Ix

Maiden half mortal, half divine, We triumphed in thy coming; to the brinks Our hearts were filled with pride's tumultuous wine; Better to-day who rather feels than thinks. Yet will some graver thoughts intrude, And cares of sterner mood; They won thee: who shall keep thee? From the deeps Where discrowned empires o'er their ruins brood, And many a thwarted hope wrings its weak hands and weeps, I hear the voice as of a mighty wind From all heaven's caverns rushing unconfined, 'I, Freedom, dwell with Knowledge: I abide With men whom dust of faction cannot blind To the slow tracings of the Eternal Mind; With men by culture trained and fortified, Who bitter duty to sweet lusts prefer, Fearless to counsel and obey. Conscience my sceptre is, and law my sword, Not to be drawn in passion or in play, But terrible to punish and deter; Implacable as God's word, Like it, a shepherd's crook to them that blindly err. Your firm-pulsed sires, my martyrs and my saints, Offshoots of that one stock whose patient sense Hath known to mingle flux with permanence, Rated my chaste denials and restraints Above the moment's dear-paid paradise: Beware lest, shifting with Time's gradual creep, The light that guided shine into your eyes. The envious Powers of ill nor wink nor sleep; Be therefore timely wise, Nor laugh when this one steals, and that one lies, As if your luck could cheat those sleepless spies, Till the deaf Fury comes your house to sweep!' I hear the voice, and unaffrighted bow; Ye shall not be prophetic now, Heralds of ill, that darkening fly Between my vision and the rainbowed sky, Or on the left your hoarse forebodings croak From many a blasted bough On Yggdrasil's storm-sinewed oak, That once was green, Hope of the West, as thou; Yet pardon if I tremble while I boast; For I have loved as those who pardon most.