IMAGINATIONS AND REVERIES

By AE [George William Russell]

PREFACE

The publishers of this book thought that a volume of articles and taleswritten by me during the past twenty-five years would have interestenough to justify publication, and asked me to make a selection. I havenot been able to make up a book with only one theme. My temperamentwould only allow me to be happy when I was working at art. My consciencewould not let me have peace unless I worked with other Irishmen at thereconstruction of Irish life. Birth in Ireland gave me a bias towardsIrish nationalism, while the spirit which inhabits my body told me thepolitics of eternity ought to be my only concern, and that all otherraces equally with my own were children of the Great King. To aid inmovements one must be orthodox. My desire to help prompted agreement, while my intellect was always heretical. I had written out of everymood, and could not retain any mood for long. If I advocated anational ideal I felt immediately I could make an equal plea for morecosmopolitan and universal ideas. I have observed my intuitions whereverthey drew me, for I felt that the Light within us knows better than anyother the need and the way. So I have no book on one theme, and the onlyunity which connects what is here written is a common origin. The readermust try a balance between the contraries which exist here as theyexist in us all, as they exist and are harmonized in that multitudinousmeditation which is the universe. --A. E. 

PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION

To this edition four essays have been added. Two of these, "Thoughtsfor a Convention" and "The New Nation, " made some little stir when theyfirst appeared. Ireland since then has passed away from the mood whichmade it possible to consider the reconciliations suggested, and hasset its heart on more fundamental changes, and these essays have onlyinterest as marking a moment of transition in national life before ittook a new road leading to another destiny. 

CONTENTS

 NATIONALITY OR COSMOPOLITANISM STANDISH O'GRADY THE DRAMATIC TREATMENT OF LEGEND THE CHARACTER OF HEROIC LITERATURE A POET OF SHADOWS THE BOYHOOD OF A POET THE POETRY OF JAMES STEPHENS A NOTE ON SEUMAS O'SULLIVAN ART AND LITERATURE AN ARTIST OF GARLIC IRELAND TWO IRISH ARTISTS "ULSTER" IDEALS OF THE NEW RURAL SOCIETY THOUGHTS FOR A CONVENTION THE NEW NATION THE SPIRITUAL CONFLICT ON AN IRISH HILL RELIGION AND LOVE THE RENEWAL OF YOUTH THE HERO IN MAN THE MEDITATION OF ANANDA THE MIDNIGHT BLOSSOM THE CHILDHOOD OF APOLLO THE MASK OF APOLLO The CAVE OF LILITH THE STORY OF A STAR THE DREAM OF ANGUS OGE DEIRDRE

NATIONALITY OR COSMOPOLITANISM

As one of those who believe that the literature of a country is forever creating a new soul among its people, I do not like to think thatliterature with us must follow an inexorable law of sequence, and gain aspiritual character only after the bodily passions have grown weary andexhausted themselves. In the essay called The Autumn of the Body, Mr. Yeats seems to indicate such a sequence. Yet, whether the art of anyof the writers of the decadence does really express spiritual things isopen to doubt. The mood in which their work is conceived, a distemperedemotion, through which no new joy quivers, seems too often to tellrather of exhausted vitality than of the ecstasy of a new life. Howevermuch, too, their art refines itself, choosing, ever rarer and moreexquisite forms of expression, underneath it all an intuition seems todisclose only the old wolfish lust, hiding itself beneath the goldenfleece of the spirit. It is not the spirit breaking through corruption, but the life of the senses longing to shine with the light which makessaintly things beautiful: and it would put on the jeweled raiment ofseraphim, retaining still a heart of clay smitten through and throughwith the unappeasable desire of the flesh: so Rossetti's women, who havearound them all the circumstance of poetry and romantic beauty, seemthrough their sucked-in lips to express a thirst which could be allayedin no spiritual paradise. Art in the decadence in our time might besymbolized as a crimson figure undergoing a dark crucifixion: the hostsof light are overcoming it, and it is dying filled with anguish anddespair at a beauty it cannot attain. All these strange emotions have aprofound psychological interest. I do not think because a spiritualflaw can be urged against a certain phase of life that it should remainunexpressed. The psychic maladies which attack all races when theircivilization grows old must needs be understood to be dealt with: andthey cannot be understood without being revealed in literature or art. But in Ireland we are not yet sick with this sickness. As psychologyit concerns only the curious. Our intellectual life is in suspense. Thenational spirit seems to be making a last effort to assert itselfin literature and to overcome cosmopolitan influences and the artof writers who express a purely personal feeling. It is true thatnationality may express itself in many ways: it may not be at allevident in the subject matter, but it may be very evident in thesentiment. But a literature loosely held together by some emotionalcharacteristics common to the writers, however great it may be, does notfulfill the purpose of a literature or art created by a number of menwho have a common aim in building up an overwhelming ideal--who create, in a sense, a soul for their country, and who have a common pride in theachievement of all. The world has not seen this since the great antiquecivilizations of Egypt and Greece passed away. We cannot imagine anEgyptian artist daring enough to set aside the majestic attainment ofmany centuries. An Egyptian boy as he grew up must have been overawed bythe national tradition, and have felt that it was not to be set aside:it was beyond his individual rivalry. The soul of Egypt incarnated inhim, and, using its immemorial language and its mysterious lines, theefforts of the least workman who decorated a tomb seem to have beendirected by the same hand that carved the Sphinx. This adherence to atraditional form is true of Greece, though to a less extent. Somelittle Tanagra terra-cottas might have been fashioned by Phidias, andin literature Ulysses and Agamemnon were not the heroes of one epic, butappeared endlessly in epic and drama. Since the Greek civilization noEuropean nation has had an intellectual literature which was genuinelynational. In the present century, leaving aside a few things in outwardcircumstance, there is little to distinguish the work of thebest English writers or artists from that of their Continentalcontemporaries. Milliais, Leighton, Rossetti, Turner--how different fromeach other, and yet they might have painted the same pictures as bornFrenchmen, and it would not have excited any great surprise as a markeddivergence from French art. The cosmopolitan spirit, whether for good orfor evil, is hastily obliterating all distinctions. What is distinctlynational in these countries is less valuable than the immense wealth ofuniversal ideas; and the writers who use this wealth appeal to no narrowcircle: the foremost writers, the Tolstois and Ibsens, are conscious ofaddressing a European audience. 

If nationality is to justify itself in the face of all this, it must bebecause the country which preserves its individuality does so with theprofound conviction that its peculiar ideal is nobler than that whichthe cosmopolitan spirit suggests--that this ideal is so precious to itthat its loss would be as the loss of the soul, and that it could notbe realized without an aloofness from, if not an actual indifference to, the ideals which are spreading so rapidly over Europe. Is it possiblefor any nationality to make such a defense of its isolation? If not, let us read Goethe, Balzac, Tolstoi, men so much greater than any wecan show, try to absorb their universal wisdom, and no longer confineourselves to local traditions. But nationality was never so strong inIreland as at the present time. It is beginning to be felt, less as apolitical movement than as a spiritual force. It seems to be gatheringitself together, joining men who were hostile before, in a newintellectual fellowship: and if all these could unite on fundamentals, it would be possible in a generation to create a national Ideal inIreland, or rather to let that spirit incarnate fully which began amongthe ancient peoples, which has haunted the hearts and whispered a dimrevelation of itself through the lips of the bards and peasant storytellers. 

Every Irishman forms some vague ideal of his country, born from hisreading of history, or from contemporary politics, or from imaginativeintuition; and this Ireland in the mind it is, not the actual Ireland, which kindles his enthusiasm. For this he works and makes sacrifices;but because it has never had any philosophical definition or a supremelybeautiful statement in literature which gathered all aspirations aboutit, the ideal remains vague. This passionate love cannot explain itself;it cannot make another understand its devotion. To reveal Ireland inclear and beautiful light, to create the Ireland in the heart, is theprovince of a national literature. Other arts would add to this idealhereafter, and social life and politics must in the end be in harmony. We are yet before our dawn, in a period comparable to Egypt before thefirst of her solemn temples constrained its people to an equal mystery, or to Greece before the first perfect statue had fixed an ideal ofbeauty which mothers dreamed of to mould their yet unborn children. Wecan see, however, as the ideal of Ireland grows from mind to mind, ittends to assume the character of a sacred land. The Dark Rosaleen ofMangan expresses an almost religious adoration, and to a later writer itseems to be nigher to the spiritual beauty than other lands:

 And still the thoughts of Ireland brood Upon her holy quietude. 

The faculty of abstracting from the land their eyes beheld anotherIreland through which they wandered in dream, has always been acharacteristic of the Celtic poets. This inner Ireland which thevisionary eye saw was the Tirnanoge, the Country of Immortal Youth, forthey peopled it only with the young and beautiful. It was the Land ofthe Living Heart, a tender name which showed that it had become dearerthan the heart of woman, and overtopped all other dreams as the lasthope of the spirit, the bosom where it would rest after it had passedfrom the fading shelter of the world. And sure a strange and beautifulland this Ireland is, with a mystic beauty which closes the eyes ofthe body as in sleep, and opens the eyes of the spirit as in dreams andnever a poet has lain on our hillsides but gentle, stately figures, with hearts shining like the sun, move through his dreams, over radiantgrasses, in an enchanted world of their own: and it has become alivethrough every haunted rath and wood and mountain and lake, so that wecan hardly think of it otherwise than as the shadow of the thought ofGod. The last Irish poet who has appeared shows the spiritual qualitiesof the first, when he writes of the gray rivers in their "enraptured"wanderings, and when he sees in the jeweled bow which arches theheavens--

 The Lord's seven spirits that shine through the rain

This mystical view of nature, peculiar to but one English poet, Wordsworth is a national characteristic; and much in the creation of theIreland in the mind is already done, and only needs retelling by the newwriters. More important, however, for the literature we are imaginingas an offset to the cosmopolitan ideal would be the creation of heroicfigures, types, whether legendary or taken from history, and enlargedto epic proportions by our writers, who would use them in common, asCuculain, Fionn, Ossian, and Oscar were used by the generations of poetswho have left us the bardic history of Ireland, wherein one would writeof the battle fury of a hero, and another of a moment when his firewould turn to gentleness, and another of his love for some beauty of histime, and yet another tell how the rivalry of a spiritual beauty madehim tire of love; and so from iteration and persistent dwelling on a fewheroes, their imaginative images found echoes in life, and other heroesarose, continuing their tradition of chivalry. 

That such types are of the highest importance, and have the mostennobling influence on a country, cannot be denied. It was this idea ledWhitman to exploit himself as the typical American. He felt that whathe termed a "stock personality" was needed to elevate and harmonize theincongruous human elements in the States. English literature has alwaysbeen more sympathetic with actual beings than with ideal types, andcannot help us much. A man who loves Dickens, for example, may growto have a great tolerance for the grotesque characters which are theoutcome of the social order in England, but he will not be assistedin the conception of a higher humanity: and this is true of very manyEnglish writers who lack a fundamental philosophy, and are content totake man as he seems to be for the moment, rather than as the pilgrim ofeternity--as one who is flesh today but who may hereafter grow divine, and who may shine at last like the stars of the morning, triumphantamong the sons of God. 

Mr. Standish O'Grady, in his notable epic of Cuculain, was in our timethe first to treat the Celtic tradition worthily. He has contributed onehero who awaits equal comrades, if indeed the tales of the Red Branch donot absorb the thoughts of many imaginative writers, and Cuculain remainthe typical hero of the Gael, becoming to every boy who reads the storya revelation of what his own spirit is. 

I know John Eglinton, one of our most thoughtful writers, our firstcosmopolitan, thinks that "these ancient legends refuse to be taken outof their old environment. " But I believe that the tales which have beenpreserved for a hundred generations in the heart of the people must havehad their power, because they had in them a core of eternal truth. Truthis not a thing of today or tomorrow. Beauty, heroism, and spiritualitydo not change like fashion, being the reflection of an unchangingspirit. The face of faces which looks at us through so many shiftingshadows has never altered the form of its perfection since the face ofman, made after its image, first looked back on its original:

 For these red lips, with all their mournful pride, Troy passed away in one high funeral gleam, And Usna's children died. 

These dreams, antiquities, traditions, once actual, living, andhistorical, have passed from the world of sense into the world of memoryand thought: and time, it seems to me, has not taken away from theirpower, nor made them more remote from sympathy, but has rather purifiedthem by removing them from earth to heaven: from things which the eyecan see and the ear can hear they have become what the heart pondersover, and are so much nearer, more familiar, more suitable for literaryuse than the day they were begotten. They have now the character ofsymbol, and, as symbol, are more potent than history. They have creptthrough veil after veil of the manifold nature of man; and now eachdream, heroism, or beauty has laid itself nigh the divine power itrepresents, the suggestion of which made it first beloved: and theyare ready for the use of the spirit, a speech of which every word hasa significance beyond itself, and Deirdre is, like Helen, a symbol ofeternal beauty; and Cuculain represents as much as Prometheus the heroicspirit, the redeemer in man. 

In so far as these ancient traditions live in the memory of man, theyare contemporary to us as much as electrical science: for the imageswhich time brings now to our senses, before they can be used inliterature, have to enter into exactly the same world of humanimagination as the Celtic traditions live in. And their fitness forliterary use is not there determined by their freshness but by theirpower of suggestion. Modern literature, where it is really literatureand not book-making, grows more subjective year after year, and the mindhas a wider range over time than the physical nature has. Many thingslive in it--empires which have never crumbled, beauty which has neverperished, love whose fires have never waned: and, in this formidablecompetition for use in the artist's mind, today stands only its chancewith a thousand days. To question the historical accuracy of the use ofsuch memories is not a matter which can be rightly raised. The questionis--do they express lofty things to the soul? If they do they havejustified themselves. 

I have written at some length on the two paths which lie before us, forwe have arrived at a parting of ways. One path leads, and has alreadyled many Irishmen, to obliterate all nationality from their work. Theother path winds upward to a mountain-top of our own, which may be inthe future the Mecca to which many worshippers will turn. To remainwhere we are as a people, indifferent to literature, to art, to ideas, wasting the precious gift of public spirit we possess so abundantly inthe sordid political rivalries, without practical or ideal ends, is tojustify those who have chosen the other path, and followed another starthan ours. I do not wish any one to infer from this a contempt for thosewho, for the last hundred years, have guided public opinion in Ireland. If they failed in one respect, it was out of a passionate sympathy forwrongs of which many are memories, thanks to them, and to them is duethe creation of a force which may be turned in other directions, notwithout a memory of those pale sleepers to whom we may turn in thought, placing--

 A kiss of fire on the dim brow of failure, A crown upon her uncrowned head. 

1899

STANDISH O'GRADY

In this age we read so much that we lay too great a burden on theimagination. It is unable to create images which are the spiritualequivalent of the words on the printed page, and reading becomes for toomany an occupation of the eye rather than of the mind. How rarely, outof the multitude of volumes a man reads in his lifetime, can he rememberwhere or when he read any particular book, or with any vividness recallthe mood it evoked in him. When I close my eyes, and brood in memoryover the books which most profoundly affected me, I find none excited myimagination more than Standish O'Grady's epical narrative of Cuculain. Whitman said of his Leaves of Grass: "Camerado, this is no book. Whotouches this touches a man, " and O'Grady might have boasted of hisBardic History of Ireland, written with his whole being, that there wasmore than a man in it, there was the soul of a people, its noblest andmost exalted life symbolized in the story of one heroic character. 

With reference to Ireland, I was at the time I read like many others whowere bereaved of the history of their race. I was as a man who, throughsome accident, had lost memory of his past, Who could recall no morethan a few months of new life, and could not say to what songs hiscradle had been rocked, what mother had nursed him, who were theplaymates of childhood, or by what woods and streams he had wandered. When I read O'Grady I was as such a man who suddenly feels ancientmemories rushing at him, and knows he was born in a royal house, that hehad mixed with the mighty of heaven and earth and had the very noblestfor his companions. It was the memory of race which rose up within me asI read, and I felt exalted as one who learns he is among the childrenof kings. That is what O'Grady did for me and for others who were mycontemporaries, and I welcome the reprints, of his tales in the hopethat he will go on magically recreating for generations yet unborn theancestral life of their race in Ireland. For many centuries the youthof Ireland as it grew up was made aware of the life of bygone ages, andthere were always some who remade themselves in the heroic mould beforethey passed on. The sentiment engendered by the Gaelic literature was anarcane presence, though unconscious of itself, in those who for thepast hundred years had learned another speech. In O'Grady's writings thesubmerged river of national culture rose up again, a shining torrent, and I realized as I bathed in that stream, that the greatest spiritualevil one nation could inflict on another was to cut off from it thestory of the national soul. For not all music can be played upon anyinstrument, and human nature for most of us is like a harp on which canbe rendered the music written for the harp but nor that written for theviolin. The harp strings quiver for the harp-player alone, and he whocan utter his passion through the violin is silent before an unfamiliarinstrument. That is why the Irish have rarely been deeply stirred byEnglish literature, though it is one of the great literatures of theworld. Our history was different and the evolutionary product was apeculiarity of character, and the strings of our being vibrate most inecstasy when the music evokes ancestral moods or embodies emotions akinto these. I am not going to argue the comparative worth of the Gaelicand English tradition. All that I can say is that the traditions of ourown country move us more than the traditions of any other. Even if therewas not essential greatness in them we would love them for the samereasons which bring back so many exiles to revisit the haunts ofchildhood. But there was essential greatness in that neglected bardicliterature which O'Grady was the first to reveal in a noble manner. Hehad the spirit of an ancient epic poet. He is a comrade of Homer, hisbirth delayed in time perhaps that he might renew for a sophisticatedpeople the elemental simplicity and hardihood men had when the worldwas young and manhood was prized more than any of its parts, more thanthought or beauty or feeling. He has created for us, or rediscovered, one figure which looms in the imagination as a high comrade of Hector, Achilles, Ulysses, Rama or Yudisthira, as great in spirit as any. Whocould extol enough his Cuculain, that incarnation of Gaelic chivalry, the fire and gentleness, the beauty and heroic ardour or the imaginativesplendor of the episodes in his retelling of the ancient story. Thereare writers who bewitch you by a magical use of words whose linesglitter like jewels, whose effects are gained by an elaborate art andwho deal with the subtlest emotions. Others again are simple as anEgyptian image, and yet are more impressive, and you remember themless for the sentence than for a grandiose effect. They are not so muchconcerned with the art of words as with the creation of great imagesinformed with magnificence of spirit. They are not lesser artists butgreater, for there is a greater art in the simplification of form in thestatue of Memnon than there is in the intricate detail of a bronze byBenvenuto Cellini. Standish O'Grady had in his best moments that epicwholeness and simplicity, and the figure of Cuculain amid his companionsof the Red Branch which he discovered and refashioned for us is, Ithink, the greatest spiritual gift any Irishman for centuries has givento Ireland. 

I know it will be said that this is a scientific age, the world is sofull of necessitous life that it is waste of time for young Ireland tobrood upon tales of legendary heroes, who fought with enchanters, whoharnessed wild fairy horses to magic chariots and who talked withthe ancient gods, and that it would be much better for youth to bescientific and practical. Do not believe it, dear Irish boy, dear Irishgirl, I know as well as any the economic needs of our people. They mustnot be overlooked, but keep still in your hearts some desires whichmight enter Paradise. Keep in your souls some images of magnificenceso that hereafter the halls of heaven and the divine folk may not seemaltogether alien to the spirit. These legends have passed the testof generations for century after century, and they were treasuredand passed on to those who followed, and that was because there wassomething in them akin to the immortal spirit. Humanity cannot carrywith it through time the memory of all its deeds and imaginations, andit burdens itself only in a new era with what was highest among theimaginations of the ancestors. What is essentially noble is never outof date. The figures carved by Pheidias for the Parthenon still shine bythe side of the greatest modern sculpture. There has been no evolutionof the human form to a greater beauty than the ancient Greek saw, andthe forms they carved are not strange to us, and if this is true of theoutward form it is true of the indwelling spirit. What is essentiallynoble is contemporary with all that is splendid today, and until themass of men are equal in spirit the great figures of the past willaffect us less as memories than as prophecies of the Golden Age to whichyouth is ever hurrying in its heart. 

O'Grady in his stories of the Red Branch rescued from the past what wascontemporary to the best in us today, and he was equal in his gifts asa writer to the greatest of his bardic predecessors in Ireland. Hissentences are charged with a heroic energy, and, when he is telling agreat tale, their rise and fall is like the flashing and falling of thebright sword of some great battle, or like the onset and withdrawal ofAtlantic surges. He can at need be beautifully tender and quiet. Whothat has read his tale of the young Finn and the Seven Ancients willforget the weeping of Finn over the kindness of the famine-stricken oldmen, and their wonder at his weeping, and the self-forgetful pathosof their meditation unconscious that it was their own sacrifice calledforth the tears of Finn. "Youth, " they said, "has many sorrows that coldage cannot comprehend. "

There are critics repelled by the abounding energy in O'Grady'ssentences. It is easy to point to faults due to excess and abundance, but how rare in literature is that heroic energy and power. There issomething arcane and elemental in it, a quality that the most carefulstylist cannot attain, however he uses the file, however subtle he is. O'Grady has noticed this power in the ancient bards and we find it inhis own writing. It ran all through the Bardic History, the Criticaland Philosophical History, and through the political books, The ToryDemocracy and All Ireland. There is this imaginative energy in the taleof Cuculain, in all its episodes, the slaying of the hound, the captureof the Liath Macha, the hunting of the enchanted deer, the capture ofthe Wild swans, the fight at the ford, and the awakening of the RedBranch. In the later tale of Red Hugh which, he calls The Flight ofthe Eagle there is the same quality of power joined with a shiningsimplicity in the narrative which rises into a poetic ecstasy in thatwonderful chapter where Red Hugh, escaping from the Pale, rides throughthe Mountain Gates of Ulster and sees high above him Sheve Gullion, a mountain of the Gods, the birth-place of legend "more mythic thanAvernus"; and O'Grady evokes for us and his hero the legendary past andthe great hill seems to be like Mount Sinai, thronged with immortals, and it lives and speaks to the fugitive boy, "the last great secularchampion of the Gael, " and inspires him for the fulfillment of hisdestiny. We might say of Red Hugh, and indeed of all O'Grady's heroes, that they are the spiritual progeny of Cuculain. From Red Hugh down tothe boys who have such enchanting adventures in Lost on Du Corrig andThe Chain of Gold they have all a natural and hardy purity of mind, abeautiful simplicity of character, and one can imagine them all in anhour of need, being faithful to any trust like the darling of the RedBranch. These shining lads never grew up amid books. They are as muchchildren of nature as the Lucy of Wordsworth's poetry. It might be saidof them as the poet of the Kalevala sang of himself: "Winds and watersmy instructors. "

These were O'Grady's own earliest companions, and no man can find bettercomrades than earth, water, air and sun. I imagine O'Grady's ownyouth was not so very different from the youth of Red Hugh before hiscaptivity; that he lived on the wild and rocky western coast, that herowed in coracles, explored the caves, spoke much with hardy naturalpeople, fishermen and workers on the land, primitive folk, simple inspeech but with that fundamental depth men have who are much in naturein companionship with the elements, the elder brothers of humanity. Itmust have been out of such a boyhood and such intimacies with naturaland unsophisticated people that there came to him the understanding ofthe heroes of the Red Branch. How pallid, beside the ruddy chivalrywho pass, huge and fleet and bright, through O'Grady's pages, appearTennyson's bloodless Knights of the Round Table, fabricated in the studyto be read in the drawing room, as anemic as Burne Jones' lifeless menin armour. The heroes of ancient Irish legend reincarnated in the mindof a man who could breathe into them the fire of life, caught from sunand wind, their ancient deities, and send them forth to the world to dogreater deeds, to act through many men and speak through many voices. What sorcery was in the Irish mind that it has taken so many years towin but a little recognition for this splendid spirit; and that otherswho came after him, who diluted the pure fiery wine of romance he gaveus with literary water, should be as well known or more widely read. Formy own, part I can only point back to him and say whatever is Irishin me he kindled to life, and I am humble when I read his epic tale, feeling how much greater a thing it is for the soul of a writer tohave been the habitation of a demi-god than to have had the subtlestintellections. 

We praise the man who rushes into a burning mansion and brings out itsgreatest treasure. So ought we to praise this man who rescued from theperishing Gaelic tradition its darling hero and restored him to us, and I think now that Cuculain will not perish, and he will be invisiblypresent at many a council of youth, and he will be the daring whichlifts the will beyond itself and fires it for great causes, and he willbe also the courtesy which shall overcome the enemy that nothing elsemay overcome. 

I am sure that Standish O'Grady would rather I should speak of his workand its bearing on the spiritual life of Ireland, than about himself, and, because I think so, in this reverie I have followed no set plan buthave let my thoughts run as they will. But I would not have any to thinkthat this man was only a writer, or that he could have had the heroesof the past for spiritual companions, without himself being inspired tofight dragons and wizardry. I have sometimes regretted that contemporarypolitics drew O'Grady away from the work he began so greatly. I havesaid to myself he might have given us an Oscar, a Diarmuid or a Caolte, an equal comrade to Cuculain, but he could not, being lit up by thespirit of his hero, he merely the bard and not the fighter, and no manin Ireland intervened in the affairs of his country with a superiornobility of aim. He was the last champion of the Irish aristocracy, andstill more the voice of conscience for them, and he spoke to them oftheir duty to the nation as one might imagine some fearless prophetspeaking to a council of degenerate princes. When the aristocracy failedIreland he bade them farewell, and wrote the epitaph of their class inwords whose scorn we almost forget because of their sounding melodyand beauty. He turned his mind to the problems of democracy and moreespecially of those workers who are trapped in the city, and he pointedout for them the way of escape and how they might renew life in thegreen fields close to Earth, their ancient mother and nurse. He usedtoo exalted a language for those to whom he spoke to understand, and itmight seem that all these vehement appeals had failed but that we knowthat what is fine never really fails. When a man is in advance of hisage, a generation, unborn when he speaks, is born in due time and findsin him its inspiration. O'Grady may have failed in his appeal to thearistocracy of his own time but he may yet create an aristocracy ofcharacter and intellect in Ireland. The political and economic writingswill remain to uplift and inspire and to remind us that the man whowrote the stories of heroes had a bravery of his own and a wisdom of hisown. I owe so much to Standish O'Grady that I would like to leave iton record that it was he made me conscious and proud of my country, andrecalled to my mind, that might have wandered otherwise over too wideand vague a field of thought, to think of the earth under my feet andthe children of our common mother. There hangs in the Municipal Galleryof Dublin the portrait of a man with melancholy eyes, and scrawled onthe canvas is the subject of his bitter brooding: "'The Lost Land. "I hope that O'Grady will find before he goes back to Tir na noge thatIreland has found again through him what seemed lost for ever, the lawof its own being, and its memories which go back to the beginning of theworld. 

