~ Sarah Ockler

111:I have to tell you I love living in a world without clocks. The shackles are gone. I'm a puppy unleashed in a meadow of time. As I watched the sun come up this morning, I felt a new sense of kinship with it. Something primitive stirred inside me, something that remembers the rising sun by itself, before there were minutes and schedules and calendars, before there were even words like "morning. ~ Jerry Spinelli

112:Black Consciousness is an attitude of the mind and a way of life, the most positive call to emanate from the black world for a long time. Its essence is the realisation by the black man of the need to rally together with his brothers around the cause of their oppression - the blackness of their skin - and to operate as a group to rid themselves of the shackles that bind them to perpetual servitude. ~ Steven Biko

113:Before, they had been beasts, their instincts fitly adapted to their surroundings, and happy as living things may be. Now they stumbled in the shackles of humanity, lived in a fear that never died, fretted by a law they could not understand; their mock-human existence, begun in an agony, was one long internal struggle, one long dread of Moreau- and for what? It was the wantonness of it that stirred me. ~ H G Wells

114:Bread, cash, dosh, dough, loot, lucre, moolah, readies, the where-withal: call it what you like, money matters. To Christians, the love of it is the root of all evil. To generals, it is the sinews of war; to revolutionaries, the shackles of labour. But what exactly is money? Is it a mountain of silver, as the Spanish conquistadors thought? Or will mere clay tablets and printed paper suffice? How did we ~ Niall Ferguson

115:my family's going to eat as long as anybody eats. What they're trying to do is starve you Conchs out of here so they can burn down the shacks and put up apartments and make this a tourist town. That's what I hear. I hear they're buying up lots, and then after the poor people are starved out and gone somewhere else to starve some more they're going to come in and make it into a beauty spot for tourists. ~ Ernest Hemingway

116:Sometimes I’d get mad because things didn’t work out so well, I’d spoil a flapjack, or slip in the snowfield while getting water, or one time my shovel went sailing down into the gorge, and I’d be so mad I’d want to bite the mountaintops and would come in the shack and kick the cupboard and hurt my toe. But let the mind beware, though the flesh be bugged, the circumstances of existence are pretty glorious. ~ Jack Kerouac

117:And now the lies of the Civil War and the lies of these post-racial years began to resonate with each other, and I could now see history, awful and undead, reaching out from the grave. America had a biography, and in that biography, the shackling of black people - slaves and free - featured prominently...what I sensed was a country trying to skip out on a bill, trying to stave off a terrible accounting. ~ Ta Nehisi Coates

118:The novice screenwriter didn't see that final flourish as the characters killing themselves. She thought it carried to the extreme an irrepressible impetus to bust out of an untenable life. 'They flew away, out of this world and into the mass unconscious,' Callie wrote afterward. 'Women who are completely free from all the shackles that restrain them have no place in this world. The world is not big enough to support them. ~ Becky Aikman

119:I am a king's daughter, And if I cared to care, The moon that has no mistress Would flutter in my hair. No one dares to cherish What I choose to crave. Never have I hungered, For that I did not have I am a kings daughter, And I grow old within The prison of my person, The shackles of my skin. And I would run away And beg from door to door, Just to see your shadow Once, and never more. ~ Peter S Beagle

120:When we are reaching for the stars, the challenges ahead are such that we will perhaps have to come together to meet them: to travel the universe not as Russians, Americans, or Chinese but as representatives of humanity. But so far, although we have broken free from the shackles of gravity, we are still improsoned in our own minds, confined by our suspicion of the "other," and thus our primal competition for resources. There is a long way to go. ~ Tim Marshall

121:THE SHACK SAT BACK from the palmettos, which sprawled across sand flats to a necklace of green lagoons and, in the distance, all the marsh beyond. Miles of blade-grass so tough it grew in salt water, interrupted only by trees so bent they wore the shape of the wind. Oak forests bunched around the other sides of the shack and sheltered the closest lagoon, its surface so rich in life it churned. Salt air and gull-song drifted through the trees from the sea. ~ Delia Owens

122:I love the scene in The Shack when Papa says to Mackenzie, “Just follow my voice” (91). It is no more complicated than that. But oh, Lord, there are so many voices. Jesus’ Papa loves us forever, and shouts our name with a smiling face, but we have weird ears. There are childhood wounds, the voices of our disappointed parents, the sermons on the angry god, the constant whisper: “I am not worthy, I am not important, not lovable, not good enough, not okay. ~ C Baxter Kruger

123:But by leapfrogging the United States into space, the Russians turned even local racial policy into fodder for the international conflict. In forcing the United States to compete for the allegiance of the yellow and brown and black countries throwing off the shackles of colonialism, the Soviets influenced something more closer to Earth, and ultimately more difficult than putting a satellite, or even a human, into space: weakening Jim Crow's grip on America. ~ Margot Lee Shetterly

124:It's time to get healed. It's time to confess. Falling for the bait doesn't make you the worst person in the world. You were snared. You were hooked. But you don't have to stay that way. Now is the time to deal with the shackles that keep you enslaved. Today you can leave the prison that sexual immorality has created from your past mistakes. Hear your Father's voice call out to you above the noisy clamor of our culture. He says, "I love you. You're free to go now. Sexual sin has no hold on you. ~ Craig Groeschel

125:My hope is that this volume will make a fresh impact on an entirely new generation of believers who are longing to be free from bondage to others, but have not known how to make that happen. It is gratifying to think that these pages will provide the keys you have been looking for that will unlock those iron bars and release you from the shackles of slavery to others, awakening you to what it means to be truly free. Free in Christ. Free indeed. Free at last. —CHARLES R. SWINDOLL Dallas, Texas ~ Charles R Swindoll

126:the scientist's religious feeling takes the form of a rapturous amazement at the harmony of natural law, which reveals an intelligence of such superiority that, compared with it, all the systematic thinking and acting of human beings is utterly insignificant reflection. This feeling is the guiding principle of his life and work, in so far as he succeeds in keeping himself from the shackles of selfish desire. It is beyond question closely akin to that which has possessed the religious geniuses of all ages. ~ Albert Einstein

127:In a 91-part series of sob stories from the laid off and the disgruntled, The NY Times is in the midst of bemoaning 'the downsizing of America' - better known as 'the whining of America.' The cause of all the heartache, in the esteemed newspaper of record's view, appears to be heartless corporate chieftains - as well as capitalism itself. Americans are moving forward, despite shackles. The shackles I am referring to are not NAFTA, not corporations. They are, instead, the barriers imposed by our own government. ~ Rush Limbaugh

128:Anarchism, then, really stands for the liberation of the human mind from the dominion of religion; the liberation of the human body from the dominion of property; liberation from the shackles and restraint of government. Anarchism stands for a social order based on the free grouping of individuals for the purpose of producing real social wealth; an order that will guarantee to every human being free access to the earth and full enjoyment of the necessities of life, according to individual desires, tastes, and inclinations. ~ Emma Goldman

129:The Roosevelt Dispensation pictured an America where citizens were involved in a collective enterprise to guard one another against risk, hardship, and the denial of fundamental rights. Its watchwords were solidarity, opportunity, and public duty. The Reagan Dispensation pictured a more individualistic America where families and small communities and businesses would flourish once freed from the shackles of the state. Its watchwords were self-reliance and minimal government. The first dispensation was political, the second anti-political. ~ Mark Lilla

130:A book is made from a tree. It is an assemblage of flat, flexible parts (still called "leaves") imprinted with dark pigmented squiggles. One glance at it and you hear the voice of another person, perhaps someone dead for thousands of years. Across the millennia, the author is speaking, clearly and silently, inside your head, directly to you. Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people, citizens of distant epochs, who never knew one another. Books break the shackles of time ― proof that humans can work magic. ~ Carl Sagan

131:We were cut off from the comprehension of our surroundings; we glided past like phantoms, wondering and secretly appalled, as sane men would be before an enthusiastic outbreak in a madhouse. We could not understand because we were too far and could not remember because we were travelling in the night of first ages, of those ages that are gone, leaving hardly a sign—and no memories. The earth seemed unearthly. We are accustomed to look upon the shackled form of a conquered monster, but there—there you could look at a thing monstrous and free. ~ Joseph Conrad

132:MD’s letter finally reached the village. But no one opened it. Winds glibly carried it away in casual chase and whispers of ghastly horror through the bamboo bush. The house of the Monsoon rain and the pretty pink knitting was now deserted; front yard had fallen decrepit as though struck with the dark fever of pestilence. Branches from storm lay randomly across the yard as did poles and the shack roof. Doors hung from their hinges, in the process of coming completely apart. Ravens came and sat fruitlessly in the yard in search of salted fish. ~ Mehreen Ahmed

133:Unforgiveness feels like a prison built by the hands of a criminal where we end up incarcerated. Whether robbed, violated, or betrayed, we find ourselves trapped by the bondage of bitterness, the chains of cynicism, and the shackles of sin. With enough time, we can convince ourselves the prisons of our past were built by someone else, but unforgiveness is a cage we construct ourselves. If we choose to stop focusing on our inward pain and instead scan the perimeter, we discover the door to freedom hangs wide open thanks to Christ. The choice is ours. ~ Margaret Feinberg

134:A book is made from a tree. It is an assemblage of flat, flexible parts (still called "leaves") imprinted with dark pigmented squiggles. One glance at it and you hear the voice of another person—perhaps someone dead for thousands of years. Across the millennia, the author is speaking, clearly and silently, inside your head, directly to you. Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people, citizens of distant epochs, who never knew each other. Books break the shackles of time, proof that humans can work magic. ~ Carl Sagan, Cosmos (1980), p. 279.

135:But why wait? If what you really love doing is skiing, why wait until your hips are too old to take a hard fall and then move to Colorado? If you love surfing, why are you still trapped in a concrete jungle and not living near the beach? If all the family members you’re close to live in a small town in Oregon, why are you still stuck on the other coast? The new luxury is to shed the shackles of deferred living—to pursue your passions now, while you’re still working. What’s the point in wasting time daydreaming about how great it’ll be when you finally quit? Your ~ Jason Fried

136:Nothing upsets the philosophical mind more than when he hears that from now on all philosophy is supposed to lie caught in the shackles of one system. Never has he felt greater than when he sees before him the infinitude of knowledge. The entire dignity of his science consists in the fact that it will never be completed. In that moment in which he would believe to have completed his system, he would become unbearable to himself. He would, in that moment, cease to be a creator, and would instead descend to being an instrument of his creation. ~ Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling

137:The spirit of the times may alter, will alter. Our rulers will become corrupt, our people careless... From the conclusion of this war we shall be going downhill. It will not then be necessary to resort every moment to the people for support. They will be forgotten, therefore, and their rights disregarded. They will forget themselves, but in the sole faculty of making money, and will never think of uniting to affect a due respect for their rights. The shackles, therefore, will be made heavier and heavier, till our rights shall revive or expire in a convulsion. ~ Thomas Jefferson

138:Oh. Dane. That's his name, right?" she asked. "He took our phones and put the shackles on us, but said we could use the phone on the table. I'm not sure if it's some kind of dominance posturing," she trailed off for a moment. "Actually yeah, having been around him for more than thirty seconds, I'm relatively certain that this is one hundred percent, testosterone-laden alpha male posturing. Is Jake like this?" "I might be an idiot," I said, "but even I wouldn't fall for this sort of thing. A guy who goes to this length to seem awesome must have a dick the size of a gherkin. ~ Lynn Red

139:And I saw the roof of the shack in Hanoi where my mother lived. Sheet metal patched together with tar paper. On rainy days, the roof leaked. In the heat of summer, the acrid smell of tar was overpowering, nauseating. All around, the gutters, gurgling under slabs of cement, flowed from one house to the next. Children played in this filthy black water, sailing their little white paper boats. The few mangy patches of grass were at the foot of the wall where men drunk on too much beer came to relieve themselves. The place reeked of urine. This was my street. I had grown up here. ~ D ng Thu H ng

140:Blake would say that there are some places in the Universe where the Fall has not occurred, the world has not turned upside down and Eden still exists. Here Mankind is not governed by the rules of reason, stupid and strict, but by the heart and intuition. The people do not indulge in idle chatter, parading what they know, but create remarkable things by applying their imagination. The state ceases to impose the shackles of daily oppression, but helps people to realize their hopes and dreams. And Man is not just a cog in the system, not just playing a role, but a free Creature. ~ Olga Tokarczuk

141:Enslaved men and women hated their confinement and sought every opportunity to break the shackles that bound them, but opposition to their own enslavement—or even the enslavement of others—did not automatically make them abolitionists. For much of their history—indeed, for much of human history—the notion of a world purged of slavery was simply unimaginable. Abolition, like any other social movement, was rooted in history and confined in time and space. Prior to the American Revolution and its ideology of universal equality, there were few movements to contemplate, let alone to join. ~ Ira Berlin

142:It is surprising to me that one of the great crimes of history has gone unnoticed; the abduction of god by religions. This slight-of-hand has been the cause of countless blood-shed and has been found at the root of innumerable acts of evil. The argument continues today, as to which religion the true god belongs, when what would be most healing and empowering is to free god from the shackles of religious limitation and judgment. It is by emancipating god from the ignorance of our ancestors that we become empowered to explore and express our own relationship with what god may or may not be. ~ Steve Maraboli

143:Almost all of them had mustaches, as though they had learned to blend in by watching movies from the early eighties. He wore a white shirt, and the top button was undone; and for some reason my eyes focused on the thick tuft of black hair poking out. I looked into his dark eyes, and he smiled at me in a way that told me he was looking forward to doing what he was about to do, and I started to cry. I slid down the wall until I dangled from the shackles around my wrists, watching through my tears as he pulled razor blades, knives, pliers, and a drill from the desk they had in the center of the room.” When ~ Pittacus Lore

144:What an astonishing thing a book is. It's a flat object made from a tree with flexible parts on which are imprinted lots of funny dark squiggles. But one glance at it and you're inside the mind of another person, maybe somebody dead for thousands of years. Across the millennia, an author is speaking clearly and silently inside your head, directly to you. Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people who never knew each other, citizens of distant epochs. Books break the shackles of time. A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic." [Cosmos, Part 11: The Persistence of Memory (1980)] ~ Carl Sagan

145:People view us and our vampires as abominations," Ghastek said. "They call the undead inhuman, not realizing the irony: only humans are capable of inhumanity. Four thousand years of technology, with magic shrinking to a mere trickle before the Shift, yet the world was just as evil then as it is now. It's not vampires or werewolves who committed the worst atrocities, but average people. They are the serial killers, the child rapists, the inquisitors, the witch hunters, the perpetrators of monstrous deeds. The shackles on my wall are the symbol of humanity's capacity for cruelty. I keep them to remind myself that I must fear those who fear me. ~ Ilona Andrews

146:All we who are human partake of the earthly nature of Adam. We are children of the dust. Our bodies suffer from all the weaknesses and frailties that belong to the earth. Our resurrected bodies will be tabernacles made in heaven. In the heavenly body, there will be no room for cancer or heart disease. The curse of the fall will be removed. We will be clothed after the image and likeness of the new Adam, the heavenly Man. Yes, there will still be continuity. We will still be men and women. Our personal identities will remain intact. We will be recognizable as the people we were in this lifetime. But there will also be discontinuity as the shackles of the dust will be broken by the heavenly form. ~ R C Sproul

147:Just as one might do useful work without fully understanding the job one was engaged in, or even what the point of it was, so the behaviour of devotion still mattered to the all-forgiving God, and just as the habitual performance of a task gradually raised one’s skills to something close to perfection, bringing a deeper understanding of the work, so the actions of faith would lead to the state of faith. Finally, she was shown the filthy, stinking, windowless cell carved into the rock beneath the Refuge where she would be chained, starved and beaten if she did not at least try to accept God’s love. She trembled as she looked at the shackles and the flails, and agreed she would do her best. ~ Iain M Banks

148:Out in the stone-pile the toad squatted with its glowing jewel-eyes and, maybe, its memories. I don't know if you'll admit a toad could have memories. But I don't know, either, if you'll admit there was once witchcraft in America. Witchcraft doesn't sound sensible when you think of Pittsburgh and subways and movie houses, but the dark lore didn't start in Pittsburgh or Salem either; it goes away back to dark olive groves in Greece and dim, ancient forests in Brittany and the stone dolmens of Wales. All I'm saying, you understand, is that the toad was there, under its rocks, and inside the shack Pete was stretching on his hard bed like a cat and composing himself to sleep. ("Before I Wake...") ~ Henry Kuttner

149:It was frightening, this new clarity of vision: but I felt free at last to know darkness as the other side of light, and that both were needed for sight. And with that thought—it was almost as though I felt it in truth—the shackles of my old imprisoned self fell away at last. No more did I long for a warm bed behind safe walls. My heart drank in the beauty and wonder and danger of the world, and I saw for the first time that life was not something to survive, but something—the only thing—to be savoured in all its diversity. Light and dark together, mingled in all things, giving depth and substance where either alone was a pale shadow. I felt from that moment I might begin to find all things new. ~ Elizabeth Kerner

150:But the scientist is possessed by the sense of universal causation. The future, to him, is every whit as necessary and determined as the past. There is nothing divine about morality; it is a purely human affair. His religious feeling takes the form of a rapturous amazement at the harmony of natural law, which reveals an intelligence of such superiority that, compared with it, all the systematic thinking and acting of human beings is an utterly insignificant reflection. This feeling is the guiding principle of his life and work, in so far as he succeeds in keeping himself from the shackles of selfish desire. It is beyond question closely akin to that which has possessed the religious geniuses of all ages. ~ Albert Einstein

151:Greek women were not allowed to be: free and untamed. In fact, Artemis is a bit of a paradox. On the one hand, her commitment to purity must have been greatly admired by Ancient Greeks; yet she is also untamable and answers to no man. She is truly the eternal wild child who never has to grow up and shoulder the responsibilities that adulthood brings. She never has to compromise herself or conform to any of society’s standards. No wonder she is associated with the moon—completely untouchable, forever unattainable. If offered the option of becoming one of Artemis’ immortal maidens, freed forever from the shackles of marriage or slavery, I think many Ancient Greek women would have jumped on that bandwagon as it careened past ~ Rick Riordan

152:Thomas Hudson had gone in there to fill water, the dogs from the shacks were huddled with the pigs that had burrowed in the mud and dogs and pigs both were gray from the solid blanket of mosquitoes that covered them. It was a wonderful key when the east wind blew day and night and you could walk two days with a gun and be in good country. It was country as unspoiled as when Columbus came to this coast. Then, when the wind dropped, the mosquitoes came in clouds from the marshes. To say they came in clouds, he thought, is not a metaphor. They truly came in clouds and they could bleed a man to death. The people we are searching for would not have stopped in Romano. Not with this calm. They must have gone further up the coast. ~ Ernest Hemingway

153:How can this tainted world contain us, how can it contain our dreams? At night, in the freedom of my mind, the shackles of this mortal realm fall away as I soar above the fields and the farms, over forests and hills. I have always dreamed of flying – dreams like this are where the spirit comes alive, where we create our own rules, our own reality. Why should we let other people tell us how to live, or what is right and what is wrong? Flex your wings and soar with me, my little ones. Do you see our land below us? Is it not beautiful? The lake and the fields, the river and the trees, the horses running free beneath the sun. This is our world, our home, our sanctuary, and within it we are safe. Is that a dream? No, it is our reality. ~ Casey Hill

154:Researchers have confirmed what porn producers already know: men tend to get turned on by images depicting an environment in which sperm competition is clearly at play (though few, we imagine, think of it in quite these terms). Images and videos showing one woman with multiple males are far more popular on the Internet and in commercial pornography than those depicting one male with multiple females.14 A quick peek at the online offerings at Adult Video Universe lists over nine hundred titles in the Gangbang genre, but only twenty-seven listed under Reverse Gangbang. You do the math. Why would the males in a species that’s been wearing the shackles of monogamy for 1.9 million years be sexually excited by scenes of groups of men ejaculating with one or two women? ~ Christopher Ryan

155:Make no mistake: Sunday’s referendum will mark a defining moment in Greece’s modern history and a decisive turn for Europe’s neoliberal project. The choice is very clear. Five years after the people of Greece first rose up against the anti-democratic imposition of the Troika’s austerity measures, they have finally been given the chance to decide upon their own destiny: either they will vote yes to a lifetime of austerity within the eurozone, or they will roar back at the creditors’ inhumane demands with a proud and resounding “NO!” — thereby opening the way for a thousand yeses to a new, democratic and socially just Europe, freed from the shackles of debt servitude, the noose of a deflationary single currency, and the tyranny of an unaccountable financial technocracy. The stakes have never been higher. ~ Anonymous

156:dreams at night. Secretly, he began to make plans to travel to the shack the following weekend. At first he told no one, not even Nan. He had no reasonable defense in any exchange that would result after such a disclosure, and he was afraid that he might get locked up and the key thrown away. Anyway, he rationalized such a conversation would only bring more pain with no resolution. “I am keeping it to myself for Nan’s sake,” he told himself. Besides, acknowledging the note would mean admitting that he had kept secrets from her, secrets he still justified in his own mind. Sometimes honesty can be incredibly messy. Convinced of the rightness of his impending journey, Mack began to consider ways to get the family away from home for the weekend without rousing any suspicions. There was the slim possibility that ~ William Paul Young

157:Freedom from fear is the freedom I claim for you my motherland! Freedom from the burden of the ages, bending your head, breaking your back, blinding your eyes to the beckoning call of the future; Freedom from the shackles of slumber wherewith you fasten yourself in night's stillness, mistrusting the star that speaks of truth's adventurous paths; freedom from the anarchy of destiny whole sails are weakly yielded to the blind uncertain winds, and the helm to a hand ever rigid and cold as death. Freedom from the insult of dwelling in a puppet's world, where movements are started through brainless wires, repeated through mindless habits, where figures wait with patience and obedience for the master of show, to be stirred into a mimicry of life. ~ Rabindranath Tagore, Freedom

158:Ivanov- "Up to now , all revolutions have been made by moralizing diletantes. They were always in good faith and perished because of their dilettantism. We for the first time are consequent..." "Yes," said Rubashov. "So consequent, that in the interests of a just distribution of land we deliberately let die of starvation about five million farmers and their families in one year. So consequent were we in the liberation of human beings from the shackles of industrial exploitation that we sent about ten million people to do forced labour in the Artic regions and the jungles of the East, under conditions similar to those of antique galley slaves. So consequent that, to settle a difference of opinion, we know only one argument: death, whether it is a matter of submarines, manure, or the Party line to be followed in Indo-China. ... ~ Arthur Koestler

159:Philosophy is one of those subjects, like astrophysics and neurosurgery, that are not for the fainthearted. To delve into the absolutes of the human experience, to seek to advance the progress of enlightenment first expounded by the likes of the revered Aristotle and Plato, to search for the answers to the profound questions of the universe, often at the risk of deadly reprisal from entrenched powers, requires not only brilliance and tenacity but a deep sense of purpose. But even among this select fraternity, [René] Descartes stands out. From him did we get practical discoveries like coordinates in geometry and the law of refraction of light. But what he really did was to shake loose the human mind from the shackles of centuries of stultifying religious orthodoxy by creating an entirely original approach to reasoning: the Cartesian method. ~ Nancy Goldstone

160:Free Weary am I of the tumult, sick of the staring crowd, Pining for wild sea places where the soul may think aloud. Fled is the glamour of cities, dead as the ghost of a dream, While I pine anew for the tint of blue on the breast of the old Gulf Stream. I have had my dance with Folly, nor do I shirk the blame ; I have sipped the so-called Wine of Life and paid the price of shame; But I know that I shall find surcease, the rest my spirit craves, Where the rainbows play in the flying spray, 'Mid the keen salt kiss of the waves. Then it's ho! for the plunging deck of a bark, the hoarse song of the crew, With never a thought of those we left or what we are going to do; Nor heed the old ship's burning, but break the shackles of care And at last be free, on the open sea, with the trade wind in our hair. ~ Eugene O'Neill

161:We were to write a short essay on one of the works we read in the course and relate it to our lives. I chose the "Allegory of the Cave" in Plato's Republic. I compared my childhood of growing up in a family of migrant workers with the prisoners who were in a dark cave chained to the floor and facing a blank wall. I wrote that, like the captives, my family and other migrant workers were shackled to the fields day after day, seven days a week, week after week, being paid very little and living in tents or old garages that had dirt floors, no indoor plumbing, no electricity. I described how the daily struggle to simply put food on our tables kept us from breaking the shackles, from turning our lives around. I explained that faith and hope for a better life kept us going. I identified with the prisoner who managed to escape and with his sense of obligation to return to the cave and help others break free. ~ Francisco Jim nez

162:I was utterly terrified—petrified—but I knew there had to be a Japanese sniper in a small fishing shack near the shore. He was firing in the other direction at Marines in another battalion, but I knew as soon as he picked off the people there—there was a window on our side—that he would start picking us off. And there was nobody else to go…and so I ran towards the shack and broke in and found myself in an empty room. There was a door which meant there was another room and the sniper was in that—and I just broke that down. I was just absolutely gripped by the fear that this man would expect me and would shoot me. But as it turned out he was in a sniper harness and he couldn’t turn around fast enough. He was entangled in the harness so I shot him with a .45 and I felt remorse and shame. I can remember whispering foolishly, “I’m sorry” and then just throwing up…I threw up all over myself. It was a betrayal of what I’d been taught since a child. ~ Dave Grossman

163:She wasn’t sure how much time passed—it could have been hours—when something roused her. With a start she opened her eyes. It took her a moment to realize Connell was sitting next to her and that he’d tucked her into the crook of his arm with her head against his chest. The steady thud of his heartbeat echoed against her ear. His face was haggard with weariness, a testimony to the sleeplessness and danger he’d endured all night. She had no doubt it was well into the morning and that the threat of wolves was over for at least the time being; otherwise he wouldn’t have allowed himself the luxury of breaking his vigilance. Her parched tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth, and her body ached with feverish chills. She was sick. The peril of their predicament returned with a fresh wave of fear. One glance across the shack to the door, to the dead wolf, to the blood now crusted brown, and the terror of the night crashed back through her. How could they survive another day? Or another night? ~ Jody Hedlund

164:He shrugged. “You know I was in the dark about all that as much as you were. This time it’s straightforward. And sanctioned.” “Sanctioned by whom?” He looked at me. “By the proper authorities.” “All right,” I said, taking a sip from the porcelain demitasse. “Tell me.” He leaned forward and put his elbows on the table. “After nine-eleven, Congress took the shackles off the Agency. There’s a new spirit in the place. We’re pushing the envelope again, going after the bad guys—” “The few, the proud?” He frowned. “Look, we’re really making a difference now—” “Be all that you can be?” His jaw clenched. “Do you just enjoy pissing me off?” “A bit, yes.” “It’s petty.” I took another sip of espresso. “What’s your point?” “I wish you’d just listen.” “So far I’ve listened to five clichés, including something about shackled envelopes. I’m waiting for you to actually say something.” He flushed, but then nodded and even managed a chuckle. I smiled at his composure. He had matured since I had last seen him. ~ Barry Eisler

165:This emphasis calls into question some of the most ingrained insights into the history of the modern world—for example, conceptualizing the nineteenth century, as is so often done, as an age of “bourgeois civilization,” in contrast with the twentieth century, which historian Eric Hobsbawm has termed the “age of catastrophe.”19 An assessment such as this can only be derived from a vision of the world that focuses its moral judgments on Europe. Looked at from the perspective of much of Asia, Africa, and the Americas, one can argue just the opposite—that the nineteenth century was an age of barbarity and catastrophe, as slavery and imperialism devastated first one pocket of the globe and then another. It is the twentieth century, by contrast, that saw the weakening of imperial powers and thus allowed more of the world’s people to determine their own futures and shake off the shackles of colonial domination. Without its Eurocentric distortions, decolonialization would be at the very center of the narrative we tell about the twentieth century ~ Sven Beckert

166:Mark came home late one frozen Sunday carrying a bag of small, silver fish. They were smelts, locally known as icefish. He’d brought them at the store in the next town south, across from which a little village had sprung up on the ice of the lake, a collection of shacks with holes drilled in and around them. I’d seen the men going from the shore to the shacks on snowmobiles, six-packs of beer strapped on behind them like a half dozen miniature passengers. “Sit and rest,” Mark said. “I’m cooking.” He sautéed minced onion in our homemade butter, added a little handful of crushed, dried sage, and when the onion was translucent, he sprinkled n flour to make a roux, which he loosened with beer, in honor of the fishermen. He added cubed carrot, celery root, potato, and some stock, and then the fish, cut into pieces, and when they were all cooked through he poured in a whole morning milking’s worth of Delia’s yellow cream. Icefish chowder, rich and warm, eaten while sitting in Mark’s lap, my feet so close to the woodstove that steam came off my damp socks. ~ Kristin Kimball

167:I’d been reborn since Marlboro Man had entered my life; his wild abandon and unabashed passion had freed me from the shackles of cynicism, from thinking that love had to be something to labor over or agonize about. He’d ridden into my life on a speckled gray horse and had saved my heart from hardness. He’d taught me that when you love someone, you say it--and that when it comes to matters of the heart, games are for pimply sixteen-year-olds. Up until then that’s all I’d been: a child masquerading as a disillusioned adult, looking at love much as I’d looked at a round of Marco Polo in the pool at the country club: when they swam after me, I’d swim away. And there are accusations of peeking and cheating, and you always wind up sunburned and pruney and pooped. And no one ever wins. It was Marlboro Man who’d helped me out of the pool, wrapped a towel around my blistering shoulders, and carried me to a world where love has nothing to do with competition or sport or strategy. He told me he loved me when he felt like it, when he thought of it. He never saw any reason not to. ~ Ree Drummond

168:He tans into burning while the opening fanfare to "Peaches en Regalia" flows over him, the bugle call for a hippie army that marched at the peak of the American parabola, that moment when physics held its breath to allow levitation, a small reward before the descent. The hippies knew it then, Maggot Boy Johnson thinks; they couldn't build it into words but they could feel it; a floating in the stomach as history shifted direction. They stopped, hey, what's that sound, and knew that the spiny skyscrapers reflected in the river, the chasms of concrete, the wide streets and sidewalks, the power lines cutting into the hills and mountains above missile silos, the highways drawing lines across the blank plains under enormous skies, the pupil of God's eye, would be the ruins that their grandchildren wandered among, the reminders that once there was always water in the faucet, there was electricity all the time, and America was prying off the shackles of its past. The vision opened up to them and winked out again, and those it blinded staggered through their lives unable to see anything else, while the rest of them wondered if they had only dreamed it. ~ Brian Francis Slattery

169:Getting back to Audrey, though, I should really feel complimented that she won’t ever touch me because she likes me more than anyone else. It makes perfect sense, really, doesn’t it? If she ever gets down or depressed, i can make out the figure of her through the front window of the shack. She comes in and we drink cheap beer or wine and watch a movie or all three. Something old and long like Ben-Hur that stretches into the night. She’ll be next to me on the couch in her flannel shirt and jeans that have been cut into shorts,and eventually, when she’s asleep, I’ll bring a blanket out and cover her up. I kiss her cheek. I stroke her hair. I think of how she lives alone, just like me, and how she never had any real family, and how she only has sex with people. She never lets any love get in the way. I think she had a family once, but it was one of those beat-the-crap-out-of-each-other situations. There’s no shortage of them around here. I think she loved them and all she ever did was hurt her. That’s why she refuses to love. Anybody. I guess she feels better off that way, and who can blame her? When she sleeps on my couch, I think about all that. Everytime. I cover her up, then go to the bed and dream. With my eyes open. ~ Markus Zusak

170:So consequent were we in the liberation of human beings from the shackles of industrial exploitation that we sent about ten million people to do forced labour in the Arctic regions and the jungles of the East, under conditions similar to those of antique galley slaves. So consequent that, to settle a difference of opinion, we know only one argument: death, whether it is a matter of submarines, manure, or the party line to be followed in Indo-China. Our engineers work with the constant knowledge that an error in calculation may take them to prison or the scaffold; the higher officials in our administration ruin and destroy their subordinates, because they know that they will be held responsible for the slightest slip and be destroyed themselves; our poets settle discussions on questions of style by denunciations to the Secret Police, because the expressionists consider the naturalistic style counter-revolutionary, and vice versa. Acting consequentially in the interests of the coming generations, we have laid such terrible privations on the present one that its average length of life is shortened by a quarter. In order to defend the existence of the country, we have to take exceptional measures and make transition-stage laws, which are in every point contrary to the aims of the Revolution. ~ Arthur Koestler

171:Sloth (I) & (Ii) Sloth (I) Too many a Samsan lip your teeth indent: Too many a Sybil girl you lure to make The Great Refusal for a fireside sake: And glamoured poet many a look has sent Into those eyeballs bear-brown, somnolent, Nor dreamed that devils in each muddy lake Were sucking his devotion in to slake The furrowed belly of your fanged content! Religion's bane and Freedom's subtlest foe! Behold the poppied freight your barges bring The dim-lit souls that crave the prophet's gleam, Or fettered people's writhing 'neath their woe-Gossamer clips and thriftless harvesting Of phantom flocks and shadowy tilth of dream! Sloth (II) My dreams dissolve the day's illusive net: While crested Action's billows blinding beat, Omniscient Eyes in troughs of Faith I meet: I wait with ancient stars until they set Lest forward progress should their runes forget: I am the rest that makes the bar complete: And, in the shackled body of Defeat, The womb of Baby Triumph living yet! I am the blende of sleeping radiance: The Siding where belated Industry Draws from a Silent Tank tomorrow's zest: Prophetic Art's preparatory Trance: Dilating Force's Sabbath systole: The Night of Brahm when worn Creators rest! ~ Bernard O'Dowd

