Hellas. A Lyrical Drama.

HERALD OF ETERNITY:     It is the day when all the sons of God     Wait in the roofless senate-house, whose floor     Is Chaos, and the immovable abyss     Frozen by His steadfast word to hyaline     ...     The shadow of God, and delegate     Of that before whose breath the universe     Is as a print of dew.     Hierarchs and kings     Who from your thrones pinnacled on the past     Sway the reluctant present, ye who sit     Pavilioned on the radiance or the gloom     Of mortal thought, which like an exhalation     Steaming from earth, conceals the ... of heaven     Which gave it birth. ... assemble here     Before your Father's throne; the swift decree     Yet hovers, and the fiery incarnation     Is yet withheld, clothed in which it shall     annul     The fairest of those wandering isles that gem     The sapphire space of interstellar air,     That green and azure sphere, that earth enwrapped     Less in the beauty of its tender light     Than in an atmosphere of living spirit     Which interpenetrating all the ...     it rolls from realm to realm     And age to age, and in its ebb and flow     Impels the generations     To their appointed place,     Whilst the high Arbiter     Beholds the strife, and at the appointed time     Sends His decrees veiled in eternal...     Within the circuit of this pendent orb     There lies an antique region, on which fell     The dews of thought in the world's golden dawn     Earliest and most benign, and from it sprung     Temples and cities and immortal forms     And harmonies of wisdom and of song,     And thoughts, and deeds worthy of thoughts so fair.     And when the sun of its dominion failed,     And when the winter of its glory came,     The winds that stripped it bare blew on and swept     That dew into the utmost wildernesses     In wandering clouds of sunny rain that thawed     The unmaternal bosom of the North.     Haste, sons of God, ... for ye beheld,     Reluctant, or consenting, or astonished,     The stern decrees go forth, which heaped on Greece     Ruin and degradation and despair.     A fourth now waits: assemble, sons of God,     To speed or to prevent or to suspend,     If, as ye dream, such power be not withheld,     The unaccomplished destiny.     NOTE:     _8 your Garnett; yon Forman, Dowden.     ...     CHORUS:     The curtain of the Universe     Is rent and shattered,     The splendour-winged worlds disperse     Like wild doves scattered.     Space is roofless and bare,     And in the midst a cloudy shrine,     Dark amid thrones of light.     In the blue glow of hyaline     Golden worlds revolve and shine.     In ... flight     From every point of the Infinite,     Like a thousand dawns on a single night     The splendours rise and spread;     And through thunder and darkness dread     Light and music are radiated,     And in their pavilioned chariots led     By living wings high overhead     The giant Powers move,     Gloomy or bright as the thrones they fill.     ...     A chaos of light and motion     Upon that glassy ocean.     ...     The senate of the Gods is met,     Each in his rank and station set;     There is silence in the spaces -     Lo! Satan, Christ, and Mahomet     Start from their places!     CHRIST:     Almighty Father!     Low-kneeling at the feet of Destiny     ...     There are two fountains in which spirits weep     When mortals err, Discord and Slavery named,     And with their bitter dew two Destinies     Filled each their irrevocable urns; the third     Fiercest and mightiest, mingled both, and added     Chaos and Death, and slow Oblivion's lymph,     And hate and terror, and the poisoned rain     ...     The Aurora of the nations. By this brow     Whose pores wept tears of blood, by these wide wounds,     By this imperial crown of agony,     By infamy and solitude and death,     For this I underwent, and by the pain     Of pity for those who would ... for me     The unremembered joy of a revenge,     For this I felt - by Plato's sacred light,     Of which my spirit was a burning morrow -     By Greece and all she cannot cease to be.     Her quenchless words, sparks of immortal truth,     Stars of all night - her harmonies and forms,     Echoes and shadows of what Love adores     In thee, I do compel thee, send forth Fate,     Thy irrevocable child: let her descend,     A seraph-winged Victory [arrayed]     In tempest of the omnipotence of God     Which sweeps through all things.     From hollow leagues, from Tyranny which arms     Adverse miscreeds and emulous anarchies     To stamp, as on a winged serpent's seed,     Upon the name of Freedom; from the storm     Of faction, which like earthquake shakes and sickens     The solid heart of enterprise; from all     By which the holiest dreams of highest spirits     Are stars beneath the dawn...     She shall arise     Victorious as the world arose from Chaos!     And as the Heavens and the Earth arrayed     Their presence in the beauty and the light     Of Thy first smile, O Father, - as they gather     The spirit of Thy love which paves for them     Their path o'er the abyss, till every sphere     Shall be one living Spirit, - so shall Greece -     SATAN:     Be as all things beneath the empyrean,     Mine! Art thou eyeless like old Destiny,     Thou mockery-king, crowned with a wreath of thorns?     Whose sceptre is a reed, the broken reed     Which pierces thee! whose throne a chair of scorn;     For seest thou not beneath this crystal floor     The innumerable worlds of golden light     Which are my empire, and the least of them     which thou wouldst redeem from me?     Know'st thou not them my portion?     Or wouldst rekindle the ... strife     Which our great Father then did arbitrate     Which he assigned to his competing sons     Each his apportioned realm?     Thou Destiny,     Thou who art mailed in the omnipotence     Of Him who tends thee forth, whate'er thy task,     Speed, spare not to accomplish, and be mine     Thy trophies, whether Greece again become     The fountain in the desert whence the earth     Shall drink of freedom, which shall give it strength     To suffer, or a gulf of hollow death     To swallow all delight, all life, all hope.     Go, thou Vicegerent of my will, no less     Than of the Father's; but lest thou shouldst faint,     The winged hounds, Famine and Pestilence,     Shall wait on thee, the hundred-forked snake     Insatiate Superstition still shall...     The earth behind thy steps, and War shall hover     Above, and Fraud shall gape below, and Change     Shall flit before thee on her dragon wings,     Convulsing and consuming, and I add     Three vials of the tears which daemons weep     When virtuous spirits through the gate of Death     Pass triumphing over the thorns of life,     Sceptres and crowns, mitres and swords and snares,     Trampling in scorn, like Him and Socrates.     The first is Anarchy; when Power and Pleasure,     Glory and science and security,     On Freedom hang like fruit on the green tree,     Then pour it forth, and men shall gather ashes.     The second Tyranny -     CHRIST:     Obdurate spirit!     Thou seest but the Past in the To-come.     Pride is thy error and thy punishment.     Boast not thine empire, dream not that thy worlds     Are more than furnace-sparks or rainbow-drops     Before the Power that wields and kindles them.     True greatness asks not space, true excellence     Lives in the Spirit of all things that live,     Which lends it to the worlds thou callest thine.     ...     MAHOMET:     ...Haste thou and fill the waning crescent     With beams as keen as those which pierced the shadow     Of Christian night rolled back upon the West,     When the orient moon of Islam rode in triumph     From Tmolus to the Acroceraunian snow.     ...     Wake, thou Word     Of God, and from the throne of Destiny     Even to the utmost limit of thy way     May Triumph     ...     Be thou a curse on them whose creed     Divides and multiplies the most high God.     HELLAS.     DRAMATIS PERSONAE:     MAHMUD.     HASSAN.     DAOOD.     AHASUERUS, A JEW.     CHORUS OF GREEK CAPTIVE WOMEN.     [THE PHANTOM OF MAHOMET II. (OMITTED, EDITION 1822.)]     MESSENGERS, SLAVES, AND ATTENDANTS.     SCENE:     CONSTANTINOPLE.     TIME: SUNSET.     SCENE:     A TERRACE ON THE SERAGLIO.     MAHMUD SLEEPING,     AN INDIAN SLAVE SITTING BESIDE HIS COUCH.     CHORUS OF GREEK CAPTIVE WOMEN:     We strew these opiate flowers     On thy restless pillow, -     They were stripped from Orient bowers,     By the Indian billow.     Be thy sleep     Calm and deep,     Like theirs who fell - not ours who weep!     INDIAN:     Away, unlovely dreams!     Away, false shapes of sleep     Be his, as Heaven seems,     Clear, and bright, and deep!     Soft as love, and calm as death,     Sweet as a summer night without a breath.     CHORUS:     Sleep, sleep! our song is laden     With the soul of slumber;     It was sung by a Samian maiden,     Whose lover was of the number     Who now keep     That calm sleep     Whence none may wake, where none shall weep.     INDIAN:     I touch thy temples pale!     I breathe my soul on thee!     And could my prayers avail,     All my joy should be     Dead, and I would live to weep,     So thou mightst win one hour of quiet sleep.     CHORUS:     Breathe low, low     The spell of the mighty mistress now!     When Conscience lulls her sated snake,     And Tyrants sleep, let Freedom wake.     Breathe low - low     The words which, like secret fire, shall flow     Through the veins of the frozen earth - low, low!     SEMICHORUS 1:     Life may change, but it may fly not;     Hope may vanish, but can die not;     Truth be veiled, but still it burneth;     Love repulsed, - but it returneth!     SEMICHORUS 2:     Yet were life a charnel where     Hope lay coffined with Despair;     Yet were truth a sacred lie,     Love were lust -     SEMICHORUS 1:     If Liberty     Lent not life its soul of light,     Hope its iris of delight,     Truth its prophet's robe to wear,     Love its power to give and bear.     CHORUS:     In the great morning of the world,     The Spirit of God with might unfurled     The flag of Freedom over Chaos,     And all its banded anarchs fled,     Like vultures frighted from Imaus,     Before an earthquake's tread. -     So from Time's tempestuous dawn     Freedom's splendour burst and shone: -     Thermopylae and Marathon     Caught like mountains beacon-lighted,     The springing Fire. - The winged glory     On Philippi half-alighted,     Like an eagle on a promontory.     Its unwearied wings could fan     The quenchless ashes of Milan.     From age to age, from man to man,     It lived; and lit from land to land     Florence, Albion, Switzerland.     Then night fell; and, as from night,     Reassuming fiery flight,     From the West swift Freedom came,     Against the course of Heaven and doom.     A second sun arrayed in flame,     To burn, to kindle, to illume.     From far Atlantis its young beams     Chased the shadows and the dreams.     France, with all her sanguine steams,     Hid, but quenched it not; again     Through clouds its shafts of glory rain     From utmost Germany to Spain.     As an eagle fed with morning     Scorns the embattled tempest's warning,     When she seeks her aerie hanging     In the mountain-cedar's hair,     And her brood expect the clanging     Of her wings through the wild air,     Sick with famine: - Freedom, so     To what of Greece remaineth now     Returns; her hoary ruins glow     Like Orient mountains lost in day;     Beneath the safety of her wings     Her renovated nurslings prey,     And in the naked lightenings     Of truth they purge their dazzled eyes.     Let Freedom leave - where'er she flies,     A Desert, or a Paradise:     Let the beautiful and the brave     Share her glory, or a grave.     NOTES:     _77 tempest's]tempests edition 1822.     _87 prey edition 1822; play editions 1839.     SEMICHORUS 1:     With the gifts of gladness     Greece did thy cradle strew;     SEMICHORUS 2:     With the tears of sadness     Greece did thy shroud bedew!     SEMICHORUS 1:     With an orphan's affection     She followed thy bier through Time;     SEMICHORUS 2:     And at thy resurrection     Reappeareth, like thou, sublime!     SEMICHORUS 1:     If Heaven should resume thee,     To Heaven shall her spirit ascend;     SEMICHORUS 2:     If Hell should entomb thee,     To Hell shall her high hearts bend.     SEMICHORUS 1:     If Annihilation -     SEMICHORUS 2:     Dust let her glories be!     And a name and a nation     Be forgotten, Freedom, with thee!     INDIAN:     His brow grows darker - breathe not - move not!     He starts - he shudders - ye that love not,     With your panting loud and fast,     Have awakened him at last.     MAHMUD [STARTING FROM HIS SLEEP]:     Man the Seraglio-guard! make fast the gate!     What! from a cannonade of three short hours?     'Tis false! that breach towards the Bosphorus     Cannot be practicable yet - who stirs?     Stand to the match; that when the foe prevails     One spark may mix in reconciling ruin     The conqueror and the conquered! Heave the tower     Into the gap - wrench off the roof!     [ENTER HASSAN.]     Ha! what!     The truth of day lightens upon my dream     And I am Mahmud still.     HASSAN:     Your Sublime Highness     Is strangely moved.     MAHMUD:     The times do cast strange shadows     On those who watch and who must rule their course,     Lest they, being first in peril as in glory,     Be whelmed in the fierce ebb: - and these are of them.     Thrice has a gloomy vision hunted me     As thus from sleep into the troubled day;     It shakes me as the tempest shakes the sea,     Leaving no figure upon memory's glass.     Would that - no matter. Thou didst say thou knewest     A Jew, whose spirit is a chronicle     Of strange and secret and forgotten things.     I bade thee summon him: - 'tis said his tribe     Dream, and are wise interpreters of dreams.     HASSAN:     The Jew of whom I spake is old, - so old     He seems to have outlived a world's decay;     The hoary mountains and the wrinkled ocean     Seem younger still than he; - his hair and beard     Are whiter than the tempest-sifted snow;     His cold pale limbs and pulseless arteries     Are like the fibres of a cloud instinct     With light, and to the soul that quickens them     Are as the atoms of the mountain-drift     To the winter wind: - but from his eye looks forth     A life of unconsumed thought which pierces     The Present, and the Past, and the To-come.     Some say that this is he whom the great prophet     Jesus, the son of Joseph, for his mockery,     Mocked with the curse of immortality.     Some feign that he is Enoch: others dream     He was pre-adamite and has survived     Cycles of generation and of ruin.     The sage, in truth, by dreadful abstinence     And conquering penance of the mutinous flesh,     Deep contemplation, and unwearied study,     In years outstretched beyond the date of man,     May have attained to sovereignty and science     Over those strong and secret things and thoughts     Which others fear and know not.     MAHMUD:     I would talk     With this old Jew.     HASSAN:     Thy will is even now     Made known to him, where he dwells in a sea-cavern     'Mid the Demonesi, less accessible     Than thou or God! He who would question him     Must sail alone at sunset, where the stream     Of Ocean sleeps around those foamless isles,     When the young moon is westering as now,     And evening airs wander upon the wave;     And when the pines of that bee-pasturing isle,     Green Erebinthus, quench the fiery shadow     Of his gilt prow within the sapphire water,     Then must the lonely helmsman cry aloud     'Ahasuerus!' and the caverns round     Will answer 'Ahasuerus!' If his prayer     Be granted, a faint meteor will arise     Lighting him over Marmora, and a wind     Will rush out of the sighing pine-forest,     And with the wind a storm of harmony     Unutterably sweet, and pilot him     Through the soft twilight to the Bosphorus:     Thence at the hour and place and circumstance     Fit for the matter of their conference     The Jew appears. Few dare, and few who dare     Win the desired communion - but that shout     Bodes -     [A SHOUT WITHIN.]     MAHMUD:     Evil, doubtless; Like all human sounds.     Let me converse with spirits.     HASSAN:     That shout again.     MAHMUD:     This Jew whom thou hast summoned -     HASSAN:     Will be here -     MAHMUD:     When the omnipotent hour to which are yoked     He, I, and all things shall compel - enough!     Silence those mutineers - that drunken crew,     That crowd about the pilot in the storm.     Ay! strike the foremost shorter by a head!     They weary me, and I have need of rest.     Kinks are like stars - they rise and set, they have     The worship of the world, but no repose.     [EXEUNT SEVERALLY.]     CHORUS:     Worlds on worlds are rolling ever     From creation to decay,     Like the bubbles on a river     Sparkling, bursting, borne away.     But they are still immortal     Who, through birth's orient portal     And death's dark chasm hurrying to and fro,     Clothe their unceasing flight     In the brief dust and light     Gathered around their chariots as they go;     New shapes they still may weave,     New gods, new laws receive,     Bright or dim are they as the robes they last     On Death's bare ribs had cast.     A power from the unknown God,     A Promethean conqueror, came;     Like a triumphal path he trod     The thorns of death and shame.     A mortal shape to him     Was like the vapour dim     Which the orient planet animates with light;     Hell, Sin, and Slavery came,     Like bloodhounds mild and tame,     Nor preyed, until their Lord had taken flight;     The moon of Mahomet     Arose, and it shall set:     While blazoned as on Heaven's immortal noon     The cross leads generations on.     Swift as the radiant shapes of sleep     From one whose dreams are Paradise     Fly, when the fond wretch wakes to weep,     And Day peers forth with her blank eyes;     So fleet, so faint, so fair,     The Powers of earth and air     Fled from the folding-star of Bethlehem:     Apollo, Pan, and Love,     And even Olympian Jove     Grew weak, for killing Truth had glared on them;     Our hills and seas and streams,     Dispeopled of their dreams,     Their waters turned to blood, their dew to tears,     Wailed for the golden years.     [ENTER MAHMUD, HASSAN, DAOOD, AND OTHERS.]     MAHMUD:     More gold? our ancestors bought gold with victory,     And shall I sell it for defeat?     DAOOD:     The Janizars     Clamour for pay.     MAHMUD:     Go! bid them pay themselves     With Christian blood! Are there no Grecian virgins     Whose shrieks and spasms and tears they may enjoy?     No infidel children to impale on spears?     No hoary priests after that Patriarch     Who bent the curse against his country's heart,     Which clove his own at last? Go! bid them kill,     Blood is the seed of gold.     DAOOD:     It has been sown,     And yet the harvest to the sicklemen     Is as a grain to each.     MAHMUD:     Then, take this signet,     Unlock the seventh chamber in which lie     The treasures of victorious Solyman, -     An empire's spoil stored for a day of ruin.     O spirit of my sires! is it not come?     The prey-birds and the wolves are gorged and sleep;     But these, who spread their feast on the red earth,     Hunger for gold, which fills not. - See them fed;     Then, lead them to the rivers of fresh death.     [EXIT DAOOD.]     O miserable dawn, after a night     More glorious than the day which it usurped!     O faith in God! O power on earth! O word     Of the great prophet, whose o'ershadowing wings     Darkened the thrones and idols of the West,     Now bright! - For thy sake cursed be the hour,     Even as a father by an evil child,     When the orient moon of Islam rolled in triumph     From Caucasus to White Ceraunia!     Ruin above, and anarchy below;     Terror without, and treachery within;     The Chalice of destruction full, and all     Thirsting to drink; and who among us dares     To dash it from his lips? and where is Hope?     HASSAN:     The lamp of our dominion still rides high;     One God is God - Mahomet is His prophet.     Four hundred thousand Moslems, from the limits     Of utmost Asia, irresistibly     Throng, like full clouds at the Sirocco's cry;     But not like them to weep their strength in tears:     They bear destroying lightning, and their step     Wakes earthquake to consume and overwhelm,     And reign in ruin. Phrygian Olympus,     Tmolus, and Latmos, and Mycale, roughen     With horrent arms; and lofty ships even now,     Like vapours anchored to a mountain's edge,     Freighted with fire and whirlwind, wait at Scala     The convoy of the ever-veering wind.     Samos is drunk with blood; - the Greek has paid     Brief victory with swift loss and long despair.     The false Moldavian serfs fled fast and far     When the fierce shout of 'Allah-illa-Allah!'     Rose like the war-cry of the northern wind     Which kills the sluggish clouds, and leaves a flock     Of wild swans struggling with the naked storm.     So were the lost Greeks on the Danube's day!     If night is mute, yet the returning sun     Kindles the voices of the morning birds;     Nor at thy bidding less exultingly     Than birds rejoicing in the golden day,     The Anarchies of Africa unleash     Their tempest-winged cities of the sea,     To speak in thunder to the rebel world.     Like sulphurous clouds, half-shattered by the storm,     They sweep the pale Aegean, while the Queen     Of Ocean, bound upon her island-throne,     Far in the West, sits mourning that her sons     Who frown on Freedom spare a smile for thee:     Russia still hovers, as an eagle might     Within a cloud, near which a kite and crane     Hang tangled in inextricable fight,     To stoop upon the victor; - for she fears     The name of Freedom, even as she hates thine.     But recreant Austria loves thee as the Grave     Loves Pestilence, and her slow dogs of war     Fleshed with the chase, come up from Italy,     And howl upon their limits; for they see     The panther, Freedom, fled to her old cover,     Amid seas and mountains, and a mightier brood     Crouch round. What Anarch wears a crown or mitre,     Or bears the sword, or grasps the key of gold,     Whose friends are not thy friends, whose foes thy foes?     Our arsenals and our armouries are full;     Our forts defy assault; ten thousand cannon     Lie ranged upon the beach, and hour by hour     Their earth-convulsing wheels affright the city;     The galloping of fiery steeds makes pale     The Christian merchant; and the yellow Jew     Hides his hoard deeper in the faithless earth.     Like clouds, and like the shadows of the clouds,     Over the hills of Anatolia,     Swift in wide troops the Tartar chivalry     Sweep; - the far flashing of their starry lances     Reverberates the dying light of day.     We have one God, one King, one Hope, one Law;     But many-headed Insurrection stands     Divided in itself, and soon must fall.     NOTES:     _253 spoil edition 1822; spoils editions 1839.     _279 bear edition 1822; have editions 1839.     _322 assault edition 1822; assaults editions 1839.     MAHMUD:     Proud words, when deeds come short, are seasonable:     Look, Hassan, on yon crescent moon, emblazoned     Upon that shattered flag of fiery cloud     Which leads the rear of the departing day;     Wan emblem of an empire fading now!     See how it trembles in the blood-red air,     And like a mighty lamp whose oil is spent     Shrinks on the horizon's edge, while, from above,     One star with insolent and victorious light     Hovers above its fall, and with keen beams,     Like arrows through a fainting antelope,     Strikes its weak form to death.     HASSAN:     Even as that moon     Renews itself -     MAHMUD:     Shall we be not renewed!     Far other bark than ours were needed now     To stem the torrent of descending time:     The Spirit that lifts the slave before his lord     Stalks through the capitals of armed kings,     And spreads his ensign in the wilderness:     Exults in chains; and, when the rebel falls,     Cries like the blood of Abel from the dust;     And the inheritors of the earth, like beasts     When earthquake is unleashed, with idiot fear     Cower in their kingly dens - as I do now.     What were Defeat when Victory must appal?     Or Danger, when Security looks pale? -     How said the messenger - who, from the fort     Islanded in the Danube, saw the battle     Of Bucharest? - that -     NOTES:     _351 his edition 1822; its editions 1839.     _356 of the earth edition 1822; of earth editions 1839.     HASSAN:     Ibrahim's scimitar     Drew with its gleam swift victory from Heaven,     To burn before him in the night of battle -     A light and a destruction.     MAHMUD:     Ay! the day     Was ours: but how? -     HASSAN:     The light Wallachians,     The Arnaut, Servian, and Albanian allies     Fled from the glance of our artillery     Almost before the thunderstone alit.     One half the Grecian army made a bridge     Of safe and slow retreat, with Moslem dead;     The other -     MAHMUD:     Speak - tremble not. -     HASSAN:     Islanded     By victor myriads, formed in hollow square     With rough and steadfast front, and thrice flung back     The deluge of our foaming cavalry;     Thrice their keen wedge of battle pierced our lines.     Our baffled army trembled like one man     Before a host, and gave them space; but soon,     From the surrounding hills, the batteries blazed,     Kneading them down with fire and iron rain:     Yet none approached; till, like a field of corn     Under the hook of the swart sickleman,     The band, intrenched in mounds of Turkish dead,     Grew weak and few. - Then said the Pacha, 'Slaves,     Render yourselves - they have abandoned you -     What hope of refuge, or retreat, or aid?     We grant your lives.' 'Grant that which is thine own!'     Cried one, and fell upon his sword and died!     Another - 'God, and man, and hope abandon me;     But I to them, and to myself, remain     Constant:' - he bowed his head, and his heart burst.     A third exclaimed, 'There is a refuge, tyrant,     Where thou darest not pursue, and canst not harm     Shouldst thou pursue; there we shall meet again.'     Then held his breath, and, after a brief spasm,     The indignant spirit cast its mortal garment     Among the slain - dead earth upon the earth!     So these survivors, each by different ways,     Some strange, all sudden, none dishonourable,     Met in triumphant death; and when our army     Closed in, while yet wonder, and awe, and shame     Held back the base hyaenas of the battle     That feed upon the dead and fly the living,     One rose out of the chaos of the slain:     And if it were a corpse which some dread spirit     Of the old saviours of the land we rule     Had lifted in its anger, wandering by; -     Or if there burned within the dying man     Unquenchable disdain of death, and faith     Creating what it feigned; - I cannot tell -     But he cried, 'Phantoms of the free, we come!     Armies of the Eternal, ye who strike     To dust the citadels of sanguine kings,     And shake the souls throned on their stony hearts,     And thaw their frostwork diadems like dew; -     O ye who float around this clime, and weave     The garment of the glory which it wears,     Whose fame, though earth betray the dust it clasped,     Lies sepulchred in monumental thought; -     Progenitors of all that yet is great,     Ascribe to your bright senate, O accept     In your high ministrations, us, your sons -     Us first, and the more glorious yet to come!     And ye, weak conquerors! giants who look pale     When the crushed worm rebels beneath your tread,     The vultures and the dogs, your pensioners tame,     Are overgorged; but, like oppressors, still     They crave the relic of Destruction's feast.     The exhalations and the thirsty winds     Are sick with blood; the dew is foul with death;     Heaven's light is quenched in slaughter: thus, where'er     Upon your camps, cities, or towers, or fleets,     The obscene birds the reeking remnants cast     Of these dead limbs, - upon your streams and mountains,     Upon your fields, your gardens, and your housetops,     Where'er the winds shall creep, or the clouds fly,     Or the dews fall, or the angry sun look down     With poisoned light - Famine, and Pestilence,     And Panic, shall wage war upon our side!     Nature from all her boundaries is moved     Against ye: Time has found ye light as foam.     The Earth rebels; and Good and Evil stake     Their empire o'er the unborn world of men     On this one cast; - but ere the die be thrown,     The renovated genius of our race,     Proud umpire of the impious game, descends,     A seraph-winged Victory, bestriding     The tempest of the Omnipotence of God,     Which sweeps all things to their appointed doom,     And you to oblivion!' - More he would have said,     But -     NOTE:     _384 band edition 1822; bands editions 1839.     MAHMUD:     Died - as thou shouldst ore thy lips had painted     Their ruin in the hues of our success.     A rebel's crime, gilt with a rebel's tongue!     Your heart is Greek, Hassan.     HASSAN:     It may be so:     A spirit not my own wrenched me within,     And I have spoken words I fear and hate;     Yet would I die for -     MAHMUD:     Live! oh live! outlive     Me and this sinking empire. But the fleet -     HASSAN:     Alas! -     MAHMUD:     The fleet which, like a flock of clouds     Chased by the wind, flies the insurgent banner!     Our winged castles from their merchant ships!     Our myriads before their weak pirate bands!     Our arms before their chains! our years of empire     Before their centuries of servile fear!     Death is awake! Repulse is on the waters!     They own no more the thunder-bearing banner     Of Mahmud; but, like hounds of a base breed,     Gorge from a stranger's hand, and rend their master.     NOTE:     _466 Repulse is "Shelley, Errata", edition 1822; Repulsed edition 1822.     HASSAN:     Latmos, and Ampelos, and Phanae saw     The wreck -     MAHMUD:     The caves of the Icarian isles     Told each to the other in loud mockery,     And with the tongue as of a thousand echoes,     First of the sea-convulsing fight - and, then, -     Thou darest to speak - senseless are the mountains:     Interpret thou their voice!     NOTE:     _472 Told Errata, Wms. transcript; Hold edition 1822.     HASSAN:     My presence bore     A part in that day's shame. The Grecian fleet     Bore down at daybreak from the North, and hung     As multitudinous on the ocean line,     As cranes upon the cloudless Thracian wind.     Our squadron, convoying ten thousand men,     Was stretching towards Nauplia when the battle     Was kindled. -     First through the hail of our artillery     The agile Hydriote barks with press of sail     Dashed: - ship to ship, cannon to cannon, man     To man were grappled in the embrace of war,     Inextricable but by death or victory.     The tempest of the raging fight convulsed     To its crystalline depths that stainless sea,     And shook Heaven's roof of golden morning clouds,     Poised on an hundred azure mountain-isles.     In the brief trances of the artillery     One cry from the destroyed and the destroyer     Rose, and a cloud of desolation wrapped     The unforeseen event, till the north wind     Sprung from the sea, lifting the heavy veil     Of battle-smoke - then victory - victory!     For, as we thought, three frigates from Algiers     Bore down from Naxos to our aid, but soon     The abhorred cross glimmered behind, before,     Among, around us; and that fatal sign     Dried with its beams the strength in Moslem hearts,     As the sun drinks the dew. - What more? We fled! -     Our noonday path over the sanguine foam     Was beaconed, - and the glare struck the sun pale, -     By our consuming transports: the fierce light     Made all the shadows of our sails blood-red,     And every countenance blank. Some ships lay feeding     The ravening fire, even to the water's level;     Some were blown up; some, settling heavily,     Sunk; and the shrieks of our companions died     Upon the wind, that bore us fast and far,     Even after they were dead. Nine thousand perished!     We met the vultures legioned in the air     Stemming the torrent of the tainted wind;     They, screaming from their cloudy mountain-peaks,     Stooped through the sulphurous battle-smoke and perched     Each on the weltering carcase that we loved,     Like its ill angel or its damned soul,     Riding upon the bosom of the sea.     We saw the dog-fish hastening to their feast.     Joy waked the voiceless people of the sea,     And ravening Famine left his ocean cave     To dwell with War, with us, and with Despair.     We met night three hours to the west of Patmos,     And with night, tempest -     NOTES:     _503 in edition 1822; of editions 1839.     _527 And edition 1822; As editions 1839.     MAHMUD:     Cease!     [ENTER A MESSENGER.]     MESSENGER:     Your Sublime Highness,     That Christian hound, the Muscovite Ambassador,     Has left the city. - If the rebel fleet     Had anchored in the port, had victory     Crowned the Greek legions in the Hippodrome,     Panic were tamer. - Obedience and Mutiny,     Like giants in contention planet-struck,     Stand gazing on each other. - There is peace     In Stamboul. -     MAHMUD:     Is the grave not calmer still?     Its ruins shall be mine.     HASSAN:     Fear not the Russian:     The tiger leagues not with the stag at bay     Against the hunter. - Cunning, base, and cruel,     He crouches, watching till the spoil be won,     And must be paid for his reserve in blood.     After the war is fought, yield the sleek Russian     That which thou canst not keep, his deserved portion     Of blood, which shall not flow through streets and fields,     Rivers and seas, like that which we may win,     But stagnate in the veins of Christian slaves!     [ENTER SECOND MESSENGER.]     SECOND MESSENGER:     Nauplia, Tripolizza, Mothon, Athens,     Navarin, Artas, Monembasia,     Corinth, and Thebes are carried by assault,     And every Islamite who made his dogs     Fat with the flesh of Galilean slaves     Passed at the edge of the sword: the lust of blood,     Which made our warriors drunk, is quenched in death;     But like a fiery plague breaks out anew     In deeds which make the Christian cause look pale     In its own light. The garrison of Patras     Has store but for ten days, nor is there hope     But from the Briton: at once slave and tyrant,     His wishes still are weaker than his fears,     Or he would sell what faith may yet remain     From the oaths broke in Genoa and in Norway;     And if you buy him not, your treasury     Is empty even of promises - his own coin.     The freedman of a western poet-chief     Holds Attica with seven thousand rebels,     And has beat back the Pacha of Negropont:     The aged Ali sits in Yanina     A crownless metaphor of empire:     His name, that shadow of his withered might,     Holds our besieging army like a spell     In prey to famine, pest, and mutiny;     He, bastioned in his citadel, looks forth     Joyless upon the sapphire lake that mirrors     The ruins of the city where he reigned     Childless and sceptreless. The Greek has reaped     The costly harvest his own blood matured,     Not the sower, Ali - who has bought a truce     From Ypsilanti with ten camel-loads     Of Indian gold.     NOTE:     _563 freedman edition 1822; freeman editions 1839.     [ENTER A THIRD MESSENGER.]     MAHMUD:     What more?     THIRD MESSENGER:     The Christian tribes     Of Lebanon and the Syrian wilderness     Are in revolt; - Damascus, Hems, Aleppo     Tremble; - the Arab menaces Medina,     The Aethiop has intrenched himself in Sennaar,     And keeps the Egyptian rebel well employed,     Who denies homage, claims investiture     As price of tardy aid. Persia demands     The cities on the Tigris, and the Georgians     Refuse their living tribute. Crete and Cyprus,     Like mountain-twins that from each other's veins     Catch the volcano-fire and earthquake-spasm,     Shake in the general fever. Through the city,     Like birds before a storm, the Santons shriek,     And prophesyings horrible and new     Are heard among the crowd: that sea of men     Sleeps on the wrecks it made, breathless and still.     A Dervise, learned in the Koran, preaches     That it is written how the sins of Islam     Must raise up a destroyer even now.     The Greeks expect a Saviour from the West,     Who shall not come, men say, in clouds and glory,     But in the omnipresence of that Spirit     In which all live and are. Ominous signs     Are blazoned broadly on the noonday sky:     One saw a red cross stamped upon the sun;     It has rained blood; and monstrous births declare     The secret wrath of Nature and her Lord.     The army encamped upon the Cydaris     Was roused last night by the alarm of battle,     And saw two hosts conflicting in the air,     The shadows doubtless of the unborn time     Cast on the mirror of the night. While yet     The fight hung balanced, there arose a storm     Which swept the phantoms from among the stars.     At the third watch the Spirit of the Plague     Was heard abroad flapping among the tents;     Those who relieved watch found the sentinels dead.     The last news from the camp is, that a thousand     Have sickened, and -     [ENTER A FOURTH MESSENGER.]     MAHMUD:     And thou, pale ghost, dim shadow     Of some untimely rumour, speak!     FOURTH MESSENGER:     One comes     Fainting with toil, covered with foam and blood:     He stood, he says, on Chelonites'     Promontory, which o'erlooks the isles that groan     Under the Briton's frown, and all their waters     Then trembling in the splendour of the moon,     When as the wandering clouds unveiled or hid     Her boundless light, he saw two adverse fleets     Stalk through the night in the horizon's glimmer,     Mingling fierce thunders and sulphureous gleams,     And smoke which strangled every infant wind     That soothed the silver clouds through the deep air.     At length the battle slept, but the Sirocco     Awoke, and drove his flock of thunder-clouds     Over the sea-horizon, blotting out     All objects - save that in the faint moon-glimpse     He saw, or dreamed he saw, the Turkish admiral     And two the loftiest of our ships of war,     With the bright image of that Queen of Heaven,     Who hid, perhaps, her face for grief, reversed;     And the abhorred cross -     NOTE:     _620 on Chelonites']on Chelonites "Errata";          upon Clelonite's edition 1822;          upon Clelonit's editions 1839.     [ENTER AN ATTENDANT.]     ATTENDANT:     Your Sublime Highness,     The Jew, who -     MAHMUD:     Could not come more seasonably:     Bid him attend. I'll hear no more! too long     We gaze on danger through the mist of fear,     And multiply upon our shattered hopes     The images of ruin. Come what will!     To-morrow and to-morrow are as lamps     Set in our path to light us to the edge     Through rough and smooth, nor can we suffer aught     Which He inflicts not in whose hand we are.     [EXEUNT.]     SEMICHORUS 1:     Would I were the winged cloud     Of a tempest swift and loud!     I would scorn     The smile of morn     And the wave where the moonrise is born!     I would leave     The spirits of eve     A shroud for the corpse of the day to weave     From other threads than mine!     Bask in the deep blue noon divine.     Who would? Not I.     NOTE:     _657 the deep blue "Errata", Wms. transcript; the blue edition 1822.     SEMICHORUS 2:     Whither to fly?     SEMICHORUS 1:     Where the rocks that gird th' Aegean     Echo to the battle paean     Of the free -     I would flee     A tempestuous herald of victory!     My golden rain     For the Grecian slain     Should mingle in tears with the bloody main,     And my solemn thunder-knell     Should ring to the world the passing-bell     Of Tyranny!     SEMICHORUS 2:     Ah king! wilt thou chain     The rack and the rain?     Wilt thou fetter the lightning and hurricane?     The storms are free,     But we -     CHORUS:     O Slavery! thou frost of the world's prime,     Killing its flowers and leaving its thorns bare!     Thy touch has stamped these limbs with crime,     These brows thy branding garland bear,     But the free heart, the impassive soul     Scorn thy control!     SEMICHORUS 1:     Let there be light! said Liberty,     And like sunrise from the sea,     Athens arose! - Around her born,     Shone like mountains in the morn     Glorious states; - and are they now     Ashes, wrecks, oblivion?     SEMICHORUS 2:     Go,     Where Thermae and Asopus swallowed     Persia, as the sand does foam:     Deluge upon deluge followed,     Discord, Macedon, and Rome:     And lastly thou!     SEMICHORUS 1:     Temples and towers,     Citadels and marts, and they     Who live and die there, have been ours,     And may be thine, and must decay;     But Greece and her foundations are     Built below the tide of war,     Based on the crystalline sea     Of thought and its eternity;     Her citizens, imperial spirits,     Rule the present from the past,     On all this world of men inherits     Their seal is set.     SEMICHORUS 2:     Hear ye the blast,     Whose Orphic thunder thrilling calls     From ruin her Titanian walls?     Whose spirit shakes the sapless bones     Of Slavery? Argos, Corinth, Crete     Hear, and from their mountain thrones     The daemons and the nymphs repeat     The harmony.     SEMICHORUS 1:     I hear! I hear!     SEMICHORUS 2:     The world's eyeless charioteer,     Destiny, is hurrying by!     What faith is crushed, what empire bleeds     Beneath her earthquake-footed steeds?     What eagle-winged victory sits     At her right hand? what shadow flits     Before? what splendour rolls behind?     Ruin and renovation cry     'Who but We?'     SEMICHORUS 1:     I hear! I hear!     The hiss as of a rushing wind,     The roar as of an ocean foaming,     The thunder as of earthquake coming.     I hear! I hear!     The crash as of an empire falling,     The shrieks as of a people calling     'Mercy! mercy!' - How they thrill!     Then a shout of 'kill! kill! kill!'     And then a small still voice, thus -     SEMICHORUS 2:     For     Revenge and Wrong bring forth their kind,     The foul cubs like their parents are,     Their den is in the guilty mind,     And Conscience feeds them with despair.     NOTE:     _728 For edition 1822, Wms. transcript;          Fear cj. Fleay, Forman, Dowden. See Editor's Note.     SEMICHORUS 1:     In sacred Athens, near the fane     Of Wisdom, Pity's altar stood:     Serve not the unknown God in vain.     But pay that broken shrine again,     Love for hate and tears for blood.     [ENTER MAHMUD AND AHASUERUS.]     MAHMUD:     Thou art a man, thou sayest, even as we.     AHASUERUS:     No more!     MAHMUD:     But raised above thy fellow-men     By thought, as I by power.     AHASUERUS:     Thou sayest so.     MAHMUD:     Thou art an adept in the difficult lore     Of Greek and Frank philosophy; thou numberest     The flowers, and thou measurest the stars;     Thou severest element from element;     Thy spirit is present in the Past, and sees     The birth of this old world through all its cycles     Of desolation and of loveliness,     And when man was not, and how man became     The monarch and the slave of this low sphere,     And all its narrow circles - it is much -     I honour thee, and would be what thou art     Were I not what I am; but the unborn hour,     Cradled in fear and hope, conflicting storms,     Who shall unveil? Nor thou, nor I, nor any     Mighty or wise. I apprehended not     What thou hast taught me, but I now perceive     That thou art no interpreter of dreams;     Thou dost not own that art, device, or God,     Can make the Future present - let it come!     Moreover thou disdainest us and ours;     Thou art as God, whom thou contemplatest.     AHASUERUS:     Disdain thee? - not the worm beneath thy feet!     The Fathomless has care for meaner things     Than thou canst dream, and has made pride for those     Who would be what they may not, or would seem     That which they are not. Sultan! talk no more     Of thee and me, the Future and the Past;     But look on that which cannot change - the One,     The unborn and the undying. Earth and ocean,     Space, and the isles of life or light that gem     The sapphire floods of interstellar air,     This firmament pavilioned upon chaos,     With all its cressets of immortal fire,     Whose outwall, bastioned impregnably     Against the escape of boldest thoughts, repels them     As Calpe the Atlantic clouds - this Whole     Of suns, and worlds, and men, and beasts, and flowers,     With all the silent or tempestuous workings     By which they have been, are, or cease to be,     Is but a vision; - all that it inherits     Are motes of a sick eye, bubbles and dreams;     Thought is its cradle and its grave, nor less     The Future and the Past are idle shadows     Of thought's eternal flight - they have no being:     Nought is but that which feels itself to be.     NOTE:     _762 thy edition 1822; my editions 1839.     MAHMUD:     What meanest thou? Thy words stream like a tempest     Of dazzling mist within my brain - they shake     The earth on which I stand, and hang like night     On Heaven above me. What can they avail?     They cast on all things surest, brightest, best,     Doubt, insecurity, astonishment.     AHASUERUS:     Mistake me not! All is contained in each.     Dodona's forest to an acorn's cup     Is that which has been, or will be, to that     Which is - the absent to the present. Thought     Alone, and its quick elements, Will, Passion,     Reason, Imagination, cannot die;     They are, what that which they regard appears,     The stuff whence mutability can weave     All that it hath dominion o'er, worlds, worms,     Empires, and superstitions. What has thought     To do with time, or place, or circumstance?     Wouldst thou behold the Future? - ask and have!     Knock and it shall be opened - look, and lo!     The coming age is shadowed on the Past     As on a glass.     MAHMUD:     Wild, wilder thoughts convulse     My spirit - Did not Mahomet the Second     Win Stamboul?     AHASUERUS:     Thou wouldst ask that giant spirit     The written fortunes of thy house and faith.     Thou wouldst cite one out of the grave to tell     How what was born in blood must die.     MAHMUD:     Thy words     Have power on me! I see -     AHASUERUS:     What hearest thou?     MAHMUD:     A far whisper -     Terrible silence.     AHASUERUS:     What succeeds?     MAHMUD:     The sound     As of the assault of an imperial city,     The hiss of inextinguishable fire,     The roar of giant cannon; the earthquaking     Fall of vast bastions and precipitous towers,     The shock of crags shot from strange enginery,     The clash of wheels, and clang of armed hoofs,     And crash of brazen mail as of the wreck     Of adamantine mountains - the mad blast     Of trumpets, and the neigh of raging steeds,     The shrieks of women whose thrill jars the blood,     And one sweet laugh, most horrible to hear,     As of a joyous infant waked and playing     With its dead mother's breast, and now more loud     The mingled battle-cry, - ha! hear I not     'En touto nike!' 'Allah-illa-Allah!'?     AHASUERUS:     The sulphurous mist is raised - thou seest -     MAHMUD:     A chasm,     As of two mountains in the wall of Stamboul;     And in that ghastly breach the Islamites,     Like giants on the ruins of a world,     Stand in the light of sunrise. In the dust     Glimmers a kingless diadem, and one     Of regal port has cast himself beneath     The stream of war. Another proudly clad     In golden arms spurs a Tartarian barb     Into the gap, and with his iron mace     Directs the torrent of that tide of men,     And seems - he is - Mahomet!     AHASUERUS:     What thou seest     Is but the ghost of thy forgotten dream.     A dream itself, yet less, perhaps, than that     Thou call'st reality. Thou mayst behold     How cities, on which Empire sleeps enthroned,     Bow their towered crests to mutability.     Poised by the flood, e'en on the height thou holdest,     Thou mayst now learn how the full tide of power     Ebbs to its depths. - Inheritor of glory,     Conceived in darkness, born in blood, and nourished     With tears and toil, thou seest the mortal throes     Of that whose birth was but the same. The Past     Now stands before thee like an Incarnation     Of the To-come; yet wouldst thou commune with     That portion of thyself which was ere thou     Didst start for this brief race whose crown is death,     Dissolve with that strong faith and fervent passion     Which called it from the uncreated deep,     Yon cloud of war, with its tempestuous phantoms     Of raging death; and draw with mighty will     The imperial shade hither.     [EXIT AHASUERUS.]     [THE PHANTOM OF MAHOMET THE SECOND APPEARS.]     MAHMUD:     Approach!     PHANTOM:     I come     Thence whither thou must go! The grave is fitter     To take the living than give up the dead;     Yet has thy faith prevailed, and I am here.     The heavy fragments of the power which fell     When I arose, like shapeless crags and clouds,     Hang round my throne on the abyss, and voices     Of strange lament soothe my supreme repose,     Wailing for glory never to return. -     A later Empire nods in its decay:     The autumn of a greener faith is come,     And wolfish change, like winter, howls to strip     The foliage in which Fame, the eagle, built     Her aerie, while Dominion whelped below.     The storm is in its branches, and the frost     Is on its leaves, and the blank deep expects     Oblivion on oblivion, spoil on spoil,     Ruin on ruin: - Thou art slow, my son;     The Anarchs of the world of darkness keep     A throne for thee, round which thine empire lies     Boundless and mute; and for thy subjects thou,     Like us, shalt rule the ghosts of murdered life,     The phantoms of the powers who rule thee now -     Mutinous passions, and conflicting fears,     And hopes that sate themselves on dust, and die! -     Stripped of their mortal strength, as thou of thine.     Islam must fall, but we will reign together     Over its ruins in the world of death: -     And if the trunk be dry, yet shall the seed     Unfold itself even in the shape of that     Which gathers birth in its decay. Woe! woe!     To the weak people tangled in the grasp     Of its last spasms.     MAHMUD:     Spirit, woe to all!     Woe to the wronged and the avenger! Woe     To the destroyer, woe to the destroyed!     Woe to the dupe, and woe to the deceiver!     Woe to the oppressed, and woe to the oppressor!     Woe both to those that suffer and inflict;     Those who are born and those who die! but say,     Imperial shadow of the thing I am,     When, how, by whom, Destruction must accomplish     Her consummation!     PHANTOM:     Ask the cold pale Hour,     Rich in reversion of impending death,     When HE shall fall upon whose ripe gray hairs     Sit Care, and Sorrow, and Infirmity -     The weight which Crime, whose wings are plumed with years,     Leaves in his flight from ravaged heart to heart     Over the heads of men, under which burthen     They bow themselves unto the grave: fond wretch!     He leans upon his crutch, and talks of years     To come, and how in hours of youth renewed     He will renew lost joys, and -     VOICE WITHOUT:     Victory! Victory!     [THE PHANTOM VANISHES.]     MAHMUD:     What sound of the importunate earth has broken     My mighty trance?     VOICE WITHOUT:     Victory! Victory!     MAHMUD:     Weak lightning before darkness! poor faint smile     Of dying Islam! Voice which art the response     Of hollow weakness! Do I wake and live?     Were there such things, or may the unquiet brain,     Vexed by the wise mad talk of the old Jew,     Have shaped itself these shadows of its fear?     It matters not! - for nought we see or dream,     Possess, or lose, or grasp at, can be worth     More than it gives or teaches. Come what may,     The Future must become the Past, and I     As they were to whom once this present hour,     This gloomy crag of time to which I cling,     Seemed an Elysian isle of peace and joy     Never to be attained. - I must rebuke     This drunkenness of triumph ere it die,     And dying, bring despair. Victory! poor slaves!     [EXIT MAHMUD.]     VOICE WITHOUT:     Shout in the jubilee of death! The Greeks     Are as a brood of lions in the net     Round which the kingly hunters of the earth     Stand smiling. Anarchs, ye whose daily food     Are curses, groans, and gold, the fruit of death,     From Thule to the girdle of the world,     Come, feast! the board groans with the flesh of men;     The cup is foaming with a nation's blood,     Famine and Thirst await! eat, drink, and die!     SEMICHORUS 1:     Victorious Wrong, with vulture scream,     Salutes the rising sun, pursues the flying day!     I saw her, ghastly as a tyrant's dream,     Perch on the trembling pyramid of night,     Beneath which earth and all her realms pavilioned lay     In visions of the dawning undelight.     Who shall impede her flight?     Who rob her of her prey?     VOICE WITHOUT:     Victory! Victory! Russia's famished eagles     Dare not to prey beneath the crescent's light.     Impale the remnant of the Greeks! despoil!     Violate! make their flesh cheaper than dust!     SEMICHORUS 2:     Thou voice which art     The herald of the ill in splendour hid!     Thou echo of the hollow heart     Of monarchy, bear me to thine abode     When desolation flashes o'er a world destroyed:     Oh, bear me to those isles of jagged cloud     Which float like mountains on the earthquake, mid     The momentary oceans of the lightning,     Or to some toppling promontory proud     Of solid tempest whose black pyramid,     Riven, overhangs the founts intensely bright'ning     Of those dawn-tinted deluges of fire     Before their waves expire,     When heaven and earth are light, and only light     In the thunder-night!     NOTE:     _958 earthquake edition 1822; earthquakes editions 1839.     VOICE WITHOUT:     Victory! Victory! Austria, Russia, England,     And that tame serpent, that poor shadow, France,     Cry peace, and that means death when monarchs speak.     Ho, there! bring torches, sharpen those red stakes,     These chains are light, fitter for slaves and poisoners     Than Greeks. Kill! plunder! burn! let none remain.     SEMICHORUS 1:     Alas! for Liberty!     If numbers, wealth, or unfulfilling years,     Or fate, can quell the free!     Alas! for Virtue, when     Torments, or contumely, or the sneers     Of erring judging men     Can break the heart where it abides.     Alas! if Love, whose smile makes this obscure world splendid,     Can change with its false times and tides,     Like hope and terror, -     Alas for Love!     And Truth, who wanderest lone and unbefriended,     If thou canst veil thy lie-consuming mirror     Before the dazzled eyes of Error,     Alas for thee! Image of the Above.     SEMICHORUS 2:     Repulse, with plumes from conquest torn,     Led the ten thousand from the limits of the morn     Through many an hostile Anarchy!     At length they wept aloud, and cried, 'The Sea! the Sea!'     Through exile, persecution, and despair,     Rome was, and young Atlantis shall become     The wonder, or the terror, or the tomb     Of all whose step wakes Power lulled in her savage lair:     But Greece was as a hermit-child,     Whose fairest thoughts and limbs were built     To woman's growth, by dreams so mild,     She knew not pain or guilt;     And now, O Victory, blush! and Empire, tremble     When ye desert the free -     If Greece must be     A wreck, yet shall its fragments reassemble,     And build themselves again impregnably     In a diviner clime,     To Amphionic music on some Cape sublime,     Which frowns above the idle foam of Time.     SEMICHORUS 1:     Let the tyrants rule the desert they have made;     Let the free possess the Paradise they claim;     Be the fortune of our fierce oppressors weighed     With our ruin, our resistance, and our name!     SEMICHORUS 2:     Our dead shall be the seed of their decay,     Our survivors be the shadow of their pride,     Our adversity a dream to pass away -     Their dishonour a remembrance to abide!     VOICE WITHOUT:     Victory! Victory! The bought Briton sends     The keys of ocean to the Islamite. -     Now shall the blazon of the cross be veiled,     And British skill directing Othman might,     Thunder-strike rebel victory. Oh, keep holy     This jubilee of unrevenged blood!     Kill! crush! despoil! Let not a Greek escape!     SEMICHORUS 1:     Darkness has dawned in the East     On the noon of time:     The death-birds descend to their feast     From the hungry clime.     Let Freedom and Peace flee far     To a sunnier strand,     And follow Love's folding-star     To the Evening land!     SEMICHORUS 2:     The young moon has fed     Her exhausted horn     With the sunset's fire:     The weak day is dead,     But the night is not born;     And, like loveliness panting with wild desire     While it trembles with fear and delight,     Hesperus flies from awakening night,     And pants in its beauty and speed with light     Fast-flashing, soft, and bright.     Thou beacon of love! thou lamp of the free!     Guide us far, far away,     To climes where now veiled by the ardour of day     Thou art hidden     From waves on which weary Noon     Faints in her summer swoon,     Between kingless continents sinless as Eden,     Around mountains and islands inviolably     Pranked on the sapphire sea.     SEMICHORUS 1:     Through the sunset of hope,     Like the shapes of a dream.     What Paradise islands of glory gleam!     Beneath Heaven's cope,     Their shadows more clear float by -     The sound of their oceans, the light of their sky,     The music and fragrance their solitudes breathe     Burst, like morning on dream, or like Heaven on death,     Through the walls of our prison;     And Greece, which was dead, is arisen!     NOTE:     _1057 dream edition 1822; dreams editions 1839.     CHORUS:     The world's great age begins anew,     The golden years return,     The earth doth like a snake renew     Her winter weeds outworn:     Heaven smiles, and faiths and empires gleam,     Like wrecks of a dissolving dream.     A brighter Hellas rears its mountains     From waves serener far;     A new Peneus rolls his fountains     Against the morning star.     Where fairer Tempes bloom, there sleep     Young Cyclads on a sunnier deep.     A loftier Argo cleaves the main,     Fraught with a later prize;     Another Orpheus sings again,     And loves, and weeps, and dies.     A new Ulysses leaves once more     Calypso for his native shore.     Oh, write no more the tale of Troy,     If earth Death's scroll must be!     Nor mix with Laian rage the joy     Which dawns upon the free:     Although a subtler Sphinx renew     Riddles of death Thebes never knew.     Another Athens shall arise,     And to remoter time     Bequeath, like sunset to the skies,     The splendour of its prime;     And leave, if nought so bright may live,     All earth can take or Heaven can give.     Saturn and Love their long repose     Shall burst, more bright and good     Than all who fell, than One who rose,     Than many unsubdued:     Not gold, not blood, their altar dowers,     But votive tears and symbol flowers.     Oh, cease! must hate and death return?     Cease! must men kill and die?     Cease! drain not to its dregs the urn     Of bitter prophecy.     The world is weary of the past,     Oh, might it die or rest at last!     NOTES:     _1068 his edition 1822; its editions 1839.     _1072 Argo]Argos edition 1822.     _1091-_1093 See Editor's note.     _1091 bright editions 1839; wise edition 1829 (ed. Galignani).     _1093 unsubdued editions 1839; unwithstood edition 1829 (ed. Galignani).