THE DRAMATIC TREATMENT OF LEGEND

 "The Red Branch ought not to be staged.... That literature ought not to be produced for popular consumption for the edification of the crowd.... I say to you drop this thing at your peril.... You may succeed in degrading Irish ideals, and banishing the soul of the land. ... Leave the heroic cycles alone, and don't bring them down to the crowd... " (Standish O'Grady in All Ireland Review). 

Years ago, in the adventurous youth of his mind, Mr. O'Grady found theGaelic tradition like a neglected antique dun with the doors barred, andthere was little or no egress. Listening, he heard from within the humof an immense chivalry, and he opened the doors and the wild riders wentforth to work their will. Now he would recall them. But it is in vain. The wild riders have gone forth, and their labors in the human mind areonly beginning. They will do their deeds over again, and now theywill act through many men and speak through many voices. The spirit ofCuculain will stand at many a lonely place in the heart, and he will winas of old against multitudes. The children of Turann will start afreshstill eager to take up and renew their cyclic labors, and they willgain, not for themselves, the Apples of the Tree of Life, and the Spearof the Will, and the Fleece which is the immortal body. All the heroesand demigods returning will have a wider field than Erin for theirdeeds, and they will not grow weary warning upon things that die butwill be fighters in the spirit against immortal powers, and, as before, the acts will be sometimes noble and sometimes base. They cannot bestayed from their deeds, for they are still in the strength of a youthwhich is ever renewing itself. Not for all the wrong which may be doneshould they be restrained. Mr. O'Grady would now have the tales keptfrom the crowd to be the poetic luxury of a few. Yet would we, for allthe martyrs who perished in the fires of the Middle Ages, counsel theplacing of the Gospels on the list of books to be read only by a fewesoteric worshippers?

The literature which should be unpublished is that which holds thesecret of the magical powers. The legends of Ireland are not of thiskind. They have no special message to the aristocrat more than to theman of the people. The men who made the literature of Ireland were byno means nobly born, and it was the bards who placed the heroes, eachin his rank, and crowned them for after ages, and gave them their famousnames. They have placed on the brow of others a crown which belonged tothemselves, and all the heroic literature of the world was made bythe sacrifice of the nameless kings of men who have given a sceptre toothers they never wielded while living, and who bestowed the powers, ofbeauty and pity on women who perhaps had never uplifted a heart in theirday, and who now sway us from the grave with a grace only imagined inthe dreaming soul of the poet. Mr. O'Grady has been the bardic championof the ancient Irish aristocracy. He has thrown on them the sunrisecolors of his own brilliant spirit, and now would restrain others fromthe use of their names lest a new kingship should be established overthem, and another law than that of his own will, lest the poets of thedemocracy looking back on the heroes of the past should overcome themwith the ideas of a later day, and the Atticottic nature find a loftierspirit in those who felt the unendurable pride of the Fianna and roseagainst it. Well, it is only natural he should try to protect thechildren of his thought, but they need no later word from him. Ifwriters of a less noble mind than his deal with these things they willnot rob his heroes of a single power to uplift or inspire. In Greece, after Eschylus and his stupendous deities, came Sophocles, whorestrained them with a calm wisdom, and Euripides, who made them human, but still the mysterious Orphic deities remain and stir us when readingthe earlier page. Mr. O'Grady would not have the Red Branch cyclecast in dramatic form or given to the people. They are too great to bestaged; and he quotes, mistaking the gigantic for the heroic, a story ofCuculain reeling round Ireland on his fairy steed the Liath Macha. Thismay be phantasy or extravagance, but it is not heroism. Cuculain isoften heroic, but it is a quality of the soul and not of the body; itis shown by his tears over Ferdiad, in his gentleness to women. A moregrandiose and heroic figure than Cuculain was seen on the Athenianstage; and no one will say that the Titan Prometheus, chained on therock in his age-long suffering for men, is not a nobler figure thanCuculain in any aspect in which he appears to us in the tales. Divine traditions, the like of which were listened to with awe by theAthenians, should not be too lofty for our Christian people, whosemorals Mr. O'Grady, here hardly candid, professes to be anxious about. What is great in literature is a greatness springing out of the humanheart. Though we fall short today of the bodily stature of the giants ofthe prime, the spirit still remains and can express an equal greatness. I can well understand how a man of our own day, by the enlargement ofhis spirit, and the passion and sincerity of his speech, could expressthe greatness of the past. The drama in its mystical beginning was thevehicle through which divine ideas, which are beyond the sphere even ofheroic life and passion, were expressed; and if the later Irish writersfail of such greatness, it is not for that reason that the soul ofIreland will depart. I can hardly believe Mr. O'Grady to be serious whenhe fears that many forbidden subjects will be themes for dramatic art, that Maeve with her many husbands will walk the stage, and the lusts ofan earlier age be revived to please the lusts of today. The danger ofart is not in its subjects, but in the attitude of the artist's mind. The nobler influences of art arise, not because heroes are the theme, but because of noble treatment and the intuition which perceives theinflexible working out of great moral laws. 

The abysses of human nature may well be sounded if the plummet bedropped by a spirit from the heights. The lust which leads on to deathmay be a terrible thing to contemplate, but in the event there isconsolation; and the eye of faith can see even in the very exultationof corruption how God the Regenerator is working His will, leading manonward to his destiny of inevitable beauty. Mr. O'Grady in his youthhad the epic imagination, and I think few people realize how great andheroic that inspiration was; but the net that is spread for Leviathanwill not capture all the creatures of the deep, and neither epic norromance will manifest fully the power of the mythical ancestors ofthe modern Gael who now seek incarnation anew in the minds of theirchildren. Men too often forget, in this age of printed books, thatliterature is, after all, only an ineffectual record of speech. Theliterary man has gone into strange byways through long contemplation ofbooks, and he writes with elaboration what could never be spoken, and heloses that power of the bards on whom tongues of fire had descended, whowere masters of the magic of utterance, whose thoughts were not meantto be silently absorbed from the lifeless page. For there never can be, while man lives in a body, a greater means of expression for him thanthe voice of man affords, and no instrument of music will ever rival inpower the flowing of the music of the spheres through his lips. In allits tones, from the chanting of the magi which compelled the elements, to those gentle voices which guide the dying into peace, there is apower which will never be stricken from tympan or harp, for in allspeech there is life, and with the greatest speech the deep tones ofanother Voice may mingle. Has not the Lord spoken through His prophets?And man, when he has returned to himself, and to the knowledge ofhimself, may find a greater power in his voice than those which he haspainfully harnessed to perform his will, in steamship or railway. It isthrough drama alone that the writer can summon, even if vicariously, so great a power to his aid; and it is possible we yet may hear on thestage, not merely the mimicry of human speech, but the old forgottenmusic which was heard in the duns of great warriors to bow low theirfaces in their hands. Dear O'Grady, if we do not succeed it is not foryou to blame us, for our aims are at least as high as your own. 

1902

THE CHARACTER OF HEROIC LITERATURE

Lady Gregory, a fairy godmother, has given to Young Ireland the gift ofher Cuchulain of Muirthemne, which should be henceforward the book ofits dream. I do not doubt but there will be a great change in thenext generation, for the character of many children will have grown tomaturity brooding over the memories of heroes who were themselves halfchildren, half demigods. Though the hero tales will have their greatestpower over the young, no one mind could measure their depth. They seemsimple and primitive, yet they draw us strangely aside from life, andthe emotions they awaken are not simple but complex. Here are twentytales, and they are so alike in imaginative character that they seem allto have poured from one mind; and to these twenty we could add a hundredothers, all endlessly fertile in difference of incident, but all seemingto own the same imaginative creator. It was so for many centuries, and then the maker of the song seems to have grown weary, and distinctvoices not overladen with the tradition of the ages were heard; andtoday every one wanders in a path of his own, finding or losing the way, the truth, and the life of art in the free play of his desires. Therewas something more to cause this later period of diverse utterance thanthe interruption of other races and the claims of the world upon us. Surely the ancient Egyptian met in Memphis or Thebes as many strangersas we did, but he wept on through many dynasties carving the sameface of mystery and rarely altering the peculiar forms which were hisinheritance from the craftsmen of a thousand years before. It was notthe introduction of something new, but the loss of something whichfinally vexed the calm of the Sphinx and marred the Phidian beauty whichin Greece was a long dream for many generations. It was not because theDane or Norman came and dwelt among us that the signature of the Sidhewas withdrawn from the Gaelic mind. I do not know how to express thisloss otherwise than by saying we appear to have fallen away from ourarchetype. We find in all the early stories the presence of one beingwho may be the genius of our land if that old idea of race divinities bea true one. A strange similitude unites all the characters. We inferan interior identity. The same spirit flashes out in hostile clans, andthen Cuculain kisses Ferdiad. They all confidently appeal to; it ineach other. Maeve flying after the great battle can ask a gift from herconqueror and obtains it. Fand and Emer dispute who shall make the lastsacrifice of love and give the beloved to a rival. The conflicts seemhalf in play or in dream, and we do not know when an awakening of lovewill disarm the foes. In spite of the bloodshed the heroes seem likechildren who fight steadily through a mock battle, but the night willsee these children at peace, and they will dream with arms around eachother in the same cot. No literature ever had a more beautiful heart ofchildhood in it. The bards could hate no one consistently. If they tookaway the heroic chivalry from Conchobar in one tale they restored itto him in another. They have the confident trust--and expectation ofgoodness that children have, who may have suffered punishment, but whocome later on and smile on the chastiser. It is this quality which givesthe tales their extraordinary charm. I know no other literature whichhas it to the same degree. I do not like to speculate on the absenceof this spirit in our later literature, which was written under otherinfluences. It cannot be because there was a less spiritual life inthe apostles than in the bards. We cannot compare Cuculain, the mostcomplete ideal of Gaelic chivalry, with that supreme figure whose comingto the world was the effacement of whole pantheons of divinities, andyet it is true that since the thoughts of men were turned from the oldideals our literature has been filled with a less noble life. I thinka due may be found in the withdrawal of thought from nature, the greatmother who, is the giver of all life, and without whose life idealsbecome inoperative and listless dwellers in the heart. The eyes of theancient Gael were fixed in wonder on the rocks and hills, and the wasteplaces of the earth were piled with phantasmal palaces where the Sidhesat on their thrones. Everywhere there was life, and as they saw sothey felt. To conceive of nature in any way, as beautiful and living, asfriendly or hostile, is to receive from her in like measure out ofher fullness. With whatever face we approach the mirror a similar faceapproaches ours. "Let him approach it, saying, 'This is the Mighty, 'he becomes mighty, " says an ancient scripture, teaching us that asour aspiration is so will be our inspiration and power. Out of thiscomradeship with earth there came a commingling of natures, and we donot know when we read who are the Sidhe and who are human. The greatenergies are all in the heroes. They bound to themselves, like theTalkend, the strength of the fire, the brightness of the sun, and theswiftness of the wind. They seem truly the earth-born. The waves respondto their deeds; the elemental creatures respond and there are clashingechoes and allies innumerable, and armies in the air continuing theirbattles illimitably beyond: a proud race, who felt with bursting heartthe heavens were watching them, who defied their gods and exiled themto have free play for their own deeds. A very different humanity indeedfrom those who have come to walk the earth with humility, who are afraidof heaven and its rulers, and whose dread is the greatest of all sins, for in it is a denial of their own divinity. Surely the sight heroes ismore welcome to the King, in whose heaven are sworded seraphim, than thebowed knees and the spirits who make themselves as worms in His sight. In the symbolic expression of our spiritual life the eagle has becomea dove brooding peace. Oh, that it might rebecome the eagle and take tothe upper airs!

A generosity and greatness of spirit are in the heroes of the RedBranch, and out of their strength grows a bloom of beauty never fullyrevealed until Lady Gregory compiled these tales. As we read oureyes are dazzled by strange graces of color flowing over the pages:everywhere there is mystery and magnificence. Procession's pass by inDruid ritual, kings and queens, and harpers who look like kings. Whenthe wind passes over them and stirs their garments a sweetness comesover the teller of the tale, who felt that delight in draperies blownover shapely forms which is the inspiration of the Winged Victory andmany Greek marbles. The bards will not have the hands of those proudpeople touch anything which is not beautiful. "It was a beautifulchessboard they had, all of white bronze, and the chessmen of gold andsilver, and a candlestick of precious stones lighting it. " The wastingof time has spared us a few things to show that this rare and intricatemetal work was not a myth, and we are forced by an inexorable logicto accept as mainly true the narration of the pride, the beauty, thegenerosity, and the large lovable character of the ancient heroes. Wemay come to realize that, losing their Druid vision of a more shiningworld mingling with this, we have lost the vision of that life into thelikeness of which it is the true labor of the spirit to transform thislife. For the Tirnanoge is that Garden where, in the mind of the Lord, the flowers and trees blossomed before they grew in the fields, whereman lived in the Golden Age before the outer darkness of the earthwas built and he was outcast from Paradise. There is no true art orliterature which has not some image of the Golden Life lurking withinit, and through the archaic rudeness of these legends the light shinesas sunlight through the hoary branches of ancient oaks. Lady Gregoryhas done her work, as compiler with a judgment which could hardly be toomuch praised, and she has translated the stories into an idiom whichis a reflection of the original Gaelic and is full of charm. We areindebted to her for this labor as much as to any of those who sang tosweeten Ireland's wrong. 

1902

A POET OF SHADOWS

When I was asked to write "anything" about Yeats, our Irish poet, mythoughts were like rambling flocks that have no shepherd, and withoutguidance my rambling thoughts have run anywhere. 

I confess I have feared to enter or linger too long in the many-coloredland of Druid twilights and tunes. A beauty not our own, more perfectthan we can ourselves conceive, is a danger to the imagination. I amtoo often tempted to wander with Usheen in Timanoge and to forget my ownheart and its more rarely accorded vision of truth. I know I like my ownheart best, but I never look into the world of my friend without feelingthat my region lies in the temperate zone and is near the Arcticcircle; the flowers grow more rarely and are paler, and the struggle forexistence is keener. Southward and in the warm west are the Happy Islesamong the Shadowy Waters. The pearly phantoms are dancing there withblown hair amid cloud tail daffodils. They have known nothing butbeauty, or at the most a beautiful unhappiness. Everything there movesin procession or according to ritual, and the agony of grief, it isfelt, must be concealed. There are no faces blurred with tears there;some traditional gesture signifying sorrow is all that is allowed. Ihave looked with longing eyes into this world. It is Ildathach, theMany-Colored Land, but not the Land of the Living Heart. That islandwhere the multitudinous beatings of many hearts became one is yetunvisited; but the isle of our poet is the more beautiful of all theisles the mystic voyagers have found during the thousands of yearsliterature has recorded in Ireland. What wonder that many wish to followhim, and already other voices are singing amid its twilights. 

They will make and unmake. They will discover new wonders; and willperhaps make commonplace some beauty which but for repetition would haveseemed rare. I would that no one but the first discoverer should enterIldathach, or at least report of it. No voyage to the new world, howevermemorable, will hold us like the voyage of Columbus. I sigh sometimesthinking on the light dominion dreams have over the heart. We cannothold a dream for long, and that early joy of the poet in his new-foundworld has passed. It has seemed to him too luxuriant. He seeks forsomething more, and has tried to make its tropical tangle orthodox;and the glimmering waters and winds are no longer beautiful naturalpresences, but have become symbolic voices and preach obscurely somedoctrine of their power to quench the light in the soul or to fan it toa brighter flame. 

I like their old voiceless motion and their natural wandering best, andwould rather roam in the bee-loud glade than under the boughs of beryland chrysoberyl, where I am put to school to learn the significanceof every jewel. I like that natural infinity which a prodigal beautysuggests more than that revealed in esoteric hieroglyphs, even thoughthe writing be in precious stones. Sometimes I wonder whether thatinsatiable desire of the mind for something more than it has yetattained, which blows the perfume from every flower, and plucks theflower from every tree, and hews down every tree in the valley until itgoes forth gnawing itself in a last hunger, does not threaten all thecloudy turrets of the Poet's soul. But whatever end or transformation, or unveiling may happen, that which creates beauty must have beauty inits essence, and the soul must cast off many vestures before it comesto itself. We, all of us, poets, artists, and musicians, who work inshadows, must sometime begin to work in substance, and why should wegrieve if one labor ends and another begins? I am interested more inlife than in the shadows of life, and as Ildathach grows fainter I awaiteagerly the revelation of the real nature of one who has built somany mansions in the heavens. The poet has concealed himself under theembroidered cloths and has moved in secretness, and only at rare times, as when he says, "A pity beyond all telling is hid in the heart oflove, " do we find a love which is not the love of the Sidhe; and morerarely still do recognizable human figures, like the Old Pensioneror Moll Magee, meet us. All the rest are from another world andare survivals of the proud and golden races who move with the oldstateliness and an added sorrow for the dark age which breaks in upontheir loveliness. They do not war upon the new age, but build up aboutthemselves in imagination the ancient beauty, and love with a love alittle colored by the passion of the darkness from which they could notescape. They are the sole inheritors of many traditions, and have nowcome to the end of the ways, and so are unhappy. We know why they areunhappy, but not the cause of a strange merriment which sometimesthey feel, unless it be that beauty within itself has a joy in its ownrhythmic being. They are changing, too, as the winds and waters havechanged. They are not like Usheen, seekers and romantic wanderers, buthave each found some mood in themselves where all quest ceases; theyutter oracles, and even in the swaying of a hand or the dropping of hairthere is less suggestion of individual action than of a divinity livingwithin them, shaping an elaborate beauty in dream for his own delight, and for no other end than the delight in his dream. Other poets havewritten of Wisdom overshadowing man and speaking through his lips, or aWill working within the human will, but I think in this poetry we findfor the first time the revelation of the Spirit as the weaver of beauty. Hence it comes that little hitherto unnoticed motions are adored:

 You need but lift a pearl-pale hand, And bind up your long hair and sigh; And all men's hearts must burn and beat. 

This woman is less the beloved than the priestess of beauty who revealsthe divinity, not as the inspired prophetesses filled with the HolyBreath did in the ancient mysteries, but in casual gestures and in awaving of her white arms, in the stillness of her eyes, in her hairwhich trembles like a faery flood of unloosed shadowy light over palebreasts, and in many glimmering motions so beautiful that it is at onceseen whose footfall it is we hear, and that the place where she standsis holy ground. This, it seems to me, is what is essential in thispoetry, what is peculiar and individual in it--the revelation ofgreat mysteries in unnoticed things; and as not a sparrow may fallunconsidered by Him, so even in the swaying of a human hand His sceptremay have dominion over the heart and His paradise be entered in thelifting of an eyelid. 

1902

THE BOYHOOD OF A POET

When I was a boy I knew another who has since become famous and who hasnow written Reveries over Childhood and Youth. I searched the pages tomeet the boy I knew and could not find him. He has told us what he sawand what he remembered of others, but from himself he seems to havepassed away and remembers himself not. The boy I knew was darklybeautiful to look on, fiery yet playful and full of lovely and elfinfancies. He was swift of response, indeed over-generous to the fanciesof others because a nature so charged with beauty could not but emitbeauty at every challenge. Even so water, however ugly the object wecast upon it, can but break out in a foam of beauty and a bewildermentof lovely curves. 

Our fancies were in reality nothing to him but the affinities which bythe slightest similitude evoked out of the infinitely richer beingthe prodigality of beautiful images with which it was endowed and madeitself conscious of itself. I have often thought how strange it is thatartist and poet have never yet revealed themselves to us except in verseand painting, that there was among them no psychologist who could turnback upon himself to search for the law of his own being, who could tellus how his brain first became illuminated with images, and who triedto track the inspiration to its secret fount and the images to theirancestral beauty. Few of the psychologists who have written aboutimagination were endowed with it themselves: and here is a poet, themost imaginative of his generation, who has written about his youth andhas told us only about external circumstances and nothing about himself, nothing about that flowering of strange beauty in poetry in him wherethe Gaelic imagination that had sunk underground when the Gaelic speechhad died, rose up again transfiguring an alien language until thatnew poetry became like the record of another mystic voyager tothe Heaven-world of our ancestors. But poet and artist are rarelyself-conscious of the processes of their own minds. They deliver theirmessage with exultation but they find nothing worth recording in thedescent upon them of the fiery tongues. So our poet has told us littleabout himself but much about circumstance, and I recall in his pages theDublin of thirty years ago, and note how faithful the memory of eye andear are, and how forgetful the heart is of its own fancies. Is naturebehind this distaste for intimate self-analysis in the poet? Are our ownemanations poisonous to us if we do not rapidly clear ourselves of them?Is it best to forget ourselves and hurry away once the deed is done orthe end is attained to some remoter valley in the Golden World and lookfor a new beauty if we would continue to create beauty?

I know how readily our poet forgets his own songs. I once quoted to himsome early verses of his own as comment on something he had said. Heasked eagerly "Who wrote that?" and when I said "Do you not remember?"he petulantly waved the poem aside for he had forsaken his past. Againat a later period he told me his early verses sometimes aroused him to afrenzy of dislike. Of the feelings which beset the young poet of geniuslittle or nothing is revealed in this Reverie. Yet what would we notgive for a book which would tell how beauty beset that youth in hiswalks about Dublin and Sligo; how the sensitive response to color, form, music and tradition began, how he came to recognize the moods whichincarnated in him as immortal moods. Perhaps it is too much to expectfrom the creative imagination that it shall also be capable of exact andsubtle analysis. In this work I walk down the streets of Dublin I walkedwith Yeats over thirty years ago. I mix with the people who then wereliving in the city, O'Leary, Taylor, Dowden, Hughes and the rest; butthe poet himself does not walk with me. It is a new voice speaking ofthe past of others, pointing out the doorways entered by dead youth. Thenew voice has distinction and dignity of its own, and we are gratefulfor this history, others more so than myself, because most of whatis written therein I knew already, and I wanted a secret which is notrevealed. I wanted to know more about the working of the imaginationwhich planted the little snow-white feet in the sally garden, and whichheard the kettle on the hob sing peace into the breast, and was intimatewith twilight and the creatures that move in the dusk and undergrowths, with weasel, heron, rabbit, hare, mouse and coney; which plucked theFlower of Immortality in the Island of Statues and wandered with Usheenin Timanogue. I wanted to know what all that magic-making meant to themagician, but he has kept his own secret, and I must be content andgrateful to one who has revealed more of beauty than any other in histime. 

1916

THE POETRY OF JAMES STEPHENS

For a generation the Irish bards have endeavored to live in a palace ofart, in chambers hung with the embroidered cloths and made dim with palelights and Druid twilights, and the melodies they most sought for werehalf soundless. The art of an early age began softly, to end its songswith a rhetorical blare of sound. The melodies of the new school beganclose to the ear and died away in distances of the soul. Even as theprophet of old was warned to take off his shoes because the place hestood on was holy ground, so it seemed for a while in Ireland as if nopoet could be accepted unless he left outside the demesnes of poetrythat very useful animal, the body, and lost all concern about itshabits. He could not enter unless he moved with the light and dreamyfoot-fall of spirit. Mr. Yeats was the chief of this eclectic school, and his poetry at its best is the most beautiful in Irish literature. But there crowded after him a whole horde of verse-writers, who seizedthe most obvious symbols he used and standardized them, and in theirwritings one wandered about, gasping for fresh air land sunlight, forthe Celtic soul seemed bound for ever pale lights of fairyland on thenorth and by the by the darkness of forbidden passion on the south, andon the east by the shadowiness of all things human, and on the west byeverything that was infinite, without form, and void. 

It was a great relief to me, personally, who had lived in the palace ofIrish art for a time, and had even contributed a little to its dimness, to hear outside the walls a few years ago a sturdy voice blasphemingagainst all the formula, and violating the tenuous atmosphere with its"Insurrections. " There are poets who cannot write with half their being, and who must write with their whole being, and they bring their poorrelation, the body, with them wherever they go, and are not ashamed ofit. They are not at warfare with the spirit, but have a kind of instinctthat the clan of human powers ought to cling together as one family. With the best poets of this school, like Shakespeare and Whitman, one rarely can separate body and soul, for we feel the whole man isspeaking. With Keats, Shelley, Swinburne, and our own Yeats, one feelsthat they have all sought shelter from disagreeable actualities in theworld of imagination. James Stephens, as he chanted his Insurrections, sang with his whole being. Let no one say I am comparing him withShakespeare. One may say the blackbird has wings as well as the eagle, without insisting that the bird in the hedgerows is peer of the wingedcreature beyond the mountain-tops. But how refreshing it was tofind somebody who was a poet without a formula, who did not ransackdictionaries for dead words, as Rossetti did to get living speech, whosenatural passions declared themselves without the least idea that theyought to be ashamed of themselves, or be thrice refined in the crucibleby the careful alchemist before they could appear in the drawing-room. Nature has an art of its own, and the natural emotions in their naturaland passionate expression have that kind of picturesque beauty whichMarcus Aurelius, tired, perhaps, of the severe orthodoxies of Greek andRoman art, referred to when he spoke of the foam on the jaws of the wildboar and the mane of the lion. 