172:Independence Ode Columbia, fair queen in your glory! Columbia, the pride of the earth! We crown you with song- wreath and story; We honour the day of your birth! The wrath of a king and his minions You braved, to be free, on that day; And the eagle sailed up on strong pinions, And frightened the lion at bay. Since the chains and the shackles are broken, And citizens now replace slaves, Since the hearts of your heros have spoken How dear they held freedom - by graves. Your beautiful banner is blotless As it floats to the breezes unfurled, And but for one blemish, all spotless Is the record you show to the world. Like a scar on the features of beauty, Lies Utah, sin-cursed to the west. Columbia! Columbia! your duty Is to wipe out that stain with the rest! Not only in freedom, and science, And letters, should you lead the earth; But let the earth learn your reliance In honour and true moral worth. When Liberty's torch shall be lighted, Let her brightest most far-reaching rays Discover no wrong thats unrighted Go challenge the jealous world's gaze! Columbia, your star is ascending! Columbia, all lands own your sway! May your reign be as proud and unrending As your glory is brilliant today. 333 ~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox

173:Tears comes to my eyes when I think about some of God's people I have had the privilege to meet in the past few years. These are people with families, with dreams, people who are made in God's image as much as you and I are. And these people are suffering. Many of them are sick, some even dying, as they live out their lives in dwellings that we would not consider good enough for our household pets. I am not exaggerating. Much of their daily hardship and suffering could be relieved with access to food, clean water, clothing, adequate shelter, or basic medical attention. I believe that God wants His people, His church, to meet these needs. The Scriptures are filled with commands and references about caring for the poor and for those who cannot help themselves. The crazy part about God's heart is that He doesn't just ask us to give; He desires that we love those in need as much as we love ourselves. That is the core of the second greatest command, to 'love your neighbor as yourself' (Matthew 22:39). He is asking that you love as you would want to be loved if it were your child who was blind from drinking contaminated water; to love the way you would want to be loved if you were the homeless woman sitting outside the cafe; to love as though it were your family living in the shack slapped together from cardboard and scrap metal... ~ Francis Chan

174:Glad There's a battered old drum on the floor, And a Teddy bear sleeps in my chair, There's a doll carriage barring the door; Ah, it's weeks since she trundled it there! There are building blocks strewn in the hall, And a train of cars wrecked on the track, And I smile as I gaze at them all, Thank goodness, the children are back. There's a handkerchief tied to my cane, That's a flag that a soldier boy bears; Now the yard is a grim battle plain And the soldiers are marching in pairs. There are finger marks now on the wall That were left there by hands that were black, But I smile as I gaze at them all, Thank goodness, the children are back. There are cries of delight and despair Resounding once more through the place; There are pillow fights fierce on the stair, And down through the hall there's a race; There's a bump of a terrible fall As the enemy's camp they attack, But I smile as I list to it all, Thank goodness, the children are back. For give me the clamor and noise And give me the pranks that they play, The disturbance of girls and of boys That comes at the end of the day. For I'm sick of monotony's pall That hovered for weeks o'er the shack, It is music to me when they call, Thank goodness, the children are back. ~ Edgar Albert Guest

175:1052 Toys I can pass up the lure of a jewel to wear With never the trace of a sigh, The things on a shelf that I'd like for myself I never regret I can't buy. I can go through the town passing store after store Showing things it would please me to own, With never a trace of despair on my face, But I can't let a toy shop alone. I can throttle the love of fine raiment to death And I don't know the craving for rum, But I do know the joy that is born of a toy, And the pleasure that comes with a drum I can reckon the value of money at times, And govern my purse strings with sense, But I fall for a toy for my girl or my boy And never regard the expense. It's seldom I sigh for unlimited gold Or the power of a rich man to buy; My courage is stout when the doing without Is only my duty, but I Curse the shackles of thrift when I gaze at the toys That my kiddies are eager to own, And I'd buy everything that they wish for, by Jing! If their mother would let me alone. There isn't much fun spending coin on myself For neckties and up-to-date lids, But there's pleasure tenfold, in the silver and gold I part with for things for the kids. I can go through the town passing store after store Showing things it would please me to own, But to thrift I am lost; I won't reckon the cost When I'm left in a toy shop alone. ~ Edgar Albert Guest

176:memoir A Ride in the Neon Sun. Here’s what she says about traveling: Some people travel with firm ideas for a journey, following in the footsteps of an intrepid ancestor whose exotic exploits were happened upon in a dusty, cobweb-laced attic containing immovable trunks full of sepia-curled daguerreotypes and age-discoloured letters redolent of bygone days. Others travel for anthropological, botanical, archaeological, geological, and other logical reasons. Some are smitten by a specific country brewed from childhood dreams. For others, travel is a challenge, a release, an escape, a shaking off of the shackles, and even if they don’t know where they will end up they usually know where they will begin. The very hardest part of writing this book was that I was unable to stop working on it. I kept reading even after the initial manuscript was turned in, discovering new titles and authors whose works I just couldn’t bear to leave out. I even envisioned myself watching the book being printed and shouting periodically, “Stop the presses!” so that I could add yet another section or title. But of course the day actually came when I knew I had to stop or there would never be an end to the project.And here is the result, in your hands right now. So, before your next trip—either virtual or actual—grab a pen and begin making notes about the titles that sound good to you. And enjoy the journeys. I’d love to hear from you. My email address is nancy@nancypearl .com. ~ Nancy Pearl

177:Writing In The Afterlife I imagined the atmosphere would be clear, shot with pristine light, not this sulphurous haze, the air ionized as before a thunderstorm. Many have pictured a river here, but no one mentioned all the boats, their benches crowded with naked passengers, each bent over a writing tablet. I knew I would not always be a child with a model train and a model tunnel, and I knew I would not live forever, jumping all day through the hoop of myself. I had heard about the journey to the other side and the clink of the final coin in the leather purse of the man holding the oar, but how could anyone have guessed that as soon as we arrived we would be asked to describe this place and to include as much detail as possible— not just the water, he insists, rather the oily, fathomless, rat-happy water, not simply the shackles, but the rusty, iron, ankle-shredding shackles— and that our next assignment would be to jot down, off the tops of our heads, our thoughts and feelings about being dead, not really an assignment, the man rotating the oar keeps telling us— think of it more as an exercise, he groans, think of writing as a process, a never-ending, infernal process, and now the boats have become jammed together, 83 bow against stern, stern locked to bow, and not a thing is moving, only our diligent pens. ~ Billy Collins

178:We’d gone about five kilometers when we rounded a bend to see a tiny roadside store with a gas bar. “Yes!” Corey said, pumping the air. “We are now, officially, rescued.” “You think?” Hayley said. “I’m not seeing any vehicles.” “Because it’s out in the middle of freaking nowhere. They’re probably lucky if they get three cars a day.” “No, I mean transportation for the person running the place.” Corey peered at the empty lot surrounding the small building. “Oh.” The shack had one gas pump out front, and a diesel one around the side. The lack of a vehicle meant that unless there was a house nearby, no one was manning the place. “But it should have a phone,” I said. “Or maps to show us where we are. Also, there must be cottages nearby if there’s a gas bar.” “Ha!” Corey said, spinning and pointing at Hayley. “Ha!” He took off at a lope. We followed. Corey stopped a few feet from the door. “Open weekends after Labor Day,” he called. “What’s today?” “Not the weekend,” I called back. Corey walked to the barred window, then turned to us. “The window’s filthy. I can’t see anything.” “How about we try the door?” Sam said. She was walking toward it when Hayley grabbed her arm and pointed to a window sign warning that the place was armed with security alarms and cameras. “Um, yeah,” Corey said. “Which will bring the local cops. If we’re lucky.” “At this point, I’ll take any ride out of here,” I said. “Even handcuffed in the back of a police cruiser. ~ Kelley Armstrong

179:The next thing I knew Jamie was in my lap wrapping her arms around my neck as if she planned on keeping me hostage for eternity. If that were the case, bring on the shackles babe, because no way was I going to be the one to end this epic kiss. I felt like I was on fire—like warm energy was spilling out of Jamie, washing over me and causing all my hair to stand on end. I started shaking—just a slight tremor in my hands at first, but it quickly progressed to violent, uncontrollable shivers. The energy was filling my body so full I thought I’d literally burst apart at my seams. Then, when I was ready to combust Jamie finally stilled. She pulled her face back and smiled at me with a cool expression, but I know she was affected as I was. I wasn’t the only one breathing hard and shaking. “You can keep the gum,” she said, trying to mask her feelings with a smirk. She couldn’t quite manage it though. Her eyes were bright and full of disbelief. She was as surprised as I was. She climbed off me and with a wink said, “Have fun at the dance.” And then she was gone. She walked out of the cafeteria as if that hadn’t just happened. As if she hadn’t just completely wrecked me. I had no idea if what I felt meant we were soul mates or something crazy like that, but I knew two things for certain. One: Jamie Baker wasn’t the ice queen she pretended to be. And two: I wanted her more than anything I’d ever wanted in my entire life. I had a feeling this wasn’t going to be easy, but I knew deep down in my gut it would be worth it. “Game on, Ice Queen,” I muttered as I stumbled back over to Mike to rub my victory in his face. “You’re already mine. You just don’t know it yet. ~ Kelly Oram

180:Oh when our hope be shaken Oh when the trouble be overtaken Oh when the storm be a token Oh when yet, we understand the solemn ways of our Maker Then shall our peace within be awaken Then shall our peace within be awaken Oh when the peace we want, dwindles! Oh when the life we want, is found in the shackles! Oh when the doors of sleeplessness is opened to us! Oh when yet, we are shown the solemn path of our lives. Then shall our peace within be unshaken Then shall our peace within be unshaken Oh when the storms of life; seem to triumph over our lives Oh when the relation with our maker; shakes at the appearance of the light Oh when life, shows its hazardous side. Oh when yet, we understand the solemn ways of God. Then shall our peace within be unshaken Then shall our peace within be unshaken Oh when we rest in the belly of troubles Oh when our skill seems not working Oh when the test seems not ending Oh when yet, we understand the solemn path of God Then shall our peace within be unshaken Then shall our peace within be unshaken Oh when we are entangled; in the worsened economic life Oh when the hurdles of life; escalates to the apex in might Oh when our strength fades away Oh when yet, we are shown the solemn path of our lives Then shall our peace within be unshaken Then shall our peace within be unshaken Oh when our achievements, be at the apex Oh when our joy, be made perfect Oh when we sleep soundly in fervent! Oh when yet, we understand the solemn paths of God Then shall our peace within be unshaken Then shall our peace within be unshaken ~ Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

181:Oh when our hope be shaken Oh when the trouble be overtaken Oh when the storm be a token Oh when yet, we understand the solemn ways of our Maker Then shall our peace within be awaken Then shall our peace within be awaken Oh when the peace we want, dwindles! Oh when the life we want is found in the shackles! Oh when the paradox of sleeplessness, makes us marvel! Oh when yet, we are shown the solemn path of our lives. Then shall our peace within be unshaken Then shall our peace within be unshaken Oh when the storms of life seem to triumph over our lives Oh when the relation with our maker shakes at the appearance of the light Oh when life, shows its hazardous side. Oh when yet, we understand the solemn ways of God. Then shall our peace within be unshaken Then shall our peace within be unshaken Oh when we rest in the belly of troubles Oh when our skill seems not working Oh when the test seems not ending Oh when yet, we understand the solemn path of God Then shall our peace within be unshaken Then shall our peace within be unshaken Oh when we are entangled in the worsened economic life Oh when the hurdles of life escalates to the apex in might Oh when our strength cannot be our might Oh when yet, we are shown the solemn path of our lives Then shall our peace within be unshaken Then shall our peace within be unshaken Oh when our achievements, be at the apex Oh when our joy, be made perfect Oh when we sleep soundly in fervent Oh when yet, we understand the solemn paths of God Then shall our peace within be unshaken Then shall our peace within be unshaken ~ Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

182:You can’t go back,” she told him bluntly. Her voice was neither kind nor unkind. “That part of your life is over. Set it aside as something you have finished. Complete or no, it is done with you. No being gets to decide what his life is ‘supposed to be.’” She lifted her eyes and her gaze stabbed him. “Be a man. Discover who you are now, and go on from there, making the best of things. Accept your life, and you might survive it. If you hold back from it, insisting that this is not your life, not where you are meant to be, life will pass you by. You may not die from such foolishness, but you might as well be dead for all the good your life will do you or anyone else.” Wintrow was stunned. Heartless as her words were, they brimmed with wisdom. Almost reflexively, he sank into meditation breathing, as if this were a teaching direct from Sa’s scrolls. He explored her idea, following it to its logical conclusions. Yes, these thoughts were of Sa, and worthy. Accept. Begin anew. Find humility again. Pre-judging his life, that was what he had been doing. Always his greatest flaw, Berandol had warned him. There was opportunity for good here, if he just reached out toward it. … He suddenly grasped how the slaves must have felt when the shackles were loosed from their ankles and wrists. Her words had freed him. He could let go of his self-imposed goals. He would lift up his eyes and look around him and see where Sa’s way beckoned him most clearly. … “accepting life and making the best of it . . .” Spoken aloud, it seemed such a simple concept. Moments ago, those words had rung for him like great bells of truth. It was right what they said: enlightenment was merely the truth at the correct time." p. 114 Etta to Wintrow ~ Robin Hobb

183:George Alfred Henty (1832–1902), who began his writing career in the 1860s. Henty – educated at Westminster and Caius, Cambridge, the son of a wealthy stockbroker – had been commissioned in the Purveyor’s Department of the army, and gone to the Crimea during the war. There he had drifted into journalism, sending back reports for the Morning Advertiser and the Morning Post before catching fever and being invalided home. He continued to work in the Purveyor’s Department until the mid-Sixties, when the life of the war correspondent and the writer of boys’ adventure stories seemed overwhelmingly more interesting and better paid. Four generations of British children grew up with Henry’s irresistible stories, beautifully produced, bound and edited, on their shelves. The Henty phenomenon – over seventy titles celebrating imperialistic derring-do – really belongs to the 1880s, but deserves a mention here not only because of his radical and political views, but because of the direction taken by his career as a writer. The Henty story, by the time he had got into his stride, followed the formula that a young English lad in his early teens, freed from the shackles of public school or home upbringing by the convenient accident of orphanhood, finds himself caught up in some thrilling historical episode. The temporal sweep is impressive, ranging from Beric at Agincourt to The Briton: a story of the Roman Invasion; but the huge majority are exercises in British imperialist myth-building: By Conduct and Courage, A Story of the Days of Nelson, By Pike and Dyke, By Sheer Pluck, A Tale of the Ashanti War, Condemned as a Nihilist, The Dash for Khartoum, For Name and Fame: or through the Afghan Passes, Jack Archer, A Tale of the Crimea, Through the Sikh War. A Tale of the Punjaub (sic); The Tiger of Mysore, With Buller in Natal, With Kitchener in the Soudan, and so on. ~ A N Wilson

184:What do I do now?” I ask desperately. “Tell me! What do I do now?” He remains calm. He looks at me closely and says, “Keep living, Ed…. It’s only the pages that stop here.” He stays perhaps another ten minutes, probably due to the trauma that has strapped itself to me. I remain standing, trying to contemplate and recover from what’s transpired. “I really think I’d better go,” he says again, this item with more finality. With difficulty, I walk him to the door. We say goodbye on the front porch, and he walks back up the street. I wonder about his name, but I’m sure I’ll earn it soon enough. He’s written about this, I’m sure, the bastard. All of it. As he walks up the street he pulls a small notebook from his pocket and writes a few things down. It makes me think maybe I should write about all this myself. After all, I;m the one who did all the work. I’d start with the bank robbery. Something like, “The gunman is useless.” The odds are, however, that he’s beaten me to it already It’ll be his name on the cover of all these words, not mine. He’ll get all the credit. Or the crap, if her does a shit job. But I just remembered the I was the one- not him- who gave life to these pages. I was the one who- I tell me to stop. It’s an inner voice and it’s loud. All day, I think about many things, though I try not to. I look through the folder and find everything as he said. All the ideas are written in and people are sketched. Scratchy excerpts are stapled together. Beginnings and endings merge and bend. Hours wander past. Days follow them. I don’t leave the shack, and I don’t answer the phone. I barely even eat. The Doorman sits with me as the minutes pass by. For a long time, I wonder what I’m waiting for, but I understand it’s just like he said. I guess it’s for life beyond these pages. ~ Markus Zusak

185:But what about human nature? Can it be changed? And if not, will it endure under Anarchism? Poor human nature, what horrible crimes have been committed in thy name! Every fool, from king to policeman, from the flatheaded parson to the visionless dabbler in science, presumes to speak authoritatively of human nature. The greater the mental charlatan, the more definite his insistence on the wickedness and weaknesses of human nature. Yet, how can any one speak of it today, with every soul in a prison, with every heart fettered, wounded, and maimed? John Burroughs has stated that experimental study of animals in captivity is absolutely useless. Their character, their habits, their appetites undergo a complete transformation when torn from their soil in field and forest. With human nature caged in a narrow space, whipped daily into submission, how can we speak of its potentialities? Freedom, expansion, opportunity, and, above all, peace and repose, alone can teach us the real dominant factors of human nature and all its wonderful possibilities. Anarchism, then, really stands for the liberation of the human mind from the dominion of religion; the liberation of the human body from the dominion of property; liberation from the shackles and restraint of government. Anarchism stands for a social order based on the free grouping of individuals for the purpose of producing real social wealth; an order that will guarantee to every human being free access to the earth and full enjoyment of the necessities of life, according to individual desires, tastes, and inclinations. This is not a wild fancy or an aberration of the mind. It is the conclusion arrived at by hosts of intellectual men and women the world over; a conclusion resulting from the close and studious observation of the tendencies of modern society: individual liberty and economic equality, the twin forces for the birth of what is fine and true in man. ~ Emma Goldman

186:At about this time David hit on a scheme to end their financial problems. With his growing family, their limited income must have been the cause of constant worry to him. Stories of the rich strikes in the Klondike a decade earlier, perhaps bolstered by his spell of active service in South Africa, seem to have persuaded him that gold-mining might be the answer. On hearing that a new goldfield had been discovered in Ontario, he staked several claims to forty acres near the small township of Swastika, in the Great Lakes area. Only small quantities of gold had been found there so far, but a big seam was believed to exist. ---- Over the next twenty years or so, David would travel to Ontario many times to work the claim. He had already been there alone when, in the spring of 1912, he and Sydney decided to go together and – the biggest treat — they were to sail on the maiden voyage of the Titanic. Fortunately, something happened to make this impossible, and their departure was delayed until autumn of the following year. ---- It is not difficult to see why David remained keen, although the mining project eventually came to nothing. Furthermore, he and Sydney were at their closest in the shack at Swastika through the winter in that inhospitable climate, and it was one of the happiest times of David’s life. It was there that Sydney conceived their fifth child. ---- The parents, still hoping for a second boy, were disappointed, but soon came round. There was time for another boy. In David’s absence Sydney called her Unity after an actress (Unity Moore) she admired, and then Grandfather Redesdale said that she must have a topically apposite second name so they added Valkyrie, after Wagner’s Norse war-maidens. Almost from the time of her birth she was known in family circles as ‘Bobo’, but with hindsight, Unity Valkyrie’s unusual name, combined with the place of her conception, Swastika, seems almost like an eerie prophecy which the fifth Mitford child had no alternative but to fulfil. ~ Mary S Lovell

187:STAY ON COURSE …Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead (Philippians 3:13). Well-trained athletes would never expect to win the race by constantly looking over their shoulder. They know in order to win they must keep focused on the finish line. As believers we cannot run the race always looking to the past. We must focus our attention toward the future. We can learn from the past, while living in the present, and focusing on the future. When it comes to past experiences there are two basic attitudes: First, some learn from the past and are helped. When Paul said he was, “ forgetting what is behind,” he was not suggesting a memory failure. God did not create us with an erase button behind our ears so we can eliminate hurtful memories. That’s not what it means at all. It means to no longer be influenced or affected by our past. When God said He would not remember our sins and iniquities (see Hebrews 10:17), He was not saying He will have a memory lapse. That is impossible with God. What He is saying is that our sins will no longer affect our standing with Him. Second, some people live in the past and are hindered. Sadly, there are many believers who never progress any further in their walk with God because all of their time is spent on painful memories. No doubt there were things in Paul’s past that could have been too heavy for him to carry into his future (see 1 Timothy 1:12-17). Instead of allowing his past memories to hurt him, they became inspirations to push him forward! Paul could not change what had happened to him in his past. But he determined to gain a new understanding of what they meant. He is a perfect example of a runner who refused to run the race backward! Without the power of the Holy Spirit it is impossible to break the shackles of past regret and hurt. No amount of “mind power” can accomplish what only God’s power can do. While we cannot change past events, like Paul, we can change how they affect us today. Father, I know I am easily distracted by hurtful memories. I pray for the power of the Holy Spirit to break their influence. Amen! ~ Paul Tsika

188:The National Socialist Movement has, besides its delivery from the Jewishcapitalist shackles imposed by a plutocratic-democratic, dwindling class of exploiters at home, pronounced its resolve to free the Reich from the shackles of the Diktat of Versailles abroad. The German demands for a revision were an absolute necessity, a matter of course for the existence and the honor of any great people. Posterity will some day come to regard them as exceedingly modest. All these demands had to be carried through, in practice against the will of the British French potentates. Now more than ever we all see it as a success of the leadership of the Third Reich that the realization of these revisions was possible for years without resort to war. This was not the case-as the British and French demagogues would have it-because we were not then in a position to wage war. When it finally appeared as though, thanks to a gradually awakening common sense, a peaceful resolution of the remaining problems could be reached through international cooperation, the agreement concluded in this spirit on September 29, 1938, at Munich by the four great states predominantly involved, was not welcomed by public opinion in London and Paris, but was condemned as a despicable sign of weakness. The Jewish capitalist warmongers, their hands covered with blood, saw in the possible success of such a peaceful revision the vanishing of plausible grounds for the realization of their insane plans. Once again that conspiracy of pitiful, corrupt political creatures and greedy financial magnates made its appearance, for whom war is a welcome means to bolster business. The international Jewish poison of the peoples began to agitate against and to coroode healthy minds. Men of letters set out to portray decent men who desired peace as weaklings and traitors, to denounce opposition parties as a “fifth column,” in order to eliminate internal resistance to their criminal policy of war. Jews and Freemasons, armament industrialists and war profiteers, international traders and stockjobbers, found political blackguards: desperados and glory seekers who represented war as something to be yearned for and hence wished for. Adolf Hitler - speech to the Reichstag Berlin, July 19, 1940 ~ Adolf Hitler

189:Genuine feelings are never the product of conscious effort. They are quite simply there, and they are there for a very good reason, even if that reason is not always apparent. I cannot force myself to love or honor my parents if my body rebels against such an endeavor for reasons that are well-known to it. But if I still attempt to obey the Fourth Commandment, then the upshot will be the kind of stress that is invariably involved when I demand the impossible of myself. This kind of stress has accompanied me almost all my life. Anxious to stay in line with the system of moral values I had accepted, I did my best to imagine good feelings I did not possess while ignoring the bad feelings I did have. My aim was to be loved as a daughter. But the effort was all in vain. In the end I had to realize that I cannot force love to come if it is not there in the first place. On the other hand, I learned that a feeling of love will establish itself automatically (for example, love for my children or love for my friends) once I stop demanding that I feel such love and stop obeying the moral injunctions imposed on me. But such a sensation can happen only when I feel free and remain open and receptive to all my feelings, including the negative ones. The realization that I cannot manipulate my feelings, that I can delude neither myself nor others, brought me immense relief and liberation. Only then was I fully struck by the large number of people who (like myself) literally almost kill themselves in the attempt to obey the Fourth Commandment, without any consideration of the price this exacts both from their own bodies and from their children. As long as the children allow themselves to be used in this way, it is entirely possible to live to be one hundred without any awareness of one’s own personal truth and without any illness ensuing from this protracted form of self-deception. A mother who is forced to realize that the deprivations imposed on her in her youth make it impossible for her to love a child of her own, however hard she may try, can certainly expect to be accused of immorality if she has the courage to put that truth into words. But I believe that it is precisely this explicit acceptance of her true feelings, independent of the claims of morality, that will enable her to give both herself and her children the honest and sincere kind of support they need most, and at the same time will allow her to free herself from the shackles of self-deception. When ~ Alice Miller

190:At Half-Mast You didn't know Billy, did you? Well, Bill was one of the boys, The greatest fellow you ever seen to racket an' raise a noise,-An' sing! say, you never heard singing 'nless you heard Billy sing. I used to say to him, "Billy, that voice that you've got there'd bring A mighty sight more bank-notes to tuck away in your vest, If only you'd go on the concert stage instead of a-ranchin' West." An' Billy he'd jist go laughin', and say as I didn't know A robin's whistle in springtime from a barnyard rooster's crow. But Billy could sing, an' I sometimes think that voice lives anyhow,-That perhaps Bill helps with the music in the place he's gone to now. The last time that I seen him was the day he rode away; He was goin' acrost the plain to catch the train for the East next day. 'Twas the only time I ever seen poor Bill that he didn't laugh Or sing, an' kick up a rumpus an' racket around, and chaff, For he'd got a letter from his folks that said for to hurry home, For his mother was dyin' away down East an' she wanted Bill to come. Say, but the feller took it hard, but he saddled up right away, An' started across the plains to take the train for the East, next day. Sometimes I lie awake a-nights jist a-thinkin' of the rest, For that was the great big blizzard day, when the wind come down from west, An' the snow piled up like mountains an' we couldn't put foot outside, But jist set into the shack an' talked of Bill on his lonely ride. We talked of the laugh he threw us as he went at the break o' day, An' we talked of the poor old woman dyin' a thousand mile away. Well, Dan O'Connell an' I went out to search at the end of the week, Fer all of us fellers thought a lot,--a lot that we darsn't speak. We'd been up the trail about forty mile, an' was talkin' of turnin' back, But Dan, well, he wouldn't give in, so we kep' right on to the railroad track. As soon as we sighted them telegraph wires says Dan, "Say, bless my soul! Ain't that there Bill's red handkerchief tied half way up that pole?" Yes, sir, there she was, with her ends a-flippin' an' flyin' in the wind, An' underneath was the envelope of Bill's letter tightly pinned. "Why, he must a-boarded the train right here," says Dan, but I kinder knew That underneath them snowdrifts we would find a thing or two; Fer he'd writ on that there paper, "Been lost fer hours,--all hope is past. You'll find me, boys, where my handkerchief is flyin' at half-mast." 18 ~ Emily Pauline Johnson

191:When I’m given a role, the first thing I do is read the play over and over again. I scour the script and write down everything the character says about himself and everything that everyone else says about him. I immerse myself in my character and imagine what it might be like to be that person. When I played Cassio in Othello I imagined what it would be like to be a lieutenant in the Venetian navy in 1604. I sat down with Ewan McGregor and Chiwetel Ejiofor and together we decided that Othello, Iago and Cassio had soldiery in their bones. I took from the script that Cassio was talented and ambitious, with no emotional or physical guard - and that’s how I played the part. For me, acting is about recreating the circumstances that would make me feel how my character is feeling. In the dressing room, I practise recreating those circumstances in my head and I try to not get in the way of myself. For example, in act two of Othello, when Cassio is manipulated to fight Roderigo and loses his rank, some nights I would burst into tears; other nights I wouldn’t but I would still feel the same emotion, night after night. Just as in life, the way we respond to catastrophe or death will be different every time because the process is unconscious. By comparison, in Chekhov’s Ivanov I played the young doctor, Lvov. Lvov was described as “a prig and a bigot … uprightness in boots … tiresome … completely sincere”. His emotions were locked away. I worked around the key phrase: “Forgive me, I’m going to tell you plainly.” I practised speaking gravely and sincerely without emotion and I actually noticed how that carried over into my personal life: when I played the open-hearted Cassio, I felt really free; when I played the pent-up Lvov, I felt a real need to release myself from the shackles of that character. It’s exhilarating to act out the emotions of a character - it’s a bit like being a child again. You flex the same muscles that you did when you pretended to be a cowboy or a policeman: acting is a grown-up version of that with more subtlety and detail. You’re responding with real emotions to imaginary situations. When I’m in a production I never have a day when I haven’t laughed, cried or screamed. There are times when I wake up stiff from emotional exhaustion. Film is a much more intimate and thoughtful medium than theatre because of the proximity of the camera. The camera can read your thoughts. On stage, if you have a moment of vulnerability you can hide it from the other actors; on film, the camera will see you feel that emotion and try to suppress it. Similarly, if you’re pretending to feel something that isn’t there, it won’t be believable. ~ Tom Hiddleston

192:The Little Worn Out Pony There's a little worn-out pony this side of Hogan's shack With a snip upon his nuzzle and a mark upon his back; Just a common little pony is what most people say, But then of course they've never heard what happened in his day: I was droving on the Leichhardt with a mob of pikers wild, When this tibby little pony belonged to Hogan's child. One night it started raining – we were camping on a rise, When the wind blew cold and bleakly and thunder shook the skies; The lightning cut the figure eight around the startled cattle, Then down there fell torrential rains and then began a battle. In a fraction of an instant the wild mob became insane, Careering through the timber helter-skelter for the plain. The timber fell before them like grass before a scythe, And heavy rain in torrents poured from the grimly blackened sky; The mob rushed ever onward through the slippery sodden ground, While the men and I worked frantically to veer their heads around; And then arose an awful cry – it came from Jimmy Rild, For there between two saplings straight ahead was Hogan's child. I owned not man or devil, I had not prayed since when, But I called upon the blessed Lord to show His mercy then; I shut my eyes and ground my teeth, the end I dared not see Great God! The cattle – a thousand head – were crashing through the trees. "God pity us bush children in our darkest hour of need," Were the words I prayed although I followed neither church or creed. Then my right-hand 'man was shouting, the faithful Jimmy Rild, "Did you see it, Harry, see the way he saved that child?" "Saved! Saved, did you say?" and I shot upright with a bound, "Yes, saved," he said, "indeed old man, the child is safe and sound. I was feeling pretty shaky and was gazing up the track, Just then a pony galloped, the kid hopped on its back. "A blinding Bash of lightning then the thunder's rolling crack; With two hands clasped upon his mane he raced towards the shack." "Good heavens, man," I shouted then, "if that is truly so, To blazes with the cattle, to the shanty we must go." 38 We reached Bill Hogan's shanty in fifteen minutes' ride, Then left our horses standing and wildly rushed inside. The little child was there unhurt but shivering with fear, And Hogan told us, "Yes, thank God, there's the pony brought her here." There's a little worn-out pony just this side of Hogan's shack With a snip upon his nuzzle and a mark upon his back; Just a common little pony is what most people say, But I doubt if there's his equal in the pony world today. ~ Anonymous Oceania

193:The Valley Of The Shadow There were faces to remember in the Valley of the Shadow, There were faces unregarded, there were faces to forget; There were fires of grief and fear that are a few forgotten ashes, There were sparks of recognition that are not forgotten yet. For at first, with an amazed and overwhelming indignation At a measureless malfeasance that obscurely willed it thus, They were lost and unacquainted—till they found themselves in others, Who had groped as they were groping where dim ways were perilous. There were lives that were as dark as are the fears and intuitions Of a child who knows himself and is alone with what he knows; There were pensioners of dreams and there were debtors of illusions, All to fail before the triumph of a weed that only grows. There were thirsting heirs of golden sieves that held not wine or water, And had no names in traffic or more value there than toys: There were blighted sons of wonder in the Valley of the Shadow, Where they suffered and still wondered why their wonder made no noise. There were slaves who dragged the shackles of a precedent unbroken, Demonstrating the fulfilment of unalterable schemes, Which had been, before the cradle, Time’s inexorable tenants Of what were now the dusty ruins of their father’s dreams. There were these, and there were many who had stumbled up to manhood, Where they saw too late the road they should have taken long ago: There were thwarted clerks and fiddlers in the Valley of the Shadow, The commemorative wreckage of what others did not know. And there were daughters older than the mothers who had borne them, Being older in their wisdom, which is older than the earth; And they were going forward only farther into darkness, Unrelieved as were the blasting obligations of their birth; And among them, giving always what was not for their possession, There were maidens, very quiet, with no quiet in their eyes; There were daughters of the silence in the Valley of the Shadow, Each an isolated item in the family sacrifice. There were creepers among catacombs where dull regrets were torches, Giving light enough to show them what was there upon the shelves— Where there was more for them to see than pleasure would remember 365 Of something that had been alive and once had been themselves. There were some who stirred the ruins with a solid imprecation, While as many fled repentance for the promise of despair: There were drinkers of wrong waters in the Valley of the Shadow, And all the sparkling ways were dust that once had led them there. There were some who knew the steps of Age incredibly beside them, And his fingers upon shoulders that had never felt the wheel; And their last of empty trophies was a gilded cup of nothing, Which a contemplating vagabond would not have come to steal. Long and often had they figured for a larger valuation, But the size of their addition was the balance of a doubt: There were gentlemen of leisure in the Valley of the Shadow, Not allured by retrospection, disenchanted, and played out. And among the dark endurances of unavowed reprisals There were silent eyes of envy that saw little but saw well; And over beauty’s aftermath of hazardous ambitions There were tears for what had vanished as they vanished where they fell. Not assured of what was theirs, and always hungry for the nameless, There were some whose only passion was for Time who made them cold: There were numerous fair women in the Valley of the Shadow, Dreaming rather less of heaven than of hell when they were old. Now and then, as if to scorn the common touch of common sorrow, There were some who gave a few the distant pity of a smile; And another cloaked a soul as with an ash of human embers, Having covered thus a treasure that would last him for a while. There were many by the presence of the many disaffected, Whose exemption was included in the weight that others bore: There were seekers after darkness in the Valley of the Shadow, And they alone were there to find what they were looking for. So they were, and so they are; and as they came are coming others, And among them are the fearless and the meek and the unborn; And a question that has held us heretofore without an answer May abide without an answer until all have ceased to mourn. For the children of the dark are more to name than are the wretched, Or the broken, or the weary, or the baffled, or the shamed: There are builders of new mansions in the Valley of the Shadow, And among them are the dying and the blinded and the maimed. 366 ~ Edwin Arlington Robinson

