Atalanta in Calydon | Page 7

worthy; and air blows down Things poisonous, and high-seated violences, And with charmed words and songs have men put out Wild evil, and the fire of tyrannies.
MELEAGER.
Yea, all things have they, save the gods and love.
ALTHAEA.
Love thou the law and cleave to things ordained.
MELEAGER.
Law lives upon their lips whom these applaud.
ALTHAEA.
How sayest thou these? what god applauds new things?
MELEAGER.
Zeus, who hath fear and custom under foot.
ALTHAEA.
But loves not laws thrown down and lives awry.
MELEAGER.
Yet is not less himself than his own law.
ALTHAEA.
Nor shifts and shuffles old things up and down.
MELEAGER.
But what he will remoulds and discreates.
ALTHAEA.
Much, but not this, that each thing live its life.
MELEAGER.
Nor only live, but lighten and lift up higher.
ALTHAEA.
Pride breaks itself, and too much gained is gone.
MELEAGER.
Things gained are gone, but great things done endure.
ALTHAEA.
Child, if a man serve law through all his life And with his whole heart worship, him all gods Praise; but who loves it only with his lips, And not in heart and deed desiring it Hides a perverse will with obsequious words, Him heaven infatuates and his twin-born fate Tracks, and gains on him, scenting sins far off, And the swift hounds of violent death devour. Be man at one with equal-minded gods, So shall he prosper; not through laws torn up, Violated rule and a new face of things. A woman armed makes war upon herself, Unwomanlike, and treads down use and wont And the sweet common honour that she hath, Love, and the cry of children, and the hand Trothplight and mutual mouth of marriages. This doth she, being unloved, whom if one love, Not fire nor iron and the wide-mouthed wars Are deadlier than her lips or braided hair. For of the one comes poison, and a curse Falls from the other and burns the lives of men. But thou, son, be not filled with evil dreams, Nor with desire of these things; for with time Blind love burns out; but if one feed it full Till some discolouring stain dyes all his life, He shall keep nothing praiseworthy, nor die The sweet wise death of old men honourable, Who have lived out all the length of all their years Blameless, and seen well-pleased the face of gods, And without shame and without fear have wrought Things memorable, and while their days held out In sight of all men and the sun's great light Have gat them glory and given of their own praise To the earth that bare them and the day that bred, Home friends and far-off hospitalities, And filled with gracious and memorial fame Lands loved of summer or washed by violent seas, Towns populous and many unfooted ways, And alien lips and native with their own. But when white age and venerable death Mow down the strength and life within their limbs, Drain out the blood and darken their clear eyes, Immortal honour is on them, having past Through splendid life and death desirable To the clear seat and remote throne of souls, Lands indiscoverable in the unheard-of west, Round which the strong stream of a sacred sea Rolls without wind for ever, and the snow There shows not her white wings and windy feet, Nor thunder nor swift rain saith anything, Nor the sun burns, but all things rest and thrive; And these, filled full of days, divine and dead, Sages and singers fiery from the god, And such as loved their land and all things good And, best beloved of best men, liberty, Free lives and lips, free hands of men free-born, And whatsoever on earth was honourable And whosoever of all the ephemeral seed, Live there a life no liker to the gods But nearer than their life of terrene days. Love thou such life and look for such a death. But from the light and fiery dreams of love Spring heavy sorrows and a sleepless life, Visions not dreams, whose lids no charm shall close Nor song assuage them waking; and swift death Crushes with sterile feet the unripening ear, Treads out the timeless vintage; whom do thou Eschewing embrace the luck of this thy life, Not without honour; and it shall bear to thee Such fruit as men reap from spent hours and wear, Few men, but happy; of whom be thou, O son, Happiest, if thou submit thy soul to fate, And set thine eyes and heart on hopes high-born And divine deeds and abstinence divine. So shalt thou be toward all men all thy days As light and might communicable, and burn From heaven among the stars above the hours, And break not as a man breaks nor burn down: For to whom other of all heroic names Have the gods given his life in hand as thine? And gloriously hast thou lived, and made thy life