There were evidences of such an art in Insurrections, the first book ofJames Stephens. In the poem called "Fossils, " the girl who flies and theboy who hunts her are followed in flight and pursuit with a swift energyby the poet, and the lines pant and gasp, and the figures flare up anddown the pages. The energy created a new form in verse, not an orthodoxbeauty, which the classic artists would have admitted, but suchpicturesque beauty as Marcus Aurelius found in the foam on the jaws ofthe wild boar. 

I always want to find the fundamental emotion out of which a poetwrites. It is easy to do this with some, with writers like Shelley andWordsworth, for they talked much of abstract things, and a man neverreveals himself so fully as when he does this, when he tries tointerpret nature, when he has to fill darkness with light, and chaoswith meaning. A man may speak about his own heart and may deceivehimself and others, but ask him to fill empty space with significance, and what he projects on that screen will be himself, and you can knowhim even as hereafter he will be known. When a poet puts his ear to ashell, I know if he listens long enough he will hear his own destiny. Iknew after reading "The Shell" that in James Stephens we were going tohave no singer of the abstract. There was no human quality or stir inthe blind elemental murmur, and the poet drops it with a sigh of relief:

 O, it was sweet To hear a cart go jolting down the street. 

From the tradition of the world too he breaks away, from the greatmurmuring shell which gives back to us our cries and questioningsand protests soothed into soft, easeful things and smooth orthodoxcomplacencies, for it was shaped by humanity to whisper back to itwhat it wished to hear. From all soft, easeful beliefs andsilken complacencies the last Irish poet breaks away in a book ofinsurrections. He is doubtful even of love, the greatest orthodoxy ofany, which so few have questioned, which has preceded all religions andwill survive them all. When he writes of love in "The Red-haired Man'sWife" and "The Rebel" he is not sure that that old intoxication ofself-surrender is not a wrong to the soul and a disloyalty to thehighest in us. His "Dancer" revolts from the applauding crowd. Thewind cries out against the inference that the beauty of nature pointsinevitably to an equal beauty of spirit within. His enemies revoltagainst their hate; his old man against his own grumblings, and the poethimself rebels against his own revolt in that quaint scrap of verse heprefixes to the volume:

 What's the use Of my abuse? The world will run Around the sun As it has done Since time begun When I have drifted to the deuce: And what's the use Of my abuse?

He does not revolt against the abstract like so many because he isincapable of thinking. Indeed, he is one of the few Irish poets we havewho is always thinking as he goes along. He does not rebel against lovebecause he is not himself sweet at heart, for the best thing in the bookis its unfeigned humanity. So we have a personal puzzle to solve withthis perplexing writer which makes us all the more eager to hear himagain. A man might be difficult to understand and the problem of hispersonality might not be worth solution, but it is not so with JamesStephens. From a man who can write with such power as he shows in thesetwo stanzas taken from "The Street behind Yours" we may expect highthings. It is a vision seen with distended imagination as if by somechild strayed from light:

 And though 'tis silent, though no sound Crawls from the darkness thickly spread, Yet darkness brings Grim noiseless things That walk as they were dead, They glide and peer and steal around With stealthy silent tread. 

 You dare not walk; that awful crew Might speak or laugh as you pass by. Might touch or paw With a formless claw Or leer from a sodden eye, Might whisper awful things they knew, Or wring their hands and cry. 

There is nothing more grim and powerful than that in The City ofDreadful Night. It has all the vaporous horror of a Dore grotesque andwill bear examination better. But our poet does not as a rule write withsuch unrelieved gloom. He keeps a stoical cheerfulness, and even whenhe faces terrible things we feel encouraged to take his hand and go withhim, for he is master of his own soul, and you cannot get a whimperout of him. He likes the storm of things, and is out for it. He hasa perfect craft in recording wild natural emotions. The verse in thisfirst book has occasional faults, but as a rule the lines move, drivenby that inner energy of emotion which will sometimes work more metricalwonders than the most conscious art. The words hiss at you sometimes, as in "The Dancer, " and again will melt away with the delicacy of fairybells as in "The Watcher, " or will run like deep river water, as in "TheWhisperer, " which in some moods I think is the best poem in the bookuntil I read "Fossils" or "What Tomas an Buile said in a Pub. " They aretoo long to print, but I must give myself the pleasure of quoting thebeautiful "Slan Leat, " with which he concludes the book, bidding us, notfarewell, but to accompany him on further adventure:

 And now, dear heart, the night is closing in, The lamps are not yet ready, and the gloom Of this sad winter evening, and the din The wind makes in the streets fills all the room. You have listened to my stories--Seumas Beg Has finished the adventures of his youth, And no more hopes to find a buried keg Stuffed to the lid with silver. He, in truth, And all alas! grew up: but he has found The path to truer romance, and with you May easily seek wonders. We are bound Out to the storm of things, and all is new. Give me your hand, so, keeping close to me, Shut tight your eyes, step forward... Where are we?

Our new Irish poet declared he was bound "out to the storm of things, "and we all waited with interest for his next utterance. Would he wearthe red cap as the poet of the social revolution, now long overdue inthese islands, or would he sing the Marsellaise of womanhood, emergingin hordes from their underground kitchens to make a still greaterrevolution? He did neither. He forgot all about the storm of things, anddelighted us with his story of Mary, the charwoman's daughter, a tale ofDublin life, so, kindly, so humane, so vivid, so wise, so witty, and sotrue, that it would not be exaggerating to say that natural humanity inIreland found its first worthy chronicler in this tale. 

We have a second volume of poetry from James Stephens, The Hill ofVision. He has climbed a hill, indeed, but has found cross roads thereleading in many directions, and seems to be a little perplexed whetherthe storm of things was his destiny after all. When one is in a cavethere is only one road which leads out, but when one stands in thesunlight there are endless roads. We enjoy his perplexity, for he hasseated himself by his cross-roads, and has tried many tunes on his lute, obviously in doubt which sounds sweetest to his own ear. I am not atall in doubt as to what is best, and I hope he will go on like Whitman, carrying "the old delicious burdens, men and women, " wherever he goes. For his references to Deity, Plato undoubtedly would have expelled himfrom his Republic; and justly so, for James Stephens treats his god verymuch as the African savage treats his fetish. Now it is supplicated, and the next minute the idol is buffeted for an unanswered prayer or aneglected duty, and then a little later our Irish African is crooningsweetly with his idol, arranging its domestic affairs and the marriageof Heaven and Earth. Sometimes our poet essays the pastoral, and insheer gaiety: flies like any bird under the boughs, and up into thesunlight. There are in his company imps and grotesques, and fauns andsatyrs, who come summoned by his piping. Sometimes, as in "Eve, " thepoem of the mystery of womanhood, he is purely beautiful, but I findmyself going back to his men and women; and I hope he will not be angrywith me when I say I prefer his tinker drunken to his Deity sober. Noneof our Irish poets has found God, at least a god any but themselveswould not be ashamed to acknowledge. But our poet does know his menand his women. They are not the shadowy, Whistler-like decorativesuggestions of humanity made by our poetic dramatists. They have enteredlike living creatures into his mind, and they break out there in aninstant's unforgettable passion or agony, and the wild words fly upto the poet's brain to match their emotion. I do not know whether theverses entitled "The Brute" are poetry, but they have an amazing energyof expression. 

But our poet can be beautiful when he wills, and sometimes, too, he haslargeness and grandeur of vision and expression. Look at this picture ofthe earth, seen from mid-heaven:

 And so he looked to where the earth, asleep, Rocked with the moon. He saw the whirling sea Swing round the world in surgent energy, Tangling the moonlight in its netted foam, And nearer saw the white and fretted dome Of the ice-capped pole spin back a larded ray To whistling stars, bright as a wizard's day, But these he passed with eyes intently wide, Till closer still the mountains he espied, Squatting tremendous on the broad-backed earth, Each nursing twenty rivers at a birth. 

I would like to quote the verses entitled "Shame. " Never have I readanywhere such an anguished cowering before Conscience, a mighty creaturefull of eyes within and without, and pointing fingers and asped tongues, anticipating in secret the blazing condemnation of the world. And thereis "Bessie Bobtail, " staggering down the streets with her reiterated, inarticulate expression of grief, moving like one of those wretched whomBlake described in a marvelous phrase as "drunken with woe forgotten";and there is "Satan, " where the reconcilement of light and darkness inthe twilights of time is perfectly and imaginatively expressed. 

The Hill of Vision is a very unequal book. There are many verses fullof power, which move with the free easy motion of the literary athlete. Others betray awkwardness, and stumble as if the writer had stepped toosuddenly into the sunlight of his power, and was dazed and bewildered. There is some diffusion of his faculties in what I feel are byways ofhis mind, but the main current of his energies will, I am convinced, urge him on to his inevitable portrayal of humanity. With writers likeSynge and Stephens the Celtic imagination is leaving its Timanoges, itsIldathachs, its Many Colored Lands and impersonal moods, and is comingdown to earth intent on vigorous life and individual humanity. I can seethat there are great tales to be told and great songs to be sung, and Iwatch the doings of the new-comers with sympathy, all the while feelingI am somewhat remote from their world, for I belong to an earlier day, and listen to these robust songs somewhat as a ghost who hears the cockcrow, and knows his hours are over, and he and his tribe must disappearinto tradition. 

1912

A NOTE ON SEUMAS O'SULLIVAN

As I grow older I get more songless. I am now exiled irrevocably fromthe Country of the Young, but I hope I can listen without jealousy andeven with delight to those who still make music in the enchanted land. Ioften searched in the "Poet's Corner" of the country papers with awild surmise that there, amid reports of Boards of Guardians and RuralCouncils, some poetic young kinsman may be taking council with thestars, watching more closely the Plough in the furrows of the heavensthan the county instructor at his task of making farmers drive theplough straight in the fields. I found many years ago in a country papera local poet making genuine music. I remember a line:

 And hidden rivers were murmuring in the dark. 

 I went on in the strength of this poem through the desertof country journalism for many years, hoping to find more hidden riversof song murmuring in the darkness. It was a patient life of unrequitedtoil, and I have returned to civilization to search publishers' listsfor more easily procurable pleasure. A few years ago I mined out of thestill darker region of manuscripts some poetic crystals which I thoughtwere valuable, and edited New Songs. Nearly all my young singers havesince then taken flight on their own account. Some have volumes in thebooksellers and some in the hands of the printers. But there is oneshy singer of the group of writers in New Songs who might easily getoverlooked because his verse takes little or no thought of the pastor present or future of his country: yet the slim book in which iscollected Seumas O'Sullivan's verses reveals a true poet, and if he istoo shy to claim his country in his verses there is no reason why hiscountry should not claim him, for he is in his way as Irish as any ofour singers. He is, as Mr. W. B. Yeats was in his earlier days, theliterary successor of those old Gaelic poets who were fastidious intheir verse, who loved little in this world but some chance light in itwhich reminded them of fairyland, or who, if they were in love, lovedtheir mistress less for her own sake than because some turn of her head, or "a foam-pale breast, " carried their impetuous imaginations past herbeauty into memories of Helen of Troy, Deirdre, or some other symbolof that remote and perfect beauty which, however man desires, he shallembrace only at the end of time. I think the wives or mistresses ofthese old poets must have been very unhappy, for women wish to be lovedfor what they know about themselves, and for the tenderness which is intheir hearts, and not because some colored twilight invests them with ashadowy beauty not their own, and which they know they can nevercarry into the light of day. These poets of the transient look and theevanescent light do not help us to live our daily life, but they dosomething which is as necessary. They educate and refine the spirit sothat it shall not come altogether without any understanding of delicateloveliness into the Kingdom of Heaven, or gaze on Timanoge with thecrude blank misunderstanding of Cockney tourists staring up at thestupendous dreams pictured on the roof of the Sistine Chapel. Thesefastidious scorners of every day and its interests are always lookingthrough nature for "the herbs before they were in the field and everyflower before it grew, " and through women for the Eve who was in theimagination of the Lord before she was embodied, and we all need thisrefining vision more than we know. It may be asked of us hereafter whenwe would mount up into the towers of vision, "How can you desire thebeauty you have not seen, who have not sought or loved its shadow inthe world?" and the Gates of Ivory may not swing open at our knock. Thiswill never be said to Seumas O'Sullivan, who is always waiting onthe transient look and the evanescent light to build up out of theirremembered beauty the Kingdom of his Heaven:

 Round you light tresses, delicate, Wind blown, wander and climb Immortal, transitory. 

Earth has no steady beauty as the calm-eyed immortals have, but theirimage glimmers on the waves of time, and out of what instantly vanisheswe can build up something within us which may yet grow into a calm-eyedimmortality of loveliness, we becoming gradually what we dream of. Ihave heard people complain of the frailty of these verses of SeumasO'Sullivan. They want war songs, plough songs, to nerve the soul tofight or the hand to do its work. I will never make that complaint. Iwill only complain if the strife or the work ever blunt my senses sothat I will pass by with an impatient disdain these delicate snatchingsat a beauty which is ever fleeting. But I would ask him to remember thatlife never allures us twice with exactly the same enchantment. Neveragain will that tress drift like a woven wind made visible out ofParadise; never again will that lifted hand, foam-pale, seem like thespringing up of beauty in the world; never a second time will that whitebrow remind him of the wonderful white towers of the city of thegods. To seek a second inspiration is to receive only a second-rateinspiration, and our poet is a little too fond of lingering in his verseround a few things, a face, the swaying poplars, or sighing reeds whichhad once piped an alluring music in his ears, and which he longs to hearagain. He lives not in too frail a world, but in too narrow a world, andhe should adventure out into new worlds in the old quest. He, has becomea master of delicate and musical rhythms. I remember reading SeumasO'Sulivan's first manuscripts with mingled pleasure and horror, for hislines often ran anyhow, and scansion seemed to him an unknown art, but Ifeel humbly now that he can get a subtle quality into his music which Icould not hope to acquire. I would like him to catch some new and rarebirds with that subtle net of his, and to begin to invent more beautyof his own and to seek for it less. I believe he has got it in him todo well, to do better than he has done if he will now try to use hisinvention more. The poems with a slight narrative in them, like "ThePortent" or the "Saint Anthony, " seem to me the most perfect, and it isin this direction, I think, he will succeed best. He wants a story tokeep him from beating musical and ineffective wings in the void. I havenot said half what I want to say about Seumas O'Sullivan's verses, butI know the world will not listen long to the musings of one verse-writeron another. I only hope this note may send some readers to theirbookseller for Seumas O'Sullivan's poems, and that it may help them tostudy with more understanding a mind that I love. 

1909

ART AND LITERATURE

A LECTURE ON THE ART OF G. F. WATTS

After the publication of The Gentle Art of Making Enemies the writer whoventures to speak of art and literature in the same breath needssome courage. Since the death of Whistler, his opinions about theindependence of art from the moral ideas with which literature ispreoccupied have been generally accepted in the studios. The artistwho is praised by a literary man would hardly be human if he was notpleased; but he listens with impatience to any criticism or suggestionabout the substance of his art or the form it should take. I had afriend, an artist of genius, and when we were both young we arguedtogether about art on equal terms. It had not then occurred to him thatany intelligence I might have displayed in writing verse did not entitleme to an opinion about modeling; but one day I found him reading Mr. Whistler's Ten O'clock. The revolt of art against literature had reachedIreland. After that, while we were still good friends, he made me feelthat I was an outsider, and when I ventured to plead for a nationalcharacter in sculpture, his righteous anger--I might say hisferocity--forced me to talk of something else. 

I was not convinced he was right, but years after I began to use thebrush a little, and I remember painting a twilight from love of somestrange colors and harmonious lines, and when one of my literary friendsfound that its interest depended on color and form, and that the ideain it could not readily be translated into words, and that it lefthim wishing that I would illustrate my poems or something that had ameaning, I veered round at once and understood Whistler, and how foolishI was to argue with John Hughes. I joined in the general insurrectionof art against the domination of literature. But being a writer andmuch concerned with abstract ideas, I have never had the comfort andhappiness of those who embrace this opinion with their whole being, andwhen I was asked to lecture, I thought that as I had no Irish Whistlerto fear, I might speak of art in relation to these universal ideas whichartists hold are for literature and not subject matter for art at all. 

I must first say it was not my wish to speak. With a world of noble andimmortal forms all about us, it seemed to me as unfitting that wordswithout art or long labor in their making should be advertised as anattraction; that any one should be expected to sit here for an hour tolisten to me or another upon a genius which speaks for itself. I wasoverruled by Mr. Lane. But it is all wrong, this desire to hear and holdopinions about art rather than to be moved by the art itself. I knowtwenty charlatans who will talk about art, but never lift their eyesto look at the pictures on the wall. I remember an Irish poet speakingabout art a whole evening in a room hung round with pictures byConstable, Monet, and others, and he came into that room and went outof it without looking at those pictures. His interest in art was in theholding of opinions about it, and in hearing other opinions, whichhe could again talk about. I hope I have made some of you feeluncomfortable. This may, perhaps, seem malicious, but it is necessary torelease artists from the dogmas of critics who are not artists. 

I would not venture to speak here tonight if I thought that anythingI said could be laid hold of and be turned into a formula, and usedafterwards to torment some unfortunate artist. An artist will takewith readiness advice or criticism from a fellow-artist, so far ashis natural vanity permits; but he writhes under opinions derived fromRuskin or Tolstoi, the great theorists. You may ask indignantly, Can noone, then, speak about paintings or statues except painters ormodelers? No; no one would condemn you to such painful silence andself-suppression. Artists would wish you to talk unceasingly aboutthe emotions their pain of making pictures arouse in you; but, underlifelong enemies, do not suggest to artists the theories under whichthey should paint. That is hitting below the belt. The poor artist is asGod made him; and no one, not even a Tolstoi, is competent to undertakehis re-creation. His fellow-artists will pass on to him the tradition ofusing the brush. He may use it well or ill; but when you ask him to usehis art to illustrate literary ideas, or ethical ideas, you are askinghim to become a literary man or a preacher. The other arts have theirobvious limitations. The literary man does not dare to demand of themusician that he shall be scientific or moral. The latter is safein uttering every kind of profanity in sound so long as it is music. Musicians have their art to themselves. But the artist is tormented, andasked to reflect the thought of his time. Beauty is primarily what heis concerned with; and the only moral ideas which he can impart in asatisfactory way are the moral ideas naturally associated with beauty inits higher or lower forms. But I think, some of you are confuting me inyour own minds at this moment. You say to yourselves: "But we have allabout us the works of great artists whose inspiration not one will deny. He used his art to express great ethical ideas. He spoke again and againabout these ideas. He was proud that his art was dedicated to theirexpression. " I am sorry to say that he did say many things which wouldhave endeared him to Tolstoi and Ruskin, and for which I respect himas a man, and which as an artist I deplore. I deplore his speaking ofethical ideas as the inspiration of his art, because I think they wereonly the inspiration of his life; and where he is weakest in his appealas an artist is where he summons consciously to his aid ethical ideaswhich find their proper expression in religion or literature or life. 

Watts wished to ennoble art by summoning to its aid the highestconceptions of literature; but in doing so he seems to me to imply thatart needed such conceptions for its justification, that the pure artistmind, careless of these ideas, and only careful to make for itselfa beautiful vision of things, was in a lower plane, and had a lessspiritual message. Now that I deny. I deny absolutely that art needs tocall to its aid, in order to justify or ennoble it, any abstract ideasabout love or justice or mercy. 

It may express none of these ideas, and yet express truths of its ownas high and as essential to the being of man; and it is in spite ofhimself, in spite of his theories, that the work of Watts will havean enduring place in the history of art. You will ask then, "Can artexpress no moral ideas? Is it unmoral?" In the definite and restrictedsense in which the words "ethical" and "moral" are generally used, artis, and must by its nature be unmoral. I do not mean "immoral, " and letno one represent me as saying art must be immoral by its very nature. There are dear newspaper men to whom it would be a delight to attributeto me such a saying; and never to let me forget that I said it. When Isay that art is essentially unmoral, I mean that the first impulse topaint comes from something seen, either beauty of color or form or tone. It may be light which attracts the artist, or it may be some dimming ofnatural forms, until they seem to have more of the loveliness of mindthan of nature. But it is the aesthetic, not the moral or ethical, nature which is stirred. The picture may afterwards be called "Charity, "or "Faith, " or "Hope"--and any of these words may make an apt title. Butwhat looms up before the vision of the artist first of all is an image, and that is accepted on account of its fitness for a picture; and animage which was not pictorial would be rejected at once by any trueartist, whether it was an illustration of the noblest moral conceptionor not. Whether a picture is moral or immoral will depend uponthe character of the artist, and not upon the subject. A man willcommunicate his character in everything he touches. He cannot escapecommunicating it. He must be content with that silent witness, and nottry to let the virtues shout out from his pictures. The fact is, art isessentially a spiritual thing, and its vision is perpetually turnedto Ultimates. It is indefinable as spirit is. It perceives in life andnature those indefinable relations of one thing to another which to thereligious thinker suggest a master mind in nature--a magician ofthe beautiful at work from hour to hour, from moment to moment, in anever-ceasing and solemn chariot motion in the heavens, in the perpetualand marvelous breathing forth of winds, in the motion of waters, and inthe unending evolution of gay and delicate forms of leaf and wing. 

The artist may be no philosopher, no mystic; he may be with or without amoral sense, he may not believe in more than his eye can see; but in sofar as he can shape clay into beautiful and moving forms he is imitatingDeity; when his eye has caught with delight some subtle relation betweencolor and color there is mysticism in his vision. I am not concernedhere to prove that there is a spirit in nature or humanity; but forthose who ask from art a serious message, here, I say, is a way ofreceiving from art an inspiration the most profound that man canreceive. When you ask from the artist that he should teach you, be careful that you are not asking him to be obvious, to utterplatitudes--that you are not asking him to debase his art to make thingseasy for you, who are too indolent to climb to the mountain, but wantit brought to your feet. There are people who pass by a nocturne byWhistler, a misty twilight by Corot, and who whisper solemnly before aNoel Paton as if they were in a Cathedral. Is God, then, only presentwhen His Name is uttered? When we call a figure Time or Death, doesit add dignity to it? What is the real inspiration we derive from thatnoble design by Mr. Watts? Not the comprehension of Time, not the natureof Death, but a revelation human form can express of the heroic dignity. Is it not more to us to know that man or woman can look half-divine, that they can wear an aspect such as we imagine belongs to theimmortals, and to feel that if man is made in the image of his Creator, his Creator is the archetype of no ignoble thing? There were immortalpowers in Watts' mind when those figures surged up in it; but they wereneither Time nor Death. He was rather near to his own archetype, and inthat mood in which Emerson was when he said, "I the imperfect adoremy own perfect. " Touch by touch, as the picture was built up, he wasbecoming conscious of some interior majesty in his own nature, andit was for himself more than for us he worked. "The oration is to theorator, " says Whitman, "and comes most back to him. " The artist, too, ashe creates a beautiful form outside himself, creates within himself, or admits to his being a nobler beauty than his eyes have seen. Hisinspiration is spiritual in its origin, and there is always in it somestrange story of the glory of the King. 

With man and his work we must take either a spiritual or a materialpoint of view. All half-way beliefs are temporary and illogical. Iprefer the spiritual with its admission of incalculable mystery andromance in nature, where we find the infinite folded in the atom, andfeel how in the unconscious result and labor of man's hand the Eternalis working Its will. You may say that this belongs more to psychologythan to art criticism, but I am trying to make clear to you and tomyself the relation which the mind which is in literature may rightlybear to the vision which is art. Are literature and ethics to dictateto Art its subjects? Is it right to demand that the artist's work shallhave an obviously intelligible message or meaning, which the intellectcan abstract from it and relate to the conduct of life? My belief isthat the most literature can do is to help to interpret art, and thatart offers to it, as nature does, a vision of beauty, but of undefinedsignificance. 

No one asks or expects the clouds to shape themselves into ethicalforms, or the sun to shine only on the just and not on the unjustalso. It is vain to expect it, but there is something written about theheavens declaring the beauty of the Creator and the firmament showingHis handiwork. If the artist can bring whatever of that vision hastouched him into his work we should ask no more, and must not expect himto be more righteously minded than his Creator, or to add a finishingtag of moral to justify it all, to show that Deity is solemnly mindedand no mere idle trifler with beauty like Whistler. 

I have stated my belief that art is spiritual, that its genuineinspirations come from a higher plane of our being than the ethicalor intellectual; and I think wherever literature or ethics have sodominated the mind of the artist that they change the form of hisinspiration, his art loses its own peculiar power and gains nothing. Wehave here a picture of "Love steering the bark of Humanity. " I may putit rather crudely when I say that pictures like this are supposed toexert a power on the man who, for example, would beat his wife, so thatlove will be his after inspiration. Anyhow, ethical pictures are paintedwith some such intention belief. Now, art has great influence, but I donot believe this or any other picture would stop a man beating his wifeif he wanted to. Art does not call sinners to repentance; that is notone of its powers. It fulfils rather another saying: "Unto them thathave much shall be given, " bringing delight to those that are alreadysensitive to beauty. My own conviction is that ethical pictures are, if anything, immoral in their influence, as everything must be thatforsakes the law of its own being, and that pictures like this only addto the vanity of people so righteously minded as to be aware of theirown virtue. We will always have these concessions to passing phases ofthought. We have had requests for the scientific painter--the man whowill paint nature with geological accuracy, and man in accordancewith evolutionary dogmas. He will find his eloquent literary defendersenchanted to find so much learning to point to in his work, but it willall pass. The true artist will still be instinctively spiritual. 

Now I have used the word "spiritual" so often in connection with artthat you may reasonably ask for some definition of my meaning. I amafraid it is easier to define spirituality in literature than in art. But a literary definition may help. Spirituality is the power certainminds have of apprehending formless spiritual essences, of seeing theeternal in the transitory, of relating the particular to the universal, the type to the archetype. 