194:The Star-Apple Kingdom There were still shards of an ancient pastoral in those shires of the island where the cattle drank their pools of shadow from an older sky, surviving from when the landscape copied such objects as 'Herefords at Sunset in the valley of the Wye.' The mountain water that fell white from the mill wheel sprinkling like petals from the star-apple trees, and all of the windmills and sugar mills moved by mules on the treadmill of Monday to Monday, would repeat in tongues of water and wind and fire, in tongues of Mission School pickaninnies, like rivers remembering their source, Parish Trelawny, Parish St David, Parish St Andrew, the names afflicting the pastures, the lime groves and fences of marl stone and the cattle with a docile longing, an epochal content. And there were, like old wedding lace in an attic, among the boas and parasols and the tea-colored daguerreotypes, hints of an epochal happiness as ordered and infinite to the child as the great house road to the Great House down a perspective of casuarinas plunging green manes in time to the horses, an orderly life reduced by lorgnettes day and night, one disc the sun, the other the moon, reduced into a pier glass: nannies diminished to dolls, mahogany stairways no larger than those of an album in which the flash of cutlery yellows, as gamboge as the piled cakes of teatime on that latticed bougainvillea verandah that looked down toward a prospect of Cuyp-like Herefords under a sky lurid as a porcelain souvenir with these words: 'Herefords at Sunset in the Valley of the Wye.' Strange, that the rancor of hatred hid in that dream of slow rivers and lily-like parasols, in snaps of fine old colonial families, curled at the edge not from age of from fire or the chemicals, no, not at all, but because, off at its edges, innocently excluded stood the groom, the cattle boy, the housemaid, the gardeners, 74 the tenants, the good Negroes down in the village, their mouth in the locked jaw of a silent scream. A scream which would open the doors to swing wildly all night, that was bringing in heavier clouds, more black smoke than cloud, frightening the cattle in whose bulging eyes the Great House diminished; a scorching wind of a scream that began to extinguish the fireflies, that dried the water mill creaking to a stop as it was about to pronounce Parish Trelawny all over, in the ancient pastoral voice, a wind that blew all without bending anything, neither the leaves of the album nor the lime groves; blew Nanny floating back in white from a feather to a chimerical, chemical pin speck that shrank the drinking Herefords to brown porcelain cows on a mantelpiece, Trelawny trembling with dusk, the scorched pastures of the old benign Custos; blew far the decent servants and the lifelong cook, and shriveled to a shard that ancient pastoral of dusk in a gilt-edged frame now catching the evening sun in Jamaica, making both epochs one. He looked out from the Great House windows on clouds that still held the fragrance of fire, he saw the Botanical Gardens officially drown in a formal dusk, where governors had strolled and black gardeners had smiled over glinting shears at the lilies of parasols on the floating lawns, the flame trees obeyed his will and lowered their wicks, the flowers tightened their fists in the name of thrift, the porcelain lamps of ripe cocoa, the magnolia's jet dimmed on the one circuit with the ginger lilies and left a lonely bulb on the verandah, and, had his mandate extended to that ceiling of star-apple candelabra, he would have ordered the sky to sleep, saying, I'm tired, save the starlight for victories, we can't afford it, leave the moon on for one more hour,and that's it. But though his power, the given mandate, extended from tangerine daybreaks to star-apple dusks, his hand could not dam that ceaseless torrent of dust 75 that carried the shacks of the poor, to their root-rock music, down the gullies of Yallahs and August Town, to lodge them on thorns of maca, with their rags crucified by cactus, tins, old tires, cartons; from the black Warieka Hills the sky glowed fierce as the dials of a million radios, a throbbing sunset that glowed like a grid where the dread beat rose from the jukebox of Kingston. He saw the fountains dried of quadrilles, the water-music of the country dancers, the fiddlers like fifes put aside. He had to heal this malarial island in its bath of bay leaves, its forests tossing with fever, the dry cattle groaning like winches, the grass that kept shaking its head to remember its name. No vowels left in the mill wheel, the river. Rock stone. Rock stone. The mountains rolled like whales through phosphorous stars, as he swayed like a stone down fathoms into sleep, drawn by that magnet which pulls down half the world between a star and a star, by that black power that has the assassin dreaming of snow, that poleaxes the tyrant to a sleeping child. The house is rocking at anchor, but as he falls his mind is a mill wheel in moonlight, and he hears, in the sleep of his moonlight, the drowned bell of Port Royal's cathedral, sees the copper pennies of bubbles rising from the empty eye-pockets of green buccaneers, the parrot fish floating from the frayed shoulders of pirates, sea horses drawing gowned ladies in their liquid promenade across the moss-green meadows of the sea; he heard the drowned choirs under Palisadoes, a hymn ascending to earth from a heaven inverted by water, a crab climbing the steeple, and he climbed from that submarine kingdom as the evening lights came on in the institute, the scholars lamplit in their own aquarium, he saw them mouthing like parrot fish, as he passed upward from that baptism, their history lessons, the bubbles like ideas which he could not break: Jamaica was captured by Penn and Venables, 76 Port Royal perished in a cataclysmic earthquake. Before the coruscating façades of cathedrals from Santiago to Caracas, where penitential archbishops washed the feet of paupers (a parenthetical moment that made the Caribbean a baptismal font, turned butterflies to stone, and whitened like doves the buzzards circling municipal garbage), the Caribbean was borne like an elliptical basin in the hands of acolytes, and a people were absolved of a history which they did not commit; the slave pardoned his whip, and the dispossessed said the rosary of islands for three hundred years, a hymn that resounded like the hum of the sea inside a sea cave, as their knees turned to stone, while the bodies of patriots were melting down walls still crusted with mute outcries of La Revolucion! 'San Salvador, pray for us,St. Thomas, San Domingo, ora pro nobis, intercede for us, Sancta Lucia of no eyes,' and when the circular chaplet reached the last black bead of Sancta Trinidad they began again, their knees drilled into stone, where Colon had begun, with San Salvador's bead, beads of black colonies round the necks of Indians. And while they prayed for an economic miracle, ulcers formed on the municipal portraits, the hotels went up, and the casinos and brothels, and the empires of tobacco, sugar, and bananas, until a black woman, shawled like a buzzard, climbed up the stairs and knocked at the door of his dream, whispering in the ear of the keyhole: 'Let me in, I'm finished with praying, I'm the Revolution. I am the darker, the older America.' She was as beautiful as a stone in the sunrise, her voice had the gutturals of machine guns across khaki deserts where the cactus flower detonates like grenades, her sex was the slit throat of an Indian, her hair had the blue-black sheen of the crow. She was a black umbrella blown inside out by the wind of revolution, La Madre Dolorosa, a black rose of sorrow, a black mine of silence, 77 raped wife, empty mother, Aztec virgin transfixed by arrows from a thousand guitars, a stone full of silence, which, if it gave tongue to the tortures done in the name of the Father, would curdle the blood of the marauding wolf, the fountain of generals, poets, and cripples who danced without moving over their graves with each revolution; her Caesarean was stitched by the teeth of machine guns,and every sunset she carried the Caribbean's elliptical basin as she had once carried the penitential napkins to be the footbath of dictators, Trujillo, Machado, and those whose faces had yellowed like posters on municipal walls. Now she stroked his hair until it turned white, but she would not understand that he wanted no other power but peace, that he wanted a revolution without any bloodshed, he wanted a history without any memory, streets without statues, and a geography without myth. He wanted no armies but those regiments of bananas, thick lances of cane, and he sobbed,'I am powerless, except for love.' She faded from him, because he could not kill; she shrunk to a bat that hung day and night in the back of his brain. He rose in his dream. ~ Derek Walcott

195:The Kalevala - Rune Xxii THE BRIDE'S FAREWELL. When the marriage was completed, When the many guests had feasted, At the wedding of the Northland, At the Dismal-land carousal, Spake the hostess of Pohyola To the blacksmith, Ilmarinen: 'Wherefore, bridegroom, dost thou linger, Why art waiting, Northland hero? Sittest for the father's pleasure, For affection of the mother, For the splendor of the maidens, For the beauty of the daughter? Noble son-in-law and brother, Wait thou longer, having waited Long already for the virgin, Thine affianced is not ready, Not prepared, thy life-companion, Only are her tresses braided. 'Chosen bridegroom, pride of Pohya, Wait thou longer, having waited Long already for the virgin, Thy beloved is preparing, Only is one hand made ready. 'Famous artist, Ilmarinen, Wait still longer, having waited Long already for the virgin, Thy beloved is not ready, Only is one foot in fur-shoes,' Spake again the ancient Louhi: 'Chosen suitor of my daughter, Thou hast thrice in kindness waited, Wait no longer for the virgin, Thy beloved now is ready, Well prepared thy life-companion, Fairy Maiden of the Rainbow. 'Beauteous daughter, join thy suitor, 362 Follow him, thy chosen husband, Very near is the uniting, Near indeed thy separation. At thy hand the honored bridegroom, Near the door he waits to lead thee, Guide thee to his home and kindred; At the gate his steed is waiting, Restless champs his silver bridle, And the sledge awaits thy presence. 'Thou wert anxious for a suitor, Ready to accept his offer, Wert in haste to take his jewels, Place his rings upon thy fingers; Now, fair daughter, keep thy promise; To his sledge, with happy footsteps, Hie in haste to join the bridegroom, Gaily journey to the village With thy chosen life-companion, With thy suitor, Ilmarinen. Little hast thou looked about thee, Hast not raised thine eyes above thee, Beauteous maiden of the Northland, Hast thou made a rueful bargain, Full of wailing thine engagement, And thy marriage full of sorrow, That thy father's ancient cottage Thou art leaving now forever, Leaving also friends and kindred, For the, blacksmith, Ilmarinen? 'O how beautiful thy childhood, In thy father's dwelling-places, Nurtured like a tender flower, Like the strawberry in spring-time Soft thy couch and sweet thy slumber, Warm thy fires and rich thy table; From the fields came corn in plenty, From the highlands, milk and berries, Wheat and barley in abundance, Fish, and fowl, and hare, and bacon, From thy father's fields and forests. 'Never wert thou, child, in sorrow, Never hadst thou grief nor trouble, 363 All thy cares were left to fir-trees, All thy worry to the copses, All thy weeping to the willows, All thy sighing to the lindens, All thy thinking to the aspens And the birches on the mountains, Light and airy as the leaflet, As a butterfly in summer, Ruddy as a mountain-berry, Beautiful as vernal flowers. 'Now thou leavest home and kindred, Wanderest to other firesides, Goest to another mother, Other sisters, other brothers, Goest to a second father, To the servant-folk of strangers, From thy native hills and lowlands. There and here the homes will differ, Happier thy mother's hearth-stone; Other horns will there be sounded, Other portals there swing open, Other hinges there be creaking; There the doors thou canst not enter Like the daughters of Wainola, Canst not tend the fires and ovens As will please the minds of strangers. 'Didst thou think, my fairest maiden, Thou couldst wed and on the morrow Couldst return, if thou shouldst wish it, To thy father's court and dwelling? Not for one, nor two, nor three days, Wilt thou leave thy mother's chambers, Leave thy sisters and thy brothers, Leave thy father's hills and lowlands. Long the time the wife must wander, Many months and years must wander, Work, and struggle, all her life long, Even though the mother liveth. Great, indeed, must be the changes When thou comest back to Pohya, Changed, thy friends and nearest kindred, Changed, thy father's ancient dwellings, 364 Changed, the valleys and the mountains, Other birds will sing thy praises!' When the mother thus had spoken, Then the daughter spake, departing: 'In my early days of childhood Often I intoned these measures: 'Art a virgin, yet no virgin, Guided by an aged mother, In a brother's fields and forests, In the mansion of a father! Only wilt become a virgin, Only when thou hast a suitor, Only when thou wedst a hero, One foot on the father's threshold, And the other for the snow-sledge That will speed thee and thy husband To his native vales and highlands!' 'I have wished thus many summers, Sang it often in my childhood, Hoped for this as for the flowers, Welcome as the birds of spring-time. Thus fulfilled are all my wishes, Very near is my departure, One foot on my father's threshold, And the, other for the journey With my husband to his people; Cannot understand the reason That has changed my former feelings, Cannot leave thee now with gladness, Cannot go with great rejoicing From my dear, old home and kindred, Where as maiden I have lingered, From the courts where I was nurtured, From my father's band and guidance, From my faithful mother's counsel. Now I go, a maid of sorrow, Heavy-hearted to the bridegroom, Like the bride of Night in winter, Like the ice upon the rivers. 'Such is not the mind of others, Other brides of Northland heroes; Others do not leave unhappy, 365 Have no tears, nor cares, nor sorrows, I alas! must weep and murmur, Carry to my grave great sadness, Heart as dark as Death's black river. 'Such the feelings of the happy, Such the minds of merry maidens: Like the early dawn of spring-time, Like the rising Sun in summer No such radiance awaits me, With my young heart filled with terror; Happiness is not my portion, Like the flat-shore of the ocean, Like the dark rift of the storm-cloud, Like the cheerless nights of winter! Dreary is the day in autumn, Dreary too the autumn evening, Still more dreary is my future!' An industrious old maiden, Ever guarding home and kindred, Spake these words of doubtful comfort: 'Dost thou, beauteous bride, remember, Canst thou not recall my counsels? These the words that I have taught thee: 'Look not joyfully for suitors, Never heed the tongues of wooers, Look not in the eyes of charmers, At their feet let fall thy vision. He that hath a mouth for sweetness, He that hath an eye for beauty, Offers little that will comfort; Lempo sits upon his forehead, In his mouth dwells dire Tuoni.' 'Thus, fair bride, did I advise thee, Thus advised my sister's daughter: Should there come the best of suitors, Noblest wooers, proudest lovers, Give to all these wisdom-sayings, Let thine answer be as follows: 'Never will I think it wisdom, Never will it be my pleasure, To become a second daughter, Linger with my husband's mother; 366 Never shall I leave my father, Never wander forth to bondage, At the bidding of a bridegroom: Never shall I be a servant, Wife and slave to any hero, Never will I be submissive To the orders of a husband.' 'Fairest bride, thou didst not heed me, Gav'st no thought to my advices, Didst not listen to my counsel; Wittingly thy feet have wandered Into boiling tar and water, Hastened to thy suitor's snow-sledge, To the bear-dens of thy husband, On his sledge to be ill-treated, Carried to his native country, To the bondage of his people, There, a subject to his mother. Thou hast left thy mother's dwelling, To the schooling of the master; Hard indeed the master's teachings, Little else than constant torture; Ready for thee are his bridles, Ready for thy bands the shackles, Were not forged for any other; Soon, indeed, thou'lt feel the hardness, Feel the weight of thy misfortune, Feel thy second father's censure, And his wife's inhuman treatment, Hear the cold words or thy brother, Quail before thy haughty sister. 'Listen, bride, to what I tell thee: In thy home thou wert a jewel, Wert thy father's pride and pleasure, 'Moonlight,' did thy father call thee, And thy mother called thee 'Sunshine,' 'Sea-foam' did thy brother call thee, And thy sister called thee 'Flower.' When thou leavest home and kindred Goest to a second mother, Often she will give thee censure, Never treat thee as her daughter, 367 Rarely will she give thee counsel, Never will she sound thy praises. 'Brush-wood,' will the father call thee, 'Sledge of Rags,' thy husband's mother, 'Flight of Stairs,' thy stranger brother, 'Scare-crow,' will the sister call thee, Sister of thy blacksmith-husband; Then wilt think of my good counsels, Then wilt wish in tears and murmurs, That as steam thou hadst ascended, That as smoke thy soul had risen, That as sparks thy life had vanished. As a bird thou canst not wander From thy nest to circle homeward, Canst not fall and die like leaflets, As the sparks thou canst not perish, Like the smoke thou canst not vanish. 'Youthful bride, and darling sister, Thou hast bartered all thy friendships, Hast exchanged thy loving father, Thou hast left thy faithful mother For the mother of thy husband; Hast exchanged thy loving brother, Hast renounced thy gentle sister, For the kindred of thy suitor; Hast exchanged thy snow-white covers For the rocky couch of sorrow; Hast exchanged these crystal waters For the waters of Wainola; Hast renounced these sandy sea-shores For the muddy banks of Kalew; Northland glens thou hast forsaken For thy husband's barren meadows; Thou hast left thy berry-mountains For the stubble-fields and deserts. 'Thou, O maiden, hast been thinking Thou wouldst happy be in wedlock; Neither work, nor care, nor sorrow, From this night would be thy portion, With thy husband for protection. Not to sleep art thou conducted, Not to happiness, nor joyance, 368 Wakefulness, thy night-companion, And thy day-attendant, trouble; Often thou wilt drink of sorrow, Often long for vanished pleasures. 'When at home thou hadst no head-gear, Thou hadst also little sadness; When thy couch was not of linen, No unhappiness came nigh thee; Head-gear brings but pain and sorrow, Linen breeds bad dispositions, Linen brings but deeps of anguish, And the flax untimely mourning. 'Happy in her home, the maiden, Happy at her father's fireside, Like the master in his mansion, Happy with her bows and arrows. 'Tis not thus with married women; Brides of heroes may be likened To the prisoners of Moskva, Held in bondage by their masters. 'As a wife, must weep and labor, Carry trouble on both shoulders; When the next hour passes over, Thou must tend the fire and oven, Must prepare thy husband's dinner, Must direct thy master's servants. When thine evening meal is ready, Thou must search for bidden wisdom In the brain of perch and salmon, In the mouths of ocean whiting, Gather wisdom from the cuckoo, Canst not learn it from thy mother, Mother dear of seven daughters; Cannot find among her treasures Where were born the human instincts, Where were born the minds of heroes, Whence arose the maiden's beauty, Whence the beauty of her tresses, Why all life revives in spring-time. 'Weep, O weep, my pretty young bride. When thou weepest, weep sincerely, Weep great rivers from thine eyelids, 369 Floods of tears in field and fallow, Lakelets in thy father's dwelling; Weep thy rooms to overflowing, Shed thy tears in great abundance, Lest thou weepest on returning To thy native hills and valleys, When thou visitest thy father In the smoke of waning glory, On his arm a withered tassel. 'Weep, O weep, my lovely maiden, When thou weepest, weep in earnest, Weep great rivers from thine eyelids; If thou dost not weep sincerely, Thou wilt weep on thy returning To thy Northland home and kindred, When thou visitest thy mother Old and breathless near the hurdles, In her arms a barley-bundle. 'Weep, O weep, sweet bride of beauty, When thou weepest, weep profusely; If thou dost not weep in earnest, Thou wilt weep on thy returning To thy native vales and highlands, When thou visitest thy brother Lying wounded by the way-side, In his hand but empty honors. 'Weep, O weep, my sister's daughter, Weep great rivers from thine eyelids; If thou dost not weep sufficient, Thou wilt weep on thy returning To the scenes of happy childhood, When thou visitest thy sister Lying, prostrate in the meadow, In her hand a birch-wood mallet.' When the ancient maid had ended, Then the young bride sighed in anguish, Straightway fell to bitter weeping, Spake these words in deeps of sorrow: 'O, ye sisters, my beloved, Ye companions of my childhood, Playmates of my early summers, Listen to your sister's counsel: 370 Cannot comprehend the reason, Why my mind is so dejected, Why this weariness and sadness, This untold and unseen torture, Cannot understand the meaning Of this mighty weight of sorrow! Differently I had thought it, I had hoped for greater pleasures, I had hoped to sing as cuckoos, On the hill-tops call and echo, When I had attained this station, Reached at last the goal expectant; But I am not like the cuckoo, Singing, merry on the hill-tops; I am like the songless blue-duck, As she swims upon the waters, Swims upon the cold, cold ocean, Icicles upon her pinions. 'Ancient father, gray-haired mother, Whither do ye wish to lead me, Whither take this bride, thy daughter, That this sorrow may pass over, Where this heavy heart may lighten, Where this grief may turn to gladness? Better it had been, O mother, Hadst thou nursed a block of birch-wood, Hadst thou clothed the colored sandstone, Rather than this hapless maiden, For the fulness of these sorrows, For this keen and killing trouble. Many sympathizers tell me: 'Foolish bride, thou art ungrateful, Do not grieve, thou child of sorrow, Thou hast little cause for weeping.' 'O, deceive me not, my people, Do not argue with me falsely, For alas! I have more troubles Than the waterfalls have pebbles, Than the Ingerland has willows, Than the Suomi-hills have berries; Never could the Pohya plow-horse Pull this mighty weight of sorrow, 371 Shaking not his birchen cross-bar, Breaking not his heavy collar; Never could the Northland reindeer Heavy shod and stoutly harnessed, Draw this load of care and trouble.' By the stove a babe was playing, And the young child spake as follows: 'Why, O fair bride, art thou weeping, Why these tears of pain and sadness? Leave thy troubles to the elk-herds, And thy grief to sable fillies, Let the steeds of iron bridles Bear the burden of thine anguish, Horses have much larger foreheads, Larger shoulders, stronger sinews, And their necks are made for labor, Stronger are their bones and muscles, Let them bear thy heavy burdens. There is little good in weeping, Useless are thy tears of sorrow; Art not led to swamps and lowlands, Nor to banks of little rivers; Thou art led to fields of flowers, Led to fruitful trees and forests, Led away from beer of Pohya To the sweeter mead of Kalew. At thy shoulder waits thy husband, On thy right side, Ilmarinen, Constant friend and life-protector, He will guard thee from all evil; Husband ready, steed in waiting, Gold-and-silver-mounted harness, Hazel-birds that sing and flutter On the courser's yoke and cross-bar; Thrushes also sing and twitter Merrily on hame and collar, Seven bluebirds, seven cuckoos, Sing thy wedding-march in concord. 'Be no longer full of sorrow, Dry thy tears, thou bride of beauty, Thou hast found a noble husband, Better wilt thou fare than ever, 372 By the side of Ilmarinen, Artist husband, metal-master, Bread-provider of thy table, On the arm of the fish-catcher, On the breast of the elk-hunter, By the side of the bear-killer. Thou hast won the best of suitors, Hast obtained a mighty hero; Never idle is his cross-bow, On the nails his quivers hang not, Neither are his dogs in kennel, Active agents is his bunting. Thrice within the budding spring-time In the early hours of morning He arises from his fare-couch, From his slumber in the brush-wood, Thrice within the sowing season, On his eyes the deer has fallen, And the branches brushed his vesture, And his locks been combed by fir-boughs. Hasten homeward with thy husband, Where thy hero's friends await thee, Where his forests sing thy welcome. 'Ilmarinen there possesses All the birds that fly in mid-air, All the beasts that haunt the woodlands, All that feed upon the mountains, All that graze on hill and valley, Sheep and cattle by the thousands; Sweet the grass upon his meadows, Sweet the barley in his uplands, In the lowlands corn abundant, Wheat upon the elm-wood fallows, Near the streamlets rye is waving, Waving grain on many acres, On his mountains gold and silver, Rich his mines of shining copper, Highlands filled with magic metals, Chests of jewels in his store-house, All the wealth of Kalevala.' 373 ~ Elias Lönnrot

