‘Tis that the lot they have 150
Fails their own will to please;
For man would make no murmuring, were his will obey’d.
And why is it, that still
Man with his lot thus fights? —
‘Tis that he makes this will 155
The measure of his rights,
And believes Nature outraged if his will’s gainsaid.
Couldst thou, Pausanias, learn
How deep a fault is this!
Couldst thou but once discern 160
Thou hast no right to bliss,
No title from the Gods to welfare and repose;
Then thou wouldst look less mazed
Whene’er from bliss debarr’d,
Nor think the Gods were crazed 165
When thy own lot went hard.
But we are all the same — the fools of our own woes!
For, from the first faint morn
Of life, the thirst for bliss
Deep in man’s heart is born; 170
And, sceptic as he is,
He fails not to judge clear if this be quench’d or no.
Nor is that thirst to blame!
Man errs not that he deems
His welfare his true aim, 175
He errs because he dreams
The world does but exist that welfare to bestow.
We mortals are no kings
For each of whom to sway
A new-made world up-springs 180
Meant merely for his play;
No, we are strangers here; the world is from of old.
In vain our pent wills fret,
And would the world subdue.
Limits we did not set 185
Condition all we do;
Born into life we are, and life must be our mould.
Born into life — man grows
Forth from his parents’ stem,
And blends their bloods, as those 190
Of theirs are blent in them;
So each new man strikes root into a far fore-time.
Born into life — we bring
A bias with us hero,
And, when here, each new thing 195
Affects us we come near;
To tunes we did not call our being must keep chime.
Born into life — in vain,
Opinions, those or these,
Unalter’d to retain 200
The obstinate mind decrees;
Experience, like a sea, soaks all-effacing in.
Born into life — who lists
May what is false hold dear,
And for himself make mists 205
Through which to see less clear;
The world is what it is, for all our dust and din.
Born into life— ‘tis we,
And not the world, are new.
Our cry for bliss, our plea, 210
Others have urged it too;
Our wants have all been felt, our errors made before.
No eye could be too sound
To observe a world so vast,
No patience too profound 215
To sort what’s here amass’d;
How man may here best live no care too great to explore.
But we — as some rude guest
Would change, where’er he roam,
The manners there profess’d 220
To those he brings from home —
We mark not the world’s course, but would have it take ours.
The world’s course proves the terms
On which man wins content;
Reason the proof confirms; 225
We spurn it, and invent
A false course for the world, and for ourselves, false powers.
Riches we wish to get,
Yet remain spendthrifts still;
We would have health, and yet 230
Still use our bodies ill;
Bafflers of our own prayers, from youth to life’s last scenes.
We would have inward peace,
Yet will not look within;
We would have misery cease, 235
Yet will not cease from sin;
We want all pleasant ends, but will use no harsh means;
We do not what we ought,
What we ought not, we do,
And lean upon the thought 240
That chance will bring us through;
But our own acts, for good or ill, are mightier powers.
Yet, even when man forsakes
All sin, — is just, is pure,
Abandons all which makes 245
His welfare insecure —
Other existences there are, that clash with ours.
Like us, the lightning fires
Love to have scope and play;
The stream, like us, desires 250
An unimpeded way;
Like us, the Libyan wind delights to roam at large.
Streams will not curb their pride
The just man not to entomb,
Nor lightnings go aside 255
To leave his virtues room;
Nor is that wind less rough which blows a good man’s barge.
Nature, with equal mind,
Sees all her sons at play;
Sees man control the wind, 260
The wind sweep man away;
Allows the proudly-riding and the founder’d bark.
And, lastly, though of ours
No weakness spoil our lot,
Though the non-human powers 265
Of Nature harm us not,
The ill-deeds of other men make often our life dark.
What were the wise man’s plan? —
Through this sharp, toil-set life,
To fight as best he can, 270
And win what’s won by strife.
But we an easier way to cheat our pains have found.
Scratch’d by a fall, with moans
As children of weak age
Lend life to the dumb stones 275
Whereon to vent their rage,
And bend their little fists, and rate the senseless ground;
So, loath to suffer mute,
We, peopling the void air,
Make Gods to whom to impute 280
The ills we ought to bear;
With God and Fate to rail at, suffering easily.
Yet grant — as sense long miss’d
Things that are now perceiv’d,
And much may still exist 285
Which is not yet believ’d —
Grant that the world were full of Gods we cannot see;
All things the world which fill
Of but one stuff are spun,
That we who rail are still, 290
With what we rail at, one;
One with the o’er-labour’d Power that through the breadth and length
Of earth, and air, and sea,
In men, and plants, and stones,
Hath toil perpetually, 295
And struggles, pants, and moans;
Fain would do all things well, but sometimes fails in strength.
And patiently exact
This universal God
Alike to any act 300
Proceeds at any nod,
And quietly declaims the cursings of himself.
This is not what man hates,
Yet he can curse but this.
Harsh Gods and hostile Fates 305
Are dreams! this only is;
Is everywhere; sustains the wise, the foolish elf.
Nor only, in the intent
To attach blame elsewhere,
Do we at will invent 310
Stern Powers who make their care
To embitter human life, malignant Deities;
But, next, we would reverse
The scheme ourselves have spun,
And what we made to curse 315
We now would lean upon,
And feign kind Gods who perfect what man vainly tries.
Look, the world tempts our eye,
And we would know it all!
We map the starry sky, 320
We mine this earthen ball,
We measure the sea-tides, we number the sea-sands;
We scrutinize the dates
Of long-past human things,
The bounds of effac’d states, 325
The lines of deceas’d kings;
We search out dead men’s words, and works of dead men’s hands;
We shut our eyes, and muse
How our own minds are made,
What springs of thought they use, 330
How righten’d, how betray’d;
And spend our wit to name what most employ unnam’d;
But still, as we proceed,
The mass swells more and more
Of volumes yet to read, 335
Of secrets yet to explore.
Our hair grows grey, our eyes are dimm’d, our heat is tamed.
We rest our faculties,
And thus address the Gods:
‘True science if there is, 340
It stays in your abodes;
Man’s measures cannot mete the immeasurable All;
‘You only can take in
The world’s immense design,
Our desperate search was sin, 345
Which henceforth we resign,
Sure only that your mind sees all things which befall!’
Fools! that in man’s brief term
He cannot all things view,
Affords no ground to affirm 350
That there are Gods who do!
Nor does being weary prove that he has where to rest!
Again: our youthful blood
Claims rapture as its right;
The world, a rolling flood 355
Of newness and delight,
Draws in the enamour’d gazer to its shining breast;
Pleasure to our hot grasp
Gives flowers after flowers,
With passionate warmth we clasp 360
Hand after hand in ours;
Nor do we soon perceive how fast our youth is spent.
At once our eyes grow clear;
We see in blank dismay
Year posting after year, 365
Sense after sense decay;
Our shivering heart is mined by secret discontent;
Yet still, in spite of truth,
In spite of hopes entomb’d,
That longing of our youth 370
Burns ever unconsum’d,
Still hungrier for delight as delights grow more rare.
We pause; we hush our heart,
And then address the Gods:
‘The world hath fail’d to impart 375
The joy our youth forbodes,
Fail’d to fill up the void which in our breasts we bear.
‘Changefull till now, we still
Look’d on to something new;
Let us, with changeless will, 380
Henceforth look on to you,
To find with you the joy we in vain here require!’
Fools! that so often here
Happiness mock’d our prayer,
I think, might make us fear 385
A like event elsewhere!
Make us, not fly to dreams, but moderate desire!
And yet, for those who know
Themselves, who wisely take
Their way through life, and bow 390
To what they cannot break,
Why should I say that life need yield but moderate bliss?
Shall we, with temper spoil’d,
Health sapp’d by living ill,
And judgement all embroil’d 395
By sadness and self-will,
Shall we judge what for man is not true bliss or is?
Is it so small a thing
To have enjoy’d the sun,
To have lived light in the spring, 400
To have loved, to have thought, to have done;
To have advanc’d true friends, and beat down baffling foes;
That we must feign a bliss
Of doubtful future date,
And, while we dream on this, 405
Lose all our present state,
And relegate to worlds yet distant our repose?
Not much, I know, you prize
What pleasures may be had,
Who look on life with eyes 410
Estrang’d, like mine, and sad;
And yet the village churl feels the truth more than you,
Who’s loath to leave this life
Which to him little yield;
His hard-task’d sunburnt wife, 415
His often-labour’d fields,
The boors with whom he talk’d, the country spots he knew.
