A DRAMA OF EXILE.
59
To your own conscience, by the dread extremes
Of what I am and have been. If ye have fallen,
It is a step's fall,—the whole ground beneath
Strewn woolly soft with promise; if ye have sinned,
Your prayers tread high as angels! if ye have grieved,
Ye are too mortal to be pitiable,
And power to die disproveth right to grieve.
Go to! ye call this ruin. I half-scorn
The ill I did you! Were ye wronged by me,
Hated and tempted, and undone of me,—
Still, what's your hurt to mine, of doing hurt,
Of hating, tempting, and so ruining?
This sword's hilt is the sharpest, and cuts through
The hand that wields it.
Go—I curse you all.
Hate one another—feebly—as ye can;
I would not certes cut you short in hate—
Far be it from me! hate on as ye can!
I breathe into your faces, spirits of earth,
As wintry blast may breathe on wintry leaves,
And, lifting up their brownness, show beneath
The branches very bare.—Beseech you, give
To Eve, who beggarly entreats your love
For her and Adam when they shall be dead,
An answer rather fitting to the sin
Than to the sorrow—as the Heavens, I trow,
For justice' sake, gave their's.
I curse you both,
Adam and Eve! Say grace as after meat,
After my curses. May your tears fall hot
On all the hissing scorns o' the creatures here,—
And yet rejoice. Increase and multiply,
Ye and your generations, in all plagues,
Corruptions, melancholies, poverties,
And hideous forms of life and fears of death;
The thought of death being al-way eminent
Immovable and dreadful in your life,
And deafly and dumbly insignificant
Of what I am and have been. If ye have fallen,
It is a step's fall,—the whole ground beneath
Strewn woolly soft with promise; if ye have sinned,
Your prayers tread high as angels! if ye have grieved,
Ye are too mortal to be pitiable,
And power to die disproveth right to grieve.
Go to! ye call this ruin. I half-scorn
The ill I did you! Were ye wronged by me,
Hated and tempted, and undone of me,—
Still, what's your hurt to mine, of doing hurt,
Of hating, tempting, and so ruining?
This sword's hilt is the sharpest, and cuts through
The hand that wields it.
Go—I curse you all.
Hate one another—feebly—as ye can;
I would not certes cut you short in hate—
Far be it from me! hate on as ye can!
I breathe into your faces, spirits of earth,
As wintry blast may breathe on wintry leaves,
And, lifting up their brownness, show beneath
The branches very bare.—Beseech you, give
To Eve, who beggarly entreats your love
For her and Adam when they shall be dead,
An answer rather fitting to the sin
Than to the sorrow—as the Heavens, I trow,
For justice' sake, gave their's.
I curse you both,
Adam and Eve! Say grace as after meat,
After my curses. May your tears fall hot
On all the hissing scorns o' the creatures here,—
And yet rejoice. Increase and multiply,
Ye and your generations, in all plagues,
Corruptions, melancholies, poverties,
And hideous forms of life and fears of death;
The thought of death being al-way eminent
Immovable and dreadful in your life,
And deafly and dumbly insignificant
