SPIRIT:My coursers are fed with the lightning,They drink of the whirlwind’s stream,And when the red morning is bright’ning _165They bathe in the fresh sunbeam;They have strength for their swiftness I deem;Then ascend with me, daughter of Ocean.I desire: and their speed makes night kindle;I fear: they outstrip the Typhoon; _170Ere the cloud piled on Atlas can dwindleWe encircle the earth and the moon:We shall rest from long labours at noon:Then ascend with me, daughter of Ocean.
SPIRIT:On the brink of the night and the morningMy coursers are wont to respire;But the Earth has just whispered a warningThat their flight must be swifter than fire:They shall drink the hot speed of desire! _5
ASIA:Thou breathest on their nostrils, but my breathWould give them swifter speed.
SPIRIT:Alas! it could not.
PANTHEA:Oh Spirit! pause, and tell whence is the lightWhich fills this cloud? the sun is yet unrisen.
NOTE: _9 this B; the 1820.
SPIRIT:The sun will rise not until noon. Apollo _10Is held in heaven by wonder; and the lightWhich fills this vapour, as the aereal hueOf fountain-gazing roses fills the water,Flows from thy mighty sister.
PANTHEA:Yes, I feel—
ASIA:What is it with thee, sister? Thou art pale. _15
PANTHEA:How thou art changed! I dare not look on thee;I feel but see thee not. I scarce endureThe radiance of thy beauty. Some good changeIs working in the elements, which sufferThy presence thus unveiled. The Nereids tell _20That on the day when the clear hyalineWas cloven at thine uprise, and thou didst standWithin a veined shell, which floated onOver the calm floor of the crystal sea,Among the Aegean isles, and by the shores _25Which bear thy name; love, like the atmosphereOf the sun’s fire filling the living world,Burst from thee, and illumined earth and heavenAnd the deep ocean and the sunless cavesAnd all that dwells within them; till grief cast _30Eclipse upon the soul from which it came:Such art thou now; nor is it I alone,Thy sister, thy companion, thine own chosen one,But the whole world which seeks thy sympathy.Hearest thou not sounds i’ the air which speak the love _35Of all articulate beings? Feelest thou notThe inanimate winds enamoured of thee? List!
NOTE: _22 thine B; thy 1820.
ASIA:Thy words are sweeter than aught else but hisWhose echoes they are; yet all love is sweet,Given or returned. Common as light is love, _40And its familiar voice wearies not ever.Like the wide heaven, the all-sustaining air,It makes the reptile equal to the God:They who inspire it most are fortunate,As I am now; but those who feel it most _45Are happier still, after long sufferings,As I shall soon become.
PANTHEA:List! Spirits speak.
VOICE IN THE AIR, SINGING:Life of Life! thy lips enkindleWith their love the breath between them;And thy smiles before they dwindle _50Make the cold air fire; then screen themIn those looks, where whoso gazesFaints, entangled in their mazes.
Child of Light! thy limbs are burningThrough the vest which seems to hide them; _55As the radiant lines of morningThrough the clouds ere they divide them;And this atmosphere divinestShrouds thee wheresoe’er thou shinest.
Fair are others; none beholds thee, _60But thy voice sounds low and tenderLike the fairest, for it folds theeFrom the sight, that liquid splendour,And all feel, yet see thee never,As I feel now, lost for ever! _65
Lamp of Earth! where’er thou movestIts dim shapes are clad with brightness,And the souls of whom thou lovestWalk upon the winds with lightness,Till they fail, as I am failing, _70Dizzy, lost, yet unbewailing!
NOTE: _54 limbs B, edition 1839; lips 1820.
ASIA:My soul is an enchanted boat,Which, like a sleeping swan, doth floatUpon the silver waves of thy sweet singing;And thine doth like an angel sit _75Beside a helm conducting it,Whilst all the winds with melody are ringing.It seems to float ever, for ever,Upon that many-winding river,Between mountains, woods, abysses, _80A paradise of wildernesses!Till, like one in slumber bound,Borne to the ocean, I float down, around,Into a sea profound, of ever-spreading sound:
Meanwhile thy spirit lifts its pinions _85In music’s most serene dominions;Catching the winds that fan that happy heaven.And we sail on, away, afar,Without a course, without a star,But, by the instinct of sweet music driven; _90Till through Elysian garden isletsBy thee most beautiful of pilots,Where never mortal pinnace glided,The boat of my desire is guided:Realms where the air we breathe is love, _95Which in the winds on the waves doth move,Harmonizing this earth with what we feel above.
We have passed Age’s icy caves,And Manhood’s dark and tossing waves,And Youth’s smooth ocean, smiling to betray: _100Beyond the glassy gulfs we fleeOf shadow-peopled Infancy,Through Death and Birth, to a diviner day;A paradise of vaulted bowers,Lit by downward-gazing flowers, _105And watery paths that wind betweenWildernesses calm and green,Peopled by shapes too bright to see,And rest, having beheld; somewhat like thee;Which walk upon the sea, and chant melodiously! _110
NOTE: _96 winds and on B; winds on 1820.
JUPITER:Ye congregated powers of heaven, who shareThe glory and the strength of him ye serve,Rejoice! henceforth I am omnipotent.All else had been subdued to me; aloneThe soul of man, like unextinguished fire, _5Yet burns towards heaven with fierce reproach, and doubt,And lamentation, and reluctant prayer,Hurling up insurrection, which might makeOur antique empire insecure, though builtOn eldest faith, and hell’s coeval, fear; _10And though my curses through the pendulous air,Like snow on herbless peaks, fall flake by flake,And cling to it; though under my wrath’s nightIt climbs the crags of life, step after step,Which wound it, as ice wounds unsandalled feet, _15It yet remains supreme o’er misery,Aspiring, unrepressed, yet soon to fall:Even now have I begotten a strange wonder,That fatal child, the terror of the earth,Who waits but till the destined hour arrive, _20Bearing from Demogorgon’s vacant throneThe dreadful might of ever-living limbsWhich clothed that awful spirit unbeheld,To redescend, and trample out the spark.Pour forth heaven’s wine, Idaean Ganymede, _25And let it fill the Daedal cups like fire,And from the flower-inwoven soil divineYe all-triumphant harmonies arise,As dew from earth under the twilight stars:Drink! be the nectar circling through your veins _30The soul of joy, ye ever-living Gods,Till exultation burst in one wide voiceLike music from Elysian winds.And thouAscend beside me, veiled in the lightOf the desire which makes thee one with me, _35Thetis, bright image of eternity!When thou didst cry, ‘Insufferable might!God! Spare me! I sustain not the quick flames,The penetrating presence; all my being,Like him whom the Numidian seps did thaw _40Into a dew with poison, is dissolved,Sinking through its foundations:’ even thenTwo mighty spirits, mingling, made a thirdMightier than either, which, unbodied now,Between us floats, felt, although unbeheld, _45Waiting the incarnation, which ascends,(Hear ye the thunder of the fiery wheelsGriding the winds?) from Demogorgon’s throne.Victory! victory! Feel’st thou not, O world,The earthquake of his chariot thundering up _50Olympus?[THE CAR OF THE HOUR ARRIVES.DEMOGORGON DESCENDS, AND MOVES TOWARDS THE THRONE OF JUPITER.]Awful shape, what art thou? Speak!
NOTES: _5 like unextinguished B, edition 1839; like an unextinguished 1820. _13 night B, edition 1839; might 1820. _20 destined B, edition 1839; distant 1820.
DEMOGORGON:Eternity. Demand no direr name.Descend, and follow me down the abyss.I am thy child, as thou wert Saturn’s child;Mightier than thee: and we must dwell together _55Henceforth in darkness. Lift thy lightnings not.The tyranny of heaven none may retain,Or reassume, or hold, succeeding thee:Yet if thou wilt, as ’tis the destinyOf trodden worms to writhe till they are dead, _60Put forth thy might.
JUPITER:Detested prodigy!Even thus beneath the deep Titanian prisonsI trample thee! thou lingerest?Mercy! mercy!No pity, no release, no respite! Oh,That thou wouldst make mine enemy my judge, _65Even where he hangs, seared by my long revenge,On Caucasus! he would not doom me thus.Gentle, and just, and dreadless, is he notThe monarch of the world? What then art thou?No refuge! no appeal!Sink with me then, _70We two will sink on the wide waves of ruin,Even as a vulture and a snake outspentDrop, twisted in inextricable fight,Into a shoreless sea. Let hell unlockIts mounded oceans of tempestuous fire, _75And whelm on them into the bottomless voidThis desolated world, and thee, and me,The conqueror and the conquered, and the wreckOf that for which they combated.Ai, Ai!The elements obey me not. I sink _80Dizzily down, ever, for ever, down.And, like a cloud, mine enemy aboveDarkens my fall with victory! Ai, Ai!
NOTE: _69 then B, edition 1839; omitted 1820.
OCEAN:He fell, thou sayest, beneath his conqueror’s frown?
APOLLO:Ay, when the strife was ended which made dimThe orb I rule, and shook the solid stars,The terrors of his eye illumined heavenWith sanguine light, through the thick ragged skirts _5Of the victorious darkness, as he fell:Like the last glare of day’s red agony,Which, from a rent among the fiery clouds,Burns far along the tempest-wrinkled deep.
OCEAN:He sunk to the abyss? To the dark void? _10
APOLLO:An eagle so caught in some bursting cloudOn Caucasus, his thunder-baffled wingsEntangled in the whirlwind, and his eyesWhich gazed on the undazzling sun, now blindedBy the white lightning, while the ponderous hail _15Beats on his struggling form, which sinks at lengthProne, and the aereal ice clings over it.
OCEAN:Henceforth the fields of heaven-reflecting seaWhich are my realm, will heave, unstained with blood,Beneath the uplifting winds, like plains of corn _20Swayed by the summer air; my streams will flowRound many-peopled continents, and roundFortunate isles; and from their glassy thronesBlue Proteus and his humid nymphs shall markThe shadow of fair ships, as mortals see _25The floating bark of the light-laden moonWith that white star, its sightless pilot’s crest,Borne down the rapid sunset’s ebbing sea;Tracking their path no more by blood and groans,And desolation, and the mingled voice _30Of slavery and command; but by the lightOf wave-reflected flowers, and floating odours,And music soft, and mild, free, gentle voices,And sweetest music, such as spirits love.
NOTES: _22 many-peopled B; many peopled 1820. _26 light-laden B; light laden 1820.
APOLLO:And I shall gaze not on the deeds which make _35My mind obscure with sorrow, as eclipseDarkens the sphere I guide; but list, I hearThe small, clear, silver lute of the young SpiritThat sits i’ the morning star.
NOTE: _39 i’ the B, edition 1839; on the 1820.
OCEAN:Thou must away;Thy steeds will pause at even, till when farewell: _40The loud deep calls me home even now to feed itWith azure calm out of the emerald urnsWhich stand for ever full beside my throne.Behold the Nereids under the green sea,Their wavering limbs borne on the wind-like stream, _45Their white arms lifted o’er their streaming hairWith garlands pied and starry sea-flower crowns,Hastening to grace their mighty sister’s joy.[A SOUND OF WAVES IS HEARD.]It is the unpastured sea hungering for calm.Peace, monster; I come now. Farewell.
APOLLO:Farewell. _50
HERCULES:Most glorious among Spirits, thus doth strengthTo wisdom, courage, and long-suffering love,And thee, who art the form they animate,Minister like a slave.
PROMETHEUS:Thy gentle wordsAre sweeter even than freedom long desired _5And long delayed.Asia, thou light of life,Shadow of beauty unbeheld: and ye,Fair sister nymphs, who made long years of painSweet to remember, through your love and care:Henceforth we will not part. There is a cave, _10All overgrown with trailing odorous plants,Which curtain out the day with leaves and flowers,And paved with veined emerald, and a fountainLeaps in the midst with an awakening sound.From its curved roof the mountain’s frozen tears _15Like snow, or silver, or long diamond spires,Hang downward, raining forth a doubtful light:And there is heard the ever-moving air,Whispering without from tree to tree, and birds,And bees; and all around are mossy seats, _20And the rough walls are clothed with long soft grass;A simple dwelling, which shall be our own;Where we will sit and talk of time and change,As the world ebbs and flows, ourselves unchanged.What can hide man from mutability? _25And if ye sigh, then I will smile; and thou,Ione, shalt chant fragments of sea-music,Until I weep, when ye shall smile awayThe tears she brought, which yet were sweet to shed.We will entangle buds and flowers and beams _30Which twinkle on the fountain’s brim, and makeStrange combinations out of common things,Like human babes in their brief innocence;And we will search, with looks and words of love,For hidden thoughts, each lovelier than the last, _35Our unexhausted spirits; and like lutesTouched by the skill of the enamoured wind,Weave harmonies divine, yet ever new,From difference sweet where discord cannot be;And hither come, sped on the charmed winds, _40Which meet from all the points of heaven, as beesFrom every flower aereal Enna feeds,At their known island-homes in Himera,The echoes of the human world, which tellOf the low voice of love, almost unheard, _45And dove-eyed pity’s murmured pain, and music,Itself the echo of the heart, and allThat tempers or improves man’s life, now free;And lovely apparitions,—dim at first,Then radiant, as the mind, arising bright _50From the embrace of beauty (whence the formsOf which these are the phantoms) casts on themThe gathered rays which are reality—Shall visit us, the progeny immortalOf Painting, Sculpture, and rapt Poesy, _55And arts, though unimagined, yet to be.The wandering voices and the shadows theseOf all that man becomes, the mediatorsOf that best worship love, by him and usGiven and returned; swift shapes and sounds, which grow _60More fair and soft as man grows wise and kind,And, veil by veil, evil and error fall:Such virtue has the cave and place around.[TURNING TO THE SPIRIT OF THE HOUR.]For thee, fair Spirit, one toil remains. Ione,Give her that curved shell, which Proteus old _65Made Asia’s nuptial boon, breathing within itA voice to be accomplished, and which thouDidst hide in grass under the hollow rock.