While I give this definition, I hope no artist will ever be insaneenough to make it the guiding principle of his art. I shudder tothink of any conscious attempt in a picture to relate the type to thearchetype. It is a philosophical definition, solely intended for thespectator. I wish the artist only to paint his vision, and whetherhe paints this, or another world he imagines, if it is art it will bespiritual. I have given a definition of spirituality in literature, buthow now relate it to art? How illustrate its presence? When Pater wrotehis famous description of the Mona Lisa, that intense and enigmatic facehad evoked a spiritual mood. When he saw in it the summed-up experienceof many generations of humanity, he felt in the picture that relationof the particular to the universal I have spoken of. When we find humanforms suggesting a superhuman dignity, as in Watts' figures of Time andDeath, or in the Phidian marbles, the type is there melting into thearchetype. When Millet paints a peasant figure of today with somegesture we imagine the first Sower must have used, it is the eternalin it which makes the transitory impressive. But these are obviousinstances, you will say, chosen from artists whose pictures lendthemselves to this kind of exposition. What about the art of thelandscape painter? Undeniably a form of art, where is the spirituality?

I am afraid my intellect is not equal to talking up every picture thatmight be suggested and using it to illustrate my meaning, though I donot think I would despair of finally discovering the spiritual elementin any picture I felt was art. However, I will go further. We have allfelt some element of art lacking in the painter who goes to Killarney, Italy, or Switzerland, and brings us back a faithful representation ofundeniably beautiful places. It is all there--the lofty mountains, thelakes, the local color; but what enchanted us in nature does not touchus in the picture. What we want is the spirit of the place evoked in usrather than the place itself. Art is neither pictured botany or geology. A great landscape is the expression of a mood of the human mind asdefinitely as music or poetry is. The artist is communicating his ownemotions. There is some mystic significance in the color he employs; andthen the doorways are opened, and we pass from sense into soul. Weare looking into a soul when we are looking at a Turner, a Carot, or aWhistler, as surely as when in dream we find ourselves moving in strangecountries which are yet within us, contained for all their seeminginfinitudes in the little hollow of the brain. All this, I think, isundeniable; but perhaps not many of you will follow me, though youmay understand me, if I go further and say, that in this, art isunconsciously also reaching out to archetypes, is lifting itself up towalk in that garden of the divine mind where, as the first Scripturesays, it created "flowers before they were in the field and every herbbefore it grew. " A man may sit in an armchair and travel farther thanever Columbus traveled; and no one can say how far Turner, in his searchafter light, had not journeyed into the lost Eden, and he himself mayhave been there most surely at the last when his pictures had become ablaze of incoherent light. 

You may say now that I have objected to literature dominating the arts, and yet I have drawn from pictures a most complicated theory. I havefelt a little, indeed, as if I was marching through subtleties tothe dismemberment of my mind, but I do not think I have anywherecontradicted myself or suggested that an artist should work on thesespeculations. These may rightly arise in the mind of the onlooker whowill regard a work of art with his whole nature, not merely with theaesthetic sense, and who will naturally pass from the first delightof vision into a psychological analysis. A profound nature will alwaysawaken profound reflections. There are heads by Da Vinci as interestingin their humanity as Hamlet. When we see eyes that tempt and allure withlips virginal in their purity, we feel in the face a union of thingswhich the dual nature of man is eternally desiring. It is the marriageof heaven and hell, the union of spirit and flesh, each with theiruncurbed desires; and what is impossible in life is in his art, and isone of the secrets of its strange fascination. It may seem paradoxicalto say of Watts--a man of genius, who was always preaching through hisart--that it is very difficult to find what he really expresses. Noone is ever for a moment in doubt about what is expressed by Rossetti, Turner, Millet, Corot, or many contemporary artists who never preachedat all, but whose mood or vision peculiar to themselves is easilydefinable. With Watts the effort at analyses is confused: first by hisown statement about the ethical significance of his works, which I thinkmisleading, because while we may come away from his pictures with manyfeelings of majesty or beauty or mystery, the ethical spirit is notthe predominant one. That rapturous winged spirit which he calls LoveTriumphant might just as easily be called Music or Song, and anotherallegory be attached to it without our feeling any more special fitnessor unfitness in the explanation. I see a beautiful exultant figure, butI do not feel love as the fundamental mood in the painter, as I feel thereligious mood is fundamental in the Angelus of Millet. I do not need tolook for a title to that or for the painting of The Shepherdess to feelhow earth and her children have become one in the vision of the painter;that the shepherdess is not the subject, nor the sheep, nor the stillevening, but altogether are one mood, one being, in which all thingsmove in harmony and are guided by the Great Shepherd. Well, I do notfeel that Love; or Charity, or Hope are expressed in this way in Watts, and that the ethical spirit is not fundamental with him as the religiousspirit is with Millet. He has an intellectual conception of his moralidea, but is not emotionally obsessed by it, and the basis of a man'sart is not to be found in his intellectual conceptions, which are lightthings, but in his character or rather in his temperament. We know, forall the poetical circumstances of Rossetti's pictures, what desire it isthat shines out of those ardent faces, and how with Leighton "the formalone is eloquent, " and that Tumer's God was light as surely as with anyPersian worshipper of the sun. Here and there they may have been temptedotherwise, but they never strayed far from their temperamental way ofexpressing themselves in art. So that the first thing to be dismissedin trying to understand Watts is Watts' own view of his art and itsinspiration. He is not the first distinguished man whose intellect hasnot proved equal to explaining rightly its sources of power. Our nextdifficulty in discovering the real Watts arises because he did not lookat nature or life directly. He was overcome by great traditions. Healmost persistently looks at nature through one or two veils. There isa Phidian veil and a Venetian or rather an Italian veil, and almosteverything in life and nature which could not be expressed in terms ofthese traditions he ignored. I might say that no artist of equal geniusever painted pictures and brought so little fresh observation into hisart except, perhaps, Burne-Jones. Both these artists seem to have asecret and refined sympathy with Fuseli's famous outburst, "Damn Nature, she always puts me out!" Even when the sitter came, Watts seems to havebeen uneasy unless he could turn him into a Venetian nobleman or personof the Middle Ages, or could disguise in some way the fact that Artistand Sitter belonged to the nineteenth century. He does not seem to beaware that people must breathe even in pictures. His skies rest solidlyon the shoulders of his figures as if they were cut out to let thefigures be inserted. If he were not a man of genius there would havebeen an end of him. But he was a man of genius, and we must try tounderstand the meaning of his acceptance of tradition. If we understandit in Watts we will understand a great deal of contemporary art andliterature which is called derivative, art issuing out of art, andliterature out of literature. 

The fact is that this kind of art in which Watts and Burne-Jones werepioneers is an art which has not yet come to its culmination or to anyperfect expression of itself. There is a genuinely individual impulse init, and it is not derivative merely, although almost every phase ofit can be related to earlier art. It has nothing in common with theso-called grand school of painting which produced worthless imitationsof Michael Angelo and Raphael. It is feeling out for a new world, and itis trying to use the older tradition as a bridge. The older art held upa mirror to natural forms and brought them nearer to man. In the perfectculmination of this new art one feels how a complete change might takeplace and natural forms be used to express an internal nature or thesoul of the artist. Colors and forms, like words after the lapse ofcenturies, enlarge their significance. The earliest art was probablysimple and literal--there may have been the outline of a figure filledup with some flat color. Then as art became more complex, colors beganto have an emotional meaning quite apart from their original relationto an object. The artist begins unconsciously to relate color moreintimately to his own temperament than to external nature. At last, after the lapse of ages, some sensitive artist begins to imagine thathe has discovered a complete language capable of expressing any moodof mind. The passing of centuries has enriched every color, and leftit related to some new phase of the soul. Phidian or Michael Angelesqueforms gather their own peculiar associations of divinity or power. Infact, this new art uses the forms of the old as symbols or hieroglyphsto express more complicated ideas than the older artists tried todepict. 

Watts never attempted, for all his admiration of these men, tofollow them in their efforts to realize perfectly the forms that theyconceived. They had done this once and for all, and repetition may haveseemed unnecessary. But the lofty temper awakened by those stupendouscreations could be aroused by a suggestion of their peculiarcharacteristics. Association of ideas will in some subtle way bring usback to the Phidian demigods when we look at forms and draperiesvaguely suggestive of the Parthenon. I do not say that Watt's did thisconsciously, but instinctively he felt compelled, with the gradualdevelopment of his own mind, to use the imaginative traditions createdby other artists as a language through which he might find expressionpeculiar to himself. It is a highly intellectual art to which traditionwas a necessity, as much as it is to the poet, who when he speaks of"beauty" draws upon a sentiment created by millions of long-dead lovers, or who, when he thinks of the "spirit, " is, in his use of the word, theheir of countless generations who brooded upon the mysteries. 

Just as in Millet, the painter of peasants, there was a religious spiritshaping all things into austere and elemental simplicities, so in Wattsthere was an intellectual spirit, seeking everywhere for the traces ofmind trying to express the bodiless and abstract. With Whitman he seemsto cry out, "The soul for ever and ever!" It is there in the astonishinghead of Swinburne, whom he reveals, if I may use a vulgar phrase, as apoetic "bounder, " but illuminated and etherealized by genius. It is inthe head of Mill, the very symbol of the moral reasoning--mind. It is inthe face of Tennyson, with its too self-conscious seership, and inall those vague faces of the imaginative paintings, into which, to usePater's phrase, "the soul with all its maladies has passed. " In hispictures he draws on the effects of earlier art, and throws his sittersback until they seem to belong to some nondescript mediaeval country, like the Bohemia of the dramatists; and he darkens and shuts out thelight of day that this starlight of soul may be more clearly seen, anddestroys, as far as he can, all traces of the century they live in, forthe mind lives in all the ages, and he would show it as the pilgrim ofeternity. Because Watts' art was necessarily so brooding and meditative, looking at life with half-closed eyes and then shutting them to be alonewith memory and the interpreter, his painting, so beautiful and fullof surety in early pictures like the Wounded Heron, grows to be oftenlabored and muddy, and his drawing uncertain. That he could draw andpaint with the greatest, he every now and then gave proof; but thesurety of beautiful craftsmanship deserts those who have not alwaystheir eye fixed on an object of vision; and Watts was not, like Blakeor Shelley, one of the proud seers whose visions are of "forms more realthan living man. " He seemed to feel what his effects should be ratherthan to see them, or else his vision was fleeting and his art was alaborious brooding to recapture the lost impression. In his color healways seems to me to be second-hand, as if the bloom and freshness ofhis paint had worn off through previous use by other artists. Itseemed to be a necessity of his curiously intellectual art that onlytraditional colors and forms should be employed, and it is only rarelywe get the shock of a new creation, and absolutely original design, asin Orpheus, where the passionate figure turns to hold what is already avanishing shadow. 

Watts' art was an effort to invest his own age, an age of reason, withthe nobilities engendered in an age of faith. At the time Watts wasat his prime his contemporaries were everywhere losing belief inthe spiritual conceptions of earlier periods; they were analyzingeverything, and were deciding that what was really true in religion, what gave it nobility, was its ethical teaching; retain that, andreligion might go, illustrating the truth of the Chinese philosopherwho said: "When the spirit is lost, men follow after charity and dutyto one's neighbors. " The unity of belief was broken up into diverseintellectual conceptions. Men talked about love and liberty, patriotism, duty, charity, and a whole host of abstractions moral and intellectual, which they had convinced themselves were the essence of religion andthe real cause of its power over man. Whether Watts lost faith like hiscontemporaries I do not know, but their spirit infected his art. He sethimself to paint these abstractions; and because we cannot imagine theseabstractions with a form, we feel something fundamentally false in thisside of his art. He who paints a man, an angelic being, or a divinebeing, paints something we feel may have life. But it is impossibleto imagine Time with a body as it is to imagine a painting embodyingNewton's law of gravitation. It is because such abstractions do notreadily take shape that Watts drew so much on the imaginative traditionof his predecessors. Where these pictures are impressive is where theartist slipped by his conscious aim, and laid hold of the nobilitypeculiar to the men and women he used as symbols. It is not Timeor Death which awes us in Watts' picture, but majestical images ofhumanity; and Watts is at his greatest as an inventor when humanityitself most occupies him when he depicts human life only, and letsit suggest its own natural infinity, as in those images of the loversdrifting through the Inferno, with whom every passion is burnt out andexhausted but the love through which they fell. 

Life itself is more infinite, noble, and suggestive than thought. Wesoon come to the end of the ingenious allegory. It tells only one storybut where there is a perfect image of life there is infinitude andmystery. We do not tire considering the long ancestry of expression ina face. It may lead us back through the ages; but we do tire of the artwhich imprisons itself within formulae, and says to the spectator: "Inthis way and in no other shall you regard what is before you. " No man isprofound enough to explain the nature of his own inspiration. Socratessays that the poet utters many things which are truer than he himselfunderstands. The same thing applies to many a great artist, who, when hepaints tree or field, or face, or form, finds that there comes on him amysterious quickening of his nature, and he paints he knows not what. It is like and unlike what his eyes have seen. It may be the same field, but we feel there the presence of the spirit. It may be the same figure, but it is made transcendental, as when the Word had become flesh anddwelt among us. His inspiration is akin to that of the prophets of old, whose words rang but for an instant and were still, yet they creatednations whose only boundaries were the silences where their speech hadnot been heard. His majestical figures are prophecies. His ecstaticlandscapes bring us nigh to the beauty which was in Eden. His art is adivine adventure, in which he, like all of us who are traveling in somany ways, seeks, consciously or unconsciously, to regain the lost unitywith nature and the knowledge of his own immortal being, and it is soyou will best understand it. 

1906

AN ARTIST OF GAELIC IRELAND

The art of Hone and the elder Yeats, while in spirit filled with asentiment which was the persistence of ancient moods into modern times, still has not the external characteristics of Gaeldom; but looking atthe pictures of the younger Yeats it seemed to me that for the firsttime we had something which could be called altogether Gaelic. Theincompleteness of the sketches suggests the term "folk" as expressingexactly the inspiration of this very genuine art. We have had abundanceof Irish folk-lore, but we knew nothing of folk-art until the figures ofJack Yeats first romped into our imagination a few years ago. It was thefolk-feeling lit up by genius and interpreted by love. It was not, andis now less than ever, the patronage bestowed by the intellectual artiston the evidently picturesque forms of a life below his own. 

I suspect Jack Yeats thinks the life of the Sligo fisherman is as gooda method of life as any, and that he could share it for a long timewithout being in the least desirous of a return to the comfortablelife of convention. The name of Muglas Hyde suggests itself to me as aliterary parallel. These sketches have all the prodigality of invention, the exuberance of gesture, and animation of "The Twisting of the Rope, "and the poetry is of as high or higher an order. In the drawing called"Midsummer Eve" there is a mystery which is not merely the mysteryof night and shadow. It is the mystery of the mingling of spirit withspirit which is suggested by the solitary figure with face upturnedto the stars. We have all memories of such summer nights when into thecharmed heart falls the enchantment we call ancient, though the dayshave no fellows, nor will ever have any, when the earth glows with thedusky hues of rich pottery, and the stars, far withdrawn into faeryaltitudes, dance with a gaiety which is more tremendous and solemn thanany repose. The night of this picture is steeped in such a dream, and Iknow not whether it is communicated, or a feeling arising in myself; butthere seems everywhere in it the breathing of life, subtle, exultant, penetrating. It is conceived in the mood of awe and prayer, which makesMillet's pictures as religious as any whichever hung over the altar, forsurely the "Angelus" is one of the most spiritual of pictures, thoughthe peasants bow their heads and worship in a temple not built withhands. I do not, of course, compare otherwise than in the mood the"Midsummer Eve" to such a masterpiece; but there is a kinship betweenthe beauty revealed in great and in little things, and our thought turnsfrom the stars to the flowers with no feeling of descent into analien world. But this mood is rare in life as in art, and it is onlyoccasionally that the younger Yeats becomes the interpreter of thespirituality of the peasant. He is more often the recorder of theextravagant energies of the race-course and the market-place, where hefinds herded together all the grotesque humors of West Irish life. 

We recognize his figures as distinctly Irish. Here the old rollickingLever and Lover type of Irishmen reappear, hunting like the very devil, with faces set in the last ecstasy of rapid motion. There is an excessof energy in these furious riders which almost gives them a symboliccharacter. They seem to ride on some passionate business of the soulrather than for any transitory excitement of the body. And besides thesewild horse-men there are quiet and lovely figures like "A Mother ofthe Rosses, " holding her child to her breast in an opalescent twilight, through which the boat that carries her moves. There are always largeand noble outlines, which suggest that if Jack Yeats had more grandioseambitions he might have been the Millet of Irish rural life, but he istoo much the symbolist, hating all but essentials, to elaborate his art. 

In writing of Jack Yeats mention must be made of his black and whitework, which at its best has a primitive intensity. The lines have akind of Gothic quality, reminding one of the rude glooms, the lightsand lines of some half-barbarian cathedral. They are very expressive andnever undecided. The artist always knows what he is going to do. Thereis no doubt he has a clear image before him when he takes up pen orbrush. A strong will is always directing the strong lines, forcing themto repeat an image present to the inner eye. In his early days JackYeats loafed about the quays at Sligo, and we may be sure he was at allthe races, and paid his penny to go into the side-shows, and see thefreaks, the Fat Woman and the Skeleton Man. It was probably at thisperiod of his life he was captured by pirates of the Spanish Main. Myremembrance of Irish county towns at that time is that no literatureflourished except the Penny Dreadful and the local press. I may bedoing Jack Yeats an injustice when hailing him at the beginning of afascinating career I yet suspect a long background of Penny Dreadfulsbehind it. How else could he have drawn his pirates? They are the onlypirates in art who manifest the true pride, glory, beauty, and terrorof their calling as the romantic heart of childhood conceives of it. Thepirate has been lifted up to a strange kind of poetry in some of JackYeats' pictures. I remember one called "Walking the Plank. " The solemntheatrical face, lifted up to the blue sky in a last farewell to thewild world and its lawless freedom, haunted me for days. There was alsoa pen-and-ink drawing I wish I could reproduce here. A young buccaneer, splendid in evil bravery, leaned across a bar where a strange, beastly, little, old, withered, rat-like figure was drawing the drink. The littlefigure was like a devil with the soul all concentrated into malice, and the whole picture affected one with terror like a descent into someferocious human hell. 

In all these figures, pirates or peasants, there is an ever presentsuggestion of poetry; it is in the skies, or in the distance, or in thecolors; and these people who laugh in the fairs will have after hoursas solemn as the quiet star-gazer in the "Midsummer Eve. " This poetryis evident in the oddest ways, and escapes analysis, so elusive and sooriginal is it, as in the "Street of Shows. " Nothing at first thoughtseems more hopelessly remote from poetry than the country circus, withits lurid posters of the Giant Schoolgirl, the Petrified Man, and theMermaid, all in strong sunlight; but the heart carries with it itsown mood, and this flaring scene has undergone some indefinitetransformation by the alchemy of genius, and it assumes the character ofa fairy tale or Arabian Nights Entertainment imagined in the fantasticdreams of childhood. The sleepy doorkeeper is a goblin or gnome. Perhapsthe charm of it all is that it is so evidently illusion, for when theheart is strong in its own surety it can look out on the world, andsmile on things which would be unendurable if felt to be permanent, knowing they are only dreams. 

Many of these sketches have a largeness, almost a nobility, ofconception, which is, I think, a gift from father to son. "After theHarvest's Saved" is something elemental. The "Post-car" suggests thehorses of the sun, or the stage coach in De Quincey's extraordinarydream, when the opium had finally rioted in his brain, and transformedhis stage-coach into a chariot carrying news of some everlastingvictory. Blake has said "exuberance is genius, " and there is an excessof energy or passion, or a dilation of the forms, or a peace deeper thanmere quietude in the figures of Mr. Yeats' pictures, which gives themthat symbolic character which genius always impresses on its works. 

The coloring grows better every year; it is more varied and purer. Itis sometimes sombre, as in the tragic and dramatic "Simon the Cyrenian, "and sometimes rich and flowerlike, but always charged with sentiment, and there is a curious fitness in it even when it is evidently unreal. These blues and purples and pale greens--what crowd ever seemed cladin such twilight colors? And yet we accept it as natural, for thisopalescence is always in the mist-laden air of the West; it enters intothe soul today as it did into the soul of the ancient Gael, who calledit Ildathach--the many-colored land; it becomes part of the atmosphereof the mind; and I think Mr. Yeats means here to express, by one of theinventions of genius, that this dim radiant coloring of his figures isthe fitting symbol of the fairyland which is in their hearts. I have notfelt so envious of any artist's gift for a long time; not envy of hispower of expression, but of his way of seeing things. We are all seekingtoday for some glimpse of the fairyland our fathers knew; but all thefairylands, the Silver Cloud World, the Tirnanoge, the Land of Heart'sDesire, rose like dreams out of the human soul, and in tracking themthere Mr. Yeats has been more fortunate than us all, for he has come tothe truth, perhaps hardly conscious of it himself. 

1902

TWO IRISH ARTISTS

It is unjust to an artist to write on the spur of the moment of hiswork--of the just seen picture which pleases or displeases. For whatinstantly delights the eye may never win its way into the heart, andwhat repels at first may steal later on into the understanding, and findits interpretation in a deeper mood. The final test of a picture, or ofany work of art, is its power of enduring charm. There are many circlesin the Paradise of Beautiful Memories, and half unconsciously, but witha justice, we at last place each in its hierarchy, remote or near tothe centre of our being; and I propose here rather to speak of theimpression left in my memory after seeing the work of Yeats and Honefor many years, than to describe in detail the pictures--some new, some familiar--which by a happy thought have been gathered together forexhibition. To tell an artist that you remember his pictures withlove after many years is the highest praise you can give him; and todistinguish the impression produced from others is a pleasure I am gladto be here allowed. 

An artist like Mr. Yeats, whose main work has been in portraiture, mustoften find himself before sitters with whom he has little sympathy, andwe all expect to find portraits which do not interest us, because theinterpreter has been at fault, and has failed in his vision. With theborn craftsman, who always gives us beautiful brushwork, we do notexpect these inequalities, but with Mr. Yeats technical power is not themost prominent characteristic. He broods or dreams over his sitters, and his meditation always tends to the discovery of some spiritualor intellectual life in them, or some hidden charm in the nature, orsomething to love; and if he finds what he seeks, we are sure, notalways of a complete picture, but of a poetic illumination, a revelationof character, a secret sweetness for which we forgive the weakness orindecision manifest here and there, and which are relics of the hoursbefore the final surety was attained. 

I do not know what Mr. Yeats' philosophy of life is, but in his workhe has been over-mastered by the spirit of his race, and he belongs tothose who from the earliest dawn of Ireland have sought for the Heart'sDesire, and who have refined away the world, until only fragmentsremained to them. They have not accepted life as it is, and Mr. Yeatscould not paint like Reynolds or Romney the beauty of every day in itsbest attire. He is like the Irish poets who have rarely left a completedescription of women, but who speak of some transitory motion or fragilecharm--"a thin palm like foam of the sea, " "a white body, " or in suchvague phrases, until it seems a spirit is praised and not flesh andblood. I remember the faces of women and children in his pictures whereeverything is blurred or obscured, save faces which have a namelesscharm. They look at you with long-remembered glances out of the broodinghour of twilight, out of reverie and dream. It is the hidden heart whichlooks out, and we love these women and children for this, for surely theheart's desire is its own secret. 

His portraits of men have kindred qualities, and the magnificent pictureof John O'Leary shows him at his best. It is itself a symbol of themovement of which O'Leary was the last great representative. The statelypatriarchal head of the old chief is the head of the idealist, so sureof his own truth that he must act, and, if needs be, become themartyr for his ideal. But the delicate hands are not the hands of anempire-breaker. This portrait will probably find its last resting-placein the National Gallery, where, with a curious irony, the Governmentplaces the portraits of the dead rebels who gave its statesmen many ananxious day and many a nightmare; and so it will go on, perhaps, untilthe contemplation of these pictures inspires some boy with an equal orbetter head and a stronger hand, and then--. 

But to return to Mr. Yeats. Some earlier pictures show him attempting topaint directly the ideal world of romance and poetry; yet interestingas these are, they do not convey the same impression of mystery as thepictures of today. Indeed, the light seen behind or through a veilis always more suggestive than the unveiled light. It may be thatthe spirit is a formless breath which pervades form, and it is betterrevealed as a light in the eyes, as a brooding expression, than by thechoice of ancient days and other-world subjects, where the shapes can bemolded to ideal forms by the artist's will. However it is, it is certainthat Millet, the realist, is more spiritual than Moreau or Burne-Jonesfor all their archaic design; and Mr. Yeats, who, as his King Gollshows, might have been a great romantic painter, has probably chosenwisely, and has painted more memorable pictures than if he had gone backto the fairyland of Celtic mythology. 

To turn from Yeats to Hone is to turn from the lighted hearth to thewilderness. Humanity is very far away, or is huddled up under immenseskies, where it seems of less importance than the rocks. The earth onwhich men have lived, where the work of their hand is evident, with allthe sentiment of the presence of man, with smoke arising from numberlesshomes, is foreign to Mr. Hone. The monsters of the primeval world mightsprawl on the rocks, for all the evidence of lapse of time since theirday, in many of his pictures. He, too, has refined away his world untilonly fragments of the earth remain to him where he can dream in; andthese are waste places, where the salt of the sea is in the wind, andthe skies are gray and vapor-laden, or the loneliness of dim twilightsare over level sands. Whatever else he paints is devoid of its properinterest, for he seems to impose on the cattle in the fields and on thehabitable places a sentiment alien to their nature. He has a mind withbut one impressive mood, and his spirit is never kindled, save in thesociety where none intrude; but in his own domain he is a master, and isalways sure of himself and his effect. There is no tentative, undecisivebrushwork, such as we often see in the subtle search for the unrevealed, which makes or mars Mr. Yeats' work. He is at home in his peculiarworld, while the other is always seeking for it. 

