Page:Prometheus Unbound - Shelley.djvu/44

Into Eternity, where recorded time,
Even all that we imagine, age on age,
Seems but a point, and the reluctant mind
Flags wearily in its unending flight,
Till it sink, dizzy, blind, lost, shelterless;
Perchance it has not numbered the slow years
Which thou must spend in torture, unreprieved?

⁠Pro. Perchance no thought can count them, yet they pass.

⁠Mer. If thou might'st dwell among the Gods the while
Lapped in voluptuous joy?

⁠Pro.⁠I would not quit
This bleak ravine, these unrepentant pains.

⁠Mer. Alas! I wonder at, yet pity thee.

⁠Pro. Pity the self-despising slaves of Heaven,
Not me, within whose mind sits peace serene,
As light in the sun, throned. How vain is talk!
Call up the fiends.

⁠Ione. Oh, sister, look! White fire
Has cloven to the roots yon huge snow-loaded cedar;
How fearfully God's thunder howls behind!

⁠Mer. I must obey his words and thine: alas!
Most heavily remorse hangs at my heart!