The Daemon of the World | Page 5

welcome when the
tyrant is awake,
So welcome when the bigot's hell-torch flares;
'Tis
but the voyage of a darksome hour,
The transient gulf-dream of a
startling sleep.
For what thou art shall perish utterly,
But what is
thine may never cease to be;
Death is no foe to virtue: earth has seen

Love's brightest roses on the scaffold bloom,
Mingling with
freedom's fadeless laurels there,
And presaging the truth of visioned
bliss.
Are there not hopes within thee, which this scene
Of linked
and gradual being has confirmed?

Hopes that not vainly thou, and
living fires
Of mind as radiant and as pure as thou,
Have shone
upon the paths of men--return,
Surpassing Spirit, to that world, where
thou
Art destined an eternal war to wage
With tyranny and
falsehood, and uproot
The germs of misery from the human heart.


Thine is the hand whose piety would soothe
The thorny pillow of
unhappy crime,
Whose impotence an easy pardon gains,
Watching
its wanderings as a friend's disease:
Thine is the brow whose
mildness would defy
Its fiercest rage, and brave its sternest will,

When fenced by power and master of the world.
Thou art sincere and
good; of resolute mind,
Free from heart-withering custom's cold
control,
Of passion lofty, pure and unsubdued.
Earth's pride and
meanness could not vanquish thee,
And therefore art thou worthy of
the boon
Which thou hast now received: virtue shall keep
Thy
footsteps in the path that thou hast trod,
And many days of beaming
hope shall bless
Thy spotless life of sweet and sacred love.
Go,
happy one, and give that bosom joy
Whose sleepless spirit waits to
catch
Light, life and rapture from thy smile.
The Daemon called its winged ministers.
Speechless with bliss the
Spirit mounts the car,
That rolled beside the crystal battlement,

Bending her beamy eyes in thankfulness.
The burning wheels inflame

The steep descent of Heaven's untrodden way.
Fast and far the
chariot flew:
The mighty globes that rolled
Around the gate of the
Eternal Fane
Lessened by slow degrees, and soon appeared
Such
tiny twinklers as the planet orbs
That ministering on the solar power

With borrowed light pursued their narrower way.
Earth floated
then below:
The chariot paused a moment;
The Spirit then
descended:
And from the earth departing
The shadows with swift
wings
Speeded like thought upon the light of Heaven.
The Body and the Soul united then,
A gentle start convulsed Ianthe's
frame:
Her veiny eyelids quietly unclosed;
Moveless awhile the
dark blue orbs remained:

She looked around in wonder and beheld

Henry, who kneeled in silence by her couch,
Watching her sleep with
looks of speechless love,
And the bright beaming stars
That through
the casement shone.
from http://www.dertz.in/