"A Sunset on Malahide Sands" shows a greater intensity than is usualeven in Mr. Hone's work. There is something thrilling in this twilighttrembling over the deserted world. Philosophies may prove very well inthe lecture-room, says Whitman, and not prove at all under the sky andstars. Pictures likewise may seem beautiful in a gallery, yet look thinand unreal where, with a turn of the head, one could look out at thepictures created hour after hour by the Master of the Beautiful; butthere is some magic in this vision made up of elemental light, darkness, and loneliness, and we feel awed as if we knew the Spirit was hiddenin His works. But primitive as this peculiar world is, and remote fromhumanity, it is just here we find a human revelation; for is not allart a symbol of the creative mind, and if we were wise enough we wouldunderstand that in art the light on every cloud, and the clear spacesabove the cloud, and the shadows of the earth beneath are made out ofthe lights, infinitudes, and shadows of the soul, and are selected fromnature because of some correspondence, unconscious or half felt. Butthese things belong more to the psychology of the artist mind than tothe appreciation of its work. I have said enough, I hope, to attract tothe work of these artists, in a mood of true understanding, those whowould like to believe in the existence in Ireland of a genuine art. Forignored and uncared for as art is, we have some names to be proud of, and of these Mr. Yeats and Mr. Hone are foremost. 

1902

"ULSTER"

AN OPEN LETTER TO MR. RUDYARD KIPLING

I Speak to you, brother, because you have spoken to me, or rather youhave spoken for me. I am a native of Ulster. So far back as I cantrace the faith of my forefathers they held the faith for whose freeobservance you are afraid. 

I call you brother, for so far as I am known beyond the circle of mypersonal friends it is as a poet. We are not a numerous tribe, but theworld has held us in honor, because on the whole in poetry is foundthe highest and sincerest utterance of man's spirit. In this manner ofspeaking if a man is not sincere his speech betrayeth him, for alltrue poetry was written on the Mount of Transfiguration, and there isrevelation in it and the mingling of heaven and earth. I am jealous ofthe honor of poetry, and I am jealous of the good name of my country, and I am impelled by both emotions to speak to you. 

You have blood of our race in you, and you may, perhaps, have someknowledge of Irish sentiment. You have offended against one of ournoblest literary traditions in the manner in which you have publishedyour thoughts. You begin by quoting Scripture. You preface your verseson Ulster by words from the mysterious oracles of humanity as if you hadbeen inflamed and inspired by the prophet of God; and you go on to singof faith in peril and patriotism betrayed and the danger of death andoppression by those who do murder by night, which things, if one trulyfeels, he speaks of without consideration of commerce or what it shallprofit him to speak. But you, brother, have withheld your fears for yourcountry and mine until they could yield you a profit in two continents. After all this high speech about the Lord and the hour of nationaldarkness it shocks me to find this following your verses: "Copyrightedin the United States of America by Rudyard Kipling. " You are not inwant. You are the most successful man of letters of your time, and yetyou are not above making profit out of the perils of your country. You ape the lordly speech of the prophets, and you conclude by warningeverybody not to reprint your words at their peril. In Ireland everypoet we honor has dedicated his genius to his country without gain, andhas given without stint, without any niggardly withholding of his giftwhen his nation was dark and evil days. Not one of our writers, whendeeply moved about Ireland, has tried to sell the gift of the spirit. You, brother, hurt me when you declare your principles, and declare adividend to yourself out of your patriotism openly and at the same time. 

I would not reason with you, but that I know there is something trulygreat and noble in you, and there have been hours when the immortal inyou secured your immortality in literature, when you ceased to see lifewith that hard cinematograph eye of yours, and saw with the eyes ofthe spirit, and power and tenderness and insight were mixed in magicaltales. But you were far from the innermost when you wrote of mycountrymen us you did. 

I have lived all my life in Ireland, holding a different faith from thatheld by the majority. I know Ireland as few Irishmen know it, county bycounty, for I traveled all over Ireland for years, and, Ulster man as Iam, and proud of the Ulster people, I resent the crowning of Ulsterwith all the virtues and the dismissal of other Irishmen as thieves androbbers. I resent the cruelty with which you, a stranger, speak of thelovable and kindly people I know. 

You are not even accurate in your history when you speak of Ulster'straditions and the blood our forefathers spilt. Over a century agoUlster was the strong and fast place of rebellion, and it was in Ulsterthat the Volunteers stood beside their cannon and wrung the gift ofpolitical freedom for the Irish Parliament. You are blundering in yourblame. You speak of Irish greed in I know not what connection, unlessyou speak of the war waged over the land; and yet you ought to know thatboth parties in England have by Act after Act confessed the absolutejustice and rightness of that agitation, Unionist no less than Liberal, and both boast of their share in answering the Irish appeal. They areboth proud today of what they did. They made inquiry into wrong andredressed it. But you, it seems, can only feel sore and angry thatintolerable conditions imposed by your laws were not borne in patienceand silence. For what party do you speak? What political ideal inspiresyou? When an Irishman has a grievance you smite him. How differentlywould you have written of Runnymede and the valiant men who rebelledwhen oppressed. You would have made heroes out of them. Have you no soulleft, after admiring the rebels in your own history, to sympathize withother rebels suffering deeper wrongs? Can you not see deeper into themotives for rebellion than the hireling reporter who is sent to makeup a case for the paper of a party? The best men in Ulster, the bestUnionists in Ireland will not be grateful to you for libeling theircountrymen in your verse. For, let the truth be known, the mass of IrishUnionists are much more in love with Ireland than with England. Theythink Irish Nationalists are mistaken, and they fight with them anduse hard words, and all the time they believe Irishmen of any party arebetter in the sight of God than Englishmen. They think Ireland is thebest country in the world to live in, and they hate to hear Irish peoplespoken of as murderers and greedy scoundrels. Murderers! Why, there ismore murder done in any four English shires in a year than in the wholeof the four provinces of Ireland! Greedy! The nation never accepted abribe, or took it as an equivalent or payment for an ideal, and whatbribe would not have been offered to Ireland if it had been willing toforswear its traditions. 

I am a person whose whole being goes into a blaze at the thoughtof oppression of faith, and yet I think my Catholic countrymen moretolerant than those who hold the faith I was born in. I am a hereticjudged by their standards, a heretic who has written and made public hisheresies, and I have never suffered in friendship or found my heresiesan obstacle in life. I set my knowledge, the knowledge of a lifetime, against your ignorance, and I say you have used your genius to doIreland and its people a wrong. You have intervened in a quarrel ofwhich you do not know the merits like any brawling bully, who passes, and only takes sides to use his strength. If there was a high court ofpoetry, and those in power jealous of the noble name of poet, and thatnone should use it save those who were truly Knights of the Holy Ghost, they would hack the golden spurs from your heels and turn you out of theCourt. You had the ear of the world and you poisoned it with prejudiceand ignorance. You had the power of song, and you have always used iton behalf of the strong against the weak. You have smitten with all yourmight at creatures who are frail on earth but mighty in the heavens, at generosity, at truth, at justice, and heaven has withheld visionand power and beauty from you, for this your verse is but a shallownewspaper article made to rhyme. Truly ought the golden spurs to behacked from your heels and you be thrust out of the Court. 

1912

IDEALS OF THE NEW RURAL SOCIETY

For a country where political agitations follow each other as rapidlyas plagues in an Eastern city, it is curious how little constructivethought we can show on the ideals of a rural civilization. But economicpeace ought surely to have its victories to show as well as politicalwar. I would a thousand times rather dwell on what men and women workingtogether may do than on what may result from majorities at Westminster. The beauty of great civilizations has been built up far more by thepeople working together than by any corporate action of the State. Inthese socialistic days we grow pessimistic about our own efforts andoptimistic about the working of the legislature. I think we do right toexpect great things from the State, but we ought to expect still greaterthings from ourselves. We ought to know full well that, if the State didtwice as much as it does, we shall never rise out of mediocrity amongthe nations unless we have unlimited faith in the power of our personalefforts to raise and transform Ireland, and unless we translate thefaith into works. The State can give a man an economic holding, butonly the man himself can make it into Earthly Paradise, and it is a dullbusiness, unworthy of a being made in the image of God, to grind awayat work without some noble end to be served, some glowing ideal to beattained. 

Ireland is a horribly melancholy and cynical country. Our literary menand poets, who ought to give us courage, have taken to writing aboutthe Irish as people who "went forth to battle, but always fell, "sentimentalizing over incompetence instead of invigorating us andliberating us and directing our energies. We have developed a new andclever school of Irish dramatists who say they are holding up the mirrorto Irish peasant nature, but they reflect nothing but decadence. Theydelight in the broken lights of insanity, the ruffian who beats hiswife, the weakling who is unfortunate in love and who goes and drinkshimself to death, while the little decaying country towns are seized onwith avidity and exhibited on the stage in every kind of decay and humanfutility and meanness. Well, it is good to be chastened in spirit, but it is a thousand times better to be invigorated in spirit. To bepositive is always better than to be negative. These writers understandand sympathize with Ireland more through their lower nature than theirhigher nature. Judging by the things people write in Ireland, and bywhat they go to see performed on the stage, it is more pleasing to themto see enacted characters they know are meaner than themselves than tosee characters which they know are nobler than themselves. 

All this is helping on our national pessimism and self-mistrust. Ithelps to fix these features permanently in our national character, which were excusable enough as temporary moods after defeat. Theyounger generation should hear nothing about failures. It should not behypnotized into self-contempt. Our energies in Ireland are sapped by acynical self-mistrust which is spread everywhere through society. Itis natural enough that the elder generation, who were promised so manymillenniums, but who actually saw four million people deducted from thepopulation, should be cynical. But it is not right they should give onlyto the younger generation the heritage of their disappointments withoutany heritage of hope. From early childhood parents and friends arehypnotizing the child into beliefs and unbeliefs, and too often they areexiling all nobility out of life, all confidence, all trust, all hope;they are insinuating a mean self-seeking, a self-mistrust, a vulgarspirit which laughs at every high ideal, until at last the hypnotizedchild is blinded to the presence of any beauty or nobility in life. Nocountry can ever hope to rise beyond a vulgar mediocrity where there isnot unbounded confidence in what its humanity can do. The self-confidentAmerican will make a great civilization yet, because he believes withall his heart and soul in the future of his country and in the powers ofthe American people. What Whitman called their "barbaric yawp" may yetturn into the lordliest speech and thought, but without self-confidencea race will go no whither. If Irish people do not believe they can equalor surpass the stature of any humanity which has been upon the globe, then they had better all emigrate and become servants to some superiorrace, and leave Ireland to new settlers who may come here with the samehigh hopes as the Pilgrim Fathers had when they went to America. 

We must go on imagining better than the best we know. Even in theirruins now, Greece and Italy seem noble and beautiful with broken pillarsand temples made in their day of glory. But before ever there was awhite marble temple shining on a hill it shone with a more brilliantbeauty in the mind of some artist who designed it. Do many people knowhow that marvelous Greek civilization spread along the shores of theMediterranean? Little nations owning hardly more land than would make upan Irish barony sent out colony after colony. The seed of beautifullife they sowed grew and blossomed out into great cities and half-divinecivilizations. Italy had a later blossoming of beauty in the MiddleAges, and travelers today go into little Italian towns and find themfilled with masterpieces of painting and architecture and sculpture, witnesses of a time when nations no larger than an Irish county rolledtheir thoughts up to Heaven and miked their imagination with the angels. Can we be contented in Ireland with the mean streets of our countrytowns and the sordid heaps of our villages dominated in their economicsby the vendors of alcohol, and inspired as to their ideals by thevendors of political animosities?

I would not mind people fighting in a passion to get rid of all thatbarred some lordly scheme of life, but quarrels over political bonesfrom which there is little or nothing wholesome to be picked onlydisgust. People tell me that the countryside must always be stupid andbackward, and I get angry, as if it were said that only townspeople hadimmortal souls, and it was only in the city that the flame of divinitybreathed into the first men had any unobscured glow. The countryside inIreland could blossom into as much beauty as the hillsides in mediaevalItaly if we could but get rid of our self-mistrust. We have all thatany race ever had to inspire them, the heavens overhead, the earthunderneath, and the breath of life in our nostrils. I would like toexile the man who would set limits to what we can do, who would take thecrown and sceptre from the human will and say, marking out some pettyenterprise as the limit--"Thus far can we go and no farther, andhere shall our life be stayed. " Therefore I hate to hear of stagnantsocieties who think because they have made butter well that they havecrowned their parochial generation with a halo of glory, and can restcontent with the fame of it all, listening to the whirr of the steamseparators and pouching in peace of mind the extra penny a gallon fortheir milk. And I dislike the little groups who meet a couple of timesa year and call themselves co-operators because they have got theirfertilizers more cheaply, and have done nothing else. Why, the villagegombeen man has done more than that! He has at least brought most ofthe necessaries of life there by his activities; and I say if weco-operators do not aim at doing more than the Irish Scribes andPharisees we shall have little to be proud of. A poet, interpreting thewords of Christ to His followers, who had scorned the followers of theold order, made Him say:

 Scorn ye their hopes, their tears, their inward prayers? I say unto you, see that your souls live A deeper life than theirs. 

The co-operative movement is delivering over the shaping of the rurallife of Ireland, and the building up of its rural civilization, intothe hands of Irish farmers. The old order of things has left Irelandunlovely. But if we do not passionately strive to build it better, better for the men, for the women, for the children, of what worth arewe? We continually come across the phrase "the dull Saxon" in our Irishpapers, it crops up in the speeches of our public orators, but it was anEnglish poet who said:

 I will not cease from mental fight, Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand Till we have built Jerusalem In England's green and pleasant land. 

And it was the last great, poet England has produced, who had so muchhope for humanity in his country that in his latest song he could mixearth with heaven, and say that to human eyes:

 Shall shine the traffic of Jacob's ladder Hung betwixt Heaven and Charing Cross. 

Shall we think more meanly of the future of Ireland than these "dullSaxons" think of the future of their island? Shall we be content withhumble crumbs fallen from the table of life, and sit like beggarswaiting only for what the commonwealth can do for us, leaving all highhopes and aims to our rulers, whether they be English or Irish? Everypeople get the kind of Government they deserve. A nation can exhibit nogreater political wisdom in the mass than it generates in its units. It is the pregnant idealism of the multitude which gives power to themakers of great nations, otherwise the prophets of civilization arehelpless as preachers in the desert and solitary places. So I havealways preached self-help above all other kinds of help, knowing that ifwe strove passionately after this righteousness all other kinds of helpwould be at our service. So, too, I would brush aside the officiousinterferer in co-operative affairs, who would offer on behalf of theState to do for us what we should, and could, do far better ourselves. We can build up a rural civilization in Ireland, shaping it to ourhearts' desires, warming it with life, but our rulers and officialscan never be warmer than a stepfather, and have no "large, divine, andcomfortable words" for us; they tinker at the body when it is the soulwhich requires to be healed and made whole. The soul of Ireland has tobe kindled, and it can be kindled only by the thought of great deeds andnot by the hope of petty parsimonies or petty gains. 

Now, great deeds are never done vicariously. They are done directly andpersonally. No country has grown to greatness mainly by the acts ofsome great ruler, but by the aggregate activities of all its people. Therefore, every Irish community should make its own ideals andshould work for them. As great work can be done in a parish as in thelegislative assemblies with a nation at gaze. Do people say: "It iseasier to work well with a nation at gaze?" I answer that true greatnessbecomes the North Pole of humanity, and when it appears all the needlesof Being point to it. You of the young generation, who have not yet lostthe generous ardour of youth, believe it is as possible to do great workand make noble sacrifices, and to roll the acceptable smoke of offeringto Heaven by your work in an Irish parish, as in any city in the world. Like the Greek architects--who saw in their dreams hills crowned withwhite marble pillared palaces and images of beauty, until these rose upin actuality--so should you, not forgetting national ideals, still mostof all set before yourselves the ideal of your own neighborhood. How canyou speak of working for all Ireland, which you have not seen, if you donot labor and dream for the Ireland before your eyes, which you see asyou look out of your own door in the morning, and on which you walk upand down through the day?

"What dream shall we dream or what labor shall we undertake?" you mayask, and it is right that those who exhort should be asked in whatmanner and how precisely they would have the listener act or think. Ianswer: the first thing to do is to create and realize the feeling forthe community, and break up the evil and petty isolation of man fromman. This can be done by every kind of co-operative effort wherecombined action is better than individual action. The parish cannot takecare of the child as well as the parents, but you will find in mostof the labors of life combined action is more fruitful than individualaction. Some of you have found this out in many branches of agriculture, of which your dairying, agricultural, credit, poultry, and flaxsocieties are witness. Some of you have combined to manufacture; someto buy in common, some to sell in common. Some of you have the commonownership of thousands of pounds' worth of expensive machinery. Some ofyou have carried the idea of co-operation for economic ends farther, andhave used the power which combination gives you to erect village hallsand to have libraries of books, the windows through which the lifeand wonder and power of humanity can be seen. Some of you havelight-heartedly, in the growing sympathy of unity, revived the dancesand songs and sports which are the right relaxation of labor. SomeIrishwomen here and there have heard beyond the four walls in which somuch of their lives are spent the music of a new day, and have startedout to help and inspire the men and be good comrades to them; andcalling themselves United Irish-women, they have joined, as men havejoined, to help their sisters who are in economic servitude, or whosuffer from the ignorance and indifference to their special needs inlife which pervade the administration of local government. We cannotbuild up a rural civilization in Ireland without the aid of Irish women. It will help life little if we have methods of the twentieth century inthe fields, and those of the fifth century in the home. A great writersaid: "Woman is the last thing man will civilize. " If a woman hadwritten on that subject she would have said: "Woman is the last thinga man thinks about when he is building up his empires. " It is true thatthe consciousness of woman has been always centered too close to thedark and obscure roots of the Tree of Life, while men have branchedout more to the sun an wind, and today the starved soul of womanhood iscrying out over the world for an intellectual life and for more chanceof earning a living. If Ireland will not listen to this cry, itsdaughters will go on slipping silently away to other countries, as theyhave been doing--all the best of them, all the bravest, all those mostmentally alive, all those who would have made the best wives and thebest mothers--and they will leave at home the timid, the stupid andthe dull to help in the deterioration of the race and to breed sons assluggish as themselves. In the New World women have taken an importantpart in the work of the National Grange, the greatest agency inbettering the economic and social conditions of the agriculturalpopulation in the States. In Ireland the women must be welcomed intothe work of building up a rural civilization, and be aided by men in thepromotion of those industries with which women have been immemoriallyassociated. We should not want to see women separated from theactivities and ideals and inspirations of men. We should want to seethem working together and in harmony. If the women carry on their workin connection with the associations by which men earn their living theywill have a greater certainty of permanence. I have seen too many littleindustries and little associations of women workers spring up and perishin Ireland, which depended on the efforts of some one person who had notdrunk of the elixir of immortal youth, and could not always continuethe work she started; and I have come to the conclusion that the women'sorganizations must be connected with the men's organizations, must usetheir premises, village halls, and rooms for women's meetings. I do notbelieve women's work can be promoted so well in any other way. Men andwomen have been companions in the world from the dawn of time. I do notknow where they are journeying to, but I believe they will never get tothe Delectable City if they journey apart from each other, and do notshare each other's burdens. 

Working so, we create the conditions in which the spirit of thecommunity grows strong. We create the true communal idea, whichthe Socialists miss in their dream of a vast amalgamation of wholenationalities in one great commercial undertaking. The true idea of theclan or commune or tribe is to have in it as many people as will giveit strength and importance, and so few people that a personal tie maybe established between them. Humanity has always grouped itselfinstinctively in this way. It did so in the ancient clans and ruralcommunes, and it does so in the parishes and co-operative associations. If they were larger they would lose the sense of unity. If they weresmaller they would be too feeble for effectual work, and could not takeover the affairs of their district. A rural commune or co-operativecommunity ought to have, to a large extent, the character of a nation. It should manufacture for its members all things which it profitably canmanufacture for them, employing its own workmen, carpenters, bootmakers, makers and menders of farming equipment, saddlery, harness, etc. Itshould aim at feeding its members and their families cheaply and well, as far as possible, out of the meat and grain produced in the district. It should have a mill to grind their grain, a creamery to manufacturetheir butter; or where certain enterprises like a bacon factory are toogreat for it, it should unite with other co-operative communities tofurnish out such an enterprise. It should sell for the members theirproduce, and buy for them their requirements, and hold for themlabor-saving machinery. It should put aside a certain portion of itsprofits every year for the creation of halls, libraries, places forrecreation and games, and it should pursue this plan steadily with thepurpose of giving its members every social and educational advantagewhich the civilization of their time affords. It should have itscouncils or village parliaments, where improvements and new venturescould be discussed. Such a community would soon generate a passionatedevotion to its own ideals and interests among the members, who wouldfeel how their fortunes rose with the fortunes of the associations ofwhich they were all members. It would kindle and quicken the intellectof every person in the community. It would create the atmosphere inwhich national genius would emerge and find opportunities for itsactivity. The clan ought to be the antechamber of the nation and thetraining ground for its statesmen. What opportunity leadership in thecouncils of such a rural community would give to the best minds! The manof social genius at present finds an unorganized community, and he doesnot know how to affect his fellow-citizens. A man might easily despairof affecting the destinies of a nation of forty million people, but yetstart with eagerness to build up a kingdom of the size of Sligo, andshape it nearer to the heart's desire. The organization of the ruralpopulation of Ireland in co-operative associations will provide theinstrument ready to the hand of the social reformer. 

Some associations will be more dowered with ability than others, butone will learn from another, and a vast network of living, progressiveorganizations will cover rural Ireland, democratic in constitution andgoverned by the aristocracy of intellect and character. 

Such associations would have great economic advantages in that theywould be self-reliant and self-contained, and would be less subject tofluctuation in their prosperity brought about by national disasters andcommercial crises than the present unorganized rural communities are. They would have all their business under local control; and, aiming atfeeding, clothing, and manufacturing locally from local resources as faras possible, the slumps in foreign trade, the shortage in supplies, thedislocations of commerce would affect them but little. They would makethe community wealthier. Every step towards this organization alreadytaken in Ireland has brought with it increased prosperity, and thetowns benefit by increased purchasing power on the part of these ruralassociations. New arts and industries would spring up under the aegis ofthe local associations. Here we should find the weaving of rugs, there the manufacture of toys, elsewhere the women would be engagedin embroidery or lace-making, and, perhaps, everywhere we might get arevival of the old local industry of weaving homespuns. We are dreamingof nothing impossible, nothing which has not been done somewherealready, nothing which we could not do here in Ireland. True, it cannotbe done all at once, but if we get the idea clearly in our minds of thebuilding up of a rural civilization in Ireland, we can labor at it withthe grand persistence of medieval burghers in their little towns, whereone generation laid down the foundations of a great cathedral, and sawonly in hope and faith the gorgeous glooms over altar and sanctuary, and the blaze and flame of stained glass, where apostles, prophets, andangelic presences were pictured in fire: and the next generation raisedhigh the walls, and only the third generation saw the realization ofwhat their grandsires had dreamed. We in Ireland should not live onlyfrom day to day, for the day only, like the beasts in the field, butshould think of where all this long cavalcade of the Gael is tending, and how and in what manner their tents will be pitched in the eveningof their generation. A national purpose is the most unconquerable andvictorious of all things on earth. It can raise up Babylons from thesands of the desert, and make imperial civilizations spring from out ascore of huts, and after it has wrought its will it can leave monumentsthat seem as everlasting a portion of nature as the rocks. The Pyramidsand the Sphinx in the sands of Egypt have seemed to humanity forcenturies as much a portion of nature as Erigal, or Benbulben, or SlieveGullion have seemed a portion of nature to our eyes in Ireland. 

We must have some purpose or plan in building up an Irish civilization. No artist takes up his paints and brushes and begins to work on hiscanvas without a clear idea burning in his brain of what he has to do, else were his work all smudges. Does anyone think that out of all theselittle cabins and farmhouses dotting the green of Ireland there willcome harmonious effort to a common end without organization and setpurpose? The idea and plan of a great rural civilization must shine likea burning lamp in the imagination of the youth of Ireland, or we shallonly be at cross-purposes and end in little fatuities. We are very fondin Ireland of talking of Ireland a nation. The word "nation" has a kindof satisfying sound, but I am afraid it is an empty word with no richsignificance to most who use it. The word "laboratory" has as fine asound, but only the practical scientist has a true conception of whatmay take place there, what roar of strange forces, what mingling ofsubtle elements, what mystery and magnificence in atomic life. The wordwithout the idea is like the purse without the coin, the skull withoutthe soul, or any other sham or empty deceit. Nations are not built up bythe repetition of words, but by the organizing of intellectual forces. If any of my readers would like to know what kind of thought goes tothe building up of a great nation, let him read the life of AlexanderHamilton by Oliver. To that extraordinary man the United States owetheir constitution, almost their existence. To him, far more than toWashington, the idea, plan, shape of all that marvelous dominion owesits origin and character. He seemed to hold in his brain, while Americawas yet a group of half-barbaric settlements, the idea of what it mightbecome. He laid down the plans, the constitution, the foreign policy, the trade policy, the relation of State to State, and it is only withinthe last few years almost, that America has realized that she hadin Hamilton a supreme political and social intelligence, the truefountain-head of what she has since become. 