196:The Great Adventure Of Max Breuck A yellow band of light upon the street Pours from an open door, and makes a wide Pathway of bright gold across a sheet Of calm and liquid moonshine. From inside Come shouts and streams of laughter, and a snatch Of song, soon drowned and lost again in mirth, The clip of tankards on a table top, And stir of booted heels. Against the patch Of candle-light a shadow falls, its girth Proclaims the host himself, and master of his shop. This is the tavern of one Hilverdink, Jan Hilverdink, whose wines are much esteemed. Within his cellar men can have to drink The rarest cordials old monks ever schemed To coax from pulpy grapes, and with nice art Improve and spice their virgin juiciness. Here froths the amber beer of many a brew, Crowning each pewter tankard with as smart A cap as ever in his wantonness Winter set glittering on top of an old yew. Tall candles stand upon the table, where Are twisted glasses, ruby-sparked with wine, Clarets and ports. Those topaz bumpers were Drained from slim, long-necked bottles of the Rhine. The centre of the board is piled with pipes, Slender and clean, the still unbaptized clay Awaits its burning fate. Behind, the vault Stretches from dim to dark, a groping way Bordered by casks and puncheons, whose brass stripes 326 And bands gleam dully still, beyond the gay tumult. 'For good old Master Hilverdink, a toast!' Clamoured a youth with tassels on his boots. 'Bring out your oldest brandy for a boast, From that small barrel in the very roots Of your deep cellar, man. Why here is Max! Ho! Welcome, Max, you're scarcely here in time. We want to drink to old Jan's luck, and smoke His best tobacco for a grand climax. Here, Jan, a paper, fragrant as crushed thyme, We'll have the best to wish you luck, or may we choke!' Max Breuck unclasped his broadcloth cloak, and sat. 'Well thought of, Franz; here's luck to Mynheer Jan.' The host set down a jar; then to a vat Lost in the distance of his cellar, ran. Max took a pipe as graceful as the stem Of some long tulip, crammed it full, and drew The pungent smoke deep to his grateful lung. It curled all blue throughout the cave and flew Into the silver night. At once there flung Into the crowded shop a boy, who cried to them: 'Oh, sirs, is there some learned lawyer here, Some advocate, or all-wise counsellor? My master sent me to inquire where Such men do mostly be, but every door Was shut and barred, for late has grown the hour. I pray you tell me where I may now find One versed in law, the matter will not wait.' 'I am a lawyer, boy,' said Max, 'my mind Is not locked to my business, though 'tis late. 327 I shall be glad to serve what way is in my power. Then once more, cloaked and ready, he set out, Tripping the footsteps of the eager boy Along the dappled cobbles, while the rout Within the tavern jeered at his employ. Through new-burst elm leaves filtered the white moon, Who peered and splashed between the twinkling boughs, Flooded the open spaces, and took flight Before tall, serried houses in platoon, Guarded by shadows. Past the Custom House They took their hurried way in the Spring-scented night. Before a door which fronted a canal The boy halted. A dim tree-shaded spot. The water lapped the stones in musical And rhythmic tappings, and a galliot Slumbered at anchor with no light aboard. The boy knocked twice, and steps approached. A flame Winked through the keyhole, then a key was turned, And through the open door Max went toward Another door, whence sound of voices came. He entered a large room where candelabra burned. An aged man in quilted dressing gown Rose up to greet him. 'Sir,' said Max, 'you sent Your messenger to seek throughout the town A lawyer. I have small accomplishment, But I am at your service, and my name Is Max Breuck, Counsellor, at your command.' 'Mynheer,' replied the aged man, 'obliged Am I, and count myself much privileged. I am Cornelius Kurler, and my fame 328 Is better known on distant oceans than on land. 10 My ship has tasted water in strange seas, And bartered goods at still uncharted isles. She's oft coquetted with a tropic breeze, And sheered off hurricanes with jaunty smiles.' 'Tush, Kurler,' here broke in the other man, 'Enough of poetry, draw the deed and sign.' The old man seemed to wizen at the voice, 'My good friend, Grootver, --' he at once began. 'No introductions, let us have some wine, And business, now that you at last have made your choice.' 11 A harsh and disagreeable man he proved to be, This Grootver, with no single kindly thought. Kurler explained, his old hands nervously Twisting his beard. His vessel he had bought From Grootver. He had thought to soon repay The ducats borrowed, but an adverse wind Had so delayed him that his cargo brought But half its proper price, the very day He came to port he stepped ashore to find The market glutted and his counted profits naught. 12 Little by little Max made out the way That Grootver pressed that poor harassed old man. His money he must have, too long delay Had turned the usurer to a ruffian. 'But let me take my ship, with many bales Of cotton stuffs dyed crimson, green, and blue, Cunningly patterned, made to suit the taste Of mandarin's ladies; when my battered sails Open for home, such stores will I bring you 329 That all your former ventures will be counted waste. 13 Such light and foamy silks, like crinkled cream, And indigo more blue than sun-whipped seas, Spices and fragrant trees, a massive beam Of sandalwood, and pungent China teas, Tobacco, coffee!' Grootver only laughed. Max heard it all, and worse than all he heard The deed to which the sailor gave his word. He shivered, 'twas as if the villain gaffed The old man with a boat-hook; bleeding, spent, He begged for life nor knew at all the road he went. 14 For Kurler had a daughter, young and gay, Carefully reared and shielded, rarely seen. But on one black and most unfriendly day Grootver had caught her as she passed between The kitchen and the garden. She had run In fear of him, his evil leering eye, And when he came she, bolted in her room, Refused to show, though gave no reason why. The spinning of her future had begun, On quiet nights she heard the whirring of her doom. 15 Max mended an old goosequill by the fire, Loathing his work, but seeing no thing to do. He felt his hands were building up the pyre To burn two souls, and seized with vertigo He staggered to his chair. Before him lay White paper still unspotted by a crime. 'Now, young man, write,' said Grootver in his ear. '`If in two years my vessel should yet stay From Amsterdam, I give Grootver, sometime 330 A friend, my daughter for his lawful wife.' Now swear.' 16 And Kurler swore, a palsied, tottering sound, And traced his name, a shaking, wandering line. Then dazed he sat there, speechless from his wound. Grootver got up: 'Fair voyage, the brigantine!' He shuffled from the room, and left the house. His footsteps wore to silence down the street. At last the aged man began to rouse. With help he once more gained his trembling feet. 'My daughter, Mynheer Breuck, is friendless now. Will you watch over her? I ask a solemn vow.' 17 Max laid his hand upon the old man's arm, 'Before God, sir, I vow, when you are gone, So to protect your daughter from all harm As one man may.' Thus sorrowful, forlorn, The situation to Max Breuck appeared, He gave his promise almost without thought, Nor looked to see a difficulty. 'Bred Gently to watch a mother left alone; Bound by a dying father's wish, who feared The world's accustomed harshness when he should be dead; 18 Such was my case from youth, Mynheer Kurler. Last Winter she died also, and my days Are passed in work, lest I should grieve for her, And undo habits used to earn her praise. My leisure I will gladly give to see Your household and your daughter prosperous.' The sailor said his thanks, but turned away. He could not brook that his humility, So little wonted, and so tremulous, 331 Should first before a stranger make such great display. 19 'Come here to-morrow as the bells ring noon, I sail at the full sea, my daughter then I will make known to you. 'Twill be a boon If after I have bid good-by, and when Her eyeballs scorch with watching me depart, You bring her home again. She lives with one Old serving-woman, who has brought her up. But that is no friend for so free a heart. No head to match her questions. It is done. And I must sail away to come and brim her cup. 20 My ship's the fastest that owns Amsterdam As home, so not a letter can you send. I shall be back, before to where I am Another ship could reach. Now your stipend --' Quickly Breuck interposed. 'When you once more Tread on the stones which pave our streets. -- Good night! To-morrow I will be, at stroke of noon, At the great wharf.' Then hurrying, in spite Of cake and wine the old man pressed upon Him ere he went, he took his leave and shut the door. 21 'Twas noon in Amsterdam, the day was clear, And sunshine tipped the pointed roofs with gold. The brown canals ran liquid bronze, for here The sun sank deep into the waters cold. And every clock and belfry in the town Hammered, and struck, and rang. Such peals of bells, To shake the sunny morning into life, And to proclaim the middle, and the crown, Of this most sparkling daytime! The crowd swells, 332 Laughing and pushing toward the quays in friendly strife. 22 The 'Horn of Fortune' sails away to-day. At highest tide she lets her anchor go, And starts for China. Saucy popinjay! Giddy in freshest paint she curtseys low, And beckons to her boats to let her start. Blue is the ocean, with a flashing breeze. The shining waves are quick to take her part. They push and spatter her. Her sails are loose, Her tackles hanging, waiting men to seize And haul them taut, with chanty-singing, as they choose. 23 At the great wharf's edge Mynheer Kurler stands, And by his side, his daughter, young Christine. Max Breuck is there, his hat held in his hands, Bowing before them both. The brigantine Bounces impatient at the long delay, Curvets and jumps, a cable's length from shore. A heavy galliot unloads on the walls Round, yellow cheeses, like gold cannon balls Stacked on the stones in pyramids. Once more Kurler has kissed Christine, and now he is away. 24 Christine stood rigid like a frozen stone, Her hands wrung pale in effort at control. Max moved aside and let her be alone, For grief exacts each penny of its toll. The dancing boat tossed on the glinting sea. A sun-path swallowed it in flaming light, Then, shrunk a cockleshell, it came again Upon the other side. Now on the lee It took the 'Horn of Fortune'. Straining sight 333 Could see it hauled aboard, men pulling on the crane. 25 Then up above the eager brigantine, Along her slender masts, the sails took flight, Were sheeted home, and ropes were coiled. The shine Of the wet anchor, when its heavy weight Rose splashing to the deck. These things they saw, Christine and Max, upon the crowded quay. They saw the sails grow white, then blue in shade, The ship had turned, caught in a windy flaw She glided imperceptibly away, Drew farther off and in the bright sky seemed to fade. 26 Home, through the emptying streets, Max took Christine, Who would have hid her sorrow from his gaze. Before the iron gateway, clasped between Each garden wall, he stopped. She, in amaze, Asked, 'Do you enter not then, Mynheer Breuck? My father told me of your courtesy. Since I am now your charge, 'tis meet for me To show such hospitality as maiden may, Without disdaining rules must not be broke. Katrina will have coffee, and she bakes today.' 27 She straight unhasped the tall, beflowered gate. Curled into tendrils, twisted into cones Of leaves and roses, iron infoliate, It guards the pleasance, and its stiffened bones Are budded with much peering at the rows, And beds, and arbours, which it keeps inside. Max started at the beauty, at the glare Of tints. At either end was set a wide Path strewn with fine, red gravel, and such shows 334 Of tulips in their splendour flaunted everywhere! 28 From side to side, midway each path, there ran A longer one which cut the space in two. And, like a tunnel some magician Has wrought in twinkling green, an alley grew, Pleached thick and walled with apple trees; their flowers Incensed the garden, and when Autumn came The plump and heavy apples crowding stood And tapped against the arbour. Then the dame Katrina shook them down, in pelting showers They plunged to earth, and died transformed to sugared food. 29 Against the high, encircling walls were grapes, Nailed close to feel the baking of the sun From glowing bricks. Their microscopic shapes Half hidden by serrated leaves. And one Old cherry tossed its branches near the door. Bordered along the wall, in beds between, Flickering, streaming, nodding in the air, The pride of all the garden, there were more Tulips than Max had ever dreamed or seen. They jostled, mobbed, and danced. Max stood at helpless stare. 30 'Within the arbour, Mynheer Breuck, I'll bring Coffee and cakes, a pipe, and Father's best Tobacco, brought from countries harbouring Dawn's earliest footstep. Wait.' With girlish zest To please her guest she flew. A moment more She came again, with her old nurse behind. Then, sitting on the bench and knitting fast, She talked as someone with a noble store Of hidden fancies, blown upon the wind, 335 Eager to flutter forth and leave their silent past. 31 The little apple leaves above their heads Let fall a quivering sunshine. Quiet, cool, In blossomed boughs they sat. Beyond, the beds Of tulips blazed, a proper vestibule And antechamber to the rainbow. Dyes Of prismed richness: Carmine. Madder. Blues Tinging dark browns to purple. Silvers flushed To amethyst and tinct with gold. Round eyes Of scarlet, spotting tender saffron hues. Violets sunk to blacks, and reds in orange crushed. 32 Of every pattern and in every shade. Nacreous, iridescent, mottled, checked. Some purest sulphur-yellow, others made An ivory-white with disks of copper flecked. Sprinkled and striped, tasselled, or keenest edged. Striated, powdered, freckled, long or short. They bloomed, and seemed strange wonder-moths new-fledged, Born of the spectrum wedded to a flame. The shade within the arbour made a port To o'ertaxed eyes, its still, green twilight rest became. 33 Her knitting-needles clicked and Christine talked, This child matured to woman unaware, The first time left alone. Now dreams once balked Found utterance. Max thought her very fair. Beneath her cap her ornaments shone gold, And purest gold they were. Kurler was rich And heedful. Her old maiden aunt had died Whose darling care she was. Now, growing bold, She asked, had Max a sister? Dropped a stitch 336 At her own candour. Then she paused and softly sighed. 34 Two years was long! She loved her father well, But fears she had not. He had always been Just sailed or sailing. And she must not dwell On sad thoughts, he had told her so, and seen Her smile at parting. But she sighed once more. Two years was long; 'twas not one hour yet! Mynheer Grootver she would not see at all. Yes, yes, she knew, but ere the date so set, The 'Horn of Fortune' would be at the wall. When Max had bid farewell, she watched him from the door. 35 The next day, and the next, Max went to ask The health of Jufvrouw Kurler, and the news: Another tulip blown, or the great task Of gathering petals which the high wind strews; The polishing of floors, the pictured tiles Well scrubbed, and oaken chairs most deftly oiled. Such things were Christine's world, and his was she Winter drew near, his sun was in her smiles. Another Spring, and at his law he toiled, Unspoken hope counselled a wise efficiency. 36 Max Breuck was honour's soul, he knew himself The guardian of this girl; no more, no less. As one in charge of guineas on a shelf Loose in a china teapot, may confess His need, but may not borrow till his friend Comes back to give. So Max, in honour, said No word of love or marriage; but the days He clipped off on his almanac. The end Must come! The second year, with feet of lead, 337 Lagged slowly by till Spring had plumped the willow sprays. 37 Two years had made Christine a woman grown, With dignity and gently certain pride. But all her childhood fancies had not flown, Her thoughts in lovely dreamings seemed to glide. Max was her trusted friend, did she confess A closer happiness? Max could not tell. Two years were over and his life he found Sphered and complete. In restless eagerness He waited for the 'Horn of Fortune'. Well Had he his promise kept, abating not one pound. 38 Spring slipped away to Summer. Still no glass Sighted the brigantine. Then Grootver came Demanding Jufvrouw Kurler. His trespass Was justified, for he had won the game. Christine begged time, more time! Midsummer went, And Grootver waxed impatient. Still the ship Tarried. Christine, betrayed and weary, sank To dreadful terrors. One day, crazed, she sent For Max. 'Come quickly,' said her note, 'I skip The worst distress until we meet. The world is blank.' 39 Through the long sunshine of late afternoon Max went to her. In the pleached alley, lost In bitter reverie, he found her soon. And sitting down beside her, at the cost Of all his secret, 'Dear,' said he, 'what thing So suddenly has happened?' Then, in tears, She told that Grootver, on the following morn, Would come to marry her, and shuddering: 'I will die rather, death has lesser fears.' 338 Max felt the shackles drop from the oath which he had sworn. 40 'My Dearest One, the hid joy of my heart! I love you, oh! you must indeed have known. In strictest honour I have played my part; But all this misery has overthrown My scruples. If you love me, marry me Before the sun has dipped behind those trees. You cannot be wed twice, and Grootver, foiled, Can eat his anger. My care it shall be To pay your father's debt, by such degrees As I can compass, and for years I've greatly toiled. 41 This is not haste, Christine, for long I've known My love, and silence forced upon my lips. I worship you with all the strength I've shown In keeping faith.' With pleading finger tips He touched her arm. 'Christine! Beloved! Think. Let us not tempt the future. Dearest, speak, I love you. Do my words fall too swift now? They've been in leash so long upon the brink.' She sat quite still, her body loose and weak. Then into him she melted, all her soul at flow. 42 And they were married ere the westering sun Had disappeared behind the garden trees. The evening poured on them its benison, And flower-scents, that only night-time frees, Rose up around them from the beamy ground, Silvered and shadowed by a tranquil moon. Within the arbour, long they lay embraced, In such enraptured sweetness as they found Close-partnered each to each, and thinking soon 339 To be enwoven, long ere night to morning faced. 43 At last Max spoke, 'Dear Heart, this night is ours, To watch it pale, together, into dawn, Pressing our souls apart like opening flowers Until our lives, through quivering bodies drawn, Are mingled and confounded. Then, far spent, Our eyes will close to undisturbed rest. For that desired thing I leave you now. To pinnacle this day's accomplishment, By telling Grootver that a bootless quest Is his, and that his schemes have met a knock-down blow.' 44 But Christine clung to him with sobbing cries, Pleading for love's sake that he leave her not. And wound her arms about his knees and thighs As he stood over her. With dread, begot Of Grootver's name, and silence, and the night, She shook and trembled. Words in moaning plaint Wooed him to stay. She feared, she knew not why, Yet greatly feared. She seemed some anguished saint Martyred by visions. Max Breuck soothed her fright With wisdom, then stepped out under the cooling sky. 45 But at the gate once more she held him close And quenched her heart again upon his lips. 'My Sweetheart, why this terror? I propose But to be gone one hour! Evening slips Away, this errand must be done.' 'Max! Max! First goes my father, if I lose you now!' She grasped him as in panic lest she drown. Softly he laughed, 'One hour through the town By moonlight! That's no place for foul attacks. 340 Dearest, be comforted, and clear that troubled brow. 46 One hour, Dear, and then, no more alone. We front another day as man and wife. I shall be back almost before I'm gone, And midnight shall anoint and crown our life.' Then through the gate he passed. Along the street She watched his buttons gleaming in the moon. He stopped to wave and turned the garden wall. Straight she sank down upon a mossy seat. Her senses, mist-encircled by a swoon, Swayed to unconsciousness beneath its wreathing pall. 47 Briskly Max walked beside the still canal. His step was firm with purpose. Not a jot He feared this meeting, nor the rancorous gall Grootver would spit on him who marred his plot. He dreaded no man, since he could protect Christine. His wife! He stopped and laughed aloud. His starved life had not fitted him for joy. It strained him to the utmost to reject Even this hour with her. His heart beat loud. 'Damn Grootver, who can force my time to this employ!' 48 He laughed again. What boyish uncontrol To be so racked. Then felt his ticking watch. In half an hour Grootver would know the whole. And he would be returned, lifting the latch Of his own gate, eager to take Christine And crush her to his lips. How bear delay? He broke into a run. In front, a line Of candle-light banded the cobbled street. Hilverdink's tavern! Not for many a day 341 Had he been there to take his old, accustomed seat. 49 'Why, Max! Stop, Max!' And out they came pell-mell, His old companions. 'Max, where have you been? Not drink with us? Indeed you serve us well! How many months is it since we have seen You here? Jan, Jan, you slow, old doddering goat! Here's Mynheer Breuck come back again at last, Stir your old bones to welcome him. Fie, Max. Business! And after hours! Fill your throat; Here's beer or brandy. Now, boys, hold him fast. Put down your cane, dear man. What really vicious whacks!' 50 They forced him to a seat, and held him there, Despite his anger, while the hideous joke Was tossed from hand to hand. Franz poured with care A brimming glass of whiskey. 'Here, we've broke Into a virgin barrel for you, drink! Tut! Tut! Just hear him! Married! Who, and when? Married, and out on business. Clever Spark! Which lie's the likeliest? Come, Max, do think.' Swollen with fury, struggling with these men, Max cursed hilarity which must needs have a mark. 51 Forcing himself to steadiness, he tried To quell the uproar, told them what he dared Of his own life and circumstance. Implied Most urgent matters, time could ill be spared. In jesting mood his comrades heard his tale, And scoffed at it. He felt his anger more Goaded and bursting; -- 'Cowards! Is no one loth To mock at duty --' Here they called for ale, And forced a pipe upon him. With an oath 342 He shivered it to fragments on the earthen floor. 52 Sobered a little by his violence, And by the host who begged them to be still, Nor injure his good name, 'Max, no offence,' They blurted, 'you may leave now if you will.' 'One moment, Max,' said Franz. 'We've gone too far. I ask your pardon for our foolish joke. It started in a wager ere you came. The talk somehow had fall'n on drugs, a jar I brought from China, herbs the natives smoke, Was with me, and I thought merely to play a game. 53 Its properties are to induce a sleep Fraught with adventure, and the flight of time Is inconceivable in swiftness. Deep Sunken in slumber, imageries sublime Flatter the senses, or some fearful dream Holds them enmeshed. Years pass which on the clock Are but so many seconds. We agreed That the next man who came should prove the scheme; And you were he. Jan handed you the crock. Two whiffs! And then the pipe was broke, and you were freed.' 54 'It is a lie, a damned, infernal lie!' Max Breuck was maddened now. 'Another jest Of your befuddled wits. I know not why I am to be your butt. At my request You'll choose among you one who'll answer for Your most unseasonable mirth. Good-night And good-by, -- gentlemen. You'll hear from me.' But Franz had caught him at the very door, 'It is no lie, Max Breuck, and for your plight 343 I am to blame. Come back, and we'll talk quietly. 55 You have no business, that is why we laughed, Since you had none a few minutes ago. As to your wedding, naturally we chaffed, Knowing the length of time it takes to do A simple thing like that in this slow world. Indeed, Max, 'twas a dream. Forgive me then. I'll burn the drug if you prefer.' But Breuck Muttered and stared, -- 'A lie.' And then he hurled, Distraught, this word at Franz: 'Prove it. And when It's proven, I'll believe. That thing shall be your work. 56 I'll give you just one week to make your case. On August thirty-first, eighteen-fourteen, I shall require your proof.' With wondering face Franz cried, 'A week to August, and fourteen The year! You're mad, 'tis April now. April, and eighteen-twelve.' Max staggered, caught A chair, -- 'April two years ago! Indeed, Or you, or I, are mad. I know not how Either could blunder so.' Hilverdink brought 'The Amsterdam Gazette', and Max was forced to read. 57 'Eighteen hundred and twelve,' in largest print; And next to it, 'April the twenty-first.' The letters smeared and jumbled, but by dint Of straining every nerve to meet the worst, He read it, and into his pounding brain Tumbled a horror. Like a roaring sea Foreboding shipwreck, came the message plain: 'This is two years ago! What of Christine?' He fled the cellar, in his agony 344 Running to outstrip Fate, and save his holy shrine. 58 The darkened buildings echoed to his feet Clap-clapping on the pavement as he ran. Across moon-misted squares clamoured his fleet And terror-winged steps. His heart began To labour at the speed. And still no sign, No flutter of a leaf against the sky. And this should be the garden wall, and round The corner, the old gate. No even line Was this! No wall! And then a fearful cry Shattered the stillness. Two stiff houses filled the ground. 59 Shoulder to shoulder, like dragoons in line, They stood, and Max knew them to be the ones To right and left of Kurler's garden. Spine Rigid next frozen spine. No mellow tones Of ancient gilded iron, undulate, Expanding in wide circles and broad curves, The twisted iron of the garden gate, Was there. The houses touched and left no space Between. With glassy eyes and shaking nerves Max gazed. Then mad with fear, fled still, and left that place. 60 Stumbling and panting, on he ran, and on. His slobbering lips could only cry, 'Christine! My Dearest Love! My Wife! Where are you gone? What future is our past? What saturnine, Sardonic devil's jest has bid us live Two years together in a puff of smoke? It was no dream, I swear it! In some star, Or still imprisoned in Time's egg, you give Me love. I feel it. Dearest Dear, this stroke 345 Shall never part us, I will reach to where you are.' 61 His burning eyeballs stared into the dark. The moon had long been set. And still he cried: 'Christine! My Love! Christine!' A sudden spark Pricked through the gloom, and shortly Max espied With his uncertain vision, so within Distracted he could scarcely trust its truth, A latticed window where a crimson gleam Spangled the blackness, and hung from a pin, An iron crane, were three gilt balls. His youth Had taught their meaning, now they closed upon his dream. 62 Softly he knocked against the casement, wide It flew, and a cracked voice his business there Demanded. The door opened, and inside Max stepped. He saw a candle held in air Above the head of a gray-bearded Jew. 'Simeon Isaacs, Mynheer, can I serve You?' 'Yes, I think you can. Do you keep arms? I want a pistol.' Quick the old man grew Livid. 'Mynheer, a pistol! Let me swerve You from your purpose. Life brings often false alarms --' 63 'Peace, good old Isaacs, why should you suppose My purpose deadly. In good truth I've been Blest above others. You have many rows Of pistols it would seem. Here, this shagreen Case holds one that I fancy. Silvered mounts Are to my taste. These letters `C. D. L.' Its former owner? Dead, you say. Poor Ghost! 'Twill serve my turn though --' Hastily he counts The florins down upon the table. 'Well, 346 Good-night, and wish me luck for your to-morrow's toast.' 64 Into the night again he hurried, now Pale and in haste; and far beyond the town He set his goal. And then he wondered how Poor C. D. L. had come to die. 'It's grown Handy in killing, maybe, this I've bought, And will work punctually.' His sorrow fell Upon his senses, shutting out all else. Again he wept, and called, and blindly fought The heavy miles away. 'Christine. I'm well. I'm coming. My Own Wife!' He lurched with failing pulse. 65 Along the dyke the keen air blew in gusts, And grasses bent and wailed before the wind. The Zuider Zee, which croons all night and thrusts Long stealthy fingers up some way to find And crumble down the stones, moaned baffled. Here The wide-armed windmills looked like gallows-trees. No lights were burning in the distant thorps. Max laid aside his coat. His mind, half-clear, Babbled 'Christine!' A shot split through the breeze. The cold stars winked and glittered at his chilling corpse. ~ Amy Lowell

