Part 9 (1/2)

I'm at ease now, friend; worldly in this world, I take and like its way of life; I think My brothers, who administer the means, Live better for my comfort--that's good too; 800 And G.o.d, if he p.r.o.nounce upon such life, Approves my service, which is better still.

If he keep silence--why, for you or me Or that brute beast pulled-up in to-day's ”Times,”

What odds is 't, save to ourselves, what life we lead?

You meet me at this issue: you declare-- All special-pleading done with--truth is truth, And justifies itself by undreamed ways.

You don't fear but it's better, if we doubt, To say so, act up to our truth perceived 810 However feebly. Do then--act away!

'T is there I'm on the watch for you. How one acts Is, both of us agree, our chief concern: And how you 'll act is what I fain would see If, like the candid person you appear, You dare to make the most of your life's scheme As I of mine, live up to its full law Since there's no higher law that counterchecks.

Put natural religion to the test You've just demolished the revealed with--quick, 820 Down to the root of all that checks your will, All prohibition to lie, kill and thieve, Or even to be an atheistic priest!

Suppose a p.r.i.c.king to incontinence-- Philosophers deduce you chast.i.ty Or shame, from just the fact that at the first Whoso embraced a woman in the field, Threw club down and forewent his brains beside, So, stood a ready victim in the reach Of any brother savage, club in hand; 830 Hence saw the use of going out of sight In wood or cave to prosecute his loves: I read this in a French book t' other day.

Does law so a.n.a.lyzed coerce you much?

Oh, men spin clouds of fuzz where matters end, But you who reach where the first thread begins, You'll soon cut that!--which means you can, but won't, Through certain instincts, blind, unreasoned-out, You dare not set aside, you can't tell why, But there they are, and so you let them rule. 840 Then, friend, you seem as much a slave as I, A liar, conscious coward and hypocrite, Without the good the slave expects to get, In case he has a master after all!

You own your instincts? why, what else do I, Who want, am made for, and must have a G.o.d Ere I can be aught, do aught?--no mere name Want, but the true thing with what proves its truth, To wit, a relation from that thing to me, Touching from head to foot--which touch I feel, 850 And with it take the rest, this life of ours!

I live my life here; yours you dare not live,

--Not as I state it, who (you please subjoin) Disfigure such a life and call it names.

While, to your mind, remains another way For simple men: knowledge and power have rights, But ignorance and weakness have rights too.

There needs no crucial effort to find truth If here or there or anywhere about: We ought to turn each side, try hard and see, 860 And if we can't, be glad we've earned at least The right, by one laborious proof the more, To graze in peace earth's pleasant pasturage.

Men are not angels, neither are they brutes: Something we may see, all we cannot see.

What need of lying? I say, I see all, And swear to each detail the most minute In what I think a Pan's face--you, mere cloud: I swear I hear him speak and see him wink, For fear, if once I drop the emphasis, 870 Mankind may doubt there's any cloud at all.

You take the simple life--ready to see, Willing to see (for no cloud 's worth a face)-- And leaving quiet what no strength can move, And which, who bids you move? who has the right?

I bid you; but you are G.o.d's sheep, not mine; <”pastor est=”” tui=”” dominus.”=””> You find In this the pleasant pasture of our life Much you may eat without the least offence, Much you don't eat because your maw objects, 880 Much you would eat but that your fellow-flock Open great eyes at you and even b.u.t.t, And thereupon you like your mates so well You cannot please yourself, offending them; Though when they seem exorbitantly sheep, You weigh your pleasure with their b.u.t.ts and bleats And strike the balance. Sometimes certain fears Restrain you, real checks since you find them so; Sometimes you please yourself and nothing checks: And thus you graze through life with not one lie, 890 And like it best.

But do you, in truth's name?

If so, you beat--which means you are not I-- Who needs must make earth mine and feed my fill Not simply unb.u.t.ted at, unbickered with, But motioned to the velvet of the sward By those obsequious wethers' very selves.

Look at me. sir; my age is double yours: At yours, I knew beforehand, so enjoyed, What now I should be--as, permit the word, I pretty well imagine your whole range 900 And stretch of tether twenty years to come.

We both have minds and bodies much alike: In truth's name, don't you want my bishopric, My daily bread, my influence and my state?

You're young. I'm old; you must be old one day; Will you find then, as I do hour by hour, Women their lovers kneel to, who cut curls From your fat lap-dog's ear to grace a brooch-- Dukes, who pet.i.tion just to kiss your ring-- With much beside you know or may conceive? 910 Suppose we die to-night: well, here am I, Such were my gains, life bore this fruit to me, While writing all the same my articles On music, poetry, the fictile vase Found at Albano, chess, Anacreon's Greek.

But you--the highest honor in your life, The thing you'll crown yourself with, all your days, Is--dining here and drinking this last gla.s.s I pour you out in sign of amity Before we part forever. Of your power 920 And social influence, worldly worth in short, Judge what's my estimation by the fact, I do not condescend to enjoin, beseech, Hint secrecy on one of all these words!

You're shrewd and know that should you publish one The world would brand the lie--my enemies first, Who'd sneer--”the bishop's an arch-hypocrite And knave perhaps, but not so frank a fool.”

Whereas I should not dare for both my ears Breathe one such syllable, smile one such smile, 930 Before the chaplain who reflects myself-- My shade's so much more potent than your flesh.

What's your reward, self-abnegating friend?

Stood you confessed of those exceptional And privileged great natures that dwarf mine-- A zealot with a mad ideal in reach, A poet just about to print his ode, A statesman with a scheme to stop this war, An artist whose religion is his art-- I should have nothing to object: such men 940 Carry the fire, all things grow warm to them, Their drugget's worth my purple, they beat me.

But you--you 're just as little those as I-- You, Gigadibs, who, thirty years of age, Write statedly for Blackwood's Magazine, Believe you see two points in Hamlet's soul Unseized by the Germans yet--which view you'll print-- Meantime the best you have to show being still That lively lightsome article we took Almost for the true d.i.c.kens--what's its name? 950 ”The Slum and Cellar, or Whitechapel life Limned after dark!” it made me laugh, I know, And pleased a month, and brought you in ten pounds.

--Success I recognize and compliment, And therefore give you, if you choose, three words (The card and pencil-scratch is quite enough) Which whether here, in Dublin or New York, Will get you, prompt as at my eyebrow's wink, Such terms as never you aspired to get In all our own reviews and some not ours. 960 Go write your lively sketches! be the first ”Blougram, or The Eccentric Confidence”-- Or better simply say, ”The Outward-bound.”

Why, men as soon would throw it in my teeth As copy and quote the infamy chalked broad About me on the church-door opposite.

You will not wait for that experience though, I fancy, howsoever you decide, To discontinue--not detesting, not Defaming, but at least--despising me! 970 __________________________________________

Over his wine so smiled and talked his hour Sylvester Blougram, styled --(the deuce knows what It's changed to by our novel hierarchy) With Gigadibs the literary man, Who played with spoons, explored his plate's design, And ranged the olive-stones about its edge, While the great bishop rolled him out a mind Long crumpled, till creased consciousness lay smooth.

For Blougram, he believed, say, half he spoke. 980 The other portion, as he shaped it thus For argumentatory purposes, He felt his foe was foolish to dispute.

Some arbitrary accidental thoughts That crossed his mind, amusing because new, He chose to represent as fixtures there, Invariable convictions (such they seemed Beside his interlocutor's loose cards Flung daily down, and not the same way twice) While certain h.e.l.l-deep instincts, man's weak tongue 990 Is never bold to utter in their truth Because styled h.e.l.l-deep ('t is an old mistake To place h.e.l.l at the bottom of the earth) He ignored these--not having in readiness Their nomenclature and philosophy: He said true things, but called them by wrong names.

”On the whole,” he thought, ”I justify myself On every point where cavillers like this Oppugn my life: he tries one kind of fence, I close, he's worsted, that's enough for him. 1000 He's on the ground: if ground should break away I take my stand on, there's a firmer yet Beneath it, both of us may sink and reach.