But thou, because thou hear’st
Men scoff at Heaven and Fate,
Because the Gods thou fear’st 420
Fail to make blest thy state,
Tremblest, and wilt not dare to trust the joys there are.
I say: Fear not! Life still
Leaves human effort scope.
But, since life teems with ill, 425
Nurse no extravagant hope;
Because thou must not dream, thou need’st not then despair!
A long pause. At the end of it the notes of a harp below are again heard, and CALLICLES sings: —
Far, far from here,
The Adriatic breaks in a warm bay
Among the green Illyrian hills; and there 430
The sunshine in the happy glens is fair,
And by the sea, and in the brakes.
The grass is cool, the sea-side air
Buoyant and fresh, the mountain flowers
As virginal and sweet as ours. 435
And there, they say, two bright and aged snakes,
Who once were Cadmus and Harmonia,
Bask in the glens or on the warm sea-shore,
In breathless quiet, after all their ills.
Nor do they see their country, nor the place 440
Where the Sphinx lived among the frowning hills,
Nor the unhappy palace of their race,
Nor Thebes, nor the Ismenus, any more.
There those two live, far in the Illyrian brakes.
They had stay’d long enough to see, 445
In Thebes, the billow of calamity
Over their own dear children roll’d,
Curse upon curse, pang upon pang,
For years, they sitting helpless in their home,
A grey old man and woman; yet of old 450
The Gods had to their marriage come,
And at the banquet all the Muses sang.
Therefore they did not end their days
In sight of blood; but were rapt, far away,
To where the west wind plays, 455
And murmurs of the Adriatic come
To those untrodden mountain lawns; and there
Placed safely in changed forms, the Pair
Wholly forget their first sad life, and home,
And all that Theban woe, and stray 460
For ever through the glens, placid and dumb.
EMPEDOCLES
That was my harp-player again! — where is he?
Down by the stream?
PAUSANIAS
Yes, Master, in the wood.
EMPEDOCLES
He ever loved the Theban story well!
But the day wears. Go now, Pausanias, 465
For I must be alone. Leave me one mule;
Take down with thee the rest to Catana.
And for young Callicles, thank him from me;
Tell him I never fail’d to love his lyre:
But he must follow me no more to-night. 470
PAUSANIAS
Thou wilt return to-morrow to the city?
EMPEDOCLES
Either to-morrow or some other day,
In the sure revolutions of the world,
Good friend, I shall revisit Catana.
I have seen many cities in my time 475
Till my eyes ache with the long spectacle,
And I shall doubtless see them all again;
Thou know’st me for a wanderer from of old.
Meanwhile, stay me not now. Farewell, Pausanias!
He departs on his way up the mountain.
PAUSANIAS (alone)
I dare not urge him further; he must go. 480
But he is strangely wrought! — I will speed back
And bring Peisianax to him from the city;
His counsel could once soothe him. But, Apollo!
How his brow lighten’d as the music rose!
Callicles must wait here, and play to him; 485
I saw him through the chestnuts far below,
Just since, down at the stream. — Ho! Callicles!
He descends, calling.
Act II
Evening. The Summit of Etna
EMPEDOCLES
Alone! —
On this charr’d, blacken’d, melancholy waste,
Crown’d by the awful peak, Etna’s great mouth,
Round which the sullen vapour rolls — alone!
Pausanias is far hence, and that is well, 5
For I must henceforth speak no more with man.
He has his lesson too, and that debt’s paid;
And the good, learned, friendly, quiet man,
May bravelier front his life, and in himself
Find henceforth energy and heart; but I, 10
The weary man, the banish’d citizen —
Whose banishment is not his greatest ill,
Whose weariness no energy can reach,
And for whose hurt courage is not the cure —
What should I do with life and living more? 15
No, thou art come too late, Empedocles!
And the world hath the day, and must break thee,
Not thou the world. With men thou canst not live,
Their thoughts, their ways, their wishes, are not thine;
And being lonely thou art miserable, 20
For something has impair’d thy spirit’s strength,
And dried its self-sufficing fount of joy.
Delphi Complete Poetical Works of Matthew Arnold Page 8