197:Scene. Basil; a chamber in the house of Paracelsus. 1526. Paracelsus, Festus. Paracelsus. Heap logs and let the blaze laugh out! Festus.                      True, true! 'T is very fit all, time and chance and change Have wrought since last we sat thus, face to face And soul to soulall cares, far-looking fears, Vague apprehensions, all vain fancies bred By your long absence, should be cast away, Forgotten in this glad unhoped renewal Of our affections. Paracelsus.          Oh, omit not aught Which witnesses your own and Michal's own Affection: spare not that! Only forget The honours and the glories and what not, It pleases you to tell profusely out. Festus. Nay, even your honours, in a sense, I waive: The wondrous Paracelsus, life's dispenser, Fate's commissary, idol of the schools And courts, shall be no more than Aureole still, Still Aureole and my friend as when we parted Some twenty years ago, and I restrained As best I could the promptings of my spirit Which secretly advanced you, from the first, To the pre-eminent rank which, since, your own Adventurous ardour, nobly triumphing, Has won for you. Paracelsus.          Yes, yes. And Michal's face Still wears that quiet and peculiar light Like the dim circlet floating round a pearl? Festus. Just so. Paracelsus.     And yet her calm sweet countenance, Though saintly, was not sad; for she would sing Alone. Does she still sing alone, bird-like, Not dreaming you are near? Her carols dropt In flakes through that old leafy bower built under The sunny wall at Wrzburg, from her lattice Among the trees above, while I, unseen, Sat conning some rare scroll from Tritheim's shelves Much wondering notes so simple could divert My mind from study. Those were happy days. Respect all such as sing when all alone! Festus. Scarcely alone: her children, you may guess, Are wild beside her. Paracelsus.            Ah, those children quite Unsettle the pure picture in my mind: A girl, she was so perfect, so distinct: No change, no change! Not but this added grace May blend and harmonize with its compeers, And Michal may become her motherhood; But't is a change, and I detest all change, And most a change in aught I loved long since. So, Michalyou have said she thinks of me? Festus. O very proud will Michal be of you! Imagine how we sat, long winter-nights, Scheming and wondering, shaping your presumed Adventure, or devising its reward; Shutting out fear with all the strength of hope. For it was strange how, even when most secure In our domestic peace, a certain dim And flitting shade could sadden all; it seemed A restlessness of heart, a silent yearning, A sense of something wanting, incomplete Not to be put in words, perhaps avoided By mute consentbut, said or unsaid, felt To point to one so loved and so long lost. And then the hopes rose and shut out the fears How you would laugh should I recount them now I still predicted your return at last With gifts beyond the greatest of them all, All Tritheim's wondrous troop; did one of which Attain renown by any chance, I smiled, As well aware of who would prove his peer Michal was sure some woman, long ere this, As beautiful as you were sage, had loved . . . Paracelsus. Far-seeing, truly, to discern so much In the fantastic projects and day-dreams Of a raw restless boy! Festus.            Oh, no: the sunrise Well warranted our faith in this full noon! Can I forget the anxious voice which said "Festus, have thoughts like these ere shaped themselves "In other brains than mine? have their possessors "Existed in like circumstance? were they weak "As I, or ever constant from the first, "Despising youth's allurements and rejecting "As spider-films the shackles I endure? "Is there hope for me?"and I answered gravely As an acknowledged elder, calmer, wiser, More gifted mortal. O you must remember, For all your glorious . . . Paracelsus.                Glorious? ay, this hair, These handsnay, touch them, they are mine! Recall With all the said recallings, times when thus To lay them by your own ne'er turned you pale As now. Most glorious, are they not? Festus.                    Whywhy Something must be subtracted from success So wide, no doubt. He would be scrupulous, truly, Who should object such drawbacks. Still, still, Aureole, You are changed, very changed! 'T were losing nothing To look well to it: you must not be stolen From the enjoyment of your well-won meed. Paracelsus. My friend! you seek my pleasure, past a doubt: You will best gain your point, by talking, not Of me, but of yourself. Festus.             Have I not said All touching Michal and my children? Sure You know, by this, full well how Aennchen looks Gravely, while one disparts her thick brown hair; And Aureole's glee when some stray gannet builds Amid the birch-trees by the lake. Small hope Have I that he will honour (the wild imp) His namesake. Sigh not! 't is too much to ask That all we love should reach the same proud fate. But you are very kind to humour me By showing interest in my quiet life; You, who of old could never tame yourself To tranquil pleasures, must at heart despise . . . Paracelsus. Festus, strange secrets are let out by death Who blabs so oft the follies of this world: And I am death's familiar, as you know. I helped a man to die, some few weeks since, Warped even from his go-cart to one end The living on princes' smiles, reflected from A mighty herd of favourites. No mean trick He left untried, and truly well-nigh wormed All traces of God's finger out of him: Then died, grown old. And just an hour before, Having lain long with blank and soulless eyes, He sat up suddenly, and with natural voice Said that in spite of thick air and closed doors God told him it was June; and he knew well, Without such telling, harebells grew in June; And all that kings could ever give or take Would not be precious as those blooms to him. Just so, allowing I am passing sage, It seems to me much worthier argument Why pansies,[1] eyes that laugh, bear beauty's prize From violets, eyes that dream(your Michal's choice) Than all fools find to wonder at in me Or in my fortunes. And be very sure I say this from no prurient restlessness, No self-complacency, itching to turn, Vary and view its pleasure from all points, And, in this instance, willing other men May be at pains, demonstrate to itself The realness of the very joy it tastes. What should delight me like the news of friends Whose memories were a solace to me oft, As mountain-baths to wild fowls in their flight? Ofter than you had wasted thought on me Had you been wise, and rightly valued bliss. But there's no taming nor repressing hearts: God knows I need such!So, you heard me speak? Festus. Speak? when? Paracelsus.       When but this morning at my class? There was noise and crowd enough. I saw you not. Surely you know I am engaged to fill The chair here?that't is part of my proud fate To lecture to as many thick-skulled youths As please, each day, to throng the theatre, To my great reputation, and no small Danger of Basil's benches long unused To crack beneath such honour? Festus.                I was there; I mingled with the throng: shall I avow Small care was mine to listen?too intent On gathering from the murmurs of the crowd A full corroboration of my hopes! What can I learn about your powers? but they Know, care for nought beyond your actual state, Your actual value; yet they worship you, Those various natures whom you sway as one! But ere I go, be sure I shall attend . . . Paracelsus. Stop, o' God's name: the thing's by no means yet Past remedy! Shall I read this morning's labour At least in substance? Nought so worth the gaining As an apt scholar! Thus then, with all due Precision and emphasisyou, beside, are clearly Guiltless of understanding more, a whit, The subject than your stoolallowed to be A notable advantage. Festus.            Surely, Aureole, You laugh at me! Paracelsus.          I laugh? Ha, ha! thank heaven, I charge you, if't be so! for I forget Much, and what laughter should be like. No less, However, I forego that luxury Since it alarms the friend who brings it back. True, laughter like my own must echo strangely To thinking men; a smile were better far; So, make me smile! If the exulting look You wore but now be smiling, 't is so long Since I have smiled! Alas, such smiles are born Alone of hearts like yours, or herdsmen's souls Of ancient time, whose eyes, calm as their flocks, Saw in the stars mere garnishry of heaven, And in the earth a stage for altars only. Never change, Festus: I say, never change! Festus. My God, if he be wretched after all Paracelsus. When last we parted, Festus, you declared, Or Michal, yes, her soft lips whispered words I have preserved. She told me she believed I should succeed (meaning, that in the search I then engaged in, I should meet success) And yet be wretched: now, she augured false. Festus. Thank heaven! but you spoke strangely: could I venture To think bare apprehension lest your friend, Dazzled by your resplendent course, might find Henceforth less sweetness in his own, could move Such earnest mood in you? Fear not, dear friend, That I shall leave you, inwardly repining Your lot was not my own! Paracelsus.              And this for ever! For ever! gull who may, they will be gulled! They will not look nor think;'t is nothing new In them: but surely he is not of them! My Festus, do you know, I reckoned, you Though all beside were sand-blindyou, my friend, Would look at me, once close, with piercing eye Untroubled by the false glare that confounds A weaker vision: would remain serene, Though singular amid a gaping throng. I feared you, or I had come, sure, long ere this, To Einsiedeln. Well, error has no end, And Rhasis is a sage, and Basil boasts A tribe of wits, and I am wise and blest Past all dispute! 'T is vain to fret at it. I have vowed long ago my worshippers Shall owe to their own deep sagacity All further information, good or bad. Small risk indeed my reputation runs, Unless perchance the glance now searching me Be fixed much longer; for it seems to spell Dimly the characters a simpler man Might read distinct enough. Old Eastern books Say, the fallen prince of morning some short space Remained unchanged in semblance; nay, his brow Was hued with triumph: every spirit then Praising, his heart on flame the while:a tale! Well, Festus, what discover you, I pray? Festus. Some foul deed sullies then a life which else Were raised supreme? Paracelsus.            Good: I do well, most well Why strive to make men hear, feel, fret themselves With what is past their power to comprehend? I should not strive now: only, having nursed The faint surmise that one yet walked the earth, One, at least, not the utter fool of show, Not absolutely formed to be the dupe Of shallow plausibilities alone: One who, in youth, found wise enough to choose The happiness his riper years approve, Was yet so anxious for another's sake, That, ere his friend could rush upon a mad And ruinous course, the converse of his own, His gentle spirit essayed, prejudged for him The perilous path, foresaw its destiny, And warned the weak one in such tender words, Such accentshis whole heart in every tone That oft their memory comforted that friend When it by right should have increased despair: Having believed, I say, that this one man Could never lose the light thus from the first His portionhow should I refuse to grieve At even my gain if it disturb our old Relation, if it make me out more wise? Therefore, once more reminding him how well He prophesied, I note the single flaw That spoils his prophet's title. In plain words, You were deceived, and thus were you deceived I have not been successful, and yet am Most miserable; 't is said at last; nor you Give credit, lest you force me to concede That common sense yet lives upon the world! Festus. You surely do not mean to banter me? Paracelsus. You know, orif you have been wise enough To cleanse your memory of such mattersknew, As far as words of mine could make it clear, That't was my purpose to find joy or grief Solely in the fulfilment of my plan Or plot or whatsoe'er it was; rejoicing Alone as it proceeded prosperously, Sorrowing then only when mischance retarded Its progress. That was in those Wrzburg days! Not to prolong a theme I thoroughly hate, I have pursued this plan with all my strength; And having failed therein most signally, Cannot object to ruin utter and drear As all-excelling would have been the prize Had fortune favoured me. I scarce have right To vex your frank good spirit late so glad In my supposed prosperity, I know, And, were I lucky in a glut of friends, Would well agree to let your error live, Nay, strengthen it with fables of success. But mine is no condition to refuse The transient solace of so rare a godsend, My solitary luxury, my one friend: Accordingly I venture to put off The wearisome vest of falsehood galling me, Secure when he is by. I lay me bare Prone at his mercybut he is my friend! Not that he needs retain his aspect grave; That answers not my purpose; for't is like, Some sunny morningBasil being drained Of its wise population, every corner Of the amphitheatre crammed with learned clerks, Here OEcolampadius, looking worlds of wit, Here Castellanus, as profound as he, Munsterus here, Frobenius there, all squeezed And staring,that the zany of the show, Even Paracelsus, shall put off before them His trappings with a grace but seldom judged Expedient in such cases:the grim smile That will go round! Is it not therefore best To venture a rehearsal like the present In a small way? Where are the signs I seek, The first-fruits and fair sample of the scorn Due to all quacks? Why, this will never do! Festus. These are foul vapours, Aureole; nought beside! The effect of watching, study, weariness. Were there a spark of truth in the confusion Of these wild words, you would not outrage thus Your youth's companion. I shall ne'er regard These wanderings, bred of faintness and much study. 'T is not thus you would trust a trouble to me, To Michal's friend. Paracelsus.           I have said it, dearest Festus! For the manner, 't is ungracious probably; You may have it told in broken sobs, one day, And scalding tears, ere long: but I thought best To keep that off as long as possible. Do you wonder still? Festus.            No; it must oft fall out That one whose labour perfects any work, Shall rise from it with eye so worn that he Of all men least can measure the extent Of what he has accomplished. He alone Who, nothing tasked, is nothing weary too, May clearly scan the little he effects: But we, the bystanders, untouched by toil, Estimate each aright. Paracelsus.            This worthy Festus Is one of them, at last! 'T is so with all! First, they set down all progress as a dream; And next, when he whose quick discomfiture Was counted on, accomplishes some few And doubtful steps in his career,behold, They look for every inch of ground to vanish Beneath his tread, so sure they spy success! Festus. Few doubtful steps? when death retires before Your presencewhen the noblest of mankind, Broken in body or subdued in soul, May through your skill renew their vigour, raise The shattered frame to pristine stateliness? When men in racking pain may purchase dreams Of what delights them most, swooning at once Into a sea of bliss or rapt along As in a flying sphere of turbulent light? When we may look to you as one ordained To free the flesh from fell disease, as frees Our Luther's burning tongue the fettered soul? When . . . Paracelsus.      When and where, the devil, did you get This notable news? Festus.          Even from the common voice; From those whose envy, daring not dispute The wonders it decries, attributes them To magic and such folly. Paracelsus.              Folly? Why not To magic, pray? You find a comfort doubtless In holding, God ne'er troubles him about Us or our doings: once we were judged worth The devil's tempting . . . I offend: forgive me, And rest content. Your prophecy on the whole Was fair enough as prophesyings go; At fault a little in detail, but quite Precise enough in the main; and hereupon I pay due homage: you guessed long ago (The prophet!) I should failand I have failed. Festus. You mean to tell me, then, the hopes which fed Your youth have not been realized as yet? Some obstacle has barred them hitherto? Or that their innate . . . Paracelsus.               As I said but now, You have a very decent prophet's fame, So you but shun details here. Little matter Whether those hopes were mad,the aims they sought, Safe and secure from all ambitious fools; Or whether my weak wits are overcome By what a better spirit would scorn: I fail. And now methinks't were best to change a theme I am a sad fool to have stumbled on. I say confusedly what comes uppermost; But there are times when patience proves at fault, As now: this morning's strange encounteryou Beside me once again! you, whom I guessed Alive, since hitherto (with Luther's leave) No friend have I among the saints at peace, To judge by any good their prayers effect. I knew you would have helped mewhy not he, My strange competitor in enterprise, Bound for the same end by another path, Arrived, or ill or well, before the time, At our disastrous journey's doubtful close? How goes it with Aprile? Ah, they miss Your lone sad sunny idleness of heaven, Our martyrs for the world's sake; heaven shuts fast: The poor mad poet is howling by this time! Since you are my sole friend then, here or there, I could not quite repress the varied feelings This meeting wakens; they have had their vent, And now forget them. Do the rear-mice still Hang like a fretwork on the gate (or what In my time was a gate) fronting the road From Einsiedeln to Lachen? Festus.               Trifle not: Answer me, for my sake alone! You smiled Just now, when I supposed some deed, unworthy Yourself, might blot the else so bright result; Yet if your motives have continued pure, Your will unfaltering, and in spite of this, You have experienced a defeat, why then I say not you would cheerfully withdraw From contestmortal hearts are not so fashioned But surely you would ne'ertheless withdraw. You sought not fame nor gain nor even love, No end distinct from knowledge,I repeat Your very words: once satisfied that knowledge Is a mere dream, you would announce as much, Yourself the first. But how is the event? You are defeatedand I find you here! Paracelsus. As though "here" did not signify defeat! I spoke not of my little labours here, But of the break-down of my general aims: For you, aware of their extent and scope, To look on these sage lecturings, approved By beardless boys, and bearded dotards worse, As a fit consummation of such aims, Is worthy notice. A professorship At Basil! Since you see so much in it, And think my life was reasonably drained Of life's delights to render me a match For duties arduous as such post demands, Be it far from me to deny my power To fill the petty circle lotted out Of infinite space, or justify the host Of honours thence accruing. So, take notice, This jewel dangling from my neck preserves The features of a prince, my skill restored To plague his people some few years to come: And all through a pure whim. He had eased the earth For me, but that the droll despair which seized The vermin of his household, tickled me. I came to see. Here, drivelled the physician, Whose most infallible nostrum was at fault; There quaked the astrologer, whose horoscope Had promised him interminable years; Here a monk fumbled at the sick man's mouth With some undoubted relica sudary Of the Virgin; while another piebald knave Of the same brotherhood (he loved them ever) Was actively preparing 'neath his nose Such a suffumigation as, once fired, Had stunk the patient dead ere he could groan. I cursed the doctor and upset the brother, Brushed past the conjurer, vowed that the first gust Of stench from the ingredients just alight Would raise a cross-grained devil in my sword, Not easily laid: and ere an hour the prince Slept as he never slept since prince he was. A dayand I was posting for my life, Placarded through the town as one whose spite Had near availed to stop the blessed effects Of the doctor's nostrum which, well seconded By the sudary, and most by the costly smoke Not leaving out the strenuous prayers sent up Hard by in the abbeyraised the prince to life: To the great reputation of the seer Who, confident, expected all along The glad eventthe doctor's recompense Much largess from his highness to the monks And the vast solace of his loving people, Whose general satisfaction to increase, The prince was pleased no longer to defer The burning of some dozen heretics Remanded till God's mercy should be shown Touching his sickness: last of all were joined Ample directions to all loyal folk To swell the complement by seizing me Whodoubtless some rank sorcererendeavoured To thwart these pious offices, obstruct The prince's cure, and frustrate heaven by help Of certain devils dwelling in his sword. By luck, the prince in his first fit of thanks Had forced this bauble on me as an earnest Of further favours. This one case may serve To give sufficient taste of many such, So, let them pass. Those shelves support a pile Of patents, licences, diplomas, titles From Germany, France, Spain, and Italy; They authorize some honour; ne'ertheless, I set more store by this Erasmus sent; He trusts me; our Frobenius is his friend, And him "I raised" (nay, read it) "from the dead." I weary you, I see. I merely sought To show, there's no great wonder after all That, while I fill the class-room and attract A crowd to Basil, I get leave to stay, And therefore need not scruple to accept The utmost they can offer, if I please: For't is but right the world should be prepared To treat with favour e'en fantastic wants Of one like me, used up in serving her. Just as the mortal, whom the gods in part Devoured, received in place of his lost limb Some virtue or othercured disease, I think; You mind the fables we have read together. Festus. You do not think I comprehend a word. The time was, Aureole, you were apt enough To clothe the airiest thoughts in specious breath; But surely you must feel how vague and strange These speeches sound. Paracelsus.            Well, then: you know my hopes; I am assured, at length, those hopes were vain; That truth is just as far from me as ever; That I have thrown my life away; that sorrow On that account is idle, and further effort To mend and patch what's marred beyond repairing, As useless: and all this was taught your friend By the convincing good old-fashioned method Of forceby sheer compulsion. Is that plain? Festus. Dear Aureole, can it be my fears were just? God wills not . . . Paracelsus.           Now, 't is this I most admire The constant talk men of your stamp keep up Of God's will, as they style it; one would swear Man had but merely to uplift his eye, And see the will in question charactered On the heaven's vault. 'T is hardly wise to moot Such topics: doubts are many and faith is weak. I know as much of any will of God As knows some dumb and tortured brute what Man, His stern lord, wills from the perplexing blows That plague him every way; but there, of course, Where least he suffers, longest he remains My case; and for such reasons I plod on, Subdued but not convinced. I know as little Why I deserve to fail, as why I hoped Better things in my youth. I simply know I am no master here, but trained and beaten Into the path I tread; and here I stay, Until some further intimation reach me, Like an obedient drudge. Though I prefer To view the whole thing as a task imposed Which, whether dull or pleasant, must be done Yet, I deny not, there is made provision Of joys which tastes less jaded might affect; Nay, some which please me too, for all my pride Pleasures that once were pains: the iron ring Festering about a slave's neck grows at length Into the flesh it eats. I hate no longer A host of petty vile delights, undreamed of Or spurned before; such now supply the place Of my dead aims: as in the autumn woods Where tall trees used to flourish, from their roots Springs up a fungous brood sickly and pale, Chill mushrooms coloured like a corpse's cheek. Festus. If I interpret well your words, I own It troubles me but little that your aims, Vast in their dawning and most likely grown Extravagantly since, have baffled you. Perchance I am glad; you merit greater praise; Because they are too glorious to be gained, You do not blindly cling to them and die; You fell, but have not sullenly refused To rise, because an angel worsted you In wrestling, though the world holds not your peer; And though too harsh and sudden is the change To yield content as yet, still you pursue The ungracious path as though't were rosv-strewn. 'T is well: and your reward, or soon or late, Will come from him whom no man serves in vain. Paracelsus. Ah, very fine! For my part, I conceive The very pausing from all further toil, Which you find heinous, would become a seal To the sincerity of all my deeds. To be consistent I should die at once; I calculated on no after-life; Yet (how crept in, how fostered, I know not) Here am I with as passionate regret For youth and health and love so vainly lavished, As if their preservation had been first And foremost in my thoughts; and this strange fact Humbled me wondrously, and had due force In rendering me the less averse to follow A certain counsel, a mysterious warning You will not understandbut't was a man With aims not mine and yet pursued like mine, With the same fervour and no more success, Perishing in my sight; who summoned me As I would shun the ghastly fate I saw, To serve my race at once; to wait no longer That God should interfere in my behalf, But to distrust myself, put pride away, And give my gains, imperfect as they were, To men. I have not leisure to explain How, since, a singular series of events Has raised me to the station you behold, Wherein I seem to turn to most account The mere wreck of the past,perhaps receive Some feeble glimmering token that God views And may approve my penance: therefore here You find me, doing most good or least harm. And if folks wonder much and profit little 'T is not my fault; only, I shall rejoice When my part in the farce is shuffled through, And the curtain falls: I must hold out till then. Festus. Till when, dear Aureole? Paracelsus.              Till I'm fairly thrust From my proud eminence. Fortune is fickle And even professors fall: should that arrive, I see no sin in ceding to my bent. You little fancy what rude shocks apprise us We sin; God's intimations rather fail In clearness than in energy: 't were well Did they but indicate the course to take Like that to be forsaken. I would fain Be spared a further sample. Here I stand, And here I stay, be sure, till forced to flit. Festus. Be you but firm on that head! long ere then All I expect will come to pass, I trust: The cloud that wraps you will have disappeared. Meantime, I see small chance of such event: They praise you here as one whose lore, already Divulged, eclipses all the past can show, But whose achievements, marvellous as they be, Are faint anticipations of a glory About to be revealed. When Basil's crowds Dismiss their teacher, I shall be content That he depart. Paracelsus.         This favour at their hands I look for earlier than your view of things Would warrant. Of the crowd you saw to-day, Remove the full half sheer amazement draws, Mere novelty, nought else; and next, the tribe Whose innate blockish dulness just perceives That unless miracles (as seem my works) Be wrought in their behalf, their chance is slight To puzzle the devil; next, the numerous set Who bitterly hate established schools, and help The teacher that oppugns them, till he once Have planted his own doctrine, when the teacher May reckon on their rancour in his turn; Take, too, the sprinkling of sagacious knaves Whose cunning runs not counter to the vogue But seeks, by flattery and crafty nursing, To force my system to a premature Short-lived development. Why swell the list? Each has his end to serve, and his best way Of serving it: remove all these, remains A scantling, a poor dozen at the best, Worthy to look for sympathy and service, And likely to draw profit from my pains. Festus. 'T is no encouraging picture: still these few Redeem their fellows. Once the germ implanted, Its growth, if slow, is sure. Paracelsus.                God grant it so! I would make some amends: but if I fail, The luckless rogues have this excuse to urge, That much is in my method and my manner, My uncouth habits, my impatient spirit, Which hinders of reception and result My doctrine: much to say, small skill to speak! These old aims suffered not a looking-off Though for an instant; therefore, only when I thus renounced them and resolved to reap Some present fruitto teach mankind some truth So dearly purchasedonly then I found Such teaching was an art requiring cares And qualities peculiar to itself: That to possess was one thingto display Another. With renown first in my thoughts, Or popular praise, I had soon discovered it: One grows but little apt to learn these things. Festus. If it be so, which nowise I believe, There needs no waiting fuller dispensation To leave a labour of so little use. Why not throw up the irksome charge at once? Paracelsus. A task, a task!         But wherefore hide the whole Extent of degradation, once engaged In the confessing vein? Despite of all My fine talk of obedience and repugnance, Docility and what not, 't is yet to learn If when the task shall really be performed, My inclination free to choose once more, I shall do aught but slightly modify The nature of the hated task I quit. In plain words, I am spoiled; my life still tends As first it tended; I am broken and trained To my old habits: they are part of me. I know, and none so well, my darling ends Are proved impossible: no less, no less, Even now what humours me, fond fool, as when Their faint ghosts sit with me and flatter me And send me back content to my dull round? How can I change this soul?this apparatus Constructed solely for their purposes, So well adapted to their every want, To search out and discover, prove and perfect; This intricate machine whose most minute And meanest motions have their charm to me Though to none elsean aptitude I seize, An object I perceive, a use, a meaning, A property, a fitness, I explain And I alone:how can I change my soul? And this wronged body, worthless save when tasked Under that soul's dominionused to care For its bright master's cares and quite subdue Its proper cravingsnot to ail nor pine So he but prosperwhither drag this poor Tried patient body? God! how I essayed To live like that mad poet, for a while, To love alone; and how I felt too warped And twisted and deformed! What should I do, Even tho'released from drudgery, but return Faint, as you see, and halting, blind and sore, To my old life and die as I began? I cannot feed on beauty for the sake Of beauty only, nor can drink in balm From lovely objects for their loveliness; My nature cannot lose her first imprint; I still must hoard and heap and class all truths With one ulterior purpose: I must know! Would God translate me to his throne, believe That I should only listen to his word To further my own aim! For other men, Beauty is prodigally strewn around, And I were happy could I quench as they This mad and thriveless longing, and content me With beauty for itself alone: alas, I have addressed a frock of heavy mail Yet may not join the troop of sacred knights; And now the forest-creatures fly from me, The grass-banks cool, the sunbeams warm no more. Best follow, dreaming that ere night arrive, I shall o'ertake the company and ride Glittering as they! Festus.           I think I apprehend What you would say: if you, in truth, design To enter once more on the life thus left, Seek not to hide that all this consciousness Of failure is assumed! Paracelsus.            My friend, my friend, I toil, you listen; I explain, perhaps You understand: there our communion ends. Have you learnt nothing from to-day's discourse? When we would thoroughly know the sick man's state We feel awhile the fluttering pulse, press soft The hot brow, look upon the languid eye, And thence divine the rest. Must I lay bare My heart, hideous and beating, or tear up My vitals for your gaze, ere you will deem Enough made known? You! who are you, forsooth? That is the crowning operation claimed By the arch-demonstratorheaven the hall, And earth the audience. Let Aprile and you Secure good places: 't will be worth the while. Festus. Are you mad, Aureole? What can I have said To call for this? I judged from your own words. Paracelsus. Oh, doubtless! A sick wretch describes the ape That mocks him from the bed-foot, and all gravely You thither turn at once: or he recounts The perilous journey he has late performed, And you are puzzled much how that could be! You find me here, half stupid and half mad; It makes no part of my delight to search Into these matters, much less undergo Another's scrutiny; but so it chances That I am led to trust my state to you: And the event is, you combine, contrast And ponder on my foolish words as though They thoroughly conveyed all hidden here Here, loathsome with despair and hate and rage! Is there no fear, no shrinking and no shame? Will you guess nothing? will you spare me nothing? Must I go deeper? Ay or no? Festus.                Dear friend . . .                Paracelsus. True: I am brutal't is a part of it; The plague's signyou are not a lazar-haunter, How should you know? Well then, you think it strange I should profess to have failed utterly, And yet propose an ultimate return To courses void of hope: and this, because You know not what temptation is, nor how 'T is like to ply men in the sickliest part. You are to understand that we who make Sport for the gods, are hunted to the end: There is not one sharp volley shot at us, Which 'scaped with life, though hurt, we slacken pace And gather by the wayside herbs and roots To staunch our wounds, secure from further harm: We are assailed to life's extremest verge. It will be well indeed if I return, A harmless busy fool, to my old ways! I would forget hints of another fate, Significant enough, which silent hours Have lately scared me with. Festus.                Another! and what?                Paracelsus. After all, Festus, you say well: I am A man yet: I need never humble me. I would have beensomething, I know not what; But though I cannot soar, I do not crawl. There are worse portions than this one of mine. You say well! Festus.        Ah!        Paracelsus.          And deeper degradation! If the mean stimulants of vulgar praise, If vanity should become the chosen food Of a sunk mind, should stifle even the wish To find its early aspirations true, Should teach it to breathe falsehood like life-breath An atmosphere of craft and trick and lies; Should make it proud to emulate, surpass Base natures in the practices which woke Its most indignant loathing once . . . No, no! Utter damnation is reserved for hell! I had immortal feelings; such shall never Be wholly quenched: no, no!                My friend, you wear A melancholy face, and certain't is There's little cheer in all this dismal work. But was it my desire to set abroach Such memories and forebodings? I foresaw Where they would drive. 'T were better we discuss News from Lucerne or Zurich; ask and tell Of Egypt's flaring sky or Spain's cork-groves. Festus. I have thought: trust me, this mood will pass away! I know you and the lofty spirit you bear, And easily ravel out a clue to all. These are the trials meet for such as you, Nor must you hope exemption: to be mortal Is to be plied with trials manifold. Look round! The obstacles which kept the rest From your ambition, have been spurned by you; Their fears, their doubts, the chains that bind themall, Were flax before your resolute soul, which nought Avails to awe save these delusions bred From its own strength, its selfsame strength disguised, Mocking itself. Be brave, dear Aureole! Since The rabbit has his shade to frighten him, The fawn a rustling bough, mortals their cares, And higher natures yet would slight and laugh At these entangling fantasies, as you At trammels of a weaker intellect, Measure your mind's height by the shade it casts! I know you. Paracelsus.      And I know you, dearest Festus! And how you love unworthily; and how All admiration renders blind. Festus.                You hold That admiration blinds? Paracelsus.             Ay and alas!             Festus. Nought blinds you less than admiration, friend! Whether it be that all love renders wise In its degree; from love which blends with love Heart answering heartto love which spends itself In silent mad idolatry of some Pre-eminent mortal, some great soul of souls, Which ne'er will know how well it is adored. I say, such love is never blind; but rather Alive to every the minutest spot Which mars its object, and which hate (supposed So vigilant and searching) dreams not of. Love broods on such: what then? When first perceived Is there no sweet strife to forget, to change, To overflush those blemishes with all The glow of general goodness they disturb? To make those very defects an endless source Of new affection grown from hopes and fears? And, when all fails, is there no gallant stand Made even for much proved weak? no shrinking-back Lest, since all love assimilates the soul To what it loves, it should at length become Almost a rival of its idol? Trust me, If there be fiends who seek to work our hurt, To ruin and drag down earth's mightiest spirits Even at God's foot, 't will be from such as love, Their zeal will gather most to serve their cause; And least from those who hate, who most essay By contumely and scorn to blot the light Which forces entrance even to their hearts: For thence will our defender tear the veil And show within each heart, as in a shrine, The giant image of perfection, grown In hate's despite, whose calumnies were spawned In the untroubled presence of its eyes. True admiration blinds not; nor am I So blind. I call your sin exceptional; It springs from one whose life has passed the bounds Prescribed to life. Compound that fault with God! I speak of men; to common men like me The weakness you reveal endears you more, Like the far traces of decay in suns. I bid you have good cheer! Paracelsus.               Proeclare! Optime! Think of a quiet mountain-cloistered priest Instructing Paracelsus! yet't is so. Come, I will show you where my merit lies. 'T is in the advance of individual minds That the slow crowd should ground their expectation Eventually to follow; as the sea Waits ages in its bed till some one wave Out of the multitudinous mass, extends The empire of the whole, some feet perhaps, Over the strip of sand which could confine Its fellows so long time: thenceforth the rest, Even to the meanest, hurry in at once, And so much is clear gained. I shall be glad If all my labours, failing of aught else, Suffice to make such inroad and procure A wider range for thought: nay, they do this; For, whatsoe'er my notions of true knowledge And a legitimate success, may be, I am not blind to my undoubted rank When classed with others: I precede my age: And whoso wills is very free to mount These labours as a platform whence his own May have a prosperous outset. But, alas! My followersthey are noisy as you heard; But, for intelligence, the best of them So clumsily wield the weapons I supply And they extol, that I begin to doubt Whether their own rude clubs and pebble-stones Would not do better service than my arms Thus vilely swayedif error will not fall Sooner before the old awkward batterings Than my more subtle warfare, not half learned. Festus. I would supply that art, then, or withhold New arms until you teach their mystery. Paracelsus. Content you, 't is my wish; I have recourse To the simplest training. Day by day I seek To wake the mood, the spirit which alone Can make those arms of any use to men. Of course they are for swaggering forth at once Graced with Ulysses' bow, Achilles' shield Flash on us, all in armour, thou Achilles! Make our hearts dance to thy resounding step! A proper sight to scare the crows away! Festus. Pity you choose not then some other method Of coming at your point. The marvellous art At length established in the world bids fair To remedy all hindrances like these: Trust to Frobenius' press the precious lore Obscured by uncouth manner, or unfit For raw beginners; let his types secure A deathless monument to after-time; Meanwhile wait confidently and enjoy The ultimate effect: sooner or later You shall be all-revealed. Paracelsus.               The old dull question In a new form; no more. Thus: I possess Two sorts of knowledge; one,vast, shadowy, Hints of the unbounded aim I once pursued: The other consists of many secrets, caught While bent on nobler prize,perhaps a few Prime principles which may conduct to much: These last I offer to my followers here. Now, bid me chronicle the first of these, My ancient study, and in effect you bid Revert to the wild courses just abjured: I must go find them scattered through the world. Then, for the principles, they are so simple (Being chiefly of the overturning sort), That one time is as proper to propound them As any otherto-morrow at my class, Or half a century hence embalmed in print. For if mankind intend to learn at all, They must begin by giving faith to them And acting on them: and I do not see But that my lectures serve indifferent well: No doubt these dogmas fall not to the earth, For all their novelty and rugged setting. I think my class will not forget the day I let them know the gods of Israel, Atius, Oribasius, Galen, Rhasis, Serapion, Avicenna, Averres, Were blocks! Festus.       And that reminds me, I heard something About your waywardness: you burned their books, It seems, instead of answering those sages. Paracelsus. And who said that? Festus.          Some I met yesternight With OEcolampadius. As you know, the purpose Of this short stay at Basil was to learn His pleasure touching certain missives sent For our Zuinglius and himself. 'T was he Apprised me that the famous teacher here Was my old friend. Paracelsus.          Ah, I forgot: you went . . .          Festus. From Zurich with advices for the ear Of Luther, now at Wittenberg(you know, I make no doubt, the differences of late With Carolostadius)and returning sought Basil and . . . Paracelsus.         I remember. Here's a case, now, Will teach you why I answer not, but burn The books you mention. Pray, does Luther dream His arguments convince by their own force The crowds that own his doctrine? No, indeed! His plain denial of established points Ages had sanctified and men supposed Could never be oppugned while earth was under And heaven above thempoints which chance or time Affected notdid more than the array Of argument which followed. Boldly deny! There is much breath-stopping, hair-stiffening Awhile; then, amazed glances, mute awaiting The thunderbolt which does not come: and next, Reproachful wonder and inquiry: those Who else had never stirred, are able now To find the rest out for themselves, perhaps To outstrip him who set the whole at work, As never will my wise class its instructor. And you saw Luther? Festus.           'T is a wondrous soul!           Paracelsus. True: the so-heavy chain which galled mankind Is shattered, and the noblest of us all Must bow to the deliverernay, the worker Of our own projectwe who long before Had burst our trammels, but forgot the crowd, We should have taught, still groaned beneath the load: This he has done and nobly. Speed that may! Whatever be my chance or my mischance, What benefits mankind must glad me too; And men seem made, though not as I believed, For something better than the times produce. Witness these gangs of peasants your new lights From Suabia have possessed, whom Mnzer leads, And whom the duke, the landgrave and the elector Will calm in blood! Well, well; 't is not my world! Festus. Hark! Paracelsus.    'T is the melancholy wind astir Within the trees; the embers too are grey: Morn must be near. Festus.          Best ope the casement: see, The night, late strewn with clouds and flying stars, Is blank and motionless: how peaceful sleep The tree-tops altogether! Like an asp, The wind slips whispering from bough to bough. Paracelsus. Ay; you would gaze on a wind-shaken tree By the hour, nor count time lost. Festus.                  So you shall gaze: Those happy times will come again. Paracelsus.                   Gone, gone, Those pleasant times! Does not the moaning wind Seem to bewail that we have gained such gains And bartered sleep for them? Festus.                It is our trust That there is yet another world to mend All error and mischance. Paracelsus.              Another world! And why this world, this common world, to be A make-shift, a mere foil, how fair soever, To some fine life to come? Man must be fed With angels' food, forsooth; and some few traces Of a diviner nature which look out Through his corporeal baseness, warrant him In a supreme contempt of all provision For his inferior tastessome straggling marks Which constitute his essence, just as truly As here and there a gem would constitute The rock, their barren bed, one diamond. But were it sowere man all mindhe gains A station little enviable. From God Down to the lowest spirit ministrant, Intelligence exists which casts our mind Into immeasurable shade. No, no: Love, hope, fear, faiththese make humanity; These are its sign and note and character, And these I have lost!gone, shut from me for ever, Like a dead friend safe from unkindness more! See, morn at length. The heavy darkness seems Diluted, grey and clear without the stars; The shrubs bestir and rouse themselves as if Some snake, that weighed them down all night, let go His hold; and from the East, fuller and fuller Day, like a mighty river, flowing in; But clouded, wintry, desolate and cold. Yet see how that broad prickly star-shaped plant, Half-down in the crevice, spreads its woolly leaves All thick and glistering with diamond dew. And you depart for Einsiedeln this day, And we have spent all night in talk like this! If you would have me better for your love, Revert no more to these sad themes. Festus.                    One favour, And I have done. I leave you, deeply moved; Unwilling to have fared so well, the while My friend has changed so sorely. If this mood Shall pass away, if light once more arise Where all is darkness now, if you see fit To hope and trust again, and strive again, You will remembernot our love alone But that my faith in God's desire that man Should trust on his support, (as I must think You trusted) is obscured and dim through you: For you are thus, and this is no reward. Will you not call me to your side, dear Aureole? ~ Robert Browning, Paracelsus - Part III - Paracelsus

