Book III: Olympus — Athene

But while I stood
Expectant, lo! a fair pale form drew near
With front severe, and wide blue eyes which bore
Mild wisdom in their gaze. Great purity
Shone from her--not the young-eyed innocence
Of her whom first I saw, but that which comes
From wider knowledge, which restrains the tide
Of passionate youth, and leads the musing soul
By the calm deeps of Wisdom. And I knew
My eyes had seen the fair, the virgin Queen,
Who once within her shining Parthenon
Beheld the sages kneel.
She with clear voice
And coldly sweet, yet with a softness too,
As doth befit a virgin:
"She does right
To boast her sway, my sister, seeing indeed
That all things are as by a double law,
And from a double root the tree of Life
Springs up to the face of heaven. Body and Soul,
Matter and Spirit, lower joys of Sense
And higher joys of Thought, I know that both
Build up the shrine of Being. The brute sense
Leaves man a brute; but, winged with soaring thought
Mounts to high heaven. The unembodied spirit,
Dwelling alone, unmated, void of sense,
Is impotent. And yet I hold there is,
Far off, but not too far for mortal reach,
A calmer height, where, nearer to the stars,
Thought sits alone and gazes with rapt gaze,
A large-eyed maiden in a robe of white.
Who brings the light of Knowledge down, and draws
To her pontifical eyes a bridge of gold,
Which spans from earth to heaven.
For what were life,
If things of sense were all, for those large souls
And high, which grudging Nature has shut fast
Within unlovely forms, or those from whom
The circuit of the rapid gliding years
Steals the brief gift of beauty? Shall we hold,
With idle singers, all the treasure of hope
Is lost with youth--swift-fleeting, treacherous youth,
Which fades and flies before the ripening brain
Crowns life with Wisdom's crown? Nay, even in youth,
Is it not more to walk upon the heights
Alone--the cold free heights--and mark the vale
Lie breathless in the glare, or hidden and blurred
By cloud and storm; or pestilence and war
Creep on with blood and death; while the soul dwells
Apart upon the peaks, outfronts the sun
As the eagle does, and takes the coming dawn
While all the vale is dark, and knows the springs
Of tiny rivulets hurrying from the snows,
Which soon shall swell to vast resistless floods,
And feed the Oceans which divide the World?

Oh, ecstasy! oh, wonder! oh, delight!
Which neither the slow-withering wear of Time,
That takes all else--the smooth and rounded cheek
Of youth; the lightsome step; the warm young heart
Which beats for love or friend; the treasure of hope
Immeasurable; the quick-coursing blood
Which makes it joy to be,--ay, takes them all
And leaves us naught--nor yet satiety
Born of too full possession, takes or mars!
Oh, fair delight of learning! which grows great
And stronger and more keen, for slower limbs,
And dimmer eyes and loneliness, and loss
Of lower good--wealth, friendship, ay, and Love--
When the swift soul, turning its weary gaze
From the old vanished joys, projects itself
Into the void and floats in empty space,
Striving to reach the mystic source of Things,
The secrets of the earth and sea and air,
The Law that holds the process of the suns,
The awful depths of Mind and Thought; the prime
Unfathomable mystery of God!

Is there, then, any who holds my worship cold
And lifeless? Nay, but 'tis the light which cheers
The waning life! Love thou thy love, brave youth!
Cleave to thy love, fair maid! it is the Law
Which dominates the world, that bids ye use
Your nature; but, when now the fuller tide
Slackens a little, turn your calmer eyes
To the fair page of Knowledge. It is power
I give, and power is precious. It is strength
To live four-square, careless of outward shows,
And self-sufficing. It is clearer sight
To know the rule of life, the Eternal scheme;
And, knowing it, to do and not to err,
And, doing, to be blest."
The calm voice soared
Higher and higher to the close; the cold
Clear accents, fired as by a hidden fire,
Glowed into life and tenderness, and throbbed
As with some spiritual ecstasy
Sweeter than that of Love.