We have not half a continent to deal with, but size matters nothing. TheRussian Empire, which covers half Europe, and stretches over the UralMountains to the Pacific, would weigh light as a feather in the balanceif we compare its services to humanity with those of the little State ofAttica, which was no larger than Tipperary. Every State which has cometo command the admiration of the world has had clearly conceived idealswhich it realized before it went the way which all empires, even thegreatest, must go; becoming finally a legend, a fable, or a symbol. Wehave to lay down the foundations of a new social order in Ireland, and, if the possibilities of it are realized, our thousand years of sorrowand darkness may be followed by as long a cycle of happy effort andever-growing prosperity. We shall want all these plans whether weare ruled from Westminster or College Green. Without an imaginativeconception of what kind of civilization we wish to create, the bestgovernment from either quarter will never avail to lift us beyondnational mediocrity. I write for those who have joined the ranks of theco-operators without perhaps realizing all that the movement meant, orall that it tended to. Because we hold in our hearts and keep holy therethe vision of a great future, I have fought passionately for the entirefreedom of our movement from external control, lest the meddling ofpoliticians or official persons without any inspiration should deflect, for some petty purpose or official gratification, the strength of thatcurrent which was flowing and gathering strength unto the realizationof great ideals. Every country has its proportion of little souls whichcould find ample room on a threepenny bit, and be majestically housed ina thimble, who follow out some little minute practice in an ecstasy ofself-satisfaction, seeking some little job which is the El Dorado oftheir desires as if there were naught else, as if humanity were notgoing from the Great Deep to the Great Deep of Deity, with wind andwater, fire and earth, stars and sun, lordly companions for it on itspath to a divine destiny. We have our share of these in Ireland in highand low places, but I do not write for them. This essay is for thosewho are working at laying deep the foundations of a new social order, tohearten them with some thought of what their labor may bring to Ireland. I welcome to this work the United Irishwomen. As one of their poetesseshas said in a beautiful song, the services of women to Ireland in thepast have been the services of mourners to the stricken. But for todayand tomorrow we need hope and courage and gaiety, and I repeat for themthe last passionate words of her verse:

 Rise to your feet, O daughters, rise, Our mother still is young and fair. Let the world look into your eyes And see her beauty shining there. Grant of that beauty but one ray, Heroes shall leap from every hill; Today shall be as yesterday, The red blood burns in Ireland still. 

THOUGHTS FOR A CONVENTION

1. There are moments in history when by the urgency of circumstanceeveryone in a country is drawn from normal pursuits to consider theaffairs of the nation. The merchant is turned from his warehouse, thebookman from his books, the farmer from his fields, because they realizethat the very foundations of the society, under whose shelter they wereable to carry on their avocation, are being shaken, and they can nolonger be voiceless, or leave it to deputies, unadvised by them, to arrange national destinies. We are all accustomed to endure theannoyances and irritations caused by legislation which is not agreeableto us, and solace ourselves by remembering that the things whichreally matter are not affected. But when the destiny of a nation, theprinciples by which life is to be guided are at stake, all are on alevel, are equally affected and are bound to give expression to theiropinions. Ireland is in one of these moments of history. Circumstanceswith which we are all familiar and the fever in which the world existshave infected it, and it is like molten metal the skilled politicalartificer might pour into a desirable mould. But if it is not handledrightly, if any factor is ignored, there may be an explosion which wouldbring on us a fate as tragic as anything in our past history. Irishmencan no longer afford to remain aloof from each other, or to address eachother distantly and defiantly from press or platform, but must striveto understand each other truly, and to give due weight to each other'sopinions, and, if possible, arrive at a compromise, a balancing oftheir diversities, which may save our country from anarchy and chaos forgenerations to come. 

2. An agreement about Irish Government must be an agreement, not betweentwo but three Irish parties first of all, and afterwards with GreatBritain. The Premier of a Coalition Cabinet has declared that there isno measure of self government which Great Britain would not assent tobeing set up in Ireland, if Irishmen themselves could but come to anagreement. Before such a compromise between Irish parties is possiblethere must be a clear understanding of the ideals of these parties, as they are understood by themselves, and not as they are presentedin party controversy by special pleaders whose object too often is topervert or discredit the principles and actions of opponents, athing which is easy to do because all parties, even the noblest, havefollowers who do them disservice by ignorant advocacy or excited action. If we are to unite Ireland we can only do so by recognizing what trulyare the principles each party stands for, and will not forsake, and forwhich, if necessary they will risk life. True understanding is to seeideas as they are held by men between themselves and Heaven; and in thismood I will try, first of all, to understand the position of Unionists, Sinn Feiners and Constitutional Nationalists as they have been explainedto me by the best minds among them, those who have induced others oftheir countrymen to accept those ideals. When this is done we will seeif compromise, a balancing of diversities be not possible in anIrish State where all that is essential in these varied ideals may beharmonized and retained. 

3. I will take first of all the position of Unionists. They are, manyof them, the descendants of settlers who by their entrance into Irelandbroke up the Gaelic uniformity and introduced the speech, the thoughts, characteristic of another race. While they have grown to love theircountry as much as any of Gaelic origin, and their peculiarities havebeen modified by centuries of life in Ireland and by intermarriage, so that they are much more akin to their fellow-countrymen in mind andmanner than they are to any other people, they still retain habits, beliefs and traditions from which they will not part. They form a classeconomically powerful. They have openness and energy of character, greatorganizing power and a mastery over materials, all qualities invaluablein an Irish State. In North-East Ulster, where they are most homogeneousthey conduct the affairs of their cities with great efficiency, carryingon an international trade not only with Great Britain but with the restof the world. They have made these industries famous. They believe thattheir prosperity is in large measure due to their acceptance of theUnion, that it would be lessened if they threw in their lot with theother Ireland and accepted its ideals, that business which now goes totheir shipyards and factories would cease if they were absorbed ina self-governing Ireland whose spokesmen had an unfortunate habit ofnagging their neighbors and of conveying the impression that they areinspired by race hatred. They believe that an Irish legislature would becontrolled by a majority, representatives mainly of small farmers, menwho had no knowledge of affairs, or of the peculiar needs of Ulsterindustry, or the intricacy of the problems involved in carrying on aninternational trade; that the religious ideas of the majority would beso favored in education and government that the favoritism would amountto religious oppression. They are also convinced that no small countryin the present state of the world can really be independent, thatsuch only exist by sufferance of their mighty neighbors, and must besubservient in trade policy and military policy to retain even a nominalfreedom; and that an independent Ireland would by its position be afocus for the intrigues of powers hostile to Great Britain, and if itachieved independence Great Britain in self protection would be forcedto conquer it again. They consider that security for industry andfreedom for the individual can best be preserved in Ireland by themaintenance of the Union, and that the world spirit is with the greatempires. 

4. The second political group may be described as the spiritualinheritors of the more ancient race in Ireland. They regard thepreservation of their nationality as a sacred charge, themselves as aconquered people owing no allegiance to the dominant race. They cannotbe called traitors to it because neither they nor their predecessorshave ever admitted the right of another people to govern them againsttheir will. They are inspired by an ancient history, a literaturestretching beyond the Christian era, a national culture and distinctnational ideals which they desire to manifest in a civilization whichshall not be an echo or imitation of any other. While they do notdepreciate the worth of English culture or its political system they areas angry at its being imposed on them as a young man with a passion forart would be if his guardian insisted on his adopting another professionand denied him any chance of manifesting his own genius. Few hatredsequal those caused by the denial or obstruction of national aptitudes. Many of those who fought in the last Irish insurrection were fightersnot merely for a political change but were rather desperate anddespairing champions of a culture which they held was being stifled frominfancy in Irish children in the schools of the nation. They believethat the national genius cannot manifest itself in a civilization andis not allowed to manifest itself while the Union persists. They wishIreland to be as much itself as Japan, and as free to make its ownchoice of political principles, its culture and social order, andto develop its industries unfettered by the trade policy of theirneighbors. Their mood is unconquerable, and while often overcome ithas emerged again and again in Irish history, and it has perhaps moreadherents today than at any period since the Act of Union, and thishas been helped on by the incarnation of the Gaelic spirit in the modernAnglo-Irish literature, and a host of brilliant poets, dramatists andprose writers who have won international recognition, and have increasedthe dignity of spirit and the self-respect of the followers of thistradition. They assert that the Union kills the soul of the people; thatempires do not permit the intensive cultivation of human life: thatthey destroy the richness and variety of existence by the extinction ofpeculiar and unique gifts, and the substitution therefor of a culturewhich has its value mainly for the people who created it, but is asalien to our race as the mood of the scientist is to the artist or poet. 

5. The third group occupies a middle position between those who desirethe perfecting of the Union and those whose claim is for completeindependence: and because they occupy a middle position, and have takencoloring from the extremes between which they exist they have beenexposed to the charge of insincerity, which is unjust so far as the bestminds among them are concerned. They have aimed at a middle course, notgoing far enough on one side or another to secure the confidence of theextremists. They have sought to maintain the connection with the empire, and at the same time to acquire an Irish control over administrationand legislation. They have been more practical than ideal, and to theircredit must be placed the organizing of the movements which secured mostof the reforms in Ireland since the Union, such as religious equality, the acts securing to farmers fair rents and fixity of tenure, the wiseand salutary measures making possible the transfer of land from landlordto tenant, facilities for education at popular universities, thelaborers' acts and many others. They are a practical party taking whatthey could get, and because they could show ostensible results they havehad a greater following in Ireland than any other party. This is naturalbecause the average man in all countries is a realist. But this relianceon material results to secure support meant that they must always showresults, or the minds of their countrymen veered to those ultimatesand fundamentals which await settlement here as they do in allcivilizations. As in the race with Atalanta the golden apples had to bethrown in order to win the race. The intellect of Ireland is now fixedon fundamentals, and the compromise this middle party is able to offerdoes not make provision for the ideals of either of the extremists, andindeed meets little favor anywhere in a country excited by recentevents in world history, where revolutionary changes are expected and asettlement far more in accord with fundamental principles. 

6. It is possible that many of the rank and file of these parties willnot at first agree with the portraits painted of their opponents, andthat is because the special pleaders of the press, who in Ireland are, as a rule, allowed little freedom to state private convictions, havecome to regard themselves as barristers paid to conduct a case, and haveacquired the habit of isolating particular events, the hasty speech orviolent action of individuals in localities, and of exhibiting these asindicating the whole character of the party attacked. They misrepresentIrishmen to each other. The Ulster advocates of the Union, for example, are accustomed to hear from their advisers that the favorite employmentof Irish farmers in the three southern provinces is cattle driving, ifnot worse. They are told that Protestants in these provinces live infear of their lives, whereas anybody who has knowledge of the trueconditions knows that, so far from being riotous and unbusinesslike, the farmers in these provinces have developed a net-work of ruralassociations, dairies, bacon factories, agricultural and poultrysocieties, etc. , doing their business efficiently, applying theteachings of science in their factories, competing in quality of outputwith the very best of the same class of society in Ulster and obtainingas good prices in the same market. As a matter of fact this method oforganization now largely adopted by Ulster farmers was initiated in theSouth. With regard to the charge of intolerance I do not believe it. Here, as in all other countries, there are unfortunate souls obsessed bydark powers, whose human malignity takes the form of religious hatreds, but I believe, and the thousands of Irish Protestants in the SouthernCounties will affirm it as true that they have nothing to complain of inthis respect. I am sure that in this matter of religious tolerance theseprovinces can stand favorable comparison with any country in the worldwhere there are varieties of religions, even with Great Britain. I wouldplead with my Ulster compatriots not to gaze too long or too credulouslyinto that distorting mirror held up to them, nor be tempted to takeindividual action as representative of the mass. How would they liketo have the depth or quality of spiritual life in their great cityrepresented by the scrawlings and revilings about the head of theCatholic Church to be found occasionally on the blank walls of Belfast. If the same method of distortion by selection of facts was carried outthere is not a single city or nation which could not be made to appearbaser than Sodom or Gomorrah and as deserving of their fate. 

7. The Ulster character is better appreciated by Southern Ireland, andthere is little reason to vindicate it against any charges except theslander that Ulster Unionists do not regard themselves as Irishmen, andthat they have no love for their own country. Their position is thatthey are Unionists, not merely because it is for the good of GreatBritain, but because they hold it to be for the good of Ireland, and itis the Irish argument weighs with them, and if they were convinced itwould be better for Ireland to be self-governed they would throw intheir lot with the rest of Ireland, which would accept them gladly andgreet them as a prodigal son who had returned, having made, unlike mostprodigal sons, a fortune, and well able to be the wisest adviser infamily affairs. It is necessary to preface what I have to say by way ofargument or remonstrance to Irish parties by words making it clear thatI write without prejudice against any party, and that I do not in theleast underestimate their good qualities or the weight to be attachedto their opinions and ideals. It is the traditional Irish way, whichwe have too often forgotten, to notice the good in the opponent beforebattling with what is evil. So Maeve, the ancient Queen of Connacht, looking over the walls of her city of Cruachan at the Ulster foemen, said of them, "Noble and regal is their appearance, " and her ownfollowers said, "Noble and regal are those of whom you speak. " When welost the old Irish culture we lost the tradition of courtesy to eachother which lessens the difficulties of life and makes it possible toconduct controversy without creating bitter memories. 

8. I desire first to argue with Irish Unionists whether it is accurateto say of them, as it would appear to be from their spokesmen, that theprinciple of nationality cannot be recognized by them or allowed to takeroot in the commonwealth of dominions which form the Empire. Must oneculture only exist? Must all citizens have their minds poured intothe same mould, and varieties of gifts and cultural traditions beextinguished? What would India with its myriad races say to that theory?What would Canada enclosing in its dominion and cherishing a FrenchCanadian nation say? Unionists have by every means in their powerdiscouraged the study of the national literature of Ireland though itis one of the most ancient in Europe, though the scholars of France andGermany have founded journals for its study, and its beauty is beingrecognized by all who have read it. It contains the race memory ofIreland, its imaginations and thoughts for two thousand years. Must thatbe obliterated? Must national character be sterilized of all taint ofits peculiar beauty? Must Ireland have no character of its own but beservilely imitative of its neighbor in all things and be nothing ofitself? It is objected that the study of Irish history, Irish literatureand the national culture generates hostility to the Empire. Is that atrue psychological analysis? Is it not true in all human happeningsthat if people are denied what is right and natural they will instantlyassume an attitude of hostility to the power which denies? The hostilityis not inherent in the subject but is evoked by the denial. I put itto my Unionist compatriots that the ideal is to aim at a diversity ofculture, and the greatest freedom, richness and variety of thought. Themore this richness and variety prevail in a nation the less likelihoodis there of the tyranny of one culture over the rest. We should aim inIreland at that freedom of the ancient Athenians, who, as Pericles said, listened gladly to the opinions of others and did not turn sour faceson those who disagreed with them. A culture which is allowed essentialfreedom to develop will soon perish if it does not in itself contain theelements of human worth which make for immortality. The world has to itssorrow many instances of freak religions which were persecuted and bynatural opposition were perpetuated and hardened in belief. We shouldallow the greatest freedom in respect of cultural developments inIreland so that the best may triumph by reason of superior beauty andnot because the police are relied upon to maintain one culture in adominant position. 

9. I have also an argument to address to the extremists whose claim, uttered lately with more openness and vehemence, is for the completeindependence of the whole of Ireland, who cry out against partition, whowill not have a square mile of Irish soil subject to foreign rule. That implies they desire the inclusion of Ulster and the inhabitantsof Ulster in their Irish State. I tell them frankly that if they expectUlster to throw its lot in with a self-governing Ireland they mustremain within the commonwealth of dominions which constitute the Empire, be prepared loyally, once Ireland has complete control over its internalaffairs, to accept the status of a dominion and the responsibilities ofthat wider union. If they will not accept that status as the Boers did, they will never draw that important and powerful Irish party into anIrish State except by force, and do they think there is any possibilityof that? It is extremely doubtful whether if the world stood aloof, andallowed Irishmen to fight out their own quarrels among themselves, thatthe fighters for complete independence could conquer a community sonumerous, so determined, so wealthy, so much more capable of providingfor themselves the plentiful munitions by which alone one army can hopeto conquer another. In South Africa men who had fiercer traditionalhostilities than Irishmen of different parties here have had, whobelonged to different races, who had a few years before been engaged ina racial war, were great enough to rise above these past antagonisms, to make an agreement and abide faithfully by it. Is the same magnanimitynot possible in Ireland? I say to my countrymen who cry out for thecomplete separation of Ireland from the Empire, that they will not inthis generation bring with them the most powerful and wealthy, if notthe most numerous, party in their country. Complete control of Irishaffairs is a possibility, and I suggest to the extremists that thestatus of a self-governing dominion inside a federation of dominionsis a proposal which, if other safeguards for minority interests areincorporated, would attract Unionist attention. But if these men whodepend so much in their economic enterprises upon a friendly relationwith their largest customers are to be allured into self-governingIreland there must be acceptance of the Empire as an essentialcondition. The Boers found it not impossible to accept this status forthe sake of a United South Africa. Are our Irish Boers not preparedto make a compromise and abide by it loyally for the sake of a UnitedIreland?

10. A remonstrance must also be addressed to the middle party in thatit has made no real effort to understand and conciliate the feelings ofIrish Unionists. They have indeed made promises, no doubt sincerely, butthey have undone the effect of all they said by encouraging of recentyears the growth of sectarian organizations with political aims and haverelied on these as on a party machine. It may be said that in Ulstera similar organization, sectarian with political objects, has longexisted, and that this justified a counter organization. Both inmy opinion are unjustifiable and evil, but the backing of such anorganization was specially foolish in the case of the majority, whosemain object ought to be to allure the minority into the same politicalfold. The baser elements in society, the intriguers, the job seekers, and all who would acquire by influence what they cannot attain by merit, flock into such bodies, and create a sinister impression as to theirobjects and deliberations. If we are to have national concord amongIrishmen religion must be left to the Churches whose duty it is topromote it, and be dissevered from party politics, and it shouldbe regarded as contrary to national idealism to organize men of onereligion into secret societies with political or economic aims. So shallbe left to Caesar the realm which is Caesar's, and it shall not appearpart of the politics of eternity that Michael's sister's son obtains aparticular post beginning at thirty shillings a week. I am not certainthat it should not be an essential condition of any Irish settlementthat all such sectarian organizations should be disbanded in so far astheir objects are political, and remain solely as friendly societies. Itis useless assuring a minority already suspicious, of the tolerance itmay expect from the majority, if the party machine of the majority issectarian and semi-secret, if no one of the religion of the minority canjoin it. I believe in spite of the recent growth of sectarian societiesthat it has affected but little the general tolerant spirit in Ireland, and where the evils have appeared they have speedily resulted in thebreak up of the organization in the locality. Irishmen individually asa rule are much nobler in spirit than the political organizations theybelong to. 

11. It is necessary to speak with the utmost frankness and not to slurover any real difficulty in the way of a settlement. Irish parties mustrise above themselves if they are to bring about an Irish unity. Theyappear on the surface irreconcilable, but that, in my opinion, isbecause the spokesmen of parties are under the illusion that they shouldnever indicate in public that they might possibly abate one jot of theclaims of their party. A crowd or organization is often more extremethan its individual members. I have spoken to Unionists and Sinn Feinersand find them as reasonable in private as they are unreasonable inpublic. I am convinced that an immense relief would be felt by allIrishmen if a real settlement of the Irish question could be arrived at, a compromise which would reconcile them to living under one government, and would at the same time enable us to live at peace with ourneighbors. The suggestions which follow were the result of discussionsbetween a group of Unionists, Nationalists and Sinn Feiners, and as theyfound it possible to agree upon a compromise it is hoped that the policywhich harmonized their diversities may help to bring about a similarresult in Ireland. 

12. I may now turn to consider the Anglo-Irish problem and to makespecific suggestions for its solution and the character of thegovernment to be established in Ireland. The factors are triple. There is first the desire many centuries old of Irish nationalists forself-government and the political unity of the people: secondly, thereis the problem of the Unionists who require that the self-governingIreland they enter shall be friendly to the imperial connection, andthat their religious and economic interests shall be safeguarded by realand not merely by verbal guarantees; and, thirdly, there is theposition of Great Britain which requires, reasonably enough, that anyself-governing dominion set up alongside it shall be friendly tothe Empire. In this matter Great Britain has priority of claim toconsideration, for it has first proposed a solution, the Home Rule Actwhich is on the Statute Book, though later variants of that have beenoutlined because of the attitude of Unionists in North-East Ulster, variants which suggest the partition of Ireland, the elimination of sixcounties from the area controlled by the Irish government. This Act, orthe variants of it offered to Ireland, is the British contribution tothe settlement of the Anglo-Irish problem. 

13. If it is believed that this scheme, or any diminutive of it, willsettle the Anglo-Irish problem, British statesmen and people who trustthem are only preparing for themselves bitter disappointment. I believethat nothing less than complete self-government has ever been the objectof Irish Nationalism. However ready certain sections have been to acceptinstallments, no Irish political leader had authority to pledge hiscountrymen to ever accept a half measure as a final settlement of theIrish claim. The Home Rule Act, if put into operation tomorrow, even ifUlster were cajoled or coerced into accepting it, would not be regardedby Irish Nationalists as a final settlement, no matter what may besaid at Westminster. Nowhere in Ireland has it been accepted as final. Received without enthusiasm at first, every year which has passedsince the Bill was introduced has seen the system of self-governmentformulated there subjected to more acute and hostile criticism: and Ibelieve it would be perfectly accurate to say that its passing tomorrowwould only be the preliminary for another agitation, made fiercer by theunrest of the world, where revolutions and the upsetting of dynastiesare in the air, and where the claims of nationalities no more ancientthan the Irish, like the Poles, the Finns, and the Arabs, to politicalfreedom are admitted by the spokesmen of the great powers, Great Britainincluded, or are already conceded. If any partition of Ireland iscontemplated this will intensify the bitterness now existing. I believeit is to the interest of Great Britain to settle the Anglo-Irishdispute. It has been countered in many of its policies in America andthe Colonies by the vengeful feelings of Irish exiles. There may yetcome a time when the refusal of the Irish mouse to gnaw at a net spreadabout the lion may bring about the downfall of the Empire. It cannot beto the interest of Great Britain to have on its flank some millions ofpeople who, whenever Great Britain is engaged in a war which threatensits existence, feel a thrill running through them, as prisoners dohearing the guns sounding closer of an army which comes, as they think, to liberate them. Nations denied essential freedom ever feel like thatwhen the power which dominates them is itself in peril. Who can doubtbut for the creation of Dominion Government in South Africa that thepresent war would have found the Boers thirsty for revenge, and theHome Government incapable of dealing with a distant people who taxed itsresources but a few years previously. I have no doubt that if Irelandwas granted the essential freedom and wholeness in its political lifeit desires, its mood also would be turned. I have no feelings of racehatred, no exultation in thought of the downfall of any race; but as aclose observer of the mood of millions in Ireland, I feel certain thatif their claim is not met they will brood and scheme and Wait to strikea blow, though the dream may be handed on from them to their childrenand their children's children, yet they will hope, sometime, to give thelast vengeful thrust of enmity at the stricken heart of the Empire. 

14. Any measure which is not a settlement which leaves Ireland stillactively discontented is a waste of effort, and the sooner Englishstatesmen realize the futility of half measures the better. A man whoclaims a debt he believes is due to him, who is offered half of it inpayment, is not going to be conciliated or to be one iota more friendly, if he knows that the other is able to pay the full amount and it couldbe yielded without detriment to the donor. Ireland will never be contentwith a system of self-government which lessens its representation in theImperial Parliament, and still retains for that Parliament control overall-important matters like taxation and trade policy. Whoever controlsthese controls the character of an Irish civilization, and the demandof Ireland is not merely for administrative powers, but the power tofashion its own national policy, and to build up a civilization ofits own with an economic character in keeping by self-devised andself-checked efforts. To misunderstand this is to suppose there isno such thing as national idealism, and that a people will acceptsubstitutes for the principle of nationality, whereas the past historyof the world and present circumstance in Europe are evidence thatnothing is more unconquerable and immortal than national feeling, andthat it emerges from centuries of alien government, and is ready at anytime to flare out in insurrection. At no period in Irish history wasthat sentiment more self-conscious than it is today. 

15. Nationalist Ireland requires that the Home Rule Act should beradically changed to give Ireland unfettered control over taxation, customs, excise and trade policy. These powers are at present denied, and if the Act were in operation, Irish people instead of trying to makethe best of it, would begin at once to use whatever powers they had asa lever to gain the desired control, and this would lead to freshantagonism and a prolonged struggle between the two countries, andin this last effort Irish Nationalists would have the support of thatwealthy class now Unionist in the three southern provinces, and alsoin Ulster if it were included, for they would then desire as much asNationalists that, while they live in a self-governing Ireland, thepowers of the Irish government should be such as would enable it tobuild up Irish industries by an Irish trade policy, and to imposetaxation in a way to suit Irish conditions. As the object of Britishconsent to Irish self-government is to dispose of Irish antagonismnothing is to be gained by passing measures which will not dispose ofit. The practically unanimous claim of Nationalists as exhibited inthe press in Ireland is for the status and power of economic controlpossessed by the self-governing dominions. By this alone will the causesof friction between the two nations be removed, and a real solidarity ofinterest based on a federal union for joint defense of the freedom andwell-being of the federated communities be possible and I have no doubtit would take place. I do not believe that hatreds remain for long amongpeople when the causes which created them are removed. We have seen inEurope and in the dominions the continual reversals of feeling whichhave taken place when a sore has been removed. Antagonisms are replacedby alliances. It is mercifully true of human nature that it prefers toexercise goodwill to hatred when it can, and the common sense of thebest in Ireland would operate once there was no longer interferencein our internal affairs, to allay and keep in order these turbulentelements which exist in every country, but which only become a danger tosociety when real grievances based on the violation of true principlesof government are present. 

16. The Union has failed absolutely to conciliate Ireland. Everygeneration there have been rebellions and shootings and agitations ofa vehement and exhausting character carried continually to the pointof lawlessness before Irish grievances could be redressed. A form ofgovernment which requires a succession of rebellions to securereforms afterwards admitted to be reasonable cannot be a good form ofgovernment. These agitations have inflicted grave material andmoral injury on Ireland. The instability of the political system hasprejudiced natural economic development. Capital will not be investedin industries where no one is certain about the future. And becausethe will of the people was so passionately set on political freedom anatmosphere of suspicion gathered around public movements which in othercountries would have been allowed to carry on their beneficent workunhindered by any party. Here they were continually being forced todeclare themselves either for or against self-government. The longattack on the movement for the organization of Irish agriculture wasan instance. Men are elected on public bodies not because they areefficient administrators, but because they can be trusted to passresolutions favoring one party or another. This has led to corruption. Every conceivable rascality in Ireland has hid itself behind the greatnames of nation or empire. The least and the most harmless actions ofmen engaged in philanthropic or educational work or social reform arescrutinized and criticized so as to obstruct good work. If a phrase evensuggests the possibility of a political partiality, or a tendency toanything which might be construed by the most suspicious scrutineer toindicate a remote desire to use the work done as an argument eitherfor or against self-government the man or movement is never allowed toforget it. Public service becomes intolerable and often impossibleunder such conditions, and while the struggle continues this also willcontinue to the moral detriment of the people. There are only two formsof government possible. A people may either be governed by force or maygovern themselves. The dual government of Ireland by two Parliaments, one sitting in Dublin and one in London, contemplated in the Home RuleAct, would be impossible and irritating. Whatever may be said for twobodies each with their spheres of influence clearly defined, thereis nothing to be said for two legislatures with concurrent powers oflegislation and taxation, and with members from Ireland retained atWestminster to provide some kind of democratic excuse for the exerciseof powers of Irish legislation and taxation by the Parliament atWestminster. The Irish demand is that Great Britain shall throw upon ourshoulders the full weight of responsibility for the management of ourown affairs, so that we can only blame ourselves and our politicalguides and not Great Britain if we err in our policies. 

17. I have stated what I believe to be sound reasons for the recognitionof the justice of the Irish demand by Great Britain and I now turn toUlster, and ask it whether the unstable condition of things in Irelanddoes not affect it even more than Great Britain. If it persists in itspresent attitude, if it remains out of a self-governing Ireland, it willnot thereby exempt itself from political, social and economic trouble. Ireland will regard the six Ulster counties as the French have regardedAlsace-Lorraine, whose hopes of reconquest turned Europe into an armedcamp, with the endless suspicions, secret treaties, military and navaldevelopments, the expense of maintaining huge armies, and finally theinevitable war. So sure as Ulster remains out, so surely will it becomea focus for nationalist designs. I say nothing of the injury to thegreat wholesale business carried on from its capital city throughout therest of Ireland where the inevitable and logical answer of merchantsin the rest of Ireland to requests for orders will be: "You would dierather than live in the same political house with us. We will die ratherthan trade with you. " There will be lamentably and inevitably a fiercertone between North and South. Everything that happens in one quarterwill be distorted in the other. Each will lie about the other. Thematerials will exist more than before for civil commotion, and thiswill be aided by the powerful minority of Nationalists in the excludedcounties working in conjunction with their allies across the border. Nothing was ever gained in life by hatred; nothing good ever came ofit or could come of it; and the first and most important of all thecommandments of the spirit that there should be brotherhood betweenmen will be deliberately broken to the ruin of the spiritual life ofIreland. 

18. So far from Irish Nationalists wishing to oppress Ulster, I believethat there is hardly any demand which could be made, even involvingdemocratic injustice to themselves, which would not willingly be grantedif their Ulster compatriots would fling their lot in with the rest ofIreland and heal the eternal sore. I ask Ulster what is there that theycould not do as efficiently in an Ireland with the status and economicpower of a self-governing dominion as they do at present. Could they notbuild their ships and sell them, manufacture and export their linens?What do they mean when they say Ulster industries would be taxed? Icannot imagine any Irish taxation which their wildest dreams imaginedso heavy as the taxation which they will endure as part of the UnitedKingdom in future. They will be implicated in all the revolutionarylegislation made inevitable in Great Britain by the recoil on societyof the munition workers and disbanded conscripts. Ireland, which luckilyfor itself, has the majority of its population economically independentas workers on the land, and which, in the development of agriculture nowmade necessary as a result of changes in naval warfare, will be able toabsorb without much trouble its returning workers. Ireland will be muchquieter, less revolutionary and less expensive to govern. I ask whatreason is there to suppose that taxation in a self-governing Irelandwould be greater than in Great Britain after the war, or in what wayUlster industries could be singled out, or for what evil purpose by anIrish Parliament? It would be only too anxious rather to develop stillfurther the one great industrial centre in Ireland; and would, it ismy firm conviction, allow the representatives of Ulster practically todictate the industrial policy of Ireland. Has there ever at any timebeen the slightest opposition by any Irish Nationalist to proposals madeby Ulster industrialists which would lend color to such a suspicion?Personally, I think that Ulster without safeguards of any kind mighttrust its fellow-countrymen; the weight, the intelligence, the vigorof character of Ulster people in any case would enable them to dominateIreland economically. But I do not for a moment say that Ulster is notjustified in demanding safeguards. Its leader, speaking at Westminsterduring one of the debates on the Home Rule Bill, said scornfully, "Wedo not fear oppressive legislation. We know in fact there would be none. What we do fear is oppressive administration. " That I translate to meanthat Ulster feels that the policy of the spoils to the victors would beadopted, and that jobbery in Nationalist and Catholic interests would berampant. There are as many honest Nationalists and Catholics who wouldobject to this as there are Protestant Unionists, and they would readilyaccept as part of any settlement the proposal that all posts which canrightly be filled by competitive examination shall only be filled afterexamination by Irish Civil Service Commissioners, and that this shouldinclude all posts paid for out of public funds whether directlyunder the Irish Government or under County Councils, Urban Councils, Corporations, or Boards of Guardians. Further, they would allowthe Ulster Counties through their members a veto on any importantadministrative position where the area of the official's operation waslargely confined to North-East Ulster, if such posts were of a characterwhich could not rightly be filled after examination and-must needs be agovernment appointment. I have heard the suspicion expressed that Gaelicmight be made a subject compulsory on all candidates, and that thiswould prejudice the chances of Ulster candidates desirous of enteringthe Civil Service. Nationalist opinion would readily agree that, ifmarks were given for Gaelic, an alternative language, such as French orGerman, should be allowed the candidate as a matter of choice and themarks given be of equal value. By such concession jobbery would be madeimpossible. The corruption and bribery now prevalent in local governmentwould be a thing of the past. Nationalists and Unionists alike wouldbe assured of honest administration and that merit and efficiency, notmembership of some sectarian or political association, would lead topublic service. 

20. If that would not be regarded as adequate protection Nationalistsare ready to consider with friendly minds any other safeguards proposedeither by Ulster or Southern Unionists, though in my opinion the lessthere are formal and legal acknowledgments of differences the better, for it is desirable that Protestant and Catholic, Unionist andNationalist should meet and redivide along other lines than those ofreligion or past party politics, and it is obvious that the raising ofartificial barriers might perpetuate the present lines of division. A real settlement is impossible without the inclusion of the wholeprovince in the Irish State, and apart from the passionate sentimentexisting in Nationalist Ireland for the unity of the whole countrythere are strong economic bonds between Ulster and the three provinces. Further, the exclusion of all or a large part of Ulster would make theexcluded part too predominantly industrial and the rest of Ireland tooexclusively agricultural, tending to prevent that right balance betweenrural and urban industry which all nations should aim at and whichmakes for a varied intellectual life, social and political wisdom anda healthy national being. Though for the sake of obliteration of pastdifferences I would prefer as little building by legislation of fencesisolating one section of the community from another, still I am certainthat if Ulster, as the price of coming into a self-governing Ireland, demanded some application of the Swiss Cantonal system to itself whichwould give it control over local administration it could have it; or, again, it could be conceded the powers of local control vested in theprovincial governments in Canada, where the provincial assemblies haveexclusive power to legislate for themselves in respect of local works, municipal institutions, licenses, and administration of justice inthe province. Further, subject to certain provisions protecting theinterests of different religious bodies, the provincial assemblies havethe exclusive power to make laws upon education. Would not this giveUlster all the guarantees for civil and religious liberty it requires?What arguments of theirs, what fears have they expressed which would notbe met by such control over local administration? I would prefer thatthe mind of Ulster should argue its points with the whole of Ireland andpress its ideals upon it without reservation of its wisdom for itself. But doubtless if Ulster accepted this proposal it would benefit the restof Ireland by the model it would set of efficient administration: andit would, I have no doubt, insert in its provincial constitution all thesafeguards for minorities there which they would ask should beinserted in any Irish constitution to protect the interest of theirco-religionists in that part of Ireland where they are in a minority. 

21. I can deal only with fundamentals in this memorandum, because itis upon fundamentals there are differences of thinking. Once these aresettled it would be comparatively easy to devise the necessary clausesin an Irish constitution, giving safeguards to England for the duepayment of the advances under the Land Acts, and the principles uponwhich an Irish contribution should be made to the empire for navaland military purposes. It was suggested by Mr. Lionel Curtis in his"Problems of the Commonwealth, " that assessors might be appointed by thedominions to fix the fair taxable capacity of each for this purpose. Itwill be observed that while I have claimed for Ireland the status of adominion, I have referred solely hitherto to the powers of control overtrade policy, customs, excise, taxation and legislation possessed by thedominions, and have not claimed for Ireland the right to have an armyor a navy of its own. I recognize that the proximity of the two islandsmakes it desirable to consolidate the naval power under the control ofthe Admiralty. The regular army should remain in the same way underthe War Office which would have the power of recruiting in Ireland. TheIrish Parliament would, I have no doubt, be willing to raise at its ownexpense under an Irish Territorial Council a Territorial Force similarto that of England but not removable from Ireland. Military conscriptioncould never be permitted except by Act of the Irish Parliament. Itwould be a denial of the first principle of nationality if the powerof conscripting the citizens of the country lay not in the hands of theNational Parliament but was exercised by another nation. 

22. While a self-governing Ireland would contribute money to the defenseof the federated empire, it would not be content that that moneyshould be spent on dockyards, arsenals, camps, harbors, naval stations, ship-building and supplies in Great Britain to the almost completeneglect of Ireland as at present. A large contribution for such purposesspent outside Ireland would be an economic drain if not balanced bycounter expenditure here. This might be effected by the training of aportion of the navy and army and the Irish regiments of the regulararmy in Ireland, and their equipment, clothing, supplies, munitionsand rations being obtained through an Irish department. Naval dockyardsshould be constructed here and a proportion of ships built in them. Justas surely as there must be a balance between the imports and exports ofa country, so must there be a balance between the revenue raised ina nation and the public expenditure on that nation. Irish economicdepression after the Act of Union was due in large measure to absenteelandlordism and the expenditure of Irish revenue outside Ireland withno proportionate return. This must not be expected to continue againstIrish interests. Ireland, granted the freedom it desires, would bewilling to defend its freedom and the freedom of other dominions in thecommonwealth of nations it belonged to, but it is not willing to allowmillions to be raised in Ireland and spent outside Ireland. If three orfive millions are raised in Ireland for imperial purposes and spentin Great Britain it simply means that the vast employment of labornecessitated takes place outside Ireland: whereas if spent here itwould mean the employment of many thousands of men, the support of theirfamilies, and in the economic chain would follow the support of thosewho cater for them in food, clothing, housing, etc. Even with the bestwill in the world, to do its share towards its defense of the freedomit had attained, Ireland could not permit such an economic drain on itsresources. No country could approve of a policy which in its applicationmeans the emigration of thousands of its people every year while itcontinued. 

23. I believe even if there were no historical basis for Irishnationalism that such claims as I have stated would have becomeinevitable, because the tendency of humanity as it developsintellectually and spiritually is to desire more and more freedom, andto substitute more and more an internal law for the external law orgovernment, and that the solidarity of empires or nations will dependnot so much upon the close texture of their political organization orthe uniformity of mind so engendered as upon the freedom allowed and thedelight people feel in that freedom. The more educated a man is the moreit is hateful to him to be constrained and the more impossible does itbecome for central governments to provide by regulation for the infinitevariety of desires and cultural developments which spring up everywhereand are in themselves laudable, and in no way endanger the State. Arecognition of this has already led to much decentralization in GreatBritain itself. And if the claim for more power in the administration oflocal affairs was so strongly felt in a homogeneous country like GreatBritain that, through its county council system, people in districtslike Kent or Essex have been permitted control over education and thepurchase of land, and the distribution of it to small holders, how muchmore passionately must this desire for self-control be felt in Irelandwhere people have a different national character which has survived allthe educational experiments to change them into the likeness of theirneighbors. The battle which is going on in the world has been stated tobe a spiritual conflict between those who desire greater freedom for theindividual and think that the State exists to preserve that freedom, and those who believe in the predominance of the state and the completesubjection of the individual to it and the molding of the individualmind in its image. This has been stated, and if the first view is adeclaration of ideals sincerely held by Great Britain it would mean thegranting to Ireland, a country which has expressed its wishes by vastermajorities than were ever polled in any other country for politicalchanges, the satisfaction of its desires. 

24. The acceptance of the proposals here made would mean sacrifices forthe two extremes in Ireland, and neither party has as yet made any realsacrifice to meet the other, but each has gone on its own way. I urgeupon them that if the suggestions made here were accepted both wouldobtain substantially what they desire, the Ulster Unionists thatsafety for their interests and provision for Ireland's unity with thecommonwealth of dominions inside the empire; the Nationalists thatpower they desire to create an Irish civilization by self-devised andself-checked efforts. The brotherhood of domimons of which they wouldform one would be inspired as much by the fresh life and wide democraticoutlook of Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Canada, as by thehoarier political wisdom of Great Britain; and military, naval, foreignand colonial policy must in the future be devised by the representativesof those dominions sitting in council together with the representativesof Great Britain. Does not that indicate a different form of imperialismfrom that they hold in no friendly memory? It would not be imperialismin the ancient sense but a federal union of independent nations toprotect national liberties, which might draw into its union otherpeoples hitherto unconnected with it, and so beget a league of nationsto make a common international law prevail. The allegiance would beto common principles which mankind desire and would not permit thedomination of any one race. We have not only to be good Irishmen butgood citizens of the world, and one is as important as the other, forearth is more and more forcing on its children a recognition of theirfundamental unity, and that all rise and fall and suffer together, andthat none can escape the infection from their common humanity. If theseideas emerge from the world conflict and are accepted as world moralityit will be some compensation for the anguish of learning the lesson. Wein Ireland like the rest of the world must rise above ourselves and ourdifferences if we are to manifest the genius which is in us, and play anoble part in world history. 

THE NEW NATION

In that cycle of history which closed in 1914, but which seems now tothe imagination as far sunken behind time as Babylon or Samarcand, itwas customary at the festival of the Incarnation to forego our enmitiesfor a little and allow freer play to the spiritual in our being. Since1914 all things in the world and with us, too, in Ireland have existedin a welter of hate, but the rhythm of ancient habit cannot altogetherhave passed away, and now if at any time, it should be possible to blowthe bugles of Heaven and recall men to that old allegiance. I do notthink it would help now if I, or another, put forward arguments drawnfrom Irish history or economics to convince any party that they werewrong and their opponents right. I think absolute truth might be statedin respect of these things, and yet it would affect nothing in ourpresent mood. It would not be recognized any more than Heaven, when Itwalked on earth in the guise of a Carpenter, was hailed by men whoseminds were filled by other imaginations of that coming. 

I will not argue about the past, but would ask Irishmen to consider howin future they may live together. Do they contemplate the continuance ofthese bitter hatreds in our own household? The war must have a finale. Many thousands of Irishmen will return to their country who have faceddeath for other ideals than those which inspire many more thousandsnow in Ireland and make them also fearless of death. How are these toco-exist in the same island if there is no change of heart? Each willreceive passionate support from relatives, friends, and parties whouphold their action. This will be a most unhappy country if we cannotarrive at some moral agreement, as necessary as a political agreement. Partition is no settlement, because there is no geographical limitationof these passions. There is scarce a locality in Ireland whereantagonisms do not gather about the thought of Ireland as in thecaduceus of Mercury the twin serpents writhe about the sceptre of thegod. I ask our national extremists in what mood do they propose to meetthose who return, men of temper as stern as their own? Will these endurebeing termed traitors to Ireland? Will their friends endure it? Willthose who mourn their dead endure to hear scornful speech of those theyloved? That way is for us a path to Hell. The unimaginative who see onlya majority in their own locality, or, perhaps, in the nation, do notrealize what a powerful factor in national life are those who differfrom them, and how they are upheld by a neighboring nation which, forall its present travail, is more powerful by far than Ireland even ifits people were united in purpose as the fingers of one hand. Nor canthose who hold to, and are upheld by, the Empire hope to coerce to auniformity of feeling with themselves the millions clinging to Irishnationality. Seven centuries of repression have left that spiritunshaken, nor can it be destroyed save by the destruction of the Irishpeople, because it springs from biological necessity. As well might afoolish gardener trust that his apple-tree would bring forth grapes asto dream that there could be uniformity of character and civilizationbetween Irishmen and Englishmen. It would be a crime against life if itcould be brought about and diversities of culture and civilization madeimpossible. We may live at peace with our neighbors when it is agreedthat we must be different, and no peace is possible in the world betweennations except on this understanding. But I am not now thinking of that, but of the more urgent problem how we are to live at peace with eachother. I am convinced Irish enmities are perpetuated because we live bymemory more than by hope, and that even now on the facts of characterthere is no justification for these enmities. 

We have been told that there are two nations in Ireland. That may havebeen so in the past, but it is not true today. The union of Norman andDane and Saxon and Celt which has been going on through the centuries isnow completed, and there is but one powerful Irish character--not Celticor Norman-Saxon, but a new race. We should recognize our moral identity. It was apparent before the war in the methods by which Ulstermen andNationalists alike strove to defend or win their political objects. There is scarce an Ulsterman, whether he regards his ancestors assettlers or not, who is not allied through marriage by his forbearsto the ancient race. There is in his veins the blood of the people whoexisted before Patrick, and he can look backward through time to thelegends of the Red Branch, the Fianna and the gods as the legends ofhis people. It would be as difficult to find even on the Western Coast afamily which has not lost in the same way its Celtic purity of race. Thecharacter of all is fed from many streams which have mingled in them andhave given them a new distinctiveness. The invasions of Ireland and thePlantations, however morally unjustifiable, however cruel in method, arejustified by biology. The invasion of one race by another was nature'sancient way of reinvigorating a people. 

Mr. Flinders Petrie, in his "Revolutions of Civilization, " hasdemonstrated that civilization comes in waves, that races rise to apinnacle of power and culture, and decline from that, and fall intodecadence, from which they do not emerge until there has been a crossingof races, a fresh intermingling of cultures. He showed in ancient Egypteight such periods, and after every decline into decadence there was aninvasion, the necessary precedent to a fresh ascent with reinvigoratedenergies. I prefer to dwell upon the final human results of thiscommingling of races than upon the tyrannies and conflicts which made itpossible. The mixture of races has added to the elemental force ofthe Celtic character a more complex mentality, and has saved us frombecoming, as in our island isolation we might easily have become, thinand weedy, like herds where there has been too much in-breeding. Themodern Irish are a race built up from many races who have to provethemselves for the future. Their animosities, based on past history, have little justification in racial diversity today, for they are a newpeople with only superficial cultural and political differences, butwith the same fundamental characteristics. It is hopeless, the dreamheld by some that the ancient Celtic character could absorb the newelements, become dominant once more, and be itself unchanged. It isequally hopeless to dream the Celtic element could be eliminated. We area new people, and not the past, but the future, is to justify this newnationality. 

I believe it was this powerful Irish character which stirred in Ulsterbefore the war, leading it to adopt methods unlike the Anglo-Saxontradition in politics. I believe that new character, far more than thespirit of the ancient race, was the ferment in the blood of those whobrought about the astonishing enterprise of Easter Week. Pearse himself, for all his Gaelic culture, was sired by one of the race he foughtagainst. He might stand in that respect as a symbol of the new racewhich is springing up. We are slowly realizing the vigor of the modernIrish character just becoming self-conscious of itself. I had met manymen who were in the enterprise of Easter Week and listened to theirspirit their speech, but they had to prove to myself and others by morethan words. I listened with that half-cynical feeling which is customarywith us when men advocate a cause with which we are temperamentallysympathetic, but about whose realization we are hopeless. I could notgauge the strength of the new spirit, for words do not by themselvesconvey the quality of power in men; and even when the reverberationsfrom Easter Week were echoing everywhere in Ireland, for a time I, and many others, thought and felt about those who died as some paganconcourse in ancient Italy might have felt looking down upon an arena, seeing below a foam of glorious faces turned to them, the noble, undismayed, inflexible faces of martyrs, and, without understanding, have realized that this spirit was stronger than death. I believe thatcapacity for sacrifice, that devotion to ideals exists equally among theopponents of these men. It would have been proved in Ireland, in Ulster, if the need had arisen. It has been proved on many a battlefield ofEurope. Whatever views we may hold about the relative value of nationalor Imperial ideals, we may recognize that there is moral equality wherethe sacrifice is equal. No one has more to give than life, and, whenthat is given, neither Nationalist nor Imperialist in Ireland can claimmoral superiority for the dead champions of their causes. 

And here I come to the purpose of my letter, which is to deprecate thescornful repudiation by Irishmen of other Irishmen, which is so commonat present, and which helps to perpetuate our feuds. We are all onepeople. We are closer to each other in character than we are to anyother race. The necessary preliminary to political adjustment is moraladjustment, forgiveness, and mutual understanding. I have been incouncil with others of my countrymen for several months, and I noticedwhat an obstacle it was to agreement how few, how very few, there werewho had been on terms of friendly intimacy with men of all parties. There was hardly one who could have given an impartial account of theideals and principles of his opponents. Our political differences havebrought about social isolations, and there can be no understanding wherethere is no eagerness to meet those who differ from us, and hear thebest they have to say for themselves. This letter is an appeal toIrishmen to seek out and understand their political opponents. If theycome to know each other, they will come to trust each other, and willrealize their kinship, and will set their faces to the future together, to build up a civilization which will justify their nationality. 

I myself am Anglo-Irish, with the blood of both races in me, and whenthe rising of Easter Week took place all that was Irish in me wasprofoundly stirred, and out of that mood I wrote commemorating the dead. And then later there rose in memory the faces of others I knew wholoved their country, but had died in other battles. They fought in thosebecause they believed they would serve Ireland, and I felt these wereno less my people. I could hold them also in my heart and pay tributeto them. Because it was possible for me to do so, I think it is possiblefor others; and in the hope that the deeds of all may in the future bea matter of pride to the new nation I append here these verses I havewritten:--

To the Memory of Some I knew Who are Dead and Who Loved Ireland. 

 Their dream had left me numb and cold, But yet my spirit rose in pride, Refashioning in burnished gold The images of those who died, Or were shut in the penal cell. Here's to you, Pearse, your dream not mine, But yet the thought, for this you fell, Has turned life's water into wine. 

 You who have died on Eastern hills Or fields of France as undismayed, Who lit with interlinked wills The long heroic barricade, You, too, in all the dreams you had, Thought of some thing for Ireland done. Was it not so, Oh, shining lad, What lured you, Alan Anderson?

 I listened to high talk from you, Thomas McDonagh, and it seemed The words were idle, but they grew To nobleness by death redeemed. Life cannot utter words more great Than life may meet by sacrifice, High words were equaled by high fate, You paid the price. You paid the price. 

 You who have fought on fields afar, That other Ireland did you wrong Who said you shadowed Ireland's star, Nor gave you laurel wreath nor song. You proved by death as true as they, In mightier conflicts played your part, Equal your sacrifice may weigh, Dear Kettle, of the generous heart. 

 The hope lives on age after age, Earth with its beauty might be won For labor as a heritage, For this has Ireland lost a son. This hope unto a flame to fan Men have put life by with a smile, Here's to you Connolly, my man, Who cast the last torch on the pile. 

 You too, had Ireland in your care, Who watched o'er pits of blood and mire, From iron roots leap up in air Wild forests, magical, of fire; Yet while the Nuts of Death were shed Your memory would ever stray To your own isle. Oh, gallant dead-- This wreath, Will Redmond, on your clay. 

 Here's to you, men I never met, Yet hope to meet behind the veil, Thronged on some starry parapet, That looks down upon Innisfail, And sees the confluence of dreams That clashed together in our night, One river, born from many streams, Roll in one blaze of blinding light. 

December 1917

THE SPIRITUAL CONFLICT

Prophetic

I am told when a gun is fired it recoils with almost as much force asurges forward the projectile. It is the triumph of the military engineerthat he anticipates and provides for this recoil when designing theweapon. Nations prepare for war, but do not, as the military engineer inhis sphere does, provide for the recoil on society. It is difficultto foresee clearly what will happen. Possible changes in territory, economic results, the effect on a social order receive considerationwhile war is being waged. But how war may affect our intellectual andspiritual life is not always apparent. Material victories are oftenspiritual defeats. History has record of nationalities which weredestroyed and causes whose followers were overborne, yet they left theirideas behind them as a glory in the air, and these incarnated anewin the minds of the conquerors. Ideas are things which can only beconquered by a greater beauty or intellectual power, and they are nevermore powerful than when they do not come threatening us in alliancewith physical forces. I have no doubt there are many today who watch thecloud over Europe as we may imagine some Israelite of old gazing onthat awful cloudy pillar wherein was the Lord, in hope or fear for somerevelation of the spirit hidden in cloud and fire. What idea is hiddenin the fiery pillar which moves over Europe? What form will it assumein its manifestation? How will it exercise dominion over the spirit?Whatever idea is most powerful in the world must draw to it theintellect and spirit of humanity, and it will be monarch over theirminds either by reason of their love or hate for it. It is more trueto say we must think of the most powerful than to say we must love thehighest, because even the blind can feel power, while it is rare to havevision of high things. 

A little over a century ago all the needles of being pointed to France. A peculiar manifestation of the democratic idea had become the mostpowerful thing in the world of moral forces. It went on multiplyingimages of itself in men's minds through after generations; and, becausethought, like matter, is subject to the laws of action and reaction, which indeed is the only safe basis for prophecy, this idea inevitablyfound itself opposed by a contrary idea in the world. Today all theneedles of being point to Germany, where the apparition of the organizedState is manifest with every factor, force, and entity co-ordinated, sothat the State might move myriads and yet have the swift freedom of theathletic individual. The idea that the State exists for the people iscountered by the idea that the individual exists for the State. Francein a violent reaction found itself dominated by a Caesar. Germany mayfind itself without a Caesar, but with a social democracy. 

But, if it does, will the idea Europe is fighting be conquered? Was theFrench idea conquered either by the European confederation without or byNapoleon within? It invaded men's minds everywhere; and in few countriesdid the democratic ideas operate more powerfully than in these islands, where the State was a most determined antagonist of their materialmanifestations in France. The German idea has sufficient power to unitethe free minds of half the world against it. But is it not alreadyinvading, and Will it not still more invade, the minds of rulers? AllGovernments are august kinsmen of each other, and discreetly imitateeach other in policy where it may conduce to power or efficiency. The efficiency of the highly organized State as a vehicle for themanifestation of power must today be sinking into the minds of those whoguide the destinies of races. The State in these islands, before ayear of war has passed, has already assumed control over myriads ofindustrial enterprises. The back-wash of great wars, their reactionwithin the national being after prolonged effort, is social disturbance;and it seems that the State will be unable easily, after this war, to relax its autocratic power. There may come a time when it would bepossible for it to do so; but the habit of overlordship will have grown, there will be many who will wish it to grow still more, and a thousandreasons can be found why the mastery over national organizations shouldbe relaxed but little. The recoil on society after the war will bealmost as powerful as the energy expended in conflict; and our politicalengineers will have to provide for the recoil. By the analogy of theFrench Revolution, by what we see taking place today, it seems safe toprophesy that the State will become more dominant over the lives of menthan ever before. 

In a quarter of a century there will hardly be anybody so obscure, soisolated in his employment, that he will not, by the development of theorganized State, be turned round to face it and to recognize it as themost potent factor in his life. From that it follows of necessity thatliterature will be concerned more and more with the shaping of thecharacter of this Great Being. In free democracies, where the Stateinterferes little with the lives of men, the mood in literature tendsto become personal and subjective; the poets sing a solitary song aboutnature, love, twilight, and the stars; the novelists deal with thelives of private persons, enlarging individual liberties of action andthought. Few concern themselves with the character of the State. Butwhen it strides in, an omnipresent overlord, organizing and directinglife and industry, then the individual imagination must be directed tothat collective life and power. For one writer today concerned with highpolitics we may expect to find hundreds engaged in a passionate attemptto create the new god in their own image. 

This may seem a far-fetched speculation, but not to those who see howthrough the centuries humanity has oscillated like a pendulum betwixtopposing ideals. The greatest reactions have been from solidarity toliberty and from liberty to solidarity. The religious solidarity ofEurope in the Middle Ages was broken by a passionate desire in the heartof millions for liberty of thought. A reaction rarely, if ever, bringspeople back to a pole deserted centuries before. The coming solidarityis the domination of the State; and to speculate whether that again willbe broken up by a new religious movement would be to speculate withoututility. What we ought to realize is that these reactions take placewithin one being, humanity, and indicate eternal desires of the soul. They seem to urge on us the idea that there is a pleroma, or humanfullness, in which the opposites may be reconciled, and that the divineevent to which we are moving is a State in which there will be essentialfreedom combined with an organic unity. At the last analysis are notall empires, nationalities, and movements spiritual in their origin, beginning with desires of the soul and externalizing themselves inimmense manifestations of energy in which the original will is oftensubmerged and lost sight of? If in their inception national ideals arespiritual, their final object must also be spiritual, perhaps to makeman a yet freer agent, but acting out of a continual consciousness ofhis unity with humanity. The discipline which the highly organizedState imposes on its subjects connects them continuously in thought tosomething greater than themselves, and so ennobles the average man. Thefreedom which the policy of other nations permits quickens intelligenceand will. Each policy has its own defects; with one a loss in individualinitiative, with the other self-absorption and a lower standard ofcitizenship or interest in national affairs. The oscillations in societyprovide the corrective. 

We are going to have our free individualism tempered by a moreautocratic action by the State. There are signs that with our enemy themoral power which attracts the free to the source of their libertyis being appreciated, and the policy which retained for Britain itsColonies and secured their support in an hour of peril is contrastedwith the policy of the iron hand in Poland. Neither Germany nor Britaincan escape being impressed by the characteristics of the other in theshock of conflict. It may seem a paradoxical outcome of the spiritualconflict Mr. Asquith announced. But history is quick with such ironies. What we condemned in others is the measure which is meted out to us. Indeed it might almost be said that all war results in an exchange ofcharacteristics, and if the element of hatred is strong in the conflictit will certainly bring a nation to every baseness of the foe it fights. Love and hate are alike in this, that they change us into the image wecontemplate. We grow nobly like what we adore through love and ignoblylike what we contemplate through hate. It will be well for us ifwe remember that all our political ideals are symbols of spiritualdestinies. These clashings of solidarity and freedom will enrichour spiritual life if we understand of the first that our thirst forgreatness, for the majesty of empire, is a symbol of our final unitywith a greater majesty, and if we remember of the second that, as an oldscripture said, "The universe exists for the purposes of soul. "

1915

ON AN IRISH HILL

It has been my dream for many years that I might at some time dwell in acabin on the hillside in this dear and living land of ours, and thereI would lay my head in the lap of a serene nature, and be on friendlyterms with the winds and mountains who hold enough of unexplored mysteryand infinitude to engage me at present. I would not dwell too far frommen, for above an enchanted valley, only a morning's walk from thecity, is the mountain of my dream. Here, between heaven and earth and mybrothers, there might come on me some foretaste of the destiny which thegreat powers are shaping for us in this isle, the mingling of God andnature and man in a being, one, yet infinite in number. Old traditionhas it that there was in our mysterious past such a union, a sympathybetween man and the elements so complete, that at every great deed ofhero or king the three swelling waves of Fohla responded: the waveof Toth, the wave of Rury, and the long, slow, white, foaming wave ofCleena. O mysterious kinsmen, would that today some deed great enoughcould call forth the thunder of your response once again! But perhapshe is now rocked in his cradle who will hereafter rock you into joyousfoam. 

The mountain which I praise has not hitherto been considered one of thesacred places in Eire, no glittering tradition hangs about it as a lureand indeed I would not have it considered as one in any special senseapart from its companions, but I take it here as a type of what any highplace in nature may become for us if well loved; a haunt of deep peace, a spot where the Mother lays aside veil after veil, until at last thegreat Spirit seems in brooding gentleness to be in the boundless fieldsalone. I am not inspired by that brotherhood which does not overflowwith love into the being of the elements, not hail in them the samespirit as that which calls us with so many pathetic and loving voicesfrom the lives of men. So I build my dream cabin in hope of its widerintimacy:

 A cabin on the mountain side hid in a grassy nook, With door and windows open wide, where friendly stars may look; The rabbit shy can patter in; the winds may enter free Who throng around the mountain throne in living ecstasy. And when the sun sets dimmed in eve and purple fills the air, I think the sacred Hazel Tree is dropping berries there From starry fruitage waved aloft where Connla's well o'er-flows: For sure the immortal waters pour through every wind that blows. I think when night towers up aloft and shakes the trembling dew, How every high and lonely thought that thrills my being through Is but a shining berry dropped down through the purple air, And from the magic tree of life the fruit falls everywhere. 

The Sacred Hazel was the Celtic branch of the Tree of Life; its scarletnuts gave wisdom and inspiration; and fed on this ethereal fruit, theancient Gael grew to greatness. Though today none eat of the fruit ordrink the purple flood welling from Connla's fountain, I think that thefire which still kindles the Celtic races was flashed into their bloodin that magical time, and is our heritage from the Druidic past. It isstill here, the magic and mystery: it lingers in the heart of a peopleto whom their neighbors of another world are frequent visitors in thespirit and over-shadowers of reverie and imagination. 

The earth here remembers her past, and to bring about its renewal shewhispers with honeyed entreaty and lures with bewitching glamour. Atthis mountain I speak of it was that our greatest poet, the last andmost beautiful voice of Eire, first found freedom in song, so he tellsme: and it was the pleading for a return to herself that this mysteriousnature first fluted through his lips:

 Come away, O human child, To the Woods and waters wild With a faery hand in hand:

For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand. 

Away! yes, yes; to wander on and on under star-rich skies, ever gettingdeeper into the net, the love that will not let us rest, the peace abovethe desire of love. The village lights in heaven and earth, each withtheir own peculiar hint of home, draw us hither and thither, where itmatters not, so the voice calls and the heart-light burns. 

Some it leads to the crowded ways; some it draws apart: and the Lightknows, and not any other, the need and the way. 

If you ask me what has the mountain to do with these inspirations, andwhether the singer would not anywhere out of his own soul have made anequal song, I answer to the latter, I think not. In these lofty placesthe barrier between the sphere of light and the sphere of darkness arefragile, and the continual ecstasy of the high air communicates itself, and I have also heard from others many tales of things seen and heardhere which show that the races of the Sidhe are often present. Some haveseen below the mountain a blazing heart of light, others have heard theMusical beating of a heart, of faery bells, or aerial clashings, and theheart-beings have also spoken; so it has gathered around itself its owntraditions of spiritual romance and adventures of the soul. 

Let no one call us dreamers when the mind is awake. If we grew forgetfuland felt no more the bitter human struggle--yes. But if we bring to itthe hope and courage of those who are assured of the nearby presence andencircling love of the great powers? I would bring to my mountain theweary spirits who are obscured in the fetid city where life decays intorottenness; and call thither those who are in doubt, the pitiful andtrembling hearts who are skeptic of any hope, and place them where thedusky vapors of their thought might dissolve in the inner light, andtheir doubts vanish on the mountain top where the earthbreath streamsaway to the vast, when the night glows like a seraph, and the spirit isbeset by the evidence of a million of suns to the grandeur of the naturewherein it lives and whose destiny must be its also. 

After all, is not this longing but a search for ourselves, and whereshall we find ourselves at last? Not in this land nor wrapped in thesegarments of an hour, but wearing the robes of space whither these voicesout of the illimitable allure us, now with love, and anon with beautyor power. In our past the mighty ones came glittering across the foam ofthe mystic waters and brought their warriors away. 

Perhaps, and this also is my hope, they may again return; Manannan, on his ocean-sweeping boat, a living creature, diamond-winged, or Lu, bright as the dawn, on his fiery steed, manned with tumultuous flame, orsome hitherto unknown divinity may stand suddenly by me on the hill, andhold out the Silver Branch with white blossoms from the Land of Youth, and stay me ere I depart with the sung call as of old:

 Tarry thou yet, late lingerer in the twilight's glory Gay are the hills with song: earth's faery children leave More dim abodes to roam the primrose-hearted eve, Opening their glimmering lips to breathe some wondrous story. Hush, not a whisper! Let your heart alone go dreaming. Dream unto dream may pass: deep in the heart alone Murmurs the Mighty One his solemn undertone. Canst thou not see adown the silver cloudland streaming Rivers of faery light, dewdrop on dewdrop falling, Starfire of silver flames, lighting the dark beneath? And what enraptured hosts burn on the dusky heath! Come thou away with them for Heaven to Earth is calling. These are Earth's voice--her answer--spirits thronging. Come to the Land of Youth: the trees grown heavy there Drop on the purple wave the starry fruit they bear. Drink! the immortal waters quench the spirit's longing. Art thou not now, bright one, all sorrow past, in elation, Filled with wild joy, grown brother-hearted with the vast, Whither thy spirit wending flits the dim stars past Unto the Light of Lights in burning adoration. 

1896

RELIGION AND LOVE

I have often wondered whether there is not something wrong in ourreligious systems in that the same ritual, the same doctrines, thesame aspirations are held to be sufficient both for men and women. Thetendency everywhere is to obliterate distinctions, and if a womanbe herself she is looked upon unkindly. She rarely understands ourmetaphysics, and she gazes on the expounder of the mystery of the Logoswith enigmatic eyes which reveal the enchantment of another divinity. The ancients were wiser than we in this, for they had Aphrodite and Heraand many another form of the Mighty Mother who bestowed on women theirpeculiar graces and powers. Surely no girl in ancient Greece ever sentup to all-pervading Zeus a prayer that her natural longings might befulfilled; but we may be sure that to Aphrodite came many such prayers. The deities we worship today are too austere for women to approach withtheir peculiar desires, and indeed in Ireland the largest number ofour people do not see any necessity for love-making at all, or whatconnection spiritual powers have with the affections. A girl, withoutrepining, will follow her four-legged dowry to the house of a man shemay never have spoken twenty words to before her marriage. We praise ourwomen for their virtue, but the general acceptance of the marriage asarranged shows so unemotional, so undesirable a temperament, that it isnot to be wondered at. One wonders was there temptation. 

What the loss to the race may be it is impossible to say, but it is truethat beautiful civilizations are built up by the desire of man to givehis beloved all her desires. Where there is no beloved, but only ahousekeeper, there are no beautiful fancies to create the beautifularts, no spiritual protest against the mean dwelling, no hunger buildthe world anew for her sake. Aphrodite is outcast and with her manyof the other immortals have also departed. The home life in Ireland isprobably more squalid than with any other people equally prosperousin Europe. The children begotten without love fill more and more theteeming asylums. We are without art; literature is despised; we have fewof those industries which spring up in other countries in response tothe desire of woman to make gracious influences pervade the home of herpartner, a desire to which man readily yields, and toils to satisfy ifhe loves truly. The desire for beauty has come almost to be regarded asdangerous, if not sinful; and the woman who is still the natural childof the Great Mother and priestess of the mysteries, if she betray thedesire to exercise her divinely-given powers, if there be enchantmentin her eyes and her laugh, and if she bewilder too many men, is in ourlatest code of morals distinctly an evil influence. The spirit, meltedand tortured with love, which does not achieve its earthly desire, isheld to have wasted its strength, and the judgment which declares thelife to be wrecked is equally severe on that which caused this wildconflagration in the heart. But the end of life is not comfort butdivine being. We do not regard the life which closed in the martyr'sfire as ended ignobly. The spiritual philosophy which separateshuman emotions and ideas, and declares some to be secular and othersspiritual, is to blame. There is no meditation which if prolonged willnot bring us to the same world where religion would carry us, and if aflower in the wall will lead us to all knowledge, so the understandingof the peculiar nature of one half of humanity will bring us far on ourjourney to the sacred deep. I believe it was this wise understandingwhich in the ancient world declared the embodied spirit in man to beinfluenced more by the Divine Mind and in woman by the Mighty Mother, bywhich nature in its spiritual aspect was understood. In this philosophy, Boundless Being, when manifested, revealed itself in two forms of life, spirit and substance; and the endless evolution of its divided rays hadas its root impulse the desire to return to that boundless being. Bymany ways blindly or half consciously the individual life strives toregain its old fullness. The spirit seeks union with nature to passfrom the life of vision into Pure being; and nature, conscious that itsgrosser forms are impermanent, is for ever dissolving and leadingits votary to a more distant shrine. "Nature is timid like a woman, "declares an Indian scripture. "She reveals herself shyly and withdrawsagain. " All this metaphysic will not appear out of place if we regardwomen as influenced beyond herself and her conscious life for spiritualends. I do not enter a defense of the loveless coquette, but the womanwho has a natural delight in awakening love in men is priestess ofa divinity than which there is none mightier among the rulers of theheavens. Through her eyes, her laugh, in all her motions, there isexpressed more than she is conscious of herself. The Mighty Motherthrough the woman is kindling a symbol of herself in the spirit, andthrough that symbol she breathes her secret life into the heart, so thatit is fed from within and is drawn to herself. We remember that withDante, the image of a woman became at last the purified vesture of hisspirit through which the mysteries were revealed. We are for ever makingour souls with effort and pain, and shaping them into images whichreveal or are voiceless according to their degree; and the man whosespirit has been obsessed by a beauty so long brooded upon that he hasalmost become that which he contemplated, owes much to the woman who maynever be his; and if he or the world understood aright, he has no causeof complaint. It is the essentially irreligious spirit of Ireland whichhas come to regard love as an unnecessary emotion and the mingling ofthe sexes as dangerous. For it is a curious thing that while we commonlyregard ourselves as the most religious people in Europe, the reverse isprobably true. The country which has never produced spiritual thinkersor religious teachers of whom men have heard if we except Berkeley andperhaps the remote Johannes Scotus Erigena, cannot pride itself on itsspiritual achievement; and it might seem even more paradoxical, but Ithink it would be almost equally true, to say that the first spiritualnote in our literature was struck when a poet generally regarded aspagan wrote it as the aim of his art to reveal--

 In all poor foolish things that live a day Eternal beauty wandering on her way. 

The heavens do not declare the glory of God any more than do shiningeyes, nor the firmament show His handiwork more than the woven windof hair, for these were wrought with no lesser love than set the youngstars swimming in seas of joyous and primeval air. If we drink in thebeauty of the night or the mountains, it is deemed to be praise of theMaker, but if we show an equal adoration of the beauty of man or woman, it is dangerous, it is almost wicked. Of course it is dangerous; andwithout danger there is no passage to eternal things. There is thevalley of the shadow beside the pathway of light, and it always will bethere, and the heavens will never be entered by those who shrinkfrom it. Spirituality is the power of apprehending formless spiritualessences, of seeing the eternal in the transitory, and in the thingswhich are seen the unseen things of which they are the shadow. I callMr. Yeats' poetry spiritual when it declares, as in the lines I quoted, that there is no beauty so trivial that it is not the shadow of theEternal Beauty. A country is religious where it is common belief thatall things are instinct with divinity, and where the love between manand woman is seen as a symbol, the highest we have, of the union ofspirit and nature, and their final blending in the boundless being. Forthis reason the lightest desires even, the lightest graces of women havea philosophical value for what suggestions they bring us of the divinitybehind them. 

As men and women feel themselves more and more to be sharers ofuniversal aims, they will contemplate in each other and in themselvesthat aspect of the boundless being under whose influence they are cast, and will appeal to it for understanding and power. Time, which is forever bringing back the old and renewing it, may yet bring back to ussome counterpart of Aphrodite or Hera as they were understood by themost profound thinkers of the ancient world; and women may again haveher temples and her mysteries, and renew again her radiant life at itsfountain, and feel that in seeking for beauty she is growing more intoher own ancestral being, and that in its shining forth she is giving toman, as he may give to her, something of that completeness of spirit ofwhich it is written, "neither is the man without the woman nor the womanwithout the man in the Highest. "

It may seem strange that what is so clear should require statement, butit is only with a kind of despair the man or woman of religious mindcan contemplate the materialism of our thought about life. It is notour natural heritage from the past, for the bardic poetry shows thata heaven lay about us in the mystical childhood of our race, and asupernatural original was often divined for the great hero, or thebeautiful woman. All this perception has withered away, for religion hasbecome observance of rule and adherence to doctrine. The first stepsto the goal have been made sufficient in themselves; but religion isuseless unless it has a transforming power, unless it is able "to turnfishermen into divines, " and make the blind see and the deaf hear. They are no true teachers who cannot rise beyond the world of sense anddarkness and awaken the links within us from earth to heaven, who cannotsee within the heart what are its needs, and who have not the power toopen the poor blind eyes and touch the ears that have heard no sound ofthe heavenly harmonies. Our clergymen do their best to deliver us fromwhat they think is evil, but do not lead us into the Kingdom. Theyforget that the faculties cannot be spiritualized by restraint but inuse, and that the greatest evil of all is not to be able to seethe divine everywhere, in life and love no less than in the solemnarchitecture of the spheres. In the free play of the beautiful andnatural human relations lie the greatest possibilities of spiritualdevelopment, for heaven is not prayer nor praise but the fullness oflife, which is only divined through the richness and variety of lifeon earth. There is a certain infinitude in the emotions of love, tenderness, pity, joy, and all that is begotten in love, and thislimitless character of the emotions has never received the philosophicalconsideration which is due to it, for even laughter may be consideredsolemnly, and gaiety and joy in us are the shadowy echoes of that joyspoken of the radiant Morning Stars, and there is not an emotion in manor woman which has not, however perverted and muddied in its coming, in some way flowed from the first fountain. We are no more divided fromsupernature than we are from our own bodies, and where the life ofman or woman is naturally most intense it most naturally overflows andmingles with the subtler and more lovely world within. If religion hasno word to say upon this it is incomplete, and we wander in the narrowcircle of prayers and praise, wondering all the while what is it we arepraising God for, because we feel so melancholy and lifeless. Dante hada place in his Inferno for the joyless souls, and if his conceptionbe true the population of that circle will be largely modern Irish. A reaction against this conventional restraint is setting in, and theneeds of life will perhaps in the future no longer be violated as theyare today; and since it is the pent-up flood of the joy which ought tobe in life which is causing this reaction, and since there is a divineroot in it, it is difficult to say where it might not carry us; I hopeinto some renewal of ancient conceptions of the fundamental purpose ofwomanhood and its relations to Divine Nature, and that from the templeswhere woman may be instructed she will come forth, with strength inher to resist all pleading until the lover worship in her a divinewomanhood, and that through their love the divided portions of theimmortal nature may come together and be one as before the beginning ofworlds. 

1904

THE RENEWAL OF YOUTH

 I am a part of all that I have met; Yet all experience is an arch wherethro' Gleams that untravel'd world..... Come, my friends, 'Tis not too late to seek a newer world. --Ulysses

I. 

Humanity is no longer the child it was at the beginning of the world. The spirit which prompted by some divine intent, flung itself long agointo a vague, nebulous, drifting nature, though it has enduredthrough many periods of youth, maturity, and age, has yet had its owntransformations. Its gay, wonderful childhood gave way, as cycle aftercycle coiled itself into slumber, to more definite purposes, and now itis old and burdened with experiences. It is not an age that quenches itsfire, but it will not renew again the activities which gave it wisdom. And so it comes that men pause with a feeling which they translate intoweariness of life before the accustomed joys and purposes of their race. They wonder at the spell which induced their fathers to plot and executedeeds which seem to them to have no more meaning than a whirl of dust. But their fathers had this weariness also and concealed it from eachother in fear, for it meant the laying aside of the sceptre, thetoppling over of empires, the chilling of the household warmth, and allfor a voice whose inner significance revealed itself but to one or twoamong myriads. 

The spirit has hardly emerged from the childhood with which natureclothes it afresh at every new birth, when the disparity between thegarment and the wearer becomes manifest: the little tissue of joysand dreams woven about it is found inadequate for shelter: it tremblesexposed to the winds blowing out of the unknown. We linger at twilightwith some companion, still glad, contented, and in tune with the naturewhich fills the orchards with blossom and sprays the hedges with dewyblooms. The laughing lips give utterance to wishes--ours untilthat moment. Then the spirit, without warning, suddenly falls intoimmeasurable age: a sphinx-like face looks at us: our lips answer, butfar from the region of elemental being we inhabit, they syllable inshadowy sound, out of old usage, the response, speaking of a love and ahope which we know have vanished from us for evermore. So hour by hourthe scourge of the infinite drives us out of every nook and corner oflife we find pleasant. And this always takes place when all is fashionedto our liking: then into our dream strides the wielder of the lightning:we get glimpses of a world beyond us thronged with mighty, exultantbeings: our own deeds become infinitesimal to us: the colors of ourimagination, once so shining, grow pale as the living lights of God glowupon them. We find a little honey in the heart which we make sweeter forsome one, and then another Lover, whose forms are legion, sighs to usout of its multitudinous being: we know that the old love is gone. Thereis a sweetness in song or in the cunning re-imaging of the beauty wesee; but the Magician of the Beautiful whispers to us of his art, how wewere with him when he laid the foundations of the world, and the song isunfinished, the fingers grow listless. As we receive these intimationsof age our very sins become negative: we are still pleased if a voicepraises us, but we grow lethargic in enterprises where the spur toactivity is fame or the acclamation of men. At some point in the past wemay have struggled mightily for the sweet incense which men offer to atowering personality; but the infinite is for ever within man: we sighedfor other worlds and found that to be saluted as victor by men did notmean acceptance by the gods. 

But the placing of an invisible finger upon our lips when we wouldspeak, the heart-throb of warning where we would love, that we growcontemptuous of the prizes of life, does not mean that the spirit hasceased from its labors, that the high-built beauty of the spheres is totopple mistily into chaos, as a mighty temple in the desert sinks intothe sand, watched only by a few barbarians too feeble to renew itsancient pomp and the ritual of its once shining congregations. Beforewe, who were the bright children of the dawn, may return as the twilightrace into the silence, our purpose must be achieved, we have to assumemastery over that nature which now overwhelms us, driving into theFire-fold the flocks of stars and wandering fires. Does it seem veryvast and far away? Do you sigh at the long, long time? Or does it appearhopeless to you who perhaps return with trembling feet evening afterevening from a little labor? But it is behind all these things thatthe renewal takes place, when love and grief are dead; when they loosentheir hold on the spirit and it sinks back into itself, looking out onthe pitiful plight of those who, like it, are the weary inheritors of sogreat destinies: then a tenderness which is the most profound quality ofits being springs up like the outraying of the dawn, and if in that moodit would plan or execute it knows no weariness, for it is nourished fromthe First Fountain. As for these feeble children of the once gloriousspirits of the dawn, only a vast hope can arouse them from so vast adespair, for the fire will not invigorate them for the repetition ofpetty deeds but only for the eternal enterprise, the war in heaven, that conflict between Titan and Zeus which is part of the never-endingstruggle of the human spirit to assert its supremacy over nature. We, who he crushed by this mountain nature piled above us, must arise again, unite to storm the heavens and sit on the seats of the mighty. 

II. 

We speak out of too petty a spirit to each other; the true poems, saidWhitman:

 Bring none to his or to her terminus or to be content and full, Whom they take they take into space to behold the birth of stars, to learn one of the meanings, To launch off with absolute faith, to sweep through the ceaseless rings and never be quiet again. 

Here is inspiration--the voice of the soul. Every word which reallyinspires is spoken as if the Golden Age had never passed. The greatteachers ignore the personal identity and speak to the eternal pilgrim. Too often the form or surface far removