Festus · Scene 20 (2/2) (3/5)

| Festus | Love, mirth, woe, pleasure, was in tum his theme, And the great good which beauty does the soul; And the God-made necessity of things. And like that noble knight in olden tale, Who changed his armour’s hue at each fresh charge By virtue of his lady-love’s strange ring, So that none knew him save his private page And she who cried, God save him, every time He brake spears with the brave till he quelled all⁠— So he applied him to all themes that came; Loving the most to breast the rapid deeps Where others had been drowned, and heeding nought Where danger might not fill the place of fame. And ’mid the magic circle of those sounds, His lyre rayed out, spell-bound himself he stood, Like a stilled storm. It is no task for suns To shine. He knew himself a bard ordained, More than inspired, of God, inspirited:⁠— Making himself like an electric rod A lure for lightning feelings; and his words Felt like the things that fall in thunder, which The mind, when in a dark, hot, cloudful state, Doth make metallic, meteoric, ball like. He spake to spirits with a spirit tongue, Who came compelled by wizard word of truth, And rayed them round him from the ends of Heaven. For as be all bards he was born of beauty, And with a natural fitness to draw down All tones and shades of beauty to his soul, Even as the rainbow-tinted shell, which lies Miles deep at bottom of the sea, hath all Colours of skies and flowers, and gems, and plumes, And all by Nature which doth reproduce Like loveliness in seeming opposites. Our life is like the wizard’s charmed ring: Death’s heads, and loathsome things fill up the ground; But spirits wing about, and wait on us, While yet the hour of enchantment is. And while we keep in, we are safe, and can Force them to do our bidding. And he raised The rebel in himself, and in his mind Walked with him through the world. | | Student | He wrote of this? | | Festus | He wrote a poem. | | Student | What was said of it? | | Festus | Oh, much was said⁠—much more than understood; One said that he was mad; another, wise; Another, wisely mad. The book is there. Judge thou among them. | | Student | Well, but, who said what? | | Festus | Some said that he blasphemed; and these men lied To all eternity, unless such men Be saved, when God shall rase that lie from life, And from His own eternal memory: But still the word is lied; though it were writ In honeydew upon a lily leaf, With quill of nightingale, like love letters From Oberon sent to the bright Titania, Fairest of all the fays⁠—for that he used The name of God as spirits use it, barely, Yet surely more sublime in nakedness, Statuelike, than in a whole tongue of dress. Thou knowest, God! that to the full of worship All things are worship-full; and Thy great name, In all its awful brevity, hath nought Unholy breeding in it, but doth bless Rather the tongue that utters it; for me, I ask no higher office than to fling My spirit at Thy feet, and cry Thy name God! through eternity. The man who sees Irreverence in that name, must have been used To take that name in vain, and the same man Would see obscenity in pure white statues. Call all things by their names. Hell, call thou hell; Archangel, call archangel; and God, God. | | Student | And what said he of such? | | Festus | He held his peace A season, as a tree its sap till spring, Preparing to unfold itself, and let All rigor do its worst, which only served To harden him, though nothing nesh at first. And then he said at last, what, at the first, He deemed would have been seen by other men, By men, at least, above low-water mark, Who take it, they lead others; that it is they Who set their shoulders to the stalled world’s wheel, And give it a hitch forwards. | | Helen | There were some Encouraged him with goodwill, surely? | | Festus | Many. The kind, the noble, and the able cheered him; The lovely, likewise: others knew he nought of. And yet he loved not praise, nor sighed for fame. Men’s praise begets an awe of one’s own self Within us, till we fear our heart, lest it, Magician-like, show more than we can bear. Nor was he fameless; but obscurity Hath many a sacred use. The clouds which hide The mental mountains rising nighest Heaven, Are full of finest lightning, and a breath Can give those gathered shadows fearful life, And launch their light in thunder o’er the world. | | Student | And thought he well of that he wrote? | | Festus | Perchance. Perchance we suffer, and perchance succeed. Perchance he would his tongue had perished ere It uttered half he said, from childhood up To manhood, and so on; for much I heard From him required expiation, much Soul sacrifice and penance for heart-deeds Which passion had accomplished; yea, perchance, He wished, how vain! that fruitful heart and breast Had withered like a witch’s ere he had trained The parasites of feeling that he did About it; and perchance, for all I know, He would his brain had died ere it conceived One half the thought-seeds that took life in it, And in his