IONE:Thou most desired Hour, more loved and lovelyThan all thy sisters, this is the mystic shell; _70See the pale azure fading into silverLining it with a soft yet glowing light:Looks it not like lulled music sleeping there?
SPIRIT:It seems in truth the fairest shell of Ocean:Its sound must be at once both sweet and strange. _75
PROMETHEUS:Go, borne over the cities of mankindOn whirlwind-footed coursers: once againOutspeed the sun around the orbed world;And as thy chariot cleaves the kindling air,Thou breathe into the many-folded shell, _80Loosening its mighty music; it shall beAs thunder mingled with clear echoes: thenReturn; and thou shalt dwell beside our cave.And thou, O Mother Earth!—
THE EARTH:I hear, I feel;Thy lips are on me, and thy touch runs down _85Even to the adamantine central gloomAlong these marble nerves; ’tis life, ’tis joy,And, through my withered, old, and icy frameThe warmth of an immortal youth shoots downCircling. Henceforth the many children fair _90Folded in my sustaining arms; all plants,And creeping forms, and insects rainbow-winged,And birds, and beasts, and fish, and human shapes,Which drew disease and pain from my wan bosom,Draining the poison of despair, shall take _95And interchange sweet nutriment; to meShall they become like sister-antelopesBy one fair dam, snow-white and swift as wind,Nursed among lilies near a brimming stream.The dew-mists of my sunless sleep shall float _100Under the stars like balm: night-folded flowersShall suck unwithering hues in their repose:And men and beasts in happy dreams shall gatherStrength for the coming day, and all its joy:And death shall be the last embrace of her _105Who takes the life she gave, even as a mother,Folding her child, says, ‘Leave me not again.’
NOTES: _85 their B; thy 1820. _102 unwithering B, edition 1839; unwitting 1820.
ASIA:Oh, mother! wherefore speak the name of death?Cease they to love, and move, and breathe, and speak,Who die?
THE EARTH:It would avail not to reply: _110Thou art immortal, and this tongue is knownBut to the uncommunicating dead.Death is the veil which those who live call life:They sleep, and it is lifted: and meanwhileIn mild variety the seasons mild _115With rainbow-skirted showers, and odorous winds,And long blue meteors cleansing the dull night,And the life-kindling shafts of the keen sun’sAll-piercing bow, and the dew-mingled rainOf the calm moonbeams, a soft influence mild, _120Shall clothe the forests and the fields, ay, evenThe crag-built deserts of the barren deep,With ever-living leaves, and fruits, and flowers.And thou! There is a cavern where my spiritWas panted forth in anguish whilst thy pain _125Made my heart mad, and those who did inhale itBecame mad too, and built a temple there,And spoke, and were oracular, and luredThe erring nations round to mutual war,And faithless faith, such as Jove kept with thee; _130Which breath now rises, as amongst tall weedsA violet’s exhalation, and it fillsWith a serener light and crimson airIntense, yet soft, the rocks and woods around;It feeds the quick growth of the serpent vine, _135And the dark linked ivy tangling wild,And budding, blown, or odour-faded bloomsWhich star the winds with points of coloured light,As they rain through them, and bright golden globesOf fruit, suspended in their own green heaven, _140And through their veined leaves and amber stemsThe flowers whose purple and translucid bowlsStand ever mantling with aereal dew,The drink of spirits: and it circles round,Like the soft waving wings of noonday dreams, _145Inspiring calm and happy thoughts, like mine,Now thou art thus restored. This cave is thine.Arise! Appear![A SPIRIT RISES IN THE LIKENESS OF A WINGED CHILD.]This is my torch-bearer;Who let his lamp out in old time with gazingOn eyes from which he kindled it anew _150With love, which is as fire, sweet daughter mine,For such is that within thine own. Run, wayward,And guide this company beyond the peakOf Bacchic Nysa, Maenad-haunted mountain,And beyond Indus and its tribute rivers, _155Trampling the torrent streams and glassy lakesWith feet unwet, unwearied, undelaying,And up the green ravine, across the vale,Beside the windless and crystalline pool,Where ever lies, on unerasing waves, _160The image of a temple, built above,Distinct with column, arch, and architrave,And palm-like capital, and over-wrought,And populous with most living imagery,Praxitelean shapes, whose marble smiles _165Fill the hushed air with everlasting love.It is deserted now, but once it boreThy name, Prometheus; there the emulous youthsBore to thy honour through the divine gloomThe lamp which was thine emblem; even as those _170Who bear the untransmitted torch of hopeInto the grave, across the night of life,As thou hast borne it most triumphantlyTo this far goal of Time. Depart, farewell.Beside that temple is the destined cave. _175
NOTE: _164 with most B; most with 1820.
IONE:Sister, it is not earthly: how it glidesUnder the leaves! how on its head there burnsA light, like a green star, whose emerald beamsAre twined with its fair hair! how, as it moves,The splendour drops in flakes upon the grass! _5Knowest thou it?
PANTHEA:It is the delicate spiritThat guides the earth through heaven. From afarThe populous constellations call that lightThe loveliest of the planets; and sometimesIt floats along the spray of the salt sea, _10Or makes its chariot of a foggy cloud,Or walks through fields or cities while men sleep,Or o’er the mountain tops, or down the rivers,Or through the green waste wilderness, as now,Wondering at all it sees. Before Jove reigned _15It loved our sister Asia, and it cameEach leisure hour to drink the liquid lightOut of her eyes, for which it said it thirstedAs one bit by a dipsas, and with herIt made its childish confidence, and told her _20All it had known or seen, for it saw much,Yet idly reasoned what it saw; and called her—For whence it sprung it knew not, nor do I—Mother, dear mother.
THE SPIRIT OF THE EARTH [RUNNING TO ASIA]:Mother, dearest mother;May I then talk with thee as I was wont? _25May I then hide my eyes in thy soft arms,After thy looks have made them tired of joy?May I then play beside thee the long noons,When work is none in the bright silent air?
ASIA:I love thee, gentlest being, and henceforth _30Can cherish thee unenvied: speak, I pray:Thy simple talk once solaced, now delights.
SPIRIT OF THE EARTH:Mother, I am grown wiser, though a childCannot be wise like thee, within this day;And happier too; happier and wiser both. _35Thou knowest that toads, and snakes, and loathly worms,And venomous and malicious beasts, and boughsThat bore ill berries in the woods, were everAn hindrance to my walks o’er the green world:And that, among the haunts of humankind, _40Hard-featured men, or with proud, angry looks,Or cold, staid gait, or false and hollow smiles,Or the dull sneer of self-loved ignorance,Or other such foul masks, with which ill thoughtsHide that fair being whom we spirits call man; _45And women too, ugliest of all things evil,(Though fair, even in a world where thou art fair,When good and kind, free and sincere like thee)When false or frowning made me sick at heartTo pass them, though they slept, and I unseen. _50Well, my path lately lay through a great cityInto the woody hills surrounding it:A sentinel was sleeping at the gate:When there was heard a sound, so loud, it shookThe towers amid the moonlight, yet more sweet _55Than any voice but thine, sweetest of all;A long, long sound, as it would never end:And all the inhabitants leaped suddenlyOut of their rest, and gathered in the streets,Looking in wonder up to Heaven, while yet _60The music pealed along. I hid myselfWithin a fountain in the public square,Where I lay like the reflex of the moonSeen in a wave under green leaves; and soonThose ugly human shapes and visages _65Of which I spoke as having wrought me pain,Passed floating through the air, and fading stillInto the winds that scattered them; and thoseFrom whom they passed seemed mild and lovely formsAfter some foul disguise had fallen, and all _70Were somewhat changed, and after brief surpriseAnd greetings of delighted wonder, allWent to their sleep again: and when the dawnCame, wouldst thou think that toads, and snakes, and efts,Could e’er be beautiful? yet so they were, _75And that with little change of shape or hue:All things had put their evil nature off:I cannot tell my joy, when o’er a lake,Upon a drooping bough with nightshade twined,I saw two azure halcyons clinging downward _80And thinning one bright bunch of amber berries,With quick long beaks, and in the deep there layThose lovely forms imaged as in a sky;So, with my thoughts full of these happy changes,We meet again, the happiest change of all. _85
ASIA:And never will we part, till thy chaste sisterWho guides the frozen and inconstant moonWill look on thy more warm and equal lightTill her heart thaw like flakes of April snowAnd love thee.
SPIRIT OF THE EARTH:What! as Asia loves Prometheus? _90
ASIA:Peace, wanton, thou art yet not old enough.Think ye by gazing on each other’s eyesTo multiply your lovely selves, and fillWith sphered fires the interlunar air?
SPIRIT OF THE EARTH:Nay, mother, while my sister trims her lamp’Tis hard I should go darkling. _95
ASIA:Listen; look!
PROMETHEUS:We feel what thou hast heard and seen: yet speak.
SPIRIT OF THE HOUR:Soon as the sound had ceased whose thunder filledThe abysses of the sky and the wide earth,There was a change: the impalpable thin air _100And the all-circling sunlight were transformed,As if the sense of love dissolved in themHad folded itself round the sphered world.My vision then grew clear, and I could seeInto the mysteries of the universe: _105Dizzy as with delight I floated down,Winnowing the lightsome air with languid plumes,My coursers sought their birthplace in the sun,Where they henceforth will live exempt from toil,Pasturing flowers of vegetable fire; _110And where my moonlike car will stand withinA temple, gazed upon by Phidian formsOf thee, and Asia, and the Earth, and me,And you fair nymphs looking the love we feel,—In memory of the tidings it has borne,— _115Beneath a dome fretted with graven flowers,Poised on twelve columns of resplendent stone,And open to the bright and liquid sky.Yoked to it by an amphisbaenic snakeThe likeness of those winged steeds will mock _120The flight from which they find repose. Alas,Whither has wandered now my partial tongueWhen all remains untold which ye would hear?As I have said, I floated to the earth:It was, as it is still, the pain of bliss _125To move, to breathe, to be. I wandering wentAmong the haunts and dwellings of mankind,And first was disappointed not to seeSuch mighty change as I had felt withinExpressed in outward things; but soon I looked, _130And behold, thrones were kingless, and men walkedOne with the other even as spirits do,None fawned, none trampled; hate, disdain, or fear,Self-love or self-contempt, on human browsNo more inscribed, as o’er the gate of hell, _135‘All hope abandon ye who enter here;’None frowned, none trembled, none with eager fearGazed on another’s eye of cold command,Until the subject of a tyrant’s willBecame, worse fate, the abject of his own, _140Which spurred him, like an outspent horse, to death.None wrought his lips in truth-entangling linesWhich smiled the lie his tongue disdained to speak;None, with firm sneer, trod out in his own heartThe sparks of love and hope till there remained _145Those bitter ashes, a soul self-consumed,And the wretch crept a vampire among men,Infecting all with his own hideous ill;None talked that common, false, cold, hollow talkWhich makes the heart deny the “yes” it breathes, _150Yet question that unmeant hypocrisyWith such a self-mistrust as has no name.And women, too, frank, beautiful, and kindAs the free heaven which rains fresh light and dewOn the wide earth, past; gentle radiant forms, _155From custom’s evil taint exempt and pure;Speaking the wisdom once they could not think,Looking emotions once they feared to feel,And changed to all which once they dared not be,Yet being now, made earth like heaven; nor pride, _160Nor jealousy, nor envy, nor ill shame,The bitterest of those drops of treasured gall,Spoiled the sweet taste of the nepenthe, love.
Thrones, altars, judgement-seats, and prisons; wherein,And beside which, by wretched men were borne _165Sceptres, tiaras, swords, and chains, and tomesOf reasoned wrong, glozed on by ignorance,Were like those monstrous and barbaric shapes,The ghosts of a no-more-remembered fame,Which, from their unworn obelisks, look forth _170In triumph o’er the palaces and tombsOf those who were their conquerors: mouldering round,These imaged to the pride of kings and priestsA dark yet mighty faith, a power as wideAs is the world it wasted, and are now _175But an astonishment; even so the toolsAnd emblems of its last captivity,Amid the dwellings of the peopled earth,Stand, not o’erthrown, but unregarded now.And those foul shapes, abhorred by god and man,— _180Which, under many a name and many a formStrange, savage, ghastly, dark and execrable,Were Jupiter, the tyrant of the world;And which the nations, panic-stricken, servedWith blood, and hearts broken by long hope, and love _185Dragged to his altars soiled and garlandless,And slain among men’s unreclaiming tears,Flattering the thing they feared, which fear was hate,—Frown, mouldering fast, o’er their abandoned shrines:The painted veil, by those who were, called life, _190Which mimicked, as with colours idly spread,All men believed and hoped, is torn aside;The loathsome mask has fallen, the man remainsSceptreless, free, uncircumscribed, but manEqual, unclassed, tribeless, and nationless, _195Exempt from awe, worship, degree, the kingOver himself; just, gentle, wise; but manPassionless?—no, yet free from guilt or pain,Which were, for his will made or suffered them,Nor yet exempt, though ruling them like slaves, _200From chance, and death, and mutability,The clogs of that which else might oversoarThe loftiest star of unascended heaven,Pinnacled dim in the intense inane.
NOTES: _121 flight B, edition 1839; light 1820. _173 These B; Those 1820. _187 amid B; among 1820. _192 or B; and 1820.
VOICE OF UNSEEN SPIRITS:The pale stars are gone!For the sun, their swift shepherd,To their folds them compelling,In the depths of the dawn,Hastes, in meteor-eclipsing array, and they flee _5Beyond his blue dwelling,As fawns flee the leopard.But where are ye?
Here, oh, here:We bear the bier _10Of the father of many a cancelled year!Spectres weOf the dead Hours be,We bear Time to his tomb in eternity.
Strew, oh, strew _15Hair, not yew!Wet the dusty pall with tears, not dew!Be the faded flowersOf Death’s bare bowersSpread on the corpse of the King of Hours! _20
Haste, oh, haste!As shades are chased,Trembling, by day, from heaven’s blue waste.We melt away,Like dissolving spray, _25From the children of a diviner day,With the lullabyOf winds that dieOn the bosom of their own harmony!
IONE:What dark forms were they? _30
PANTHEA:The past Hours weak and gray,With the spoil which their toilRaked togetherFrom the conquest but One could foil.
IONE:Have they passed?
PANTHEA:They have passed; _35They outspeeded the blast,While ’tis said, they are fled:
IONE:Whither, oh, whither?
PANTHEA:To the dark, to the past, to the dead.
VOICE OF UNSEEN SPIRITS:Bright clouds float in heaven, _40Dew-stars gleam on earth,Waves assemble on ocean,They are gathered and drivenBy the storm of delight, by the panic of glee!They shake with emotion, _45They dance in their mirth.But where are ye?
The pine boughs are singingOld songs with new gladness,The billows and fountains _50Fresh music are flinging,Like the notes of a spirit from land and from sea;The storms mock the mountainsWith the thunder of gladness.But where are ye? _55
IONE:What charioteers are these?
PANTHEA:Where are their chariots?
SEMICHORUS OF HOURS:The voice of the Spirits of Air and of EarthHas drawn back the figured curtain of sleepWhich covered our being and darkened our birthIn the deep.
A VOICE:In the deep?
SEMICHORUS 2:Oh, below the deep. _60
SEMICHORUS 1:An hundred ages we had been keptCradled in visions of hate and care,And each one who waked as his brother slept,Found the truth—
SEMICHORUS 2:Worse than his visions were!
SEMICHORUS 1:We have heard the lute of Hope in sleep; _65We have known the voice of Love in dreams;We have felt the wand of Power, and leap—
SEMICHORUS 2:As the billows leap in the morning beams!
CHORUS:Weave the dance on the floor of the breeze,Pierce with song heaven’s silent light, _70Enchant the day that too swiftly flees,To check its flight ere the cave of Night.
Once the hungry Hours were houndsWhich chased the day like a bleeding deer,And it limped and stumbled with many wounds _75Through the nightly dells of the desert year.
But now, oh weave the mystic measureOf music, and dance, and shapes of light,Let the Hours, and the spirits of might and pleasure,Like the clouds and sunbeams, unite—
A VOICE:Unite! _80
PANTHEA:See, where the Spirits of the human mindWrapped in sweet sounds, as in bright veils, approach.
CHORUS OF SPIRITS:We join the throngOf the dance and the song,By the whirlwind of gladness borne along; _85As the flying-fish leapFrom the Indian deep,And mix with the sea-birds, half-asleep.
CHORUS OF HOURS:Whence come ye, so wild and so fleet,For sandals of lightning are on your feet, _90And your wings are soft and swift as thought,And your eyes are as love which is veiled not?
CHORUS OF SPIRITS:We come from the mindOf human kindWhich was late so dusk, and obscene, and blind, _95Now ’tis an oceanOf clear emotion,A heaven of serene and mighty motion.
From that deep abyssOf wonder and bliss, _100Whose caverns are crystal palaces;From those skiey towersWhere Thought’s crowned powersSit watching your dance, ye happy Hours!
From the dim recesses _105Of woven caresses,Where lovers catch ye by your loose tresses;From the azure isles,Where sweet Wisdom smiles,Delaying your ships with her siren wiles. _110
From the temples highOf Man’s ear and eye,Roofed over Sculpture and Poesy;From the murmuringsOf the unsealed springs _115Where Science bedews her Daedal wings.
Years after years,Through blood, and tears,And a thick hell of hatreds, and hopes, and fears;We waded and flew, _120And the islets were fewWhere the bud-blighted flowers of happiness grew.
Our feet now, every palm,Are sandalled with calm,And the dew of our wings is a rain of balm; _125And, beyond our eyes,The human love liesWhich makes all it gazes on Paradise.
NOTE: _116 her B; his 1820.
CHORUS OF SPIRITS AND HOURS:Then weave the web of the mystic measure;From the depths of the sky and the ends of the earth, _130Come, swift Spirits of might and of pleasure,Fill the dance and the music of mirth,As the waves of a thousand streams rush byTo an ocean of splendour and harmony!
CHORUS OF SPIRITS:Our spoil is won, _135Our task is done,We are free to dive, or soar, or run;Beyond and around,Or within the boundWhich clips the world with darkness round. _140
We’ll pass the eyesOf the starry skiesInto the hoar deep to colonize;Death, Chaos, and Night,From the sound of our flight, _145Shall flee, like mist from a tempest’s might.
And Earth, Air, and Light,And the Spirit of Might,Which drives round the stars in their fiery flight;And Love, Thought, and Breath, _150The powers that quell Death,Wherever we soar shall assemble beneath.
And our singing shall buildIn the void’s loose fieldA world for the Spirit of Wisdom to wield; _155We will take our planFrom the new world of man,And our work shall be called the Promethean.
CHORUS OF HOURS:Break the dance, and scatter the song;Let some depart, and some remain; _160
SEMICHORUS 1:We, beyond heaven, are driven along:
SEMICHORUS 2:Us the enchantments of earth retain:
SEMICHORUS 1:Ceaseless, and rapid, and fierce, and free,With the Spirits which build a new earth and sea,And a heaven where yet heaven could never be; _165
SEMICHORUS 2:Solemn, and slow, and serene, and bright,Leading the Day and outspeeding the Night,With the powers of a world of perfect light;
SEMICHORUS 1:We whirl, singing loud, round the gathering sphere,Till the trees, and the beasts, and the clouds appear _170From its chaos made calm by love, not fear.
SEMICHORUS 2:We encircle the ocean and mountains of earth,And the happy forms of its death and birthChange to the music of our sweet mirth.
CHORUS OF HOURS AND SPIRITS:Break the dance, and scatter the song; _175Let some depart, and some remain,Wherever we fly we lead alongIn leashes, like starbeams, soft yet strong,The clouds that are heavy with love’s sweet rain.
PANTHEA:Ha! they are gone!
IONE:Yet feel you no delight _180From the past sweetness?
PANTHEA:As the bare green hillWhen some soft cloud vanishes into rain,Laughs with a thousand drops of sunny waterTo the unpavilioned sky!
IONE:Even whilst we speakNew notes arise. What is that awful sound? _185
PANTHEA:’Tis the deep music of the rolling worldKindling within the strings of the waved airAeolian modulations.
IONE:Listen too,How every pause is filled with under-notes,Clear, silver, icy, keen awakening tones, _190Which pierce the sense, and live within the soul,As the sharp stars pierce winter’s crystal airAnd gaze upon themselves within the sea.
PANTHEA:But see where through two openings in the forestWhich hanging branches overcanopy, _195And where two runnels of a rivulet,Between the close moss violet-inwoven,Have made their path of melody, like sistersWho part with sighs that they may meet in smiles,Turning their dear disunion to an isle _200Of lovely grief, a wood of sweet sad thoughts;Two visions of strange radiance float uponThe ocean-like enchantment of strong sound,Which flows intenser, keener, deeper yetUnder the ground and through the windless air. _205
IONE:I see a chariot like that thinnest boat,In which the Mother of the Months is borneBy ebbing light into her western cave,When she upsprings from interlunar dreams;O’er which is curved an orblike canopy _210Of gentle darkness, and the hills and woods,Distinctly seen through that dusk aery veil,Regard like shapes in an enchanter’s glass;Its wheels are solid clouds, azure and gold,Such as the genii of the thunderstorm _215Pile on the floor of the illumined seaWhen the sun rushes under it; they rollAnd move and grow as with an inward wind;Within it sits a winged infant, whiteIts countenance, like the whiteness of bright snow, _220Its plumes are as feathers of sunny frost,Its limbs gleam white, through the wind-flowing foldsOf its white robe, woof of ethereal pearl.Its hair is white, the brightness of white lightScattered in strings; yet its two eyes are heavens _225Of liquid darkness, which the DeityWithin seems pouring, as a storm is pouredFrom jagged clouds, out of their arrowy lashes,Tempering the cold and radiant air around,With fire that is not brightness; in its hand _230It sways a quivering moonbeam, from whose pointA guiding power directs the chariot’s prowOver its wheeled clouds, which as they rollOver the grass, and flowers, and waves, wake sounds,Sweet as a singing rain of silver dew. _235
NOTES: _208 light B; night 1820. _212 aery B; airy 1820. _225 strings B, edition 1839; string 1820.
PANTHEA:And from the other opening in the woodRushes, with loud and whirlwind harmony,A sphere, which is as many thousand spheres,Solid as crystal, yet through all its massFlow, as through empty space, music and light: _240Ten thousand orbs involving and involved,Purple and azure, white, and green, and golden,Sphere within sphere; and every space betweenPeopled with unimaginable shapes,Such as ghosts dream dwell in the lampless deep, _245Yet each inter-transpicuous, and they whirlOver each other with a thousand motions,Upon a thousand sightless axles spinning,And with the force of self-destroying swiftness,Intensely, slowly, solemnly, roll on, _250Kindling with mingled sounds, and many tones,Intelligible words and music wild.With mighty whirl the multitudinous orbGrinds the bright brook into an azure mistOf elemental subtlety, like light; _255And the wild odour of the forest flowers,The music of the living grass and air,The emerald light of leaf-entangled beamsRound its intense yet self-conflicting speed,Seem kneaded into one aereal mass _260Which drowns the sense. Within the orb itself,Pillowed upon its alabaster arms,Like to a child o’erwearied with sweet toil,On its own folded wings, and wavy hair,The Spirit of the Earth is laid asleep, _265And you can see its little lips are moving,Amid the changing light of their own smiles,Like one who talks of what he loves in dream.
NOTE: _242 white and green B; white, green 1820.
IONE:’Tis only mocking the orb’s harmony.
PANTHEA:And from a star upon its forehead, shoot, _270Like swords of azure fire, or golden spearsWith tyrant-quelling myrtle overtwined,Embleming heaven and earth united now,Vast beams like spokes of some invisible wheelWhich whirl as the orb whirls, swifter than thought, _275Filling the abyss with sun-like lightenings,And perpendicular now, and now transverse,Pierce the dark soil, and as they pierce and pass,Make bare the secrets of the earth’s deep heart;Infinite mine of adamant and gold, _280Valueless stones, and unimagined gems,And caverns on crystalline columns poisedWith vegetable silver overspread;Wells of unfathomed fire, and water springsWhence the great sea, even as a child is fed, _285Whose vapours clothe earth’s monarch mountain-topsWith kingly, ermine snow. The beams flash onAnd make appear the melancholy ruinsOf cancelled cycles; anchors, beaks of ships;Planks turned to marble; quivers, helms, and spears, _290And gorgon-headed targes, and the wheelsOf scythed chariots, and the emblazonryOf trophies, standards, and armorial beasts,Round which death laughed, sepulchred emblemsOf dead destruction, ruin within ruin! _295The wrecks beside of many a city vast,Whose population which the earth grew overWas mortal, but not human; see, they lie,Their monstrous works, and uncouth skeletons,Their statues, homes and fanes; prodigious shapes _300Huddled in gray annihilation, split,Jammed in the hard, black deep; and over these,The anatomies of unknown winged things,And fishes which were isles of living scale,And serpents, bony chains, twisted around _305The iron crags, or within heaps of dustTo which the tortuous strength of their last pangsHad crushed the iron crags; and over theseThe jagged alligator, and the mightOf earth-convulsing behemoth, which once _310Were monarch beasts, and on the slimy shores,And weed-overgrown continents of earth,Increased and multiplied like summer wormsOn an abandoned corpse, till the blue globeWrapped deluge round it like a cloak, and they _315Yelled, gasped, and were abolished; or some GodWhose throne was in a comet, passed, and cried,‘Be not!’ And like my words they were no more.
NOTES: _274 spokes B, edition 1839; spoke 1820. _276 lightenings B; lightnings 1820. _280 mines B; mine 1820. _282 poised B; poized edition 1839; poured 1820.
THE EARTH:The joy, the triumph, the delight, the madness!The boundless, overflowing, bursting gladness, _320The vaporous exultation not to be confined!Ha! ha! the animation of delightWhich wraps me, like an atmosphere of light,And bears me as a cloud is borne by its own wind.
THE MOON:Brother mine, calm wanderer, _325Happy globe of land and air,Some Spirit is darted like a beam from thee,Which penetrates my frozen frame,And passes with the warmth of flame,With love, and odour, and deep melody _330Through me, through me!
THE EARTH:Ha! ha! the caverns of my hollow mountains,My cloven fire-crags, sound-exulting fountainsLaugh with a vast and inextinguishable laughter.The oceans, and the deserts, and the abysses, _335And the deep air’s unmeasured wildernesses,Answer from all their clouds and billows, echoing after.
They cry aloud as I do. Sceptred curse,Who all our green and azure universeThreatenedst to muffle round with black destruction, sending _340A solid cloud to rain hot thunderstones,And splinter and knead down my children’s bones,All I bring forth, to one void mass battering and blending,—
Until each crag-like tower, and storied column,Palace, and obelisk, and temple solemn, _345My imperial mountains crowned with cloud, and snow, and fire,My sea-like forests, every blade and blossomWhich finds a grave or cradle in my bosom,Were stamped by thy strong hate into a lifeless mire:
How art thou sunk, withdrawn, covered, drunk up _350By thirsty nothing, as the brackish cupDrained by a desert-troop, a little drop for all;And from beneath, around, within, above,Filling thy void annihilation, loveBursts in like light on caves cloven by the thunder-ball. _355
NOTES: _335-_336 the abysses, And 1820, 1839; the abysses Of B. _355 the omitted 1820.
THE MOON:The snow upon my lifeless mountainsIs loosened into living fountains,My solid oceans flow, and sing and shine:A spirit from my heart bursts forth,It clothes with unexpected birth _360My cold bare bosom: Oh! it must be thineOn mine, on mine!
Gazing on thee I feel, I knowGreen stalks burst forth, and bright flowers grow,And living shapes upon my bosom move: _365Music is in the sea and air,Winged clouds soar here and there,Dark with the rain new buds are dreaming of:’Tis love, all love!
THE EARTH:It interpenetrates my granite mass, _370Through tangled roots and trodden clay doth passInto the utmost leaves and delicatest flowers;Upon the winds, among the clouds ’tis spread,It wakes a life in the forgotten dead,They breathe a spirit up from their obscurest bowers. _375
And like a storm bursting its cloudy prisonWith thunder, and with whirlwind, has arisenOut of the lampless caves of unimagined being:With earthquake shock and swiftness making shiverThought’s stagnant chaos, unremoved for ever, _380Till hate, and fear, and pain, light-vanquished shadows, fleeing,
Leave Man, who was a many-sided mirror,Which could distort to many a shape of error,This true fair world of things, a sea reflecting love;Which over all his kind, as the sun’s heaven _385Gliding o’er ocean, smooth, serene, and even,Darting from starry depths radiance and life, doth move:
Leave Man, even as a leprous child is left,Who follows a sick beast to some warm cleftOf rocks, through which the might of healing springs is poured; _390Then when it wanders home with rosy smile,Unconscious, and its mother fears awhileIt is a spirit, then, weeps on her child restored.
Man, oh, not men! a chain of linked thought,Of love and might to be divided not, _395Compelling the elements with adamantine stress;As the sun rules, even with a tyrant’s gaze,The unquiet republic of the mazeOf planets, struggling fierce towards heaven’s free wilderness.
Man, one harmonious soul of many a soul, _400Whose nature is its own divine control,Where all things flow to all, as rivers to the sea;Familiar acts are beautiful through love;Labour, and pain, and grief, in life’s green groveSport like tame beasts, none knew how gentle they could be! _405
His will, with all mean passions, bad delights,And selfish cares, its trembling satellites,A spirit ill to guide, but mighty to obey,Is as a tempest-winged ship, whose helmLove rules, through waves which dare not overwhelm, _410Forcing life’s wildest shores to own its sovereign sway.
All things confess his strength. Through the cold massOf marble and of colour his dreams pass;Bright threads whence mothers weave the robes their children wear;Language is a perpetual Orphic song, _415Which rules with Daedal harmony a throngOf thoughts and forms, which else senseless and shapeless were.
The lightning is his slave; heaven’s utmost deepGives up her stars, and like a flock of sheepThey pass before his eye, are numbered, and roll on! _420The tempest is his steed, he strides the air;And the abyss shouts from her depth laid bare,Heaven, hast thou secrets? Man unveils me; I have none.
NOTE: _387 life B; light 1820.
THE MOON:The shadow of white death has passedFrom my path in heaven at last, _425A clinging shroud of solid frost and sleep;And through my newly-woven bowers,Wander happy paramours,Less mighty, but as mild as those who keepThy vales more deep. _430
THE EARTH:As the dissolving warmth of dawn may foldA half unfrozen dew-globe, green, and gold,And crystalline, till it becomes a winged mist,And wanders up the vault of the blue day,Outlives the noon, and on the sun’s last ray _435Hangs o’er the sea, a fleece of fire and amethyst.
NOTE: _432 unfrozen B, edition 1839; infrozen 1820.
THE MOON:Thou art folded, thou art lyingIn the light which is undyingOf thine own joy, and heaven’s smile divine;All suns and constellations shower _440On thee a light, a life, a powerWhich doth array thy sphere; thou pourest thineOn mine, on mine!
THE EARTH:I spin beneath my pyramid of night,Which points into the heavens dreaming delight, _445Murmuring victorious joy in my enchanted sleep;As a youth lulled in love-dreams faintly sighing,Under the shadow of his beauty lying,Which round his rest a watch of light and warmth doth keep.
THE MOON:As in the soft and sweet eclipse, _450When soul meets soul on lovers’ lips,High hearts are calm, and brightest eyes are dull;So when thy shadow falls on me,Then am I mute and still, by theeCovered; of thy love, Orb most beautiful, _455Full, oh, too full!
Thou art speeding round the sunBrightest world of many a one;Green and azure sphere which shinestWith a light which is divinest _460Among all the lamps of HeavenTo whom life and light is given;I, thy crystal paramourBorne beside thee by a powerLike the polar Paradise, _465Magnet-like of lovers’ eyes;I, a most enamoured maidenWhose weak brain is overladenWith the pleasure of her love,Maniac-like around thee moveGazing, an insatiate bride, _470On thy form from every sideLike a Maenad, round the cupWhich Agave lifted upIn the weird Cadmaean forest. _475Brother, wheresoe’er thou soarestI must hurry, whirl and followThrough the heavens wide and hollow,Sheltered by the warm embraceOf thy soul from hungry space, _480Drinking from thy sense and sightBeauty, majesty, and might,As a lover or a chameleonGrows like what it looks upon,As a violet’s gentle eye _485Gazes on the azure skyUntil its hue grows like what it beholds,As a gray and watery mistGlows like solid amethystAthwart the western mountain it enfolds, _490When the sunset sleepsUpon its snow—
THE EARTH:And the weak day weepsThat it should be so.Oh, gentle Moon, the voice of thy delight _495Falls on me like thy clear and tender lightSoothing the seaman, borne the summer night,Through isles for ever calm;Oh, gentle Moon, thy crystal accents pierceThe caverns of my pride’s deep universe, _500Charming the tiger joy, whose tramplings fierceMade wounds which need thy balm.
PANTHEA:I rise as from a bath of sparkling water,A bath of azure light, among dark rocks,Out of the stream of sound.
IONE:Ah me! sweet sister, _505The stream of sound has ebbed away from us,And you pretend to rise out of its wave,Because your words fall like the clear, soft dewShaken from a bathing wood-nymph’s limbs and hair.
PANTHEA:Peace! peace! a mighty Power, which is as darkness, _510Is rising out of Earth, and from the skyIs showered like night, and from within the airBursts, like eclipse which had been gathered upInto the pores of sunlight: the bright visions,Wherein the singing spirits rode and shone, _515Gleam like pale meteors through a watery night.
IONE:There is a sense of words upon mine ear.
PANTHEA:An universal sound like words: Oh, list!
DEMOGORGON:Thou, Earth, calm empire of a happy soul,Sphere of divinest shapes and harmonies, _520Beautiful orb! gathering as thou dost rollThe love which paves thy path along the skies:
THE EARTH:I hear: I am as a drop of dew that dies.
DEMOGORGON:Thou, Moon, which gazest on the nightly EarthWith wonder, as it gazes upon thee; _525Whilst each to men, and beasts, and the swift birthOf birds, is beauty, love, calm, harmony:
THE MOON:I hear: I am a leaf shaken by thee!
DEMOGORGON:Ye Kings of suns and stars, Daemons and Gods,Ethereal Dominations, who possess _530Elysian, windless, fortunate abodesBeyond Heaven’s constellated wilderness:
A VOICE FROM ABOVE:Our great Republic hears: we are blest, and bless.
DEMOGORGON:Ye happy Dead, whom beams of brightest verseAre clouds to hide, not colours to portray, _535Whether your nature is that universeWhich once ye saw and suffered—
A VOICE: FROM BENEATH:Or as theyWhom we have left, we change and pass away.
DEMOGORGON:Ye elemental Genii, who have homesFrom man’s high mind even to the central stone _540Of sullen lead; from heaven’s star-fretted domesTo the dull weed some sea-worm battens on:
A CONFUSED VOICE:We hear: thy words waken Oblivion.
DEMOGORGON:Spirits, whose homes are flesh; ye beasts and birds,Ye worms and fish; ye living leaves and buds; _545Lightning and wind; and ye untameable herds,Meteors and mists, which throng air’s solitudes:—
NOTE: _547 throng 1820, 1839; cancelled for feed B.
A VOICE:Thy voice to us is wind among still woods.
DEMOGORGON:Man, who wert once a despot and a slave;A dupe and a deceiver; a decay; _550A traveller from the cradle to the graveThrough the dim night of this immortal day:
ALL:Speak: thy strong words may never pass away.
DEMOGORGON:This is the day, which down the void abysmAt the Earth-born’s spell yawns for Heaven’s despotism, _555And Conquest is dragged captive through the deep:Love, from its awful throne of patient powerIn the wise heart, from the last giddy hourOf dread endurance, from the slippery, steep,And narrow verge of crag-like agony, springs _560And folds over the world its healing wings.
Gentleness, Virtue, Wisdom, and Endurance,These are the seals of that most firm assuranceWhich bars the pit over Destruction’s strength;And if, with infirm hand, Eternity, _565Mother of many acts and hours, should freeThe serpent that would clasp her with his length;These are the spells by which to reassumeAn empire o’er the disentangled doom.
To suffer woes which Hope thinks infinite; _570To forgive wrongs darker than death or night;To defy Power, which seems omnipotent;To love, and bear; to hope till Hope createsFrom its own wreck the thing it contemplates;Neither to change, nor falter, nor repent; _575This, like thy glory, Titan, is to beGood, great and joyous, beautiful and free;This is alone Life, Joy, Empire, and Victory!
NOTES: _559 dread B, edition 1839; dead 1820. _575 falter B, edition 1839; flatter 1820.
[First printed by Mr. C.D. Locock, “Examination of the ShelleyManuscripts at the Bodleian Library”, 1903, pages 33-7.]
(following 1._37.) When thou descendst each night with open eyes In torture, for a tyrant seldom sleeps, Thou never; … …
(following 1._195.) Which thou henceforth art doomed to interweave …
(following the first two words of 1._342.) [Of Hell:] I placed it in his choice to be The crown, or trampled refuse of the world With but one law itself a glorious boon— I gave— …