198:Lancelot And Elaine Elaine the fair, Elaine the loveable, Elaine, the lily maid of Astolat, High in her chamber up a tower to the east Guarded the sacred shield of Lancelot; Which first she placed where the morning's earliest ray Might strike it, and awake her with the gleam; Then fearing rust or soilure fashioned for it A case of silk, and braided thereupon All the devices blazoned on the shield In their own tinct, and added, of her wit, A border fantasy of branch and flower, And yellow-throated nestling in the nest. Nor rested thus content, but day by day, Leaving her household and good father, climbed That eastern tower, and entering barred her door, Stript off the case, and read the naked shield, Now guessed a hidden meaning in his arms, Now made a pretty history to herself Of every dint a sword had beaten in it, And every scratch a lance had made upon it, Conjecturing when and where: this cut is fresh; That ten years back; this dealt him at Caerlyle; That at Caerleon; this at Camelot: And ah God's mercy, what a stroke was there! And here a thrust that might have killed, but God Broke the strong lance, and rolled his enemy down, And saved him: so she lived in fantasy. How came the lily maid by that good shield Of Lancelot, she that knew not even his name? He left it with her, when he rode to tilt For the great diamond in the diamond jousts, Which Arthur had ordained, and by that name Had named them, since a diamond was the prize. For Arthur, long before they crowned him King, Roving the trackless realms of Lyonnesse, Had found a glen, gray boulder and black tarn. A horror lived about the tarn, and clave 290 Like its own mists to all the mountain side: For here two brothers, one a king, had met And fought together; but their names were lost; And each had slain his brother at a blow; And down they fell and made the glen abhorred: And there they lay till all their bones were bleached, And lichened into colour with the crags: And he, that once was king, had on a crown Of diamonds, one in front, and four aside. And Arthur came, and labouring up the pass, All in a misty moonshine, unawares Had trodden that crowned skeleton, and the skull Brake from the nape, and from the skull the crown Rolled into light, and turning on its rims Fled like a glittering rivulet to the tarn: And down the shingly scaur he plunged, and caught, And set it on his head, and in his heart Heard murmurs, 'Lo, thou likewise shalt be King.' Thereafter, when a King, he had the gems Plucked from the crown, and showed them to his knights, Saying, 'These jewels, whereupon I chanced Divinely, are the kingdom's, not the King's-For public use: henceforward let there be, Once every year, a joust for one of these: For so by nine years' proof we needs must learn Which is our mightiest, and ourselves shall grow In use of arms and manhood, till we drive The heathen, who, some say, shall rule the land Hereafter, which God hinder.' Thus he spoke: And eight years past, eight jousts had been, and still Had Lancelot won the diamond of the year, With purpose to present them to the Queen, When all were won; but meaning all at once To snare her royal fancy with a boon Worth half her realm, had never spoken word. Now for the central diamond and the last And largest, Arthur, holding then his court Hard on the river nigh the place which now Is this world's hugest, let proclaim a joust At Camelot, and when the time drew nigh 291 Spake (for she had been sick) to Guinevere, 'Are you so sick, my Queen, you cannot move To these fair jousts?' 'Yea, lord,' she said, 'ye know it.' 'Then will ye miss,' he answered, 'the great deeds Of Lancelot, and his prowess in the lists, A sight ye love to look on.' And the Queen Lifted her eyes, and they dwelt languidly On Lancelot, where he stood beside the King. He thinking that he read her meaning there, 'Stay with me, I am sick; my love is more Than many diamonds,' yielded; and a heart Love-loyal to the least wish of the Queen (However much he yearned to make complete The tale of diamonds for his destined boon) Urged him to speak against the truth, and say, 'Sir King, mine ancient wound is hardly whole, And lets me from the saddle;' and the King Glanced first at him, then her, and went his way. No sooner gone than suddenly she began: 'To blame, my lord Sir Lancelot, much to blame! Why go ye not to these fair jousts? the knights Are half of them our enemies, and the crowd Will murmur, "Lo the shameless ones, who take Their pastime now the trustful King is gone!"' Then Lancelot vext at having lied in vain: 'Are ye so wise? ye were not once so wise, My Queen, that summer, when ye loved me first. Then of the crowd ye took no more account Than of the myriad cricket of the mead, When its own voice clings to each blade of grass, And every voice is nothing. As to knights, Them surely can I silence with all ease. But now my loyal worship is allowed Of all men: many a bard, without offence, Has linked our names together in his lay, Lancelot, the flower of bravery, Guinevere, The pearl of beauty: and our knights at feast Have pledged us in this union, while the King Would listen smiling. How then? is there more? Has Arthur spoken aught? or would yourself, Now weary of my service and devoir, 292 Henceforth be truer to your faultless lord?' She broke into a little scornful laugh: 'Arthur, my lord, Arthur, the faultless King, That passionate perfection, my good lord-But who can gaze upon the Sun in heaven? He never spake word of reproach to me, He never had a glimpse of mine untruth, He cares not for me: only here today There gleamed a vague suspicion in his eyes: Some meddling rogue has tampered with him--else Rapt in this fancy of his Table Round, And swearing men to vows impossible, To make them like himself: but, friend, to me He is all fault who hath no fault at all: For who loves me must have a touch of earth; The low sun makes the colour: I am yours, Not Arthur's, as ye know, save by the bond. And therefore hear my words: go to the jousts: The tiny-trumpeting gnat can break our dream When sweetest; and the vermin voices here May buzz so loud--we scorn them, but they sting.' Then answered Lancelot, the chief of knights: 'And with what face, after my pretext made, Shall I appear, O Queen, at Camelot, I Before a King who honours his own word, As if it were his God's?' 'Yea,' said the Queen, 'A moral child without the craft to rule, Else had he not lost me: but listen to me, If I must find you wit: we hear it said That men go down before your spear at a touch, But knowing you are Lancelot; your great name, This conquers: hide it therefore; go unknown: Win! by this kiss you will: and our true King Will then allow your pretext, O my knight, As all for glory; for to speak him true, Ye know right well, how meek soe'er he seem, No keener hunter after glory breathes. He loves it in his knights more than himself: 293 They prove to him his work: win and return.' Then got Sir Lancelot suddenly to horse, Wroth at himself. Not willing to be known, He left the barren-beaten thoroughfare, Chose the green path that showed the rarer foot, And there among the solitary downs, Full often lost in fancy, lost his way; Till as he traced a faintly-shadowed track, That all in loops and links among the dales Ran to the Castle of Astolat, he saw Fired from the west, far on a hill, the towers. Thither he made, and blew the gateway horn. Then came an old, dumb, myriad-wrinkled man, Who let him into lodging and disarmed. And Lancelot marvelled at the wordless man; And issuing found the Lord of Astolat With two strong sons, Sir Torre and Sir Lavaine, Moving to meet him in the castle court; And close behind them stept the lily maid Elaine, his daughter: mother of the house There was not: some light jest among them rose With laughter dying down as the great knight Approached them: then the Lord of Astolat: 'Whence comes thou, my guest, and by what name Livest thou between the lips? for by thy state And presence I might guess thee chief of those, After the King, who eat in Arthur's halls. Him have I seen: the rest, his Table Round, Known as they are, to me they are unknown.' Then answered Sir Lancelot, the chief of knights: 'Known am I, and of Arthur's hall, and known, What I by mere mischance have brought, my shield. But since I go to joust as one unknown At Camelot for the diamond, ask me not, Hereafter ye shall know me--and the shield-I pray you lend me one, if such you have, Blank, or at least with some device not mine.' Then said the Lord of Astolat, 'Here is Torre's: Hurt in his first tilt was my son, Sir Torre. 294 And so, God wot, his shield is blank enough. His ye can have.' Then added plain Sir Torre, 'Yea, since I cannot use it, ye may have it.' Here laughed the father saying, 'Fie, Sir Churl, Is that answer for a noble knight? Allow him! but Lavaine, my younger here, He is so full of lustihood, he will ride, Joust for it, and win, and bring it in an hour, And set it in this damsel's golden hair, To make her thrice as wilful as before.' 'Nay, father, nay good father, shame me not Before this noble knight,' said young Lavaine, 'For nothing. Surely I but played on Torre: He seemed so sullen, vext he could not go: A jest, no more! for, knight, the maiden dreamt That some one put this diamond in her hand, And that it was too slippery to be held, And slipt and fell into some pool or stream, The castle-well, belike; and then I said That IF I went and IF I fought and won it (But all was jest and joke among ourselves) Then must she keep it safelier. All was jest. But, father, give me leave, an if he will, To ride to Camelot with this noble knight: Win shall I not, but do my best to win: Young as I am, yet would I do my best.' 'So will ye grace me,' answered Lancelot, Smiling a moment, 'with your fellowship O'er these waste downs whereon I lost myself, Then were I glad of you as guide and friend: And you shall win this diamond,--as I hear It is a fair large diamond,--if ye may, And yield it to this maiden, if ye will.' 'A fair large diamond,' added plain Sir Torre, 'Such be for queens, and not for simple maids.' Then she, who held her eyes upon the ground, Elaine, and heard her name so tost about, Flushed slightly at the slight disparagement Before the stranger knight, who, looking at her, Full courtly, yet not falsely, thus returned: 295 'If what is fair be but for what is fair, And only queens are to be counted so, Rash were my judgment then, who deem this maid Might wear as fair a jewel as is on earth, Not violating the bond of like to like.' He spoke and ceased: the lily maid Elaine, Won by the mellow voice before she looked, Lifted her eyes, and read his lineaments. The great and guilty love he bare the Queen, In battle with the love he bare his lord, Had marred his face, and marked it ere his time. Another sinning on such heights with one, The flower of all the west and all the world, Had been the sleeker for it: but in him His mood was often like a fiend, and rose And drove him into wastes and solitudes For agony, who was yet a living soul. Marred as he was, he seemed the goodliest man That ever among ladies ate in hall, And noblest, when she lifted up her eyes. However marred, of more than twice her years, Seamed with an ancient swordcut on the cheek, And bruised and bronzed, she lifted up her eyes And loved him, with that love which was her doom. Then the great knight, the darling of the court, Loved of the loveliest, into that rude hall Stept with all grace, and not with half disdain Hid under grace, as in a smaller time, But kindly man moving among his kind: Whom they with meats and vintage of their best And talk and minstrel melody entertained. And much they asked of court and Table Round, And ever well and readily answered he: But Lancelot, when they glanced at Guinevere, Suddenly speaking of the wordless man, Heard from the Baron that, ten years before, The heathen caught and reft him of his tongue. 'He learnt and warned me of their fierce design Against my house, and him they caught and maimed; But I, my sons, and little daughter fled 296 From bonds or death, and dwelt among the woods By the great river in a boatman's hut. Dull days were those, till our good Arthur broke The Pagan yet once more on Badon hill.' 'O there, great lord, doubtless,' Lavaine said, rapt By all the sweet and sudden passion of youth Toward greatness in its elder, 'you have fought. O tell us--for we live apart--you know Of Arthur's glorious wars.' And Lancelot spoke And answered him at full, as having been With Arthur in the fight which all day long Rang by the white mouth of the violent Glem; And in the four loud battles by the shore Of Duglas; that on Bassa; then the war That thundered in and out the gloomy skirts Of Celidon the forest; and again By castle Gurnion, where the glorious King Had on his cuirass worn our Lady's Head, Carved of one emerald centered in a sun Of silver rays, that lightened as he breathed; And at Caerleon had he helped his lord, When the strong neighings of the wild white Horse Set every gilded parapet shuddering; And up in Agned-Cathregonion too, And down the waste sand-shores of Trath Treroit, Where many a heathen fell; 'and on the mount Of Badon I myself beheld the King Charge at the head of all his Table Round, And all his legions crying Christ and him, And break them; and I saw him, after, stand High on a heap of slain, from spur to plume Red as the rising sun with heathen blood, And seeing me, with a great voice he cried, "They are broken, they are broken!" for the King, However mild he seems at home, nor cares For triumph in our mimic wars, the jousts-For if his own knight cast him down, he laughs Saying, his knights are better men than he-Yet in this heathen war the fire of God Fills him: I never saw his like: there lives No greater leader.' 297 While he uttered this, Low to her own heart said the lily maid, 'Save your own great self, fair lord;' and when he fell From talk of war to traits of pleasantry-Being mirthful he, but in a stately kind-She still took note that when the living smile Died from his lips, across him came a cloud Of melancholy severe, from which again, Whenever in her hovering to and fro The lily maid had striven to make him cheer, There brake a sudden-beaming tenderness Of manners and of nature: and she thought That all was nature, all, perchance, for her. And all night long his face before her lived, As when a painter, poring on a face, Divinely through all hindrance finds the man Behind it, and so paints him that his face, The shape and colour of a mind and life, Lives for his children, ever at its best And fullest; so the face before her lived, Dark-splendid, speaking in the silence, full Of noble things, and held her from her sleep. Till rathe she rose, half-cheated in the thought She needs must bid farewell to sweet Lavaine. First in fear, step after step, she stole Down the long tower-stairs, hesitating: Anon, she heard Sir Lancelot cry in the court, 'This shield, my friend, where is it?' and Lavaine Past inward, as she came from out the tower. There to his proud horse Lancelot turned, and smoothed The glossy shoulder, humming to himself. Half-envious of the flattering hand, she drew Nearer and stood. He looked, and more amazed Than if seven men had set upon him, saw The maiden standing in the dewy light. He had not dreamed she was so beautiful. Then came on him a sort of sacred fear, For silent, though he greeted her, she stood Rapt on his face as if it were a God's. Suddenly flashed on her a wild desire, That he should wear her favour at the tilt. 298 She braved a riotous heart in asking for it. 'Fair lord, whose name I know not--noble it is, I well believe, the noblest--will you wear My favour at this tourney?' 'Nay,' said he, 'Fair lady, since I never yet have worn Favour of any lady in the lists. Such is my wont, as those, who know me, know.' 'Yea, so,' she answered; 'then in wearing mine Needs must be lesser likelihood, noble lord, That those who know should know you.' And he turned Her counsel up and down within his mind, And found it true, and answered, 'True, my child. Well, I will wear it: fetch it out to me: What is it?' and she told him 'A red sleeve Broidered with pearls,' and brought it: then he bound Her token on his helmet, with a smile Saying, 'I never yet have done so much For any maiden living,' and the blood Sprang to her face and filled her with delight; But left her all the paler, when Lavaine Returning brought the yet-unblazoned shield, His brother's; which he gave to Lancelot, Who parted with his own to fair Elaine: 'Do me this grace, my child, to have my shield In keeping till I come.' 'A grace to me,' She answered, 'twice today. I am your squire!' Whereat Lavaine said, laughing, 'Lily maid, For fear our people call you lily maid In earnest, let me bring your colour back; Once, twice, and thrice: now get you hence to bed:' So kissed her, and Sir Lancelot his own hand, And thus they moved away: she stayed a minute, Then made a sudden step to the gate, and there-Her bright hair blown about the serious face Yet rosy-kindled with her brother's kiss-Paused by the gateway, standing near the shield In silence, while she watched their arms far-off Sparkle, until they dipt below the downs. Then to her tower she climbed, and took the shield, There kept it, and so lived in fantasy. Meanwhile the new companions past away 299 Far o'er the long backs of the bushless downs, To where Sir Lancelot knew there lived a knight Not far from Camelot, now for forty years A hermit, who had prayed, laboured and prayed, And ever labouring had scooped himself In the white rock a chapel and a hall On massive columns, like a shorecliff cave, And cells and chambers: all were fair and dry; The green light from the meadows underneath Struck up and lived along the milky roofs; And in the meadows tremulous aspen-trees And poplars made a noise of falling showers. And thither wending there that night they bode. But when the next day broke from underground, And shot red fire and shadows through the cave, They rose, heard mass, broke fast, and rode away: Then Lancelot saying, 'Hear, but hold my name Hidden, you ride with Lancelot of the Lake,' Abashed young Lavaine, whose instant reverence, Dearer to true young hearts than their own praise, But left him leave to stammer, 'Is it indeed?' And after muttering 'The great Lancelot, At last he got his breath and answered, 'One, One have I seen--that other, our liege lord, The dread Pendragon, Britain's King of kings, Of whom the people talk mysteriously, He will be there--then were I stricken blind That minute, I might say that I had seen.' So spake Lavaine, and when they reached the lists By Camelot in the meadow, let his eyes Run through the peopled gallery which half round Lay like a rainbow fallen upon the grass, Until they found the clear-faced King, who sat Robed in red samite, easily to be known, Since to his crown the golden dragon clung, And down his robe the dragon writhed in gold, And from the carven-work behind him crept Two dragons gilded, sloping down to make Arms for his chair, while all the rest of them Through knots and loops and folds innumerable 300 Fled ever through the woodwork, till they found The new design wherein they lost themselves, Yet with all ease, so tender was the work: And, in the costly canopy o'er him set, Blazed the last diamond of the nameless king. Then Lancelot answered young Lavaine and said, 'Me you call great: mine is the firmer seat, The truer lance: but there is many a youth Now crescent, who will come to all I am And overcome it; and in me there dwells No greatness, save it be some far-off touch Of greatness to know well I am not great: There is the man.' And Lavaine gaped upon him As on a thing miraculous, and anon The trumpets blew; and then did either side, They that assailed, and they that held the lists, Set lance in rest, strike spur, suddenly move, Meet in the midst, and there so furiously Shock, that a man far-off might well perceive, If any man that day were left afield, The hard earth shake, and a low thunder of arms. And Lancelot bode a little, till he saw Which were the weaker; then he hurled into it Against the stronger: little need to speak Of Lancelot in his glory! King, duke, earl, Count, baron--whom he smote, he overthrew. But in the field were Lancelot's kith and kin, Ranged with the Table Round that held the lists, Strong men, and wrathful that a stranger knight Should do and almost overdo the deeds Of Lancelot; and one said to the other, 'Lo! What is he? I do not mean the force alone-The grace and versatility of the man! Is it not Lancelot?' 'When has Lancelot worn Favour of any lady in the lists? Not such his wont, as we, that know him, know.' 'How then? who then?' a fury seized them all, A fiery family passion for the name Of Lancelot, and a glory one with theirs. They couched their spears and pricked their steeds, and thus, 301 Their plumes driven backward by the wind they made In moving, all together down upon him Bare, as a wild wave in the wide North-sea, Green-glimmering toward the summit, bears, with all Its stormy crests that smoke against the skies, Down on a bark, and overbears the bark, And him that helms it, so they overbore Sir Lancelot and his charger, and a spear Down-glancing lamed the charger, and a spear Pricked sharply his own cuirass, and the head Pierced through his side, and there snapt, and remained. Then Sir Lavaine did well and worshipfully; He bore a knight of old repute to the earth, And brought his horse to Lancelot where he lay. He up the side, sweating with agony, got, But thought to do while he might yet endure, And being lustily holpen by the rest, His party,--though it seemed half-miracle To those he fought with,--drave his kith and kin, And all the Table Round that held the lists, Back to the barrier; then the trumpets blew Proclaiming his the prize, who wore the sleeve Of scarlet, and the pearls; and all the knights, His party, cried 'Advance and take thy prize The diamond;' but he answered, 'Diamond me No diamonds! for God's love, a little air! Prize me no prizes, for my prize is death! Hence will I, and I charge you, follow me not.' He spoke, and vanished suddenly from the field With young Lavaine into the poplar grove. There from his charger down he slid, and sat, Gasping to Sir Lavaine, 'Draw the lance-head:' 'Ah my sweet lord Sir Lancelot,' said Lavaine, 'I dread me, if I draw it, you will die.' But he, 'I die already with it: draw-Draw,'--and Lavaine drew, and Sir Lancelot gave A marvellous great shriek and ghastly groan, And half his blood burst forth, and down he sank For the pure pain, and wholly swooned away. Then came the hermit out and bare him in, 302 There stanched his wound; and there, in daily doubt Whether to live or die, for many a week Hid from the wide world's rumour by the grove Of poplars with their noise of falling showers, And ever-tremulous aspen-trees, he lay. But on that day when Lancelot fled the lists, His party, knights of utmost North and West, Lords of waste marches, kings of desolate isles, Came round their great Pendragon, saying to him, 'Lo, Sire, our knight, through whom we won the day, Hath gone sore wounded, and hath left his prize Untaken, crying that his prize is death.' 'Heaven hinder,' said the King, 'that such an one, So great a knight as we have seen today-He seemed to me another Lancelot-Yea, twenty times I thought him Lancelot-He must not pass uncared for. Wherefore, rise, O Gawain, and ride forth and find the knight. Wounded and wearied needs must he be near. I charge you that you get at once to horse. And, knights and kings, there breathes not one of you Will deem this prize of ours is rashly given: His prowess was too wondrous. We will do him No customary honour: since the knight Came not to us, of us to claim the prize, Ourselves will send it after. Rise and take This diamond, and deliver it, and return, And bring us where he is, and how he fares, And cease not from your quest until ye find.' So saying, from the carven flower above, To which it made a restless heart, he took, And gave, the diamond: then from where he sat At Arthur's right, with smiling face arose, With smiling face and frowning heart, a Prince In the mid might and flourish of his May, Gawain, surnamed The Courteous, fair and strong, And after Lancelot, Tristram, and Geraint And Gareth, a good knight, but therewithal Sir Modred's brother, and the child of Lot, Nor often loyal to his word, and now 303 Wroth that the King's command to sally forth In quest of whom he knew not, made him leave The banquet, and concourse of knights and kings. So all in wrath he got to horse and went; While Arthur to the banquet, dark in mood, Past, thinking 'Is it Lancelot who hath come Despite the wound he spake of, all for gain Of glory, and hath added wound to wound, And ridden away to die?' So feared the King, And, after two days' tarriance there, returned. Then when he saw the Queen, embracing asked, 'Love, are you yet so sick?' 'Nay, lord,' she said. 'And where is Lancelot?' Then the Queen amazed, 'Was he not with you? won he not your prize?' 'Nay, but one like him.' 'Why that like was he.' And when the King demanded how she knew, Said, 'Lord, no sooner had ye parted from us, Than Lancelot told me of a common talk That men went down before his spear at a touch, But knowing he was Lancelot; his great name Conquered; and therefore would he hide his name From all men, even the King, and to this end Had made a pretext of a hindering wound, That he might joust unknown of all, and learn If his old prowess were in aught decayed; And added, "Our true Arthur, when he learns, Will well allow me pretext, as for gain Of purer glory."' Then replied the King: 'Far lovelier in our Lancelot had it been, In lieu of idly dallying with the truth, To have trusted me as he hath trusted thee. Surely his King and most familiar friend Might well have kept his secret. True, indeed, Albeit I know my knights fantastical, So fine a fear in our large Lancelot Must needs have moved my laughter: now remains But little cause for laughter: his own kin-Ill news, my Queen, for all who love him, this!-His kith and kin, not knowing, set upon him; 304 So that he went sore wounded from the field: Yet good news too: for goodly hopes are mine That Lancelot is no more a lonely heart. He wore, against his wont, upon his helm A sleeve of scarlet, broidered with great pearls, Some gentle maiden's gift.' 'Yea, lord,' she said, 'Thy hopes are mine,' and saying that, she choked, And sharply turned about to hide her face, Past to her chamber, and there flung herself Down on the great King's couch, and writhed upon it, And clenched her fingers till they bit the palm, And shrieked out 'Traitor' to the unhearing wall, Then flashed into wild tears, and rose again, And moved about her palace, proud and pale. Gawain the while through all the region round Rode with his diamond, wearied of the quest, Touched at all points, except the poplar grove, And came at last, though late, to Astolat: Whom glittering in enamelled arms the maid Glanced at, and cried, 'What news from Camelot, lord? What of the knight with the red sleeve?' 'He won.' 'I knew it,' she said. 'But parted from the jousts Hurt in the side,' whereat she caught her breath; Through her own side she felt the sharp lance go; Thereon she smote her hand: wellnigh she swooned: And, while he gazed wonderingly at her, came The Lord of Astolat out, to whom the Prince Reported who he was, and on what quest Sent, that he bore the prize and could not find The victor, but had ridden a random round To seek him, and had wearied of the search. To whom the Lord of Astolat, 'Bide with us, And ride no more at random, noble Prince! Here was the knight, and here he left a shield; This will he send or come for: furthermore Our son is with him; we shall hear anon, Needs must hear.' To this the courteous Prince Accorded with his wonted courtesy, Courtesy with a touch of traitor in it, 305 And stayed; and cast his eyes on fair Elaine: Where could be found face daintier? then her shape From forehead down to foot, perfect--again From foot to forehead exquisitely turned: 'Well--if I bide, lo! this wild flower for me!' And oft they met among the garden yews, And there he set himself to play upon her With sallying wit, free flashes from a height Above her, graces of the court, and songs, Sighs, and slow smiles, and golden eloquence And amorous adulation, till the maid Rebelled against it, saying to him, 'Prince, O loyal nephew of our noble King, Why ask you not to see the shield he left, Whence you might learn his name? Why slight your King, And lose the quest he sent you on, and prove No surer than our falcon yesterday, Who lost the hern we slipt her at, and went To all the winds?' 'Nay, by mine head,' said he, 'I lose it, as we lose the lark in heaven, O damsel, in the light of your blue eyes; But an ye will it let me see the shield.' And when the shield was brought, and Gawain saw Sir Lancelot's azure lions, crowned with gold, Ramp in the field, he smote his thigh, and mocked: 'Right was the King! our Lancelot! that true man!' 'And right was I,' she answered merrily, 'I, Who dreamed my knight the greatest knight of all.' 'And if I dreamed,' said Gawain, 'that you love This greatest knight, your pardon! lo, ye know it! Speak therefore: shall I waste myself in vain?' Full simple was her answer, 'What know I? My brethren have been all my fellowship; And I, when often they have talked of love, Wished it had been my mother, for they talked, Meseemed, of what they knew not; so myself-I know not if I know what true love is, But if I know, then, if I love not him, I know there is none other I can love.' 'Yea, by God's death,' said he, 'ye love him well, But would not, knew ye what all others know, And whom he loves.' 'So be it,' cried Elaine, 306 And lifted her fair face and moved away: But he pursued her, calling, 'Stay a little! One golden minute's grace! he wore your sleeve: Would he break faith with one I may not name? Must our true man change like a leaf at last? Nay--like enow: why then, far be it from me To cross our mighty Lancelot in his loves! And, damsel, for I deem you know full well Where your great knight is hidden, let me leave My quest with you; the diamond also: here! For if you love, it will be sweet to give it; And if he love, it will be sweet to have it From your own hand; and whether he love or not, A diamond is a diamond. Fare you well A thousand times!--a thousand times farewell! Yet, if he love, and his love hold, we two May meet at court hereafter: there, I think, So ye will learn the courtesies of the court, We two shall know each other.' Then he gave, And slightly kissed the hand to which he gave, The diamond, and all wearied of the quest Leapt on his horse, and carolling as he went A true-love ballad, lightly rode away. Thence to the court he past; there told the King What the King knew, 'Sir Lancelot is the knight.' And added, 'Sire, my liege, so much I learnt; But failed to find him, though I rode all round The region: but I lighted on the maid Whose sleeve he wore; she loves him; and to her, Deeming our courtesy is the truest law, I gave the diamond: she will render it; For by mine head she knows his hiding-place.' The seldom-frowning King frowned, and replied, 'Too courteous truly! ye shall go no more On quest of mine, seeing that ye forget Obedience is the courtesy due to kings.' He spake and parted. Wroth, but all in awe, 307 For twenty strokes of the blood, without a word, Lingered that other, staring after him; Then shook his hair, strode off, and buzzed abroad About the maid of Astolat, and her love. All ears were pricked at once, all tongues were loosed: 'The maid of Astolat loves Sir Lancelot, Sir Lancelot loves the maid of Astolat.' Some read the King's face, some the Queen's, and all Had marvel what the maid might be, but most Predoomed her as unworthy. One old dame Came suddenly on the Queen with the sharp news. She, that had heard the noise of it before, But sorrowing Lancelot should have stooped so low, Marred her friend's aim with pale tranquillity. So ran the tale like fire about the court, Fire in dry stubble a nine-days' wonder flared: Till even the knights at banquet twice or thrice Forgot to drink to Lancelot and the Queen, And pledging Lancelot and the lily maid Smiled at each other, while the Queen, who sat With lips severely placid, felt the knot Climb in her throat, and with her feet unseen Crushed the wild passion out against the floor Beneath the banquet, where all the meats became As wormwood, and she hated all who pledged. But far away the maid in Astolat, Her guiltless rival, she that ever kept The one-day-seen Sir Lancelot in her heart, Crept to her father, while he mused alone, Sat on his knee, stroked his gray face and said, 'Father, you call me wilful, and the fault Is yours who let me have my will, and now, Sweet father, will you let me lose my wits?' 'Nay,' said he, 'surely.' 'Wherefore, let me hence,' She answered, 'and find out our dear Lavaine.' 'Ye will not lose your wits for dear Lavaine: Bide,' answered he: 'we needs must hear anon Of him, and of that other.' 'Ay,' she said, 'And of that other, for I needs must hence And find that other, wheresoe'er he be, And with mine own hand give his diamond to him, 308 Lest I be found as faithless in the quest As yon proud Prince who left the quest to me. Sweet father, I behold him in my dreams Gaunt as it were the skeleton of himself, Death-pale, for lack of gentle maiden's aid. The gentler-born the maiden, the more bound, My father, to be sweet and serviceable To noble knights in sickness, as ye know When these have worn their tokens: let me hence I pray you.' Then her father nodding said, 'Ay, ay, the diamond: wit ye well, my child, Right fain were I to learn this knight were whole, Being our greatest: yea, and you must give it-And sure I think this fruit is hung too high For any mouth to gape for save a queen's-Nay, I mean nothing: so then, get you gone, Being so very wilful you must go.' Lightly, her suit allowed, she slipt away, And while she made her ready for her ride, Her father's latest word hummed in her ear, 'Being so very wilful you must go,' And changed itself and echoed in her heart, 'Being so very wilful you must die.' But she was happy enough and shook it off, As we shake off the bee that buzzes at us; And in her heart she answered it and said, 'What matter, so I help him back to life?' Then far away with good Sir Torre for guide Rode o'er the long backs of the bushless downs To Camelot, and before the city-gates Came on her brother with a happy face Making a roan horse caper and curvet For pleasure all about a field of flowers: Whom when she saw, 'Lavaine,' she cried, 'Lavaine, How fares my lord Sir Lancelot?' He amazed, 'Torre and Elaine! why here? Sir Lancelot! How know ye my lord's name is Lancelot?' But when the maid had told him all her tale, Then turned Sir Torre, and being in his moods Left them, and under the strange-statued gate, Where Arthur's wars were rendered mystically, 309 Past up the still rich city to his kin, His own far blood, which dwelt at Camelot; And her, Lavaine across the poplar grove Led to the caves: there first she saw the casque Of Lancelot on the wall: her scarlet sleeve, Though carved and cut, and half the pearls away, Streamed from it still; and in her heart she laughed, Because he had not loosed it from his helm, But meant once more perchance to tourney in it. And when they gained the cell wherein he slept, His battle-writhen arms and mighty hands Lay naked on the wolfskin, and a dream Of dragging down his enemy made them move. Then she that saw him lying unsleek, unshorn, Gaunt as it were the skeleton of himself, Uttered a little tender dolorous cry. The sound not wonted in a place so still Woke the sick knight, and while he rolled his eyes Yet blank from sleep, she started to him, saying, 'Your prize the diamond sent you by the King:' His eyes glistened: she fancied 'Is it for me?' And when the maid had told him all the tale Of King and Prince, the diamond sent, the quest Assigned to her not worthy of it, she knelt Full lowly by the corners of his bed, And laid the diamond in his open hand. Her face was near, and as we kiss the child That does the task assigned, he kissed her face. At once she slipt like water to the floor. 'Alas,' he said, 'your ride hath wearied you. Rest must you have.' 'No rest for me,' she said; 'Nay, for near you, fair lord, I am at rest.' What might she mean by that? his large black eyes, Yet larger through his leanness, dwelt upon her, Till all her heart's sad secret blazed itself In the heart's colours on her simple face; And Lancelot looked and was perplext in mind, And being weak in body said no more; But did not love the colour; woman's love, Save one, he not regarded, and so turned Sighing, and feigned a sleep until he slept. 310 Then rose Elaine and glided through the fields, And past beneath the weirdly-sculptured gates Far up the dim rich city to her kin; There bode the night: but woke with dawn, and past Down through the dim rich city to the fields, Thence to the cave: so day by day she past In either twilight ghost-like to and fro Gliding, and every day she tended him, And likewise many a night: and Lancelot Would, though he called his wound a little hurt Whereof he should be quickly whole, at times Brain-feverous in his heat and agony, seem Uncourteous, even he: but the meek maid Sweetly forbore him ever, being to him Meeker than any child to a rough nurse, Milder than any mother to a sick child, And never woman yet, since man's first fall, Did kindlier unto man, but her deep love Upbore her; till the hermit, skilled in all The simples and the science of that time, Told him that her fine care had saved his life. And the sick man forgot her simple blush, Would call her friend and sister, sweet Elaine, Would listen for her coming and regret Her parting step, and held her tenderly, And loved her with all love except the love Of man and woman when they love their best, Closest and sweetest, and had died the death In any knightly fashion for her sake. And peradventure had he seen her first She might have made this and that other world Another world for the sick man; but now The shackles of an old love straitened him, His honour rooted in dishonour stood, And faith unfaithful kept him falsely true. Yet the great knight in his mid-sickness made Full many a holy vow and pure resolve. These, as but born of sickness, could not live: For when the blood ran lustier in him again, Full often the bright image of one face, Making a treacherous quiet in his heart, 311 Dispersed his resolution like a cloud. Then if the maiden, while that ghostly grace Beamed on his fancy, spoke, he answered not, Or short and coldly, and she knew right well What the rough sickness meant, but what this meant She knew not, and the sorrow dimmed her sight, And drave her ere her time across the fields Far into the rich city, where alone She murmured, 'Vain, in vain: it cannot be. He will not love me: how then? must I die?' Then as a little helpless innocent bird, That has but one plain passage of few notes, Will sing the simple passage o'er and o'er For all an April morning, till the ear Wearies to hear it, so the simple maid Went half the night repeating, 'Must I die?' And now to right she turned, and now to left, And found no ease in turning or in rest; And 'Him or death,' she muttered, 'death or him,' Again and like a burthen, 'Him or death.' But when Sir Lancelot's deadly hurt was whole, To Astolat returning rode the three. There morn by morn, arraying her sweet self In that wherein she deemed she looked her best, She came before Sir Lancelot, for she thought 'If I be loved, these are my festal robes, If not, the victim's flowers before he fall.' And Lancelot ever prest upon the maid That she should ask some goodly gift of him For her own self or hers; 'and do not shun To speak the wish most near to your true heart; Such service have ye done me, that I make My will of yours, and Prince and Lord am I In mine own land, and what I will I can.' Then like a ghost she lifted up her face, But like a ghost without the power to speak. And Lancelot saw that she withheld her wish, And bode among them yet a little space Till he should learn it; and one morn it chanced He found her in among the garden yews, And said, 'Delay no longer, speak your wish, 312 Seeing I go today:' then out she brake: 'Going? and we shall never see you more. And I must die for want of one bold word.' 'Speak: that I live to hear,' he said, 'is yours.' Then suddenly and passionately she spoke: 'I have gone mad. I love you: let me die.' 'Ah, sister,' answered Lancelot, 'what is this?' And innocently extending her white arms, 'Your love,' she said, 'your love--to be your wife.' And Lancelot answered, 'Had I chosen to wed, I had been wedded earlier, sweet Elaine: But now there never will be wife of mine.' 'No, no,' she cried, 'I care not to be wife, But to be with you still, to see your face, To serve you, and to follow you through the world.' And Lancelot answered, 'Nay, the world, the world, All ear and eye, with such a stupid heart To interpret ear and eye, and such a tongue To blare its own interpretation--nay, Full ill then should I quit your brother's love, And your good father's kindness.' And she said, 'Not to be with you, not to see your face-Alas for me then, my good days are done.' 'Nay, noble maid,' he answered, 'ten times nay! This is not love: but love's first flash in youth, Most common: yea, I know it of mine own self: And you yourself will smile at your own self Hereafter, when you yield your flower of life To one more fitly yours, not thrice your age: And then will I, for true you are and sweet Beyond mine old belief in womanhood, More specially should your good knight be poor, Endow you with broad land and territory Even to the half my realm beyond the seas, So that would make you happy: furthermore, Even to the death, as though ye were my blood, In all your quarrels will I be your knight. This I will do, dear damsel, for your sake, And more than this I cannot.' While he spoke She neither blushed nor shook, but deathly-pale 313 Stood grasping what was nearest, then replied: 'Of all this will I nothing;' and so fell, And thus they bore her swooning to her tower. Then spake, to whom through those black walls of yew Their talk had pierced, her father: 'Ay, a flash, I fear me, that will strike my blossom dead. Too courteous are ye, fair Lord Lancelot. I pray you, use some rough discourtesy To blunt or break her passion.' Lancelot said, 'That were against me: what I can I will;' And there that day remained, and toward even Sent for his shield: full meekly rose the maid, Stript off the case, and gave the naked shield; Then, when she heard his horse upon the stones, Unclasping flung the casement back, and looked Down on his helm, from which her sleeve had gone. And Lancelot knew the little clinking sound; And she by tact of love was well aware That Lancelot knew that she was looking at him. And yet he glanced not up, nor waved his hand, Nor bad farewell, but sadly rode away. This was the one discourtesy that he used. So in her tower alone the maiden sat: His very shield was gone; only the case, Her own poor work, her empty labour, left. But still she heard him, still his picture formed And grew between her and the pictured wall. Then came her father, saying in low tones, 'Have comfort,' whom she greeted quietly. Then came her brethren saying, 'Peace to thee, Sweet sister,' whom she answered with all calm. But when they left her to herself again, Death, like a friend's voice from a distant field Approaching through the darkness, called; the owls Wailing had power upon her, and she mixt Her fancies with the sallow-rifted glooms Of evening, and the moanings of the wind. And in those days she made a little song, 314 And called her song 'The Song of Love and Death,' And sang it: sweetly could she make and sing. 'Sweet is true love though given in vain, in vain; And sweet is death who puts an end to pain: I know not which is sweeter, no, not I. 'Love, art thou sweet? then bitter death must be: Love, thou art bitter; sweet is death to me. O Love, if death be sweeter, let me die. 'Sweet love, that seems not made to fade away, Sweet death, that seems to make us loveless clay, I know not which is sweeter, no, not I. 'I fain would follow love, if that could be; I needs must follow death, who calls for me; Call and I follow, I follow! let me die.' High with the last line scaled her voice, and this, All in a fiery dawning wild with wind That shook her tower, the brothers heard, and thought With shuddering, 'Hark the Phantom of the house That ever shrieks before a death,' and called The father, and all three in hurry and fear Ran to her, and lo! the blood-red light of dawn Flared on her face, she shrilling, 'Let me die!' As when we dwell upon a word we know, Repeating, till the word we know so well Becomes a wonder, and we know not why, So dwelt the father on her face, and thought 'Is this Elaine?' till back the maiden fell, Then gave a languid hand to each, and lay, Speaking a still good-morrow with her eyes. At last she said, 'Sweet brothers, yesternight I seemed a curious little maid again, As happy as when we dwelt among the woods, And when ye used to take me with the flood Up the great river in the boatman's boat. Only ye would not pass beyond the cape That has the poplar on it: there ye fixt 315 Your limit, oft returning with the tide. And yet I cried because ye would not pass Beyond it, and far up the shining flood Until we found the palace of the King. And yet ye would not; but this night I dreamed That I was all alone upon the flood, And then I said, "Now shall I have my will:" And there I woke, but still the wish remained. So let me hence that I may pass at last Beyond the poplar and far up the flood, Until I find the palace of the King. There will I enter in among them all, And no man there will dare to mock at me; But there the fine Gawain will wonder at me, And there the great Sir Lancelot muse at me; Gawain, who bad a thousand farewells to me, Lancelot, who coldly went, nor bad me one: And there the King will know me and my love, And there the Queen herself will pity me, And all the gentle court will welcome me, And after my long voyage I shall rest!' 'Peace,' said her father, 'O my child, ye seem Light-headed, for what force is yours to go So far, being sick? and wherefore would ye look On this proud fellow again, who scorns us all?' Then the rough Torre began to heave and move, And bluster into stormy sobs and say, 'I never loved him: an I meet with him, I care not howsoever great he be, Then will I strike at him and strike him down, Give me good fortune, I will strike him dead, For this discomfort he hath done the house.' To whom the gentle sister made reply, 'Fret not yourself, dear brother, nor be wroth, Seeing it is no more Sir Lancelot's fault Not to love me, than it is mine to love Him of all men who seems to me the highest.' 'Highest?' the father answered, echoing 'highest?' 316 (He meant to break the passion in her) 'nay, Daughter, I know not what you call the highest; But this I know, for all the people know it, He loves the Queen, and in an open shame: And she returns his love in open shame; If this be high, what is it to be low?' Then spake the lily maid of Astolat: 'Sweet father, all too faint and sick am I For anger: these are slanders: never yet Was noble man but made ignoble talk. He makes no friend who never made a foe. But now it is my glory to have loved One peerless, without stain: so let me pass, My father, howsoe'er I seem to you, Not all unhappy, having loved God's best And greatest, though my love had no return: Yet, seeing you desire your child to live, Thanks, but you work against your own desire; For if I could believe the things you say I should but die the sooner; wherefore cease, Sweet father, and bid call the ghostly man Hither, and let me shrive me clean, and die.' So when the ghostly man had come and gone, She with a face, bright as for sin forgiven, Besought Lavaine to write as she devised A letter, word for word; and when he asked 'Is it for Lancelot, is it for my dear lord? Then will I bear it gladly;' she replied, 'For Lancelot and the Queen and all the world, But I myself must bear it.' Then he wrote The letter she devised; which being writ And folded, 'O sweet father, tender and true, Deny me not,' she said--'ye never yet Denied my fancies--this, however strange, My latest: lay the letter in my hand A little ere I die, and close the hand Upon it; I shall guard it even in death. And when the heat is gone from out my heart, Then take the little bed on which I died For Lancelot's love, and deck it like the Queen's 317 For richness, and me also like the Queen In all I have of rich, and lay me on it. And let there be prepared a chariot-bier To take me to the river, and a barge Be ready on the river, clothed in black. I go in state to court, to meet the Queen. There surely I shall speak for mine own self, And none of you can speak for me so well. And therefore let our dumb old man alone Go with me, he can steer and row, and he Will guide me to that palace, to the doors.' She ceased: her father promised; whereupon She grew so cheerful that they deemed her death Was rather in the fantasy than the blood. But ten slow mornings past, and on the eleventh Her father laid the letter in her hand, And closed the hand upon it, and she died. So that day there was dole in Astolat. But when the next sun brake from underground, Then, those two brethren slowly with bent brows Accompanying, the sad chariot-bier Past like a shadow through the field, that shone Full-summer, to that stream whereon the barge, Palled all its length in blackest samite, lay. There sat the lifelong creature of the house, Loyal, the dumb old servitor, on deck, Winking his eyes, and twisted all his face. So those two brethren from the chariot took And on the black decks laid her in her bed, Set in her hand a lily, o'er her hung The silken case with braided blazonings, And kissed her quiet brows, and saying to her 'Sister, farewell for ever,' and again 'Farewell, sweet sister,' parted all in tears. Then rose the dumb old servitor, and the dead, Oared by the dumb, went upward with the flood-In her right hand the lily, in her left The letter--all her bright hair streaming down-And all the coverlid was cloth of gold Drawn to her waist, and she herself in white 318 All but her face, and that clear-featured face Was lovely, for she did not seem as dead, But fast asleep, and lay as though she smiled. That day Sir Lancelot at the palace craved Audience of Guinevere, to give at last, The price of half a realm, his costly gift, Hard-won and hardly won with bruise and blow, With deaths of others, and almost his own, The nine-years-fought-for diamonds: for he saw One of her house, and sent him to the Queen Bearing his wish, whereto the Queen agreed With such and so unmoved a majesty She might have seemed her statue, but that he, Low-drooping till he wellnigh kissed her feet For loyal awe, saw with a sidelong eye The shadow of some piece of pointed lace, In the Queen's shadow, vibrate on the walls, And parted, laughing in his courtly heart. All in an oriel on the summer side, Vine-clad, of Arthur's palace toward the stream, They met, and Lancelot kneeling uttered, 'Queen, Lady, my liege, in whom I have my joy, Take, what I had not won except for you, These jewels, and make me happy, making them An armlet for the roundest arm on earth, Or necklace for a neck to which the swan's Is tawnier than her cygnet's: these are words: Your beauty is your beauty, and I sin In speaking, yet O grant my worship of it Words, as we grant grief tears. Such sin in words Perchance, we both can pardon: but, my Queen, I hear of rumours flying through your court. Our bond, as not the bond of man and wife, Should have in it an absoluter trust To make up that defect: let rumours be: When did not rumours fly? these, as I trust That you trust me in your own nobleness, I may not well believe that you believe.' While thus he spoke, half turned away, the Queen 319 Brake from the vast oriel-embowering vine Leaf after leaf, and tore, and cast them off, Till all the place whereon she stood was green; Then, when he ceased, in one cold passive hand Received at once and laid aside the gems There on a table near her, and replied: 'It may be, I am quicker of belief Than you believe me, Lancelot of the Lake. Our bond is not the bond of man and wife. This good is in it, whatsoe'er of ill, It can be broken easier. I for you This many a year have done despite and wrong To one whom ever in my heart of hearts I did acknowledge nobler. What are these? Diamonds for me! they had been thrice their worth Being your gift, had you not lost your own. To loyal hearts the value of all gifts Must vary as the giver's. Not for me! For her! for your new fancy. Only this Grant me, I pray you: have your joys apart. I doubt not that however changed, you keep So much of what is graceful: and myself Would shun to break those bounds of courtesy In which as Arthur's Queen I move and rule: So cannot speak my mind. An end to this! A strange one! yet I take it with Amen. So pray you, add my diamonds to her pearls; Deck her with these; tell her, she shines me down: An armlet for an arm to which the Queen's Is haggard, or a necklace for a neck O as much fairer--as a faith once fair Was richer than these diamonds--hers not mine-Nay, by the mother of our Lord himself, Or hers or mine, mine now to work my will-She shall not have them.' Saying which she seized, And, through the casement standing wide for heat, Flung them, and down they flashed, and smote the stream. Then from the smitten surface flashed, as it were, Diamonds to meet them, and they past away. Then while Sir Lancelot leant, in half disdain 320 At love, life, all things, on the window ledge, Close underneath his eyes, and right across Where these had fallen, slowly past the barge. Whereon the lily maid of Astolat Lay smiling, like a star in blackest night. But the wild Queen, who saw not, burst away To weep and wail in secret; and the barge, On to the palace-doorway sliding, paused. There two stood armed, and kept the door; to whom, All up the marble stair, tier over tier, Were added mouths that gaped, and eyes that asked 'What is it?' but that oarsman's haggard face, As hard and still as is the face that men Shape to their fancy's eye from broken rocks On some cliff-side, appalled them, and they said 'He is enchanted, cannot speak--and she, Look how she sleeps--the Fairy Queen, so fair! Yea, but how pale! what are they? flesh and blood? Or come to take the King to Fairyland? For some do hold our Arthur cannot die, But that he passes into Fairyland.' While thus they babbled of the King, the King Came girt with knights: then turned the tongueless man From the half-face to the full eye, and rose And pointed to the damsel, and the doors. So Arthur bad the meek Sir Percivale And pure Sir Galahad to uplift the maid; And reverently they bore her into hall. Then came the fine Gawain and wondered at her, And Lancelot later came and mused at her, And last the Queen herself, and pitied her: But Arthur spied the letter in her hand, Stoopt, took, brake seal, and read it; this was all: 'Most noble lord, Sir Lancelot of the Lake, I, sometime called the maid of Astolat, Come, for you left me taking no farewell, Hither, to take my last farewell of you. I loved you, and my love had no return, And therefore my true love has been my death. 321 And therefore to our Lady Guinevere, And to all other ladies, I make moan: Pray for my soul, and yield me burial. Pray for my soul thou too, Sir Lancelot, As thou art a knight peerless.' Thus he read; And ever in the reading, lords and dames Wept, looking often from his face who read To hers which lay so silent, and at times, So touched were they, half-thinking that her lips, Who had devised the letter, moved again. Then freely spoke Sir Lancelot to them all: 'My lord liege Arthur, and all ye that hear, Know that for this most gentle maiden's death Right heavy am I; for good she was and true, But loved me with a love beyond all love In women, whomsoever I have known. Yet to be loved makes not to love again; Not at my years, however it hold in youth. I swear by truth and knighthood that I gave No cause, not willingly, for such a love: To this I call my friends in testimony, Her brethren, and her father, who himself Besought me to be plain and blunt, and use, To break her passion, some discourtesy Against my nature: what I could, I did. I left her and I bad her no farewell; Though, had I dreamt the damsel would have died, I might have put my wits to some rough use, And helped her from herself.' Then said the Queen (Sea was her wrath, yet working after storm) 'Ye might at least have done her so much grace, Fair lord, as would have helped her from her death.' He raised his head, their eyes met and hers fell, He adding, 'Queen, she would not be content Save that I wedded her, which could not be. Then might she follow me through the world, she asked; 322 It could not be. I told her that her love Was but the flash of youth, would darken down To rise hereafter in a stiller flame Toward one more worthy of her--then would I, More specially were he, she wedded, poor, Estate them with large land and territory In mine own realm beyond the narrow seas, To keep them in all joyance: more than this I could not; this she would not, and she died.' He pausing, Arthur answered, 'O my knight, It will be to thy worship, as my knight, And mine, as head of all our Table Round, To see that she be buried worshipfully.' So toward that shrine which then in all the realm Was richest, Arthur leading, slowly went The marshalled Order of their Table Round, And Lancelot sad beyond his wont, to see The maiden buried, not as one unknown, Nor meanly, but with gorgeous obsequies, And mass, and rolling music, like a queen. And when the knights had laid her comely head Low in the dust of half-forgotten kings, Then Arthur spake among them, 'Let her tomb Be costly, and her image thereupon, And let the shield of Lancelot at her feet Be carven, and her lily in her hand. And let the story of her dolorous voyage For all true hearts be blazoned on her tomb In letters gold and azure!' which was wrought Thereafter; but when now the lords and dames And people, from the high door streaming, brake Disorderly, as homeward each, the Queen, Who marked Sir Lancelot where he moved apart, Drew near, and sighed in passing, 'Lancelot, Forgive me; mine was jealousy in love.' He answered with his eyes upon the ground, 'That is love's curse; pass on, my Queen, forgiven.' But Arthur, who beheld his cloudy brows, Approached him, and with full affection said, 323 'Lancelot, my Lancelot, thou in whom I have Most joy and most affiance, for I know What thou hast been in battle by my side, And many a time have watched thee at the tilt Strike down the lusty and long practised knight, And let the younger and unskilled go by To win his honour and to make his name, And loved thy courtesies and thee, a man Made to be loved; but now I would to God, Seeing the homeless trouble in thine eyes, Thou couldst have loved this maiden, shaped, it seems, By God for thee alone, and from her face, If one may judge the living by the dead, Delicately pure and marvellously fair, Who might have brought thee, now a lonely man Wifeless and heirless, noble issue, sons Born to the glory of thine name and fame, My knight, the great Sir Lancelot of the Lake.' Then answered Lancelot, 'Fair she was, my King, Pure, as you ever wish your knights to be. To doubt her fairness were to want an eye, To doubt her pureness were to want a heart-Yea, to be loved, if what is worthy love Could bind him, but free love will not be bound.' 'Free love, so bound, were fre st,' said the King. 'Let love be free; free love is for the best: And, after heaven, on our dull side of death, What should be best, if not so pure a love Clothed in so pure a loveliness? yet thee She failed to bind, though being, as I think, Unbound as yet, and gentle, as I know.' And Lancelot answered nothing, but he went, And at the inrunning of a little brook Sat by the river in a cove, and watched The high reed wave, and lifted up his eyes And saw the barge that brought her moving down, Far-off, a blot upon the stream, and said Low in himself, 'Ah simple heart and sweet, Ye loved me, damsel, surely with a love 324 Far tenderer than my Queen's. Pray for thy soul? Ay, that will I. Farewell too--now at last-Farewell, fair lily. "Jealousy in love?" Not rather dead love's harsh heir, jealous pride? Queen, if I grant the jealousy as of love, May not your crescent fear for name and fame Speak, as it waxes, of a love that wanes? Why did the King dwell on my name to me? Mine own name shames me, seeming a reproach, Lancelot, whom the Lady of the Lake Caught from his mother's arms--the wondrous one Who passes through the vision of the night-She chanted snatches of mysterious hymns Heard on the winding waters, eve and morn She kissed me saying, "Thou art fair, my child, As a king's son," and often in her arms She bare me, pacing on the dusky mere. Would she had drowned me in it, where'er it be! For what am I? what profits me my name Of greatest knight? I fought for it, and have it: Pleasure to have it, none; to lose it, pain; Now grown a part of me: but what use in it? To make men worse by making my sin known? Or sin seem less, the sinner seeming great? Alas for Arthur's greatest knight, a man Not after Arthur's heart! I needs must break These bonds that so defame me: not without She wills it: would I, if she willed it? nay, Who knows? but if I would not, then may God, I pray him, send a sudden Angel down To seize me by the hair and bear me far, And fling me deep in that forgotten mere, Among the tumbled fragments of the hills.' So groaned Sir Lancelot in remorseful pain, Not knowing he should die a holy man. ~ Alfred Lord Tennyson

199:The Ghost - Book Iv Coxcombs, who vainly make pretence To something of exalted sense 'Bove other men, and, gravely wise, Affect those pleasures to despise, Which, merely to the eye confined, Bring no improvement to the mind, Rail at all pomp; they would not go For millions to a puppet-show, Nor can forgive the mighty crime Of countenancing pantomime; No, not at Covent Garden, where, Without a head for play or player, Or, could a head be found most fit, Without one player to second it, They must, obeying Folly's call, Thrive by mere show, or not at all With these grave fops, who, (bless their brains!) Most cruel to themselves, take pains For wretchedness, and would be thought Much wiser than a wise man ought, For his own happiness, to be; Who what they hear, and what they see, And what they smell, and taste, and feel, Distrust, till Reason sets her seal, And, by long trains of consequences Insured, gives sanction to the senses; Who would not (Heaven forbid it!) waste One hour in what the world calls Taste, Nor fondly deign to laugh or cry, Unless they know some reason why; With these grave fops, whose system seems To give up certainty for dreams, The eye of man is understood As for no other purpose good Than as a door, through which, of course, Their passage crowding, objects force, A downright usher, to admit New-comers to the court of Wit: (Good Gravity! forbear thy spleen; 190 When I say Wit, I Wisdom mean) Where (such the practice of the court, Which legal precedents support) Not one idea is allow'd To pass unquestion'd in the crowd, But ere it can obtain the grace Of holding in the brain a place, Before the chief in congregation Must stand a strict examination. Not such as those, who physic twirl, Full fraught with death, from every curl; Who prove, with all becoming state, Their voice to be the voice of Fate; Prepared with essence, drop, and pill, To be another Ward or Hill, Before they can obtain their ends, To sign death-warrants for their friends, And talents vast as theirs employ, _Secundum artem_ to destroy, Must pass (or laws their rage restrain) Before the chiefs of Warwick Lane: Thrice happy Lane! where, uncontroll'd, In power and lethargy grown old, Most fit to take, in this bless'd land, The reins--which fell from Wyndham's hand, Her lawful throne great Dulness rears, Still more herself, as more in years; Where she, (and who shall dare deny Her right, when Reeves and Chauncy's by?) Calling to mind, in ancient time, One Garth, who err'd in wit and rhyme, Ordains, from henceforth, to admit None of the rebel sons of Wit, And makes it her peculiar care That Schomberg never shall be there. Not such as those, whom Polly trains To letters, though unbless'd with brains, Who, destitute of power and will To learn, are kept to learning still; Whose heads, when other methods fail, Receive instruction from the tail, Because their sires,--a common case 191 Which brings the children to disgrace,-Imagine it a certain rule They never could beget a fool, Must pass, or must compound for, ere The chaplain, full of beef and prayer, Will give his reverend permit, Announcing them for orders fit; So that the prelate (what's a name? All prelates now are much the same) May, with a conscience safe and quiet, With holy hands lay on that fiat Which doth all faculties dispense, All sanctity, all faith, all sense; Makes Madan quite a saint appear, And makes an oracle of Cheere. Not such as in that solemn seat, Where the Nine Ladies hold retreat,-The Ladies Nine, who, as we're told, Scorning those haunts they loved of old, The banks of Isis now prefer, Nor will one hour from Oxford stir,-Are held for form, which Balaam's ass As well as Balaam's self might pass, And with his master take degrees, Could he contrive to pay the fees. Men of sound parts, who, deeply read, O'erload the storehouse of the head With furniture they ne'er can use, Cannot forgive our rambling Muse This wild excursion; cannot see Why Physic and Divinity, To the surprise of all beholders, Are lugg'd in by the head and shoulders; Or how, in any point of view, Oxford hath any thing to do. But men of nice and subtle learning, Remarkable for quick discerning, Through spectacles of critic mould, Without instruction, will behold That we a method here have got To show what is, by what is not; And that our drift (parenthesis 192 For once apart) is briefly this: Within the brain's most secret cells A certain Lord Chief-Justice dwells, Of sovereign power, whom, one and all, With common voice, we Reason call; Though, for the purposes of satire, A name, in truth, is no great matter; Jefferies or Mansfield, which you will-It means a Lord Chief-Justice still. Here, so our great projectors say, The Senses all must homage pay; Hither they all must tribute bring, And prostrate fall before their king; Whatever unto them is brought, Is carried on the wings of Thought Before his throne, where, in full state, He on their merits holds debate, Examines, cross-examines, weighs Their right to censure or to praise: Nor doth his equal voice depend On narrow views of foe and friend, Nor can, or flattery, or force Divert him from his steady course; The channel of Inquiry's clear, No sham examination's here. He, upright justicer, no doubt, _Ad libitum_ puts in and out, Adjusts and settles in a trice What virtue is, and what is vice; What is perfection, what defect; What we must choose, and what reject; He takes upon him to explain What pleasure is, and what is pain; Whilst we, obedient to the whim, And resting all our faith on him, True members of the Stoic Weal, Must learn to think, and cease to feel. This glorious system, form'd for man To practise when and how he can, If the five Senses, in alliance, To Reason hurl a proud defiance, And, though oft conquer'd, yet unbroke, 193 Endeavour to throw off that yoke, Which they a greater slavery hold Than Jewish bondage was of old; Or if they, something touch'd with shame, Allow him to retain the name Of Royalty, and, as in sport, To hold a mimic formal court; Permitted--no uncommon thing-To be a kind of puppet king, And suffer'd, by the way of toy, To hold a globe, but not employ; Our system-mongers, struck with fear, Prognosticate destruction near; All things to anarchy must run; The little world of man's undone. Nay, should the Eye, that nicest sense, Neglect to send intelligence Unto the Brain, distinct and clear, Of all that passes in her sphere; Should she, presumptuous, joy receive Without the Understanding's leave, They deem it rank and daring treason Against the monarchy of Reason, Not thinking, though they're wondrous wise, That few have reason, most have eyes; So that the pleasures of the mind To a small circle are confined, Whilst those which to the senses fall Become the property of all. Besides, (and this is sure a case Not much at present out of place) Where Nature reason doth deny, No art can that defect supply; But if (for it is our intent Fairly to state the argument) A man should want an eye or two, The remedy is sure, though new: The cure's at hand--no need of fear-For proof--behold the Chevalier!-As well prepared, beyond all doubt, To put eyes in, as put them out. But, argument apart, which tends 194 To embitter foes and separate friends, (Nor, turn'd apostate from the Nine, Would I, though bred up a divine, And foe, of course, to Reason's Weal, Widen that breach I cannot heal) By his own sense and feelings taught, In speech as liberal as in thought, Let every man enjoy his whim; What's he to me, or I to him? Might I, though never robed in ermine, A matter of this weight determine, No penalties should settled be To force men to hypocrisy, To make them ape an awkward zeal, And, feeling not, pretend to feel. I would not have, might sentence rest Finally fix'd within my breast, E'en Annet censured and confined, Because we're of a different mind. Nature, who, in her act most free, Herself delights in liberty, Profuse in love, and without bound, Pours joy on every creature round; Whom yet, was every bounty shed In double portions on our head, We could not truly bounteous call, If Freedom did not crown them all. By Providence forbid to stray, Brutes never can mistake their way; Determined still, they plod along By instinct, neither right nor wrong; But man, had he the heart to use His freedom, hath a right to choose; Whether he acts, or well, or ill, Depends entirely on his will. To her last work, her favourite Man, Is given, on Nature's better plan, A privilege in power to err. Nor let this phrase resentment stir Amongst the grave ones, since indeed The little merit man can plead In doing well, dependeth still 195 Upon his power of doing ill. Opinions should be free as air; No man, whate'er his rank, whate'er His qualities, a claim can found That my opinion must be bound, And square with his; such slavish chains From foes the liberal soul disdains; Nor can, though true to friendship, bend To wear them even from a friend. Let those, who rigid judgment own, Submissive bow at Judgment's throne, And if they of no value hold Pleasure, till pleasure is grown cold, Pall'd and insipid, forced to wait For Judgment's regular debate To give it warrant, let them find Dull subjects suited to their mind. Theirs be slow wisdom; be my plan, To live as merry as I can, Regardless, as the fashions go, Whether there's reason for't or no: Be my employment here on earth To give a liberal scope to mirth, Life's barren vale with flowers to adorn, And pluck a rose from every thorn. But if, by Error led astray, I chance to wander from my way, Let no blind guide observe, in spite, I'm wrong, who cannot set me right. That doctor could I ne'er endure Who found disease, and not a cure; Nor can I hold that man a friend Whose zeal a helping hand shall lend To open happy Folly's eyes, And, making wretched, make me wise: For next (a truth which can't admit Reproof from Wisdom or from Wit) To being happy here below, Is to believe that we are so. Some few in knowledge find relief; I place my comfort in belief. Some for reality may call; 196 Fancy to me is all in all. Imagination, through the trick Of doctors, often makes us sick; And why, let any sophist tell, May it not likewise make us well? This I am sure, whate'er our view, Whatever shadows we pursue, For our pursuits, be what they will, Are little more than shadows still; Too swift they fly, too swift and strong, For man to catch or hold them long; But joys which in the fancy live, Each moment to each man may give: True to himself, and true to ease, He softens Fate's severe decrees, And (can a mortal wish for more?) Creates, and makes himself new o'er, Mocks boasted vain reality, And is, whate'er he wants to be. Hail, Fancy!--to thy power I owe Deliverance from the gripe of Woe; To thee I owe a mighty debt, Which Gratitude shall ne'er forget, Whilst Memory can her force employ, A large increase of every joy. When at my doors, too strongly barr'd, Authority had placed a guard, A knavish guard, ordain'd by law To keep poor Honesty in awe; Authority, severe and stern, To intercept my wish'd return; When foes grew proud, and friends grew cool, And laughter seized each sober fool; When Candour started in amaze, And, meaning censure, hinted praise; When Prudence, lifting up her eyes And hands, thank'd Heaven that she was wise; When all around me, with an air Of hopeless sorrow, look'd despair; When they, or said, or seem'd to say, There is but one, one only way Better, and be advised by us, 197 Not be at all, than to be thus; When Virtue shunn'd the shock, and Pride, Disabled, lay by Virtue's side, Too weak my ruffled soul to cheer, Which could not hope, yet would not fear; Health in her motion, the wild grace Of pleasure speaking in her face, Dull regularity thrown by, And comfort beaming from her eye, Fancy, in richest robes array'd, Came smiling forth, and brought me aid; Came smiling o'er that dreadful time, And, more to bless me, came in rhyme. Nor is her power to me confined; It spreads, it comprehends mankind. When (to the spirit-stirring sound Of trumpets breathing courage round, And fifes well-mingled, to restrain And bring that courage down again; Or to the melancholy knell Of the dull, deep, and doleful bell, Such as of late the good Saint Bride Muffled, to mortify the pride Of those who, England quite forgot, Paid their vile homage to the Scot; Where Asgill held the foremost place, Whilst my lord figured at a race) Processions ('tis not worth debate Whether they are of stage or state) Move on, so very, very slow, Tis doubtful if they move, or no; When the performers all the while Mechanically frown or smile, Or, with a dull and stupid stare, A vacancy of sense declare, Or, with down-bending eye, seem wrought Into a labyrinth of thought, Where Reason wanders still in doubt, And, once got in, cannot get out; What cause sufficient can we find, To satisfy a thinking mind, Why, duped by such vain farces, man 198 Descends to act on such a plan? Why they, who hold themselves divine, Can in such wretched follies join, Strutting like peacocks, or like crows, Themselves and Nature to expose? What cause, but that (you'll understand We have our remedy at hand, That if perchance we start a doubt, Ere it is fix'd, we wipe it out; As surgeons, when they lop a limb, Whether for profit, fame, or whim, Or mere experiment to try, Must always have a styptic by) Fancy steps in, and stamps that real, Which, _ipso facto_, is ideal. Can none remember?--yes, I know, All must remember that rare show When to the country Sense went down, And fools came flocking up to town; When knights (a work which all admit To be for knighthood much unfit) Built booths for hire; when parsons play'd, In robes canonical array'd, And, fiddling, join'd the Smithfield dance, The price of tickets to advance: Or, unto tapsters turn'd, dealt out, Running from booth to booth about, To every scoundrel, by retail, True pennyworths of beef and ale, Then first prepared, by bringing beer in, For present grand electioneering; When heralds, running all about To bring in Order, turn'd it out; When, by the prudent Marshal's care, Lest the rude populace should stare, And with unhallow'd eyes profane Gay puppets of Patrician strain, The whole procession, as in spite, Unheard, unseen, stole off by night; When our loved monarch, nothing both, Solemnly took that sacred oath, Whence mutual firm agreements spring 199 Betwixt the subject and the king, By which, in usual manner crown'd, His head, his heart, his hands, he bound, Against himself, should passion stir The least propensity to err, Against all slaves, who might prepare, Or open force, or hidden snare, That glorious Charter to maintain, By which we serve, and he must reign; Then Fancy, with unbounded sway, Revell'd sole mistress of the day, And wrought such wonders, as might make Egyptian sorcerers forsake Their baffled mockeries, and own The palm of magic hers alone. A knight, (who, in the silken lap Of lazy Peace, had lived on pap; Who never yet had dared to roam 'Bove ten or twenty miles from home, Nor even that, unless a guide Was placed to amble by his side, And troops of slaves were spread around To keep his Honour safe and sound; Who could not suffer, for his life, A point to sword, or edge to knife; And always fainted at the sight Of blood, though 'twas not shed in fight; Who disinherited one son For firing off an alder gun, And whipt another, six years old, Because the boy, presumptuous, bold To madness, likely to become A very Swiss, had beat a drum, Though it appear'd an instrument Most peaceable and innocent, Having, from first, been in the hands And service of the City bands) Graced with those ensigns, which were meant To further Honour's dread intent, The minds of warriors to inflame, And spur them on to deeds of fame; With little sword, large spurs, high feather, 200 Fearless of every thing but weather, (And all must own, who pay regard To charity, it had been hard That in his very first campaign His honours should be soil'd with rain) A hero all at once became, And (seeing others much the same In point of valour as himself, Who leave their courage on a shelf From year to year, till some such rout In proper season calls it out) Strutted, look'd big, and swagger'd more Than ever hero did before; Look'd up, look'd down, look'd all around, Like Mavors, grimly smiled and frown'd; Seem'd Heaven, and Earth, and Hell to call To fight, that he might rout them all, And personated Valour's style So long, spectators to beguile, That, passing strange, and wondrous true, Himself at last believed it too; Nor for a time could he discern, Till Truth and Darkness took their turn, So well did Fancy play her part, That coward still was at the heart. Whiffle (who knows not Whiffle's name, By the impartial voice of Fame Recorded first through all this land In Vanity's illustrious band?) Who, by all-bounteous Nature meant For offices of hardiment, A modern Hercules at least, To rid the world of each wild beast, Of each wild beast which came in view, Whether on four legs or on two, Degenerate, delights to prove His force on the parade of Love, Disclaims the joys which camps afford, And for the distaff quits the sword; Who fond of women would appear To public eye and public ear, But, when in private, lets them know 201 How little they can trust to show; Who sports a woman, as of course, Just as a jockey shows a horse, And then returns her to the stable, Or vainly plants her at his table, Where he would rather Venus find (So pall'd, and so depraved his mind) Than, by some great occasion led, To seize her panting in her bed, Burning with more than mortal fires, And melting in her own desires; Who, ripe in years, is yet a child, Through fashion, not through feeling, wild; Whate'er in others, who proceed As Sense and Nature have decreed, From real passion flows, in him Is mere effect of mode and whim; Who laughs, a very common way, Because he nothing has to say, As your choice spirits oaths dispense To fill up vacancies of sense; Who, having some small sense, defies it, Or, using, always misapplies it; Who now and then brings something forth Which seems indeed of sterling worth; Something, by sudden start and fit, Which at a distance looks like wit, But, on examination near, To his confusion will appear, By Truth's fair glass, to be at best A threadbare jester's threadbare jest; Who frisks and dances through the street, Sings without voice, rides without seat, Plays o'er his tricks, like Aesop's ass, A gratis fool to all who pass; Who riots, though he loves not waste, Whores without lust, drinks without taste, Acts without sense, talks without thought, Does every thing but what he ought; Who, led by forms, without the power Of vice, is vicious; who one hour, Proud without pride, the next will be 202 Humble without humility: Whose vanity we all discern, The spring on which his actions turn; Whose aim in erring, is to err, So that he may be singular, And all his utmost wishes mean Is, though he's laugh'd at, to be seen: Such, (for when Flattery's soothing strain Had robb'd the Muse of her disdain, And found a method to persuade Her art to soften every shade, Justice, enraged, the pencil snatch'd From her degenerate hand, and scratch'd Out every trace; then, quick as thought, From life this striking likeness caught) In mind, in manners, and in mien, Such Whiffle came, and such was seen In the world's eye; but (strange to tell!) Misled by Fancy's magic spell, Deceived, not dreaming of deceit, Cheated, but happy in the cheat, Was more than human in his own. Oh, bow, bow all at Fancy's throne, Whose power could make so vile an elf With patience bear that thing, himself. But, mistress of each art to please, Creative Fancy, what are these, These pageants of a trifler's pen, To what thy power effected then? Familiar with the human mind, And swift and subtle as the wind, Which we all feel, yet no one knows, Or whence it comes, or where it goes, Fancy at once in every part Possess'd the eye, the head, the heart, And in a thousand forms array'd, A thousand various gambols play'd. Here, in a face which well might ask The privilege to wear a mask In spite of law, and Justice teach For public good to excuse the breach, Within the furrow of a wrinkle 203 'Twixt eyes, which could not shine but twinkle, Like sentinels i' th' starry way, Who wait for the return of day, Almost burnt out, and seem to keep Their watch, like soldiers, in their sleep; Or like those lamps, which, by the power Of law, must burn from hour to hour, (Else they, without redemption, fall Under the terrors of that Hall, Which, once notorious for a hop, Is now become a justice shop) Which are so managed, to go out Just when the time comes round about, Which yet, through emulation, strive To keep their dying light alive, And (not uncommon, as we find, Amongst the children of mankind) As they grow weaker, would seem stronger, And burn a little, little longer: Fancy, betwixt such eyes enshrined, No brush to daub, no mill to grind, Thrice waved her wand around, whose force Changed in an instant Nature's course, And, hardly credible in rhyme, Not only stopp'd, but call'd back Time; The face of every wrinkle clear'd, Smooth as the floating stream appear'd, Down the neck ringlets spread their flame, The neck admiring whence they came; On the arch'd brow the Graces play'd; On the full bosom Cupid laid; Suns, from their proper orbits sent, Became for eyes a supplement; Teeth, white as ever teeth were seen, Deliver'd from the hand of Green, Started, in regular array, Like train-bands on a grand field day, Into the gums, which would have fled, But, wondering, turn'd from white to red; Quite alter'd was the whole machine, And Lady ---- ---- was fifteen. Here she made lordly temples rise 204 Before the pious Dashwood's eyes, Temples which, built aloft in air, May serve for show, if not for prayer; In solemn form herself, before, Array'd like Faith, the Bible bore. There over Melcombe's feather'd head-Who, quite a man of gingerbread, Savour'd in talk, in dress, and phiz, More of another world than this, To a dwarf Muse a giant page, The last grave fop of the last age-In a superb and feather'd hearse, Bescutcheon'd and betagg'd with verse, Which, to beholders from afar, Appear'd like a triumphal car, She rode, in a cast rainbow clad; There, throwing off the hallow'd plaid, Naked, as when (in those drear cells Where, self-bless'd, self-cursed, Madness dwells) Pleasure, on whom, in Laughter's shape, Frenzy had perfected a rape, First brought her forth, before her time, Wild witness of her shame and crime, Driving before an idol band Of drivelling Stuarts, hand in hand; Some who, to curse mankind, had wore A crown they ne'er must think of more; Others, whose baby brows were graced With paper crowns, and toys of paste, She jigg'd, and, playing on the flute, Spread raptures o'er the soul of Bute. Big with vast hopes, some mighty plan, Which wrought the busy soul of man To her full bent; the Civil Law, Fit code to keep a world in awe, Bound o'er his brows, fair to behold, As Jewish frontlets were of old; The famous Charter of our land Defaced, and mangled in his hand; As one whom deepest thoughts employ, But deepest thoughts of truest joy, Serious and slow he strode, he stalk'd; 205 Before him troops of heroes walk'd, Whom best he loved, of heroes crown'd, By Tories guarded all around; Dull solemn pleasure in his face, He saw the honours of his race, He saw their lineal glories rise, And touch'd, or seem'd to touch, the skies: Not the most distant mark of fear, No sign of axe or scaffold near, Not one cursed thought to cross his will Of such a place as Tower Hill. Curse on this Muse, a flippant jade, A shrew, like every other maid Who turns the corner of nineteen, Devour'd with peevishness and spleen; Her tongue (for as, when bound for life, The husband suffers for the wife, So if in any works of rhyme Perchance there blunders out a crime, Poor culprit bards must always rue it, Although 'tis plain the Muses do it) Sooner or later cannot fail To send me headlong to a jail. Whate'er my theme, (our themes we choose, In modern days, without a Muse; Just as a father will provide To join a bridegroom and a bride, As if, though they must be the players, The game was wholly his, not theirs) Whate'er my theme, the Muse, who still Owns no direction but her will, Plies off, and ere I could expect, By ways oblique and indirect, At once quite over head and ears In fatal politics appears. Time was, and, if I aught discern Of fate, that time shall soon return, When, decent and demure at least, As grave and dull as any priest, I could see Vice in robes array'd, Could see the game of Folly play'd Successfully in Fortune's school, 206 Without exclaiming rogue or fool. Time was, when, nothing both or proud, I lackey'd with the fawning crowd, Scoundrels in office, and would bow To cyphers great in place; but now Upright I stand, as if wise Fate, To compliment a shatter'd state, Had me, like Atlas, hither sent To shoulder up the firmament, And if I stoop'd, with general crack, The heavens would tumble from my back. Time was, when rank and situation Secured the great ones of the nation From all control; satire and law Kept only little knaves in awe; But now, Decorum lost, I stand Bemused, a pencil in my hand, And, dead to every sense of shame, Careless of safety and of fame, The names of scoundrels minute down, And libel more than half the town. How can a statesman be secure In all his villanies, if poor And dirty authors thus shall dare To lay his rotten bosom bare? Muses should pass away their time In dressing out the poet's rhyme With bills, and ribands, and array Each line in harmless taste, though gay; When the hot burning fit is on, They should regale their restless son With something to allay his rage, Some cool Castalian beverage, Or some such draught (though they, 'tis plain, Taking the Muse's name in vain, Know nothing of their real court, And only fable from report) As makes a Whitehead's Ode go down, Or slakes the Feverette of Brown: But who would in his senses think, Of Muses giving gall to drink, Or that their folly should afford 207 To raving poets gun or sword? Poets were ne'er designed by Fate To meddle with affairs of state, Nor should (if we may speak our thought Truly as men of honour ought) Sound policy their rage admit, To launch the thunderbolts of Wit About those heads, which, when they're shot, Can't tell if 'twas by Wit or not. These things well known, what devil, in spite, Can have seduced me thus to write Out of that road, which must have led To riches, without heart or head, Into that road, which, had I more Than ever poet had before Of wit and virtue, in disgrace Would keep me still, and out of place; Which, if some judge (you'll understand One famous, famous through the land For making law) should stand my friend, At last may in a pillory end; And all this, I myself admit, Without one cause to lead to it? For instance, now--this book--the Ghost-Methinks I hear some critic Post Remark most gravely--'The first word Which we about the Ghost have heard.' Peace, my good sir!--not quite so fast-What is the first, may be the last, Which is a point, all must agree, Cannot depend on you or me. Fanny, no ghost of common mould, Is not by forms to be controll'd; To keep her state, and show her skill, She never comes but when she will. I wrote and wrote, (perhaps you doubt, And shrewdly, what I wrote about; Believe me, much to my disgrace, I, too, am in the self-same case But still I wrote, till Fanny came Impatient, nor could any shame On me with equal justice fall 208 If she had never come at all. An underling, I could not stir Without the cue thrown out by her, Nor from the subject aid receive Until she came and gave me leave. So that, (ye sons of Erudition Mark, this is but a supposition, Nor would I to so wise a nation Suggest it as a revelation) If henceforth, dully turning o'er Page after page, ye read no more Of Fanny, who, in sea or air, May be departed God knows where, Rail at jilt Fortune; but agree No censure can be laid on me; For sure (the cause let Mansfield try) Fanny is in the fault, not I. But, to return--and this I hold A secret worth its weight in gold To those who write, as I write now, Not to mind where they go, or how, Through ditch, through bog, o'er hedge and stile, Make it but worth the reader's while, And keep a passage fair and plain Always to bring him back again. Through dirt, who scruples to approach, At Pleasure's call, to take a coach? But we should think the man a clown, Who in the dirt should set us down. But to return--if Wit, who ne'er The shackles of restraint could bear, In wayward humour should refuse Her timely succour to the Muse, And, to no rules and orders tied, Roughly deny to be her guide, She must renounce Decorum's plan, And get back when, and how she can; As parsons, who, without pretext, As soon as mention'd, quit their text, And, to promote sleep's genial power, Grope in the dark for half an hour, Give no more reason (for we know 209 Reason is vulgar, mean, and low) Why they come back (should it befall That ever they come back at all) Into the road, to end their rout, Than they can give why they went out. But to return--this book--the Ghost-A mere amusement at the most; A trifle, fit to wear away The horrors of a rainy day; A slight shot-silk, for summer wear, Just as our modern statesmen are, If rigid honesty permit That I for once purloin the wit Of him, who, were we all to steal, Is much too rich the theft to feel: Yet in this book, where Base should join With Mirth to sugar every line; Where it should all be mere chit-chat, Lively, good-humour'd, and all that; Where honest Satire, in disgrace, Should not so much as show her face, The shrew, o'erleaping all due bounds, Breaks into Laughter's sacred grounds, And, in contempt, plays o'er her tricks In science, trade, and politics. By why should the distemper'd scold Attempt to blacken men enroll'd In Power's dread book, whose mighty skill Can twist an empire to their will; Whose voice is fate, and on their tongue Law, liberty, and life are hung; Whom, on inquiry, Truth shall find With Stuarts link'd, time out of mind, Superior to their country's laws, Defenders of a tyrant's cause; Men, who the same damn'd maxims hold Darkly, which they avow'd of old; Who, though by different means, pursue The end which they had first in view, And, force found vain, now play their part With much less honour, much more art? Why, at the corners of the streets, 210 To every patriot drudge she meets, Known or unknown, with furious cry Should she wild clamours vent? or why, The minds of groundlings to inflame, A Dashwood, Bute, and Wyndham name? Why, having not, to our surprise, The fear of death before her eyes, Bearing, and that but now and then, No other weapon but her pen, Should she an argument afford For blood to men who wear a sword? Men, who can nicely trim and pare A point of honour to a hair-(Honour!--a word of nice import, A pretty trinket in a court, Which my lord, quite in rapture, feels Dangling and rattling with his seals-Honour!--a word which all the Nine Would be much puzzled to define-Honour!--a word which torture mocks, And might confound a thousand Lockes-Which--for I leave to wiser heads, Who fields of death prefer to beds Of down, to find out, if they can, What honour is, on their wild plan-Is not, to take it in their way, And this we sure may dare to say Without incurring an offence, Courage, law, honesty, or sense): Men, who, all spirit, life, and soul Neat butchers of a button-hole, Having more skill, believe it true That they must have more courage too: Men who, without a place or name, Their fortunes speechless as their fame, Would by the sword new fortunes carve, And rather die in fight than starve At coronations, a vast field, Which food of every kind might yield; Of good sound food, at once most fit For purposes of health and wit, Could not ambitious Satire rest, 211 Content with what she might digest? Could she not feast on things of course, A champion, or a champion's horse? A champion's horse--no, better say, Though better figured on that day, A horse, which might appear to us, Who deal in rhyme, a Pegasus; A rider, who, when once got on, Might pass for a Bellerophon, Dropt on a sudden from the skies, To catch and fix our wondering eyes, To witch, with wand instead of whip, The world with noble horsemanship, To twist and twine, both horse and man, On such a well-concerted plan, That, Centaur-like, when all was done, We scarce could think they were not one? Could she not to our itching ears Bring the new names of new-coin'd peers, Who walk'd, nobility forgot, With shoulders fitter for a knot Than robes of honour; for whose sake Heralds in form were forced to make, To make, because they could not find, Great predecessors to their mind? Could she not (though 'tis doubtful since Whether he plumber is, or prince) Tell of a simple knight's advance To be a doughty peer of France? Tell how he did a dukedom gain, And Robinson was Aquitain? Tell how her city chiefs, disgraced, Were at an empty table placed,-A gross neglect, which, whilst they live, They can't forget, and won't forgive; A gross neglect of all those rights Which march with city appetites, Of all those canons, which we find By Gluttony, time out of mind, Established, which they ever hold Dearer than any thing but gold? Thanks to my stars--I now see shore-- 212 Of courtiers, and of courts no more-Thus stumbling on my city friends, Blind Chance my guide, my purpose bends In line direct, and shall pursue The point which I had first in view, Nor more shall with the reader sport Till I have seen him safe in port. Hush'd be each fear--no more I bear Through the wide regions of the air The reader terrified, no more Wild ocean's horrid paths explore. Be the plain track from henceforth mine-Cross roads to Allen I resign; Allen, the honor of this nation; Allen, himself a corporation; Allen, of late notorious grown For writings, none, or all, his own; Allen, the first of letter'd men, Since the good Bishop holds his pen, And at his elbow takes his stand, To mend his head, and guide his hand. But hold--once more, Digression hence-Let us return to Common Sense; The car of Phoebus I discharge, My carriage now a Lord Mayor's barge. Suppose we now--we may suppose In verse, what would be sin in prose-The sky with darkness overspread, And every star retired to bed; The gewgaw robes of Pomp and Pride In some dark corner thrown aside; Great lords and ladies giving way To what they seem to scorn by day, The real feelings of the heart, And Nature taking place of Art; Desire triumphant through the night, And Beauty panting with delight; Chastity, woman's fairest crown, Till the return of morn laid down. Then to be worn again as bright As if not sullied in the night; Dull Ceremony, business o'er, 213 Dreaming in form at Cottrell's door; Precaution trudging all about To see the candles safely out, Bearing a mighty master-key, Habited like Economy, Stamping each lock with triple seals; Mean Avarice creeping at her heels. Suppose we too, like sheep in pen, The Mayor and Court of Aldermen Within their barge, which through the deep, The rowers more than half asleep, Moved slow, as overcharged with state; Thames groan'd beneath the mighty weight, And felt that bauble heavier far Than a whole fleet of men of war. Sleep o'er each well-known faithful head With liberal hand his poppies shed; Each head, by Dulness render'd fit Sleep and his empire to admit. Through the whole passage not a word, Not one faint, weak half-sound was heard; Sleep had prevail'd to overwhelm The steersman nodding o'er the helm; The rowers, without force or skill, Left the dull barge to drive at will; The sluggish oars suspended hung, And even Beardmore held his tongue. Commerce, regardful of a freight On which depended half her state, Stepp'd to the helm; with ready hand She safely clear'd that bank of sand, Where, stranded, our west-country fleet Delay and danger often meet, Till Neptune, anxious for the trade, Comes in full tides, and brings them aid. Next (for the Muses can survey Objects by night as well as day; Nothing prevents their taking aim, Darkness and light to them the same) They pass'd that building which of old Queen-mothers was design'd to hold; At present a mere lodging-pen, 214 A palace turn'd into a den; To barracks turn'd, and soldiers tread Where dowagers have laid their head. Why should we mention Surrey Street, Where every week grave judges meet All fitted out with hum and ha, In proper form to drawl out law, To see all causes duly tried 'Twixt knaves who drive, and fools who ride? Why at the Temple should we stay? What of the Temple dare we say? A dangerous ground we tread on there, And words perhaps may actions bear; Where, as the brethren of the seas For fares, the lawyers ply for fees. What of that Bridge, most wisely made To serve the purposes of trade, In the great mart of all this nation, By stopping up the navigation, And to that sand bank adding weight, Which is already much too great? What of that Bridge, which, void of sense But well supplied with impudence, Englishmen, knowing not the Guild, Thought they might have a claim to build, Till Paterson, as white as milk, As smooth as oil, as soft as silk, In solemn manner had decreed That on the other side the Tweed Art, born and bred, and fully grown, Was with one Mylne, a man unknown, But grace, preferment, and renown Deserving, just arrived in town: One Mylne, an artist perfect quite Both in his own and country's right, As fit to make a bridge as he, With glorious Patavinity, To build inscriptions worthy found To lie for ever under ground. Much more worth observation too, Was this a season to pursue The theme, our Muse might tell in rhyme: 215 The will she hath, but not the time; For, swift as shaft from Indian bow, (And when a goddess comes, we know, Surpassing Nature acts prevail. And boats want neither oar nor sail) The vessel pass'd, and reach'd the shore So quick, that Thought was scarce before. Suppose we now our City court Safely delivered at the port. And, of their state regardless quite, Landed, like smuggled goods, by night, The solemn magistrate laid down, The dignity of robe and gown, With every other ensign gone, Suppose the woollen nightcap on; The flesh-brush used, with decent state, To make the spirits circulate, (A form which, to the senses true, The lickerish chaplain uses too, Though, something to improve the plan, He takes the maid instead of man) Swathed, and with flannel cover'd o'er, To show the vigour of threescore, The vigour of threescore and ten, Above the proof of younger men, Suppose, the mighty Dulman led Betwixt two slaves, and put to bed; Suppose, the moment he lies down, No miracle in this great town, The drone as fast asleep as he Must in the course of nature be, Who, truth for our foundation take, When up, is never half awake. There let him sleep, whilst we survey The preparations for the day; That day on which was to be shown Court pride by City pride outdone. The jealous mother sends away, As only fit for childish play, That daughter who, to gall her pride, Shoots up too forward by her side. The wretch, of God and man accursed, 216 Of all Hell's instruments the worst, Draws forth his pawns, and for the day Struts in some spendthrift's vain array; Around his awkward doxy shine The treasures of Golconda's mine; Each neighbour, with a jealous glare, Beholds her folly publish'd there. Garments well saved, (an anecdote Which we can prove, or would not quote) Garments well saved, which first were made When tailors, to promote their trade, Against the Picts in arms arose, And drove them out, or made them clothes; Garments immortal, without end, Like names and titles, which descend Successively from sire to son; Garments, unless some work is done Of note, not suffer'd to appear 'Bove once at most in every year, Were now, in solemn form, laid bare, To take the benefit of air, And, ere they came to be employ'd On this solemnity, to void That scent which Russia's leather gave, From vile and impious moth to save. Each head was busy, and each heart In preparation bore a part; Running together all about The servants put each other out, Till the grave master had decreed, The more haste ever the worse speed. Miss, with her little eyes half-closed, Over a smuggled toilette dosed; The waiting-maid, whom story notes A very Scrub in petticoats, Hired for one work, but doing all, In slumbers lean'd against the wall. Milliners, summon'd from afar, Arrived in shoals at Temple Bar, Strictly commanded to import Cart loads of foppery from Court; With labour'd visible design, 217 Art strove to be superbly fine; Nature, more pleasing, though more wild, Taught otherwise her darling child, And cried, with spirited disdain, Be Hunter elegant and plain! Lo! from the chambers of the East, A welcome prelude to the feast, In saffron-colour'd robe array'd, High in a car, by Vulcan made, Who work'd for Jove himself, each steed, High-mettled, of celestial breed, Pawing and pacing all the way, Aurora brought the wish'd-for day, And held her empire, till out-run By that brave jolly groom, the Sun. The trumpet--hark! it speaks--it swells The loud full harmony; it tells The time at hand when Dulman, led By Form, his citizens must head, And march those troops, which at his call Were now assembled, to Guildhall, On matters of importance great, To court and city, church and state. From end to end the sound makes way, All hear the signal and obey; But Dulman, who, his charge forgot, By Morpheus fetter'd, heard it not; Nor could, so sound he slept and fast, Hear any trumpet, but the last. Crape, ever true and trusty known, Stole from the maid's bed to his own, Then in the spirituals of pride, Planted himself at Dulman's side. Thrice did the ever-faithful slave, With voice which might have reach'd the grave, And broke Death's adamantine chain, On Dulman call, but call'd in vain. Thrice with an arm, which might have made The Theban boxer curse his trade, The drone he shook, who rear'd the head, And thrice fell backward on his bed. What could be done? Where force hath fail'd, 218 Policy often hath prevail'd; And what--an inference most plain-Had been, Crape thought might be again. Under his pillow (still in mind The proverb kept, 'fast bind, fast find') Each blessed night the keys were laid, Which Crape to draw away assay'd. What not the power of voice or arm Could do, this did, and broke the charm; Quick started he with stupid stare, For all his little soul was there. Behold him, taken up, rubb'd down, In elbow-chair, and morning-gown; Behold him, in his latter bloom, Stripp'd, wash'd, and sprinkled with perfume; Behold him bending with the weight Of robes, and trumpery of state; Behold him (for the maxim's true, Whate'er we by another do, We do ourselves; and chaplain paid, Like slaves in every other trade, Had mutter'd over God knows what, Something which he by heart had got) Having, as usual, said his prayers, Go titter, totter to the stairs: Behold him for descent prepare, With one foot trembling in the air; He starts, he pauses on the brink, And, hard to credit, seems to think; Through his whole train (the chaplain gave The proper cue to every slave) At once, as with infection caught, Each started, paused, and aim'd at thought; He turns, and they turn; big with care, He waddles to his elbow-chair, Squats down, and, silent for a season, At last with Crape begins to reason: But first of all he made a sign, That every soul, but the divine, Should quit the room; in him, he knows, He may all confidence repose. 'Crape--though I'm yet not quite awake-- 219 Before this awful step I take, On which my future all depends, I ought to know my foes and friends. My foes and friends--observe me still-I mean not those who well or ill Perhaps may wish me, but those who Have't in their power to do it too. Now if, attentive to the state, In too much hurry to be great, Or through much zeal,--a motive, Crape, Deserving praise,--into a scrape I, like a fool, am got, no doubt I, like a wise man, should get out: Note that remark without replies; I say that to get out is wise, Or, by the very self-same rule, That to get in was like a fool. The marrow of this argument Must wholly rest on the event, And therefore, which is really hard, Against events too I must guard. Should things continue as they stand, And Bute prevail through all the land Without a rival, by his aid My fortunes in a trice are made; Nay, honours on my zeal may smile, And stamp me Earl of some great Isle: But if, a matter of much doubt, The present minister goes out, Fain would I know on what pretext I can stand fairly with the next? For as my aim, at every hour, Is to be well with those in power, And my material point of view, Whoever's in, to be in too, I should not, like a blockhead, choose To gain these, so as those to lose: 'Tis good in every case, you know, To have two strings unto our bow.' As one in wonder lost, Crape view'd His lord, who thus his speech pursued: 'This, my good Crape, is my grand point; 220 And as the times are out of joint, The greater caution is required To bring about the point desired. What I would wish to bring about Cannot admit a moment's doubt; The matter in dispute, you know, Is what we call the _Quomodo_. That be thy task.'--The reverend slave, Becoming in a moment grave, Fix'd to the ground and rooted stood, Just like a man cut out out of wood, Such as we see (without the least Reflection glancing on the priest) One or more, planted up and down, Almost in every church in town; He stood some minutes, then, like one Who wish'd the matter might be done, But could not do it, shook his head, And thus the man of sorrow said: 'Hard is this task, too hard I swear, By much too hard for me to bear; Beyond expression hard my part, Could mighty Dulman see my heart, When he, alas! makes known a will Which Crape's not able to fulfil. Was ever my obedience barr'd By any trifling nice regard To sense and honour? Could I reach Thy meaning without help of speech, At the first motion of thy eye Did not thy faithful creature fly? Have I not said, not what I ought, But what my earthly master taught? Did I e'er weigh, through duty strong, In thy great biddings, right and wrong? Did ever Interest, to whom thou Canst not with more devotion bow, Warp my sound faith, or will of mine In contradiction run to thine? Have I not, at thy table placed, When business call'd aloud for haste, Torn myself thence, yet never heard 221 To utter one complaining word, And had, till thy great work was done, All appetites, as having none? Hard is it, this great plan pursued Of voluntary servitude; Pursued without or shame, or fear, Through the great circle of the year, Now to receive, in this grand hour, Commands which lie beyond my power, Commands which baffle all my skill, And leave me nothing but my will: Be that accepted; let my lord Indulgence to his slave afford: This task, for my poor strength unfit, Will yield to none but Dulman's wit.' With such gross incense gratified, And turning up the lip of pride, 'Poor Crape'--and shook his empty head-'Poor puzzled Crape!' wise Dulman said, 'Of judgment weak, of sense confined, For things of lower note design'd; For things within the vulgar reach, To run of errands, and to preach; Well hast thou judged, that heads like mine Cannot want help from heads like thine; Well hast thou judged thyself unmeet Of such high argument to treat; Twas but to try thee that I spoke, And all I said was but a joke. Nor think a joke, Crape, a disgrace, Or to my person, or my place; The wisest of the sons of men Have deign'd to use them now and then. The only caution, do you see, Demanded by our dignity, From common use and men exempt, Is that they may not breed contempt. Great use they have, when in the hands Of one like me, who understands, Who understands the time and place, The person, manner, and the grace, Which fools neglect; so that we find, 222 If all the requisites are join'd, From whence a perfect joke must spring, A joke's a very serious thing. But to our business--my design, Which gave so rough a shock to thine, To my capacity is made As ready as a fraud in trade; Which, like broad-cloth, I can, with ease, Cut out in any shape I please. Some, in my circumstance, some few, Aye, and those men of genius too, Good men, who, without love or hate, Whether they early rise or late, With names uncrack'd, and credit sound, Rise worth a hundred thousand pound, By threadbare ways and means would try To bear their point--so will not I. New methods shall my wisdom find To suit these matters to my mind; So that the infidels at court, Who make our city wits their sport, Shall hail the honours of my reign, And own that Dulman bears a brain. Some, in my place, to gain their ends, Would give relations up, and friends; Would lend a wife, who, they might swear Safely, was none the worse for wear; Would see a daughter, yet a maid, Into a statesman's arms betray'd; Nay, should the girl prove coy, nor know What daughters to a father owe, Sooner than schemes so nobly plann'd Should fail, themselves would lend a hand; Would vote on one side, whilst a brother, Properly taught, would vote on t'other; Would every petty band forget; To public eye be with one set, In private with a second herd, And be by proxy with a third; Would, (like a queen, of whom I read, The other day--her name is fled-In a book,--where, together bound, 223 'Whittington and his Cat' I found-A tale most true, and free from art, Which all Lord Mayors should have by heart; A queen oh!--might those days begin Afresh, when queens would learn to spin-Who wrought, and wrought, but for some plot, The cause of which I've now forgot, During the absence of the sun Undid what she by day had done) Whilst they a double visage wear, What's sworn by day, by night unswear. Such be their arts, and such, perchance, May happily their ends advance; Prom a new system mine shall spring, A _locum tenens_ is the thing. That's your true plan. To obligate The present ministers of state, My shadow shall our court approach, And bear my power, and have my coach; My fine state-coach, superb to view, A fine state-coach, and paid for too. To curry favour, and the grace Obtain of those who're out of place; In the mean time I--that's to say, I proper, I myself--here stay. But hold--perhaps unto the nation, Who hate the Scot's administration, To lend my coach may seem to be Declaring for the ministry, For where the city-coach is, there Is the true essence of the Mayor: Therefore (for wise men are intent Evils at distance to prevent, Whilst fools the evils first endure, And then are plagued to seek a cure) No coach--a horse--and free from fear, To make our Deputy appear, Fast on his back shall he be tied, With two grooms marching by his side; Then for a horse--through all the land, To head our solemn city-band, Can any one so fit be found 224 As he who in Artillery-ground, Without a rider, (noble sight!) Led on our bravest troops to fight? But first, Crape, for my honour's sake-A tender point--inquiry make About that horse, if the dispute Is ended, or is still in suit: For whilst a cause, (observe this plan Of justice) whether horse or man The parties be, remains in doubt, Till 'tis determined out and out, That power must tyranny appear Which should, prejudging, interfere, And weak, faint judges overawe, To bias the free course of law. You have my will--now quickly run, And take care that my will be done. In public, Crape, you must appear, Whilst I in privacy sit here; Here shall great Dulman sit alone, Making this elbow-chair my throne, And you, performing what I bid, Do all, as if I nothing did.' Crape heard, and speeded on his way; With him to hear was to obey; Not without trouble, be assured, A proper proxy was procured To serve such infamous intent, And such a lord to represent; Nor could one have been found at all On t'other side of London Wall. The trumpet sounds--solemn and slow Behold the grand procession go, All moving on, cat after kind, As if for motion ne'er design'd. Constables, whom the laws admit To keep the peace by breaking it; Beadles, who hold the second place By virtue of a silver mace, Which every Saturday is drawn, For use of Sunday, out of pawn; Treasurers, who with empty key 225 Secure an empty treasury; Churchwardens, who their course pursue In the same state, as to their pew Churchwardens of St Margaret's go, Since Peirson taught them pride and show, Who in short transient pomp appear, Like almanacs changed every year; Behind whom, with unbroken locks, Charity carries the poor's box, Not knowing that with private keys They ope and shut it when they please: Overseers, who by frauds ensure The heavy curses of the poor; Unclean came flocking, bulls and bears, Like beasts into the ark, by pairs. Portentous, flaming in the van, Stalk'd the professor, Sheridan, A man of wire, a mere pantine, A downright animal machine; He knows alone, in proper mode, How to take vengeance on an ode, And how to butcher Ammon's son And poor Jack Dryden both in one: On all occasions next the chair He stands, for service of the Mayor, And to instruct him how to use His A's and B's, and P's and Q's: O'er letters, into tatters worn, O'er syllables, defaced and torn, O'er words disjointed, and o'er sense, Left destitute of all defence, He strides, and all the way he goes Wades, deep in blood, o'er Criss-cross-rows: Before him every consonant In agonies is seen to pant; Behind, in forms not to be known, The ghosts of tortured vowels groan. Next Hart and Duke, well worthy grace And city favour, came in place; No children can their toils engage, Their toils are turn'd to reverend age; When a court dame, to grace his brows 226 Resolved, is wed to city-spouse, Their aid with madam's aid must join, The awkward dotard to refine, And teach, whence truest glory flows, Grave sixty to turn out his toes. Each bore in hand a kit; and each To show how fit he was to teach A cit, an alderman, a mayor, Led in a string a dancing bear. Since the revival of Fingal, Custom, and custom's all in all, Commands that we should have regard, On all high seasons, to the bard. Great acts like these, by vulgar tongue Profaned, should not be said, but sung. This place to fill, renown'd in fame, The high and mighty Lockman came, And, ne'er forgot in Dulman's reign, With proper order to maintain The uniformity of pride, Brought Brother Whitehead by his side. On horse, who proudly paw'd the ground, And cast his fiery eyeballs round, Snorting, and champing the rude bit, As if, for warlike purpose fit, His high and generous blood disdain'd, To be for sports and pastimes rein'd, Great Dymock, in his glorious station, Paraded at the coronation. Not so our city Dymock came, Heavy, dispirited, and tame; No mark of sense, his eyes half-closed, He on a mighty dray-horse dozed: Fate never could a horse provide So fit for such a man to ride, Nor find a man with strictest care, So fit for such a horse to bear. Hung round with instruments of death, The sight of him would stop the breath Of braggart Cowardice, and make The very court Drawcansir quake; With dirks, which, in the hands of Spite, 227 Do their damn'd business in the night, From Scotland sent, but here display'd Only to fill up the parade; With swords, unflesh'd, of maiden hue, Which rage or valour never drew; With blunderbusses, taught to ride Like pocket-pistols, by his side, In girdle stuck, he seem'd to be A little moving armoury. One thing much wanting to complete The sight, and make a perfect treat, Was, that the horse, (a courtesy In horses found of high degree) Instead of going forward on, All the way backward should have gone. Horses, unless they breeding lack, Some scruple make to turn their back, Though riders, which plain truth declares, No scruple make of turning theirs. Far, far apart from all the rest, Fit only for a standing jest, The independent, (can you get A better suited epithet?) The independent Amyand came, All burning with the sacred flame Of Liberty, which well he knows On the great stock of Slavery grows; Like sparrow, who, deprived of mate, Snatch'd by the cruel hand of Fate, From spray to spray no more will hop, But sits alone on the house-top; Or like himself, when all alone At Croydon he was heard to groan, Lifting both hands in the defence Of interest, and common sense; Both hands, for as no other man Adopted and pursued his plan, The left hand had been lonesome quite, If he had not held up the right; Apart he came, and fix'd his eyes With rapture on a distant prize, On which, in letters worthy note, 228 There 'twenty thousand pounds' was wrote. False trap, for credit sapp'd is found By getting twenty thousand pound: Nay, look not thus on me, and stare, Doubting the certainty--to swear In such a case I should be loth-But Perry Cust may take his oath. In plain and decent garb array'd, With the prim Quaker, Fraud, came Trade; Connivance, to improve the plan, Habited like a juryman, Judging as interest prevails, Came next, with measures, weights, and scales; Extortion next, of hellish race A cub most damn'd, to show his face Forbid by fear, but not by shame, Turn'd to a Jew, like Gideon came; Corruption, Midas-like, behold Turning whate'er she touch'd to gold; Impotence, led by Lust, and Pride, Strutting with Ponton by her side; Hypocrisy, demure and sad, In garments of the priesthood clad, So well disguised, that you might swear, Deceived, a very priest was there; Bankruptcy, full of ease and health, And wallowing in well-saved wealth, Came sneering through a ruin'd band, And bringing B---- in her hand; Victory, hanging down her head, Was by a Highland stallion led; Peace, clothed in sables, with a face Which witness'd sense of huge disgrace, Which spake a deep and rooted shame Both of herself and of her name, Mourning creeps on, and, blushing, feels War, grim War, treading on her heels; Pale Credit, shaken by the arts Of men with bad heads and worse hearts, Taking no notice of a band Which near her were ordain'd to stand, Well-nigh destroyed by sickly fit, 229 Look'd wistful all around for Pitt; Freedom--at that most hallow'd name My spirits mount into a flame, Each pulse beats high, and each nerve strains, Even to the cracking; through my veins The tides of life more rapid run, And tell me I am Freedom's son-Freedom came next, but scarce was seen, When the sky, which appear'd serene And gay before, was overcast; Horror bestrode a foreign blast, And from the prison of the North, To Freedom deadly, storms burst forth. A car like those, in which, we're told, Our wild forefathers warr'd of old, Loaded with death, six horses bear Through the blank region of the air. Too fierce for time or art to tame, They pour'd forth mingled smoke and flame From their wide nostrils; every steed Was of that ancient savage breed Which fell Geryon nursed; their food The flesh of man, their drink his blood. On the first horses, ill-match'd pair, This fat and sleek, that lean and bare, Came ill-match'd riders side by side, And Poverty was yoked with Pride; Union most strange it must appear, Till other unions make it clear. Next, in the gall of bitterness, With rage which words can ill express, With unforgiving rage, which springs From a false zeal for holy things, Wearing such robes as prophets wear, False prophets placed in Peter's chair, On which, in characters of fire, Shapes antic, horrible, and dire Inwoven flamed, where, to the view, In groups appear'd a rabble crew Of sainted devils; where, all round, Vile relics of vile men were found, Who, worse than devils, from the birth 230 Perform'd the work of hell on earth, Jugglers, Inquisitors, and Popes, Pointing at axes, wheels, and ropes, And engines, framed on horrid plan, Which none but the destroyer, Man, Could, to promote his selfish views, Have head to make or heart to use, Bearing, to consecrate her tricks, In her left hand a crucifix, 'Remembrance of our dying Lord,' And in her right a two-edged sword, Having her brows, in impious sport, Adorn'd with words of high import, 'On earth peace, amongst men good will, Love bearing and forbearing still,' All wrote in the hearts' blood of those Who rather death than falsehood chose: On her breast, (where, in days of yore, When God loved Jews, the High Priest wore Those oracles which were decreed To instruct and guide the chosen seed) Having with glory clad and strength, The Virgin pictured at full length, Whilst at her feet, in small pourtray'd, As scarce worth notice, Christ was laid,-Came Superstition, fierce and fell, An imp detested, e'en in hell; Her eye inflamed, her face all o'er Foully besmear'd with human gore, O'er heaps of mangled saints she rode; Fast at her heels Death proudly strode, And grimly smiled, well pleased to see Such havoc of mortality; Close by her side, on mischief bent, And urging on each bad intent To its full bearing, savage, wild, The mother fit of such a child, Striving the empire to advance Of Sin and Death, came Ignorance. With looks, where dread command was placed, And sovereign power by pride disgraced, Where, loudly witnessing a mind 231 Of savage, more than human kind, Not choosing to be loved, but fear'd, Mocking at right, Misrule appear'd. With eyeballs glaring fiery red, Enough to strike beholders dead, Gnashing his teeth, and in a flood Pouring corruption forth and blood From his chafed jaws; without remorse Whipping and spurring on his horse, Whose sides, in their own blood embay'd, E'en to the bone were open laid, Came Tyranny, disdaining awe, And trampling over Sense and Law; One thing, and only one, he knew, One object only would pursue; Though less (so low doth passion bring) Than man, he would be more than king. With every argument and art Which might corrupt the head and heart, Soothing the frenzy of his mind, Companion meet, was Flattery join'd; Winning his carriage, every look Employed, whilst it conceal'd a hook; When simple most, most to be fear'd; Most crafty, when no craft appear'd; His tales, no man like him could tell; His words, which melted as they fell, Might even a hypocrite deceive, And make an infidel believe, Wantonly cheating o'er and o'er Those who had cheated been before:-Such Flattery came, in evil hour, Poisoning the royal ear of Power, And, grown by prostitution great, Would be first minister of state. Within the chariot, all alone, High seated on a kind of throne, With pebbles graced, a figure came, Whom Justice would, but dare not name. Hard times when Justice, without fear, Dare not bring forth to public ear The names of those who dare offend 232 'Gainst Justice, and pervert her end! But, if the Muse afford me grace, Description shall supply the place. In foreign garments he was clad; Sage ermine o'er the glossy plaid Cast reverend honour; on his heart, Wrought by the curious hand of Art, In silver wrought, and brighter far Than heavenly or than earthly star, Shone a White Rose, the emblem dear Of him he ever must revere; Of that dread lord, who, with his host Of faithful native rebels lost, Like those black spirits doom'd to hell, At once from power and virtue fell: Around his clouded brows was placed A bonnet, most superbly graced With mighty thistles, nor forgot The sacred motto--'Touch me not.' In the right hand a sword he bore Harder than adamant, and more Fatal than winds, which from the mouth Of the rough North invade the South; The reeking blade to view presents The blood of helpless innocents, And on the hilt, as meek become As lamb before the shearers dumb, With downcast eye, and solemn show Of deep, unutterable woe, Mourning the time when Freedom reign'd, Fast to a rock was Justice chain'd. In his left hand, in wax impress'd, With bells and gewgaws idly dress'd, An image, cast in baby mould, He held, and seem'd o'erjoy'd to hold On this he fix'd his eyes; to this, Bowing, he gave the loyal kiss, And, for rebellion fully ripe, Seem'd to desire the antitype. What if to that Pretender's foes His greatness, nay, his life, he owes; Shall common obligations bind, 233 And shake his constancy of mind? Scorning such weak and petty chains, Faithful to James he still remains, Though he the friend of George appear: Dissimulation's virtue here. Jealous and mean, he with a frown Would awe, and keep all merit down, Nor would to Truth and Justice bend, Unless out-bullied by his friend: Brave with the coward, with the brave He is himself a coward slave: Awed by his fears, he has no heart To take a great and open part: Mines in a subtle train he springs, And, secret, saps the ears of kings; But not e'en there continues firm 'Gainst the resistance of a worm: Born in a country, where the will Of one is law to all, he still Retain'd the infection, with full aim To spread it wheresoe'er he came; Freedom he hated, Law defied, The prostitute of Power and Pride; Law he with ease explains away, And leads bewilder'd Sense astray; Much to the credit of his brain, Puzzles the cause he can't maintain; Proceeds on most familiar grounds, And where he can't convince, confounds; Talents of rarest stamp and size, To Nature false, he misapplies, And turns to poison what was sent For purposes of nourishment. Paleness, not such as on his wings The messenger of Sickness brings, But such as takes its coward rise From conscious baseness, conscious vice, O'erspread his cheeks; Disdain and Pride, To upstart fortunes ever tied, Scowl'd on his brow; within his eye, Insidious, lurking like a spy, To Caution principled by Fear, 234 Not daring open to appear, Lodged covert Mischief; Passion hung On his lip quivering; on his tongue Fraud dwelt at large; within his breast All that makes villain found a nest; All that, on Hell's completest plan, E'er join'd to damn the heart of man. Soon as the car reach'd land, he rose, And, with a look which might have froze The heart's best blood, which was enough Had hearts been made of sterner stuff In cities than elsewhere, to make The very stoutest quail and quake, He cast his baleful eyes around: Fix'd without motion to the ground, Fear waiting on Surprise, all stood, And horror chill'd their curdled blood; No more they thought of pomp, no more (For they had seen his face before) Of law they thought; the cause forgot, Whether it was or ghost, or plot, Which drew them there: they all stood more Like statues than they were before. What could be done? Could Art, could Force. Or both, direct a proper course To make this savage monster tame, Or send him back the way he came? What neither art, nor force, nor both, Could do, a Lord of foreign growth, A Lord to that base wretch allied In country, not in vice and pride, Effected; from the self-same land, (Bad news for our blaspheming band Of scribblers, but deserving note) The poison came and antidote. Abash'd, the monster hung his head, And like an empty vision fled; His train, like virgin snows, which run, Kiss'd by the burning bawdy sun, To love-sick streams, dissolved in air; Joy, who from absence seem'd more fair, Came smiling, freed from slavish Awe; 235 Loyalty, Liberty, and Law, Impatient of the galling chain, And yoke of Power, resumed their reign; And, burning with the glorious flame Of public virtue, Mansfield came. ~ Charles Churchill

--- IN CHAPTERS (in Dictionaries, in Quotes, in Chapters)

0

   2 Poetry
   2 Fiction
   1 Yoga
   1 Psychology
   1 Philosophy
   1 Occultism
   1 Mysticism
   1 Integral Yoga
   1 Buddhism


   5 Sri Ramakrishna
   5 Sri Aurobindo
   2 H P Lovecraft


   6 The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna