The perfectness of others yet unseen.
Conceding which, had Žeus then questioned thee "Shall I go on a step, improve on this,
Do more for visible creatures than is done?"
Thou wouldst have answered, "Ay, by making each Grow conscious in himself- by that alone.
All 's perfect else: the shell sucks fast the rock,
The fish strikes thro' the sea, the snake both swims
And slides, forth range the beasts, the birds take flight, Till life's mechanics can no further go-
And all this joy in natural life is put
Like fire from off thy finger into each,
So exquisitely perfect is the same.
But 't is pure fire, and they mere matter are:
It has them, not they it; and so I choose
For man, thy last premeditated work
(If I might add a glory to the scheme)
That a third thing should stand apart from both, A quality arise within his soul,
Which, intro-active, made to supervise And feel the force it has, may view itself,
And so be happy." Man might live at first The animal life: but is there nothing more? In due time, let him critically learn
How he lives; and, the more he gets to know Of his own life's adaptabilities,
The more joy-giving will his life become. Thus man, who hath this quality, is best.
But thou, king, hadst more reasonably said: "Let progress end at once, — man make no step Beyond the natural man, the better beast, Using his senses, not the sense of sense!" In man there's failure, only since he left The lower and inconscious forms of life. We called it an advance, the rendering plain Man's spirit might grow conscious of man's life, And, by new lore so added to the old, Take each step higher over the brute's head. This grew the only life, the pleasure-house, Watch-tower and treasure-fortress of the soul, Which whole surrounding flats of natural life Seemed only fit to yield subsistence to; A tower that crowns a country. But alas, The soul now climbs it just to perish there! For thence we have discovered ('t is no dream We know this, which we had not else perceived) That there's a world of capability
For joy spread round about us, meant for us, Inviting us; and still the soul craves all, And still the flesh replies, "Take no jot more Than ere thou clombst the tower to look abroad! Nay, so much less as that fatigue has brought Deduction to it." We struggle, fain to enlarge Our bounded physical recipiency, Increase our power, supply fresh oil to life, Repair the waste of age and sickness: no, It skills not! life 's inadequate to joy, As the soul sees joy, tempting life to take. They praise a fountain in my garden here Wherein a Naiad sends the water-bow Thin from her tube; she smiles to see it rise. What if I told her, it is just a thread From that great river which the hills shut up, And mock her with my leave to take the same? The artificer has given her one small tube Past power to widen or exchange - what boots To know she might spout oceans if she could? She can not lift beyond her first thin thread: And so a man can use but a man's joy While he sees God's. Is it, for Zeus to boast "See, man, how happy I live, and despair That I may be still happier — for thy use!" If this were so, we could not thank our lord, As hearts beat on to doing: 't is not so- Malice it is not. Is it carelessness?
Still, no. If care - where is the sign? I ask, And get no answer, and agree in sum,
O king, with thy profound discouragement, Who seest the wider but to sigh the more.
Most progress is most failure: thou sayest well.
The last point now: - thou dost except a case Holding joy not impossible to one With artist-gifts- to such a man as I Who leave behind me living works indeed;
For, such a poem, such a painting lives. What? dost thou verily trip upon a word, Confound the accurate view of what joy is
(Caught somewhat clearer by my eyes than thine) With feeling joy? confound the knowing how And showing how to live (my faculty)
With actually living? Otherwise
Where is the artist's vantage o'er the king?
Because in my great epos I display
How divers men young, strong, fair, wise, can act
Is this as tho' I acted? if I paint,
Carve the young Phoebus, am I therefore young? Methinks I'm older that I bowed myself
The many years of pain that taught me art! Indeed, to know is something, and to prove How all this beauty might be enjoyed, is more: But, knowing naught, to enjoy is something too. Yon rower, with the moulded muscles there, Lowering the sail, is nearer it than I.
I can write love-odes: thy fair slave 's an ode. I get to sing of love, when grown too gray For being beloved: she turns to that young man, The muscles all a-ripple on his back.
I know the joy of kingship: well, thou art king! "But," sayest thou - (and I marvel, I repeat, To find thee trip on such a mere word) "what Thou writest, paintest, stays; that does not die: Sappho survives, because we sing her songs, And Eschylus, because we read his plays!" Why, if they live still, let them come and take Thy slave in my despite, drink from thy cup, Speak in my place. Thou diest while I survive? Say rather that my fate is deadlier still, In this, that every day my sense of joy Grows more acute, my soul (intensified
By power and insight) more enlarged, more keen; While every day my hairs fall more and more, My hand shakes, and the heavy years increase The horror quickening still from year to year, The consummation coming past escape, When I shall know most, and yet least enjoy — When all my works wherein I prove my worth, Being present still to mock me in men's mouths, Alive still, in the praise of such as thou, I, I the feeling, thinking, acting man,
The man who loved his life so over-much, Sleep in my urn. It is so horrible, I dare at times imagine to my need Some future state revealed to us by Zeus, Unlimited in capability
For joy, as this is in desire for joy,
To seek which, the joy-hunger forces us:
That, stung by straitness of our life, made strait On purpose to make prized the life at large- Freed by the throbbing impulse we call death,
We burst there as the worm into the fly,
Who, while a worm still, wants his wings. But no! Zeus has not yet revealed it; and alas,
He must have done so, were it possible!
Live long and happy, and in that thought die, Glad for what was! Farewell. And for the rest, I cannot tell thy messenger aright Where to deliver what he bears of thine
To one called Paulus; we have heard his fame Indeed, if Christus be not one with him
I know not, nor am troubled much to know. Thou canst not think a mere barbarian Jew As Paulus proves to be, one circumcised, Hath access to a secret shut from us? Thou wrongest our philosophy, O king, In stooping to inquire of such an one, As if his answer could impose at all!
He writeth, doth he? well, and he may write.
Oh, the Jew findeth scholars! certain slaves
Who touched on this same isle, preached him and Christ;
And (as I gathered from a bystander)
Their doctrine could be held by no sane man.
I pinned him to earth with my weight
And persistence of hate;
And he lay, would not moan, would not curse, As his lot might be worse.
"Were the object less mean, would he stand At the swing of my hand!
For obscurity helps him, and blots
The hole where he squats."
So, I set my five wits on the stretch To inveigle the wretch.
All in vain! Gold and jewels I threw,
Still he couched there perdue;
I tempted his blood and his flesh.
Hid in roses my mesh,
Choicest cates and the flagon's best spilth: Still he kept to his filth.
No: I could not but smile thro' my chafe: For the fellow lay safe
As his mates do, the midge and the nit,
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