soul’s dark sanctuary dwelt. Yet his blue eye’s dark ball grew greater with Delight, and darker, as he viewed the things He made; not monsters outside of the fane, Grinning and howling, but seraphic forms⁠— Embodied thoughts of worship, wisdom, love, Joining their fire-tipped wings across the shrine Where his heart’s relics lay, and where were wrought Immortal miracles upon men’s minds. | | Student | Take up the book, and, if thou understandest, Unfold it to me. | | Festus | What I can, I will. Well I remember me of thee, poor book! But there is consolation e’en for thee. Fair hand have turned thee over, and bright eyes Sprinkled their sparkles o’er thee with their prayers. The poet’s pen is the true divining rod Which trembles upwards the inner founts of feeling; Bringing to light and use, else hid from all, The many sweet clear sources which we have Of good and beauty in our own deep bosoms; And marks the variations of all mind As does the needle an air-investing storm’s. | | Student | How does the book begin, go on and end? | | Festus | It has a plan, but no plot. Life hath none. | | Helen | Tell us, love; we will listen and not speak. I wish I understood it, for I know You would rather hear me than yourselves talk. | | Student | Surely. I’d give up half the organs in my head, Besides all undiscovered faculties, To list to such a lecturer; and then Have quite enough, perhaps, to comprehend. | | Helen | ’Twere needless that, to one half-witted now. | | Festus | There is a porch, wherefrom is something seen Of the main dome beyond. Though shadows cross Each other’s path, yet let us go through it. And lo! an opening scene in Heaven, Wherein The foredoom of all things, spirit and matter, Is shown, and the permission of temptation; The angelic worship of the Trinity, By God’s name uttered thrice; the joys and powers Of souls o’erblest, and the sweet offices Of warden-angel told; and the complete Well-fixed necessity and end of all things. From Heaven we come to earth, and so do souls. For next succeeds a soft and sunset scene, Wherein is shown the collapsed, empty state In which all worldly pleasures leave us; youth’s Though natural, fitful, unavailing, struggle Against a great temptation come unlocked for: And that to sin is to curse God in deed. The soul long used to truth still keeps its strength, Though plunged upon a sudden mid the false; As hands, thrust into a dark room, retain Their sunlent light a season. So with this. The lines have under meanings, and the scene Of self-forgetfulness and indecision Breaks off, not ends. A starry, stirless night Follows, which shadows out youth’s barren longings For goodness, greatness, marvels, mysteries. Whence comes this dream of immortality, And the resurgent essence? Let us think! What mean we by the dead? The dead have life, The changed; and, if they come, it is to show Their change is for the better. The bait takes. Man and his foe shake hands upon their bargain. The youth sets out for joy, and ’neath the care Of his good enemy, begins his course. The next scene seems to promise fair; for sure If that there be one scene in life, wherefrom Evil is absent, it is pure early love. | | Helen | Alas! when beauty pleads the cause of virtue The chief temptation to embrace it’s wanting. | | Festus | A man in love sees wonders. But not love Makes the soul happy: so the youth gets hopeless. To this comes on a stem and stormy quarrel ’Tween the two foe friends⁠—Youth demanding what Cannot be; and the other withholding safe And easy grants. They part and meet, as though Nothing had happened, in the next scene: none Know how we reconcile ourselves to evil. But there they are, together, aiding each The other, and abusing others. | | Helen | I Was waiting for an eloquential pause In this mysterious, allegorical, Mythical, theological, odd story. So now, then, I shall ask myself to sing; And granting I agree to my request, I think you ought to thank me. | | Student | That we will. But not just now. | | Helen | Oh! yes, now; yes, this moment I’m in the humour. | | Student | We are not. | | Festus | Yes, let her! | | Helen | What shall I sing? | | Festus | Sing something merry, love. | | Helen | I won’t: I’ll sing the dullest thing I know; One of thine own songs. | | Student | What a compliment! | | Festus | Sing what thou lik’st, then. | | Helen | No; what thou lik’st. | | Student | Well, Something about lore, and it can’t be wrong. For love the sunny world supplies With laughing lips and happy eyes. | | Festus | And ’twill be sooner over. | | Student | And so better. | | Helen | Like an island in a river, Art thou, my love, to me; And I journey by thee ever With a gentle ecstasie. I arise to fall before thee; I come to kiss thy feet; To adorn thee and adore thee, Mine only one! my sweet! And thy love hath power upon me, Like a dream upon a brain; For the loveliness which won me, With the love, too, doth remain. And my life it beautifieth, Though love be but a shade, Known of only ere it dieth, By the darkness it hath made. Was that addressed to me? | | Student | Well, now resume. | | Festus | Trial alone of ill and folly gives Gear proofs of the world’s vanities; but little Good comes of sermons, prophecies, or warnings. Though from the steps of an old grey market-cross, The Devil is holding forth to the faithless. There A social prayer is offered up, too. This Is followed by a bird’s-eye view of earth, A stirring-up of the dust of all the nations. Then comes a village feast; a kind of home Unto the traveller⁠—where, with the world, We mix in private, talking divers things; A country merry-making, where all speak According to their sorts, and the occasion. Deeper than ever leadline went, behold We search the rayless central sun within. We penetrate all mysteries, but are Unfitted long to dwell in the recess Of our own nature, and we long for light. True aspiration riseth from research. Next, by the o’erthrown altar of a fane, Foundation-shattered, like the ripened heart, We find ourselves in worship. Let us hope The spirit, form, and offering, grateful all. In one of Earth’s head cities, after this, We tower-like rise, and with an eminent eye Glance round society, insatiate;⁠— The high unknown as yet unrealized. In less time than the twinkling of a star, Insphered in air, the arch-fiend and the youth, Like twilight and midnight, discourse and rise. Thence to another planet, for the book, Stream-like doth steal the images of stars, And trembles at its boldness, where we meet The spirit of the first night of temptation; And mix with many of those lofty musings Which sow in us the seeds of higher kind And brighter being. Heavenly poesie, Which shines among the powers of our mind, As that bright star she dwells in, mid the worlds Which make the system of the sun, is there too. But these high things are lost, and drowned, and dimmed, Like a blue eye in tears, that trickle from it Like angels leaving Heaven on their errands Of love, behind them, in the scene succeeding;⁠— A scene of song, and dance, and mirth, and wine, And damsels, in whose lily skin the blue Veins branch themselves in hidden luxury, Hues of the heaven they seem to have vanished from. | | Helen | Moonlight and music, and kisses, and wine, And beauty, which must be, for rhyme-sake, divine. | | Festus | Mere joys; but saddened and sublimed at close By sweet remembrance of immortal ones Once loved, aye hallowed. Still, in scenes like this, Youth lingers longest, drawing out his time As a gold-beater does his wire, until ’Twould reach round the earth. | | Student | And be of no use then. | | Festus | Blame not the bard for showing this, but mind He wrote of youth as passionate genius, Its flights and follies⁠—both its sensual ends And common places. To behold an eagle Batting the sunny ceiling of the world With his dark wings, one well might deem his heart On heaven; but, no! it is fixed on flesh and blood, And soon his talons tell it. Pass we on! A brief and solemn parley o’er a grave Follows, in which youth vows to trust in God, Be the end what it may. A prescient view Of what is true repentance to the soul, Spirit-informed, expands; and over all The spiritual harmonies of Heaven By the raised soul are heard, and God’s great rule To creatures justified. And next we find Ourselves in Heaven. Even man’s deadly life Can be there, by God’s leave. Once brought to God, The soul’s foredoom is set before it brightly, And Heaven’s designs are seen to be brought to bear. A lightning revelation of the Heavens, And what is in them. Let it not be said He sought his God in the self-slayer’s way, Whose highest aim was but to worship in All humbleness; for he was called thereto, To show the holy God, in three scenes, first And last in Threelihood, and midst in One: Although less hard to shape the wide-winged wind O’er the bright heights of air. He will forgive: For we, this moment, and all living souls⁠— All matter, are as much within his presence, And known through, like a glass film in the sun, As we can ever be. Through sundry worlds The mortal wends, returning, and relates To her he loves⁠—and joyously, they greet, As boat by breeze and billow backed by tide⁠— His bright experience of celestial homes; Where spiritual natures, kind and high, Light-born, which can divine immortal things, Abide embosomed in Eternity. Something he tells, too, of the friendly fiend, Something of ancient ages, infant Earth. To this succeeds a scene explaining much, Of retrospective and prospective cast, Between the bard his beauty and his friend. Our story ties us here to earth again, And sea all aged. Evil is in love; And ever those who are unhappiest have Their hearts desire the oftenest, but in dreams. Dreams are mind-clouds, high, and unshapen beauties, Or but God-shaped, like mountains, which contain Much and rich matter; often not for us, But for another. Dreams are rudiments Of the great state to come. We dream what is About to happen to us. | | Helen | What may be The dream in this case? | | Festus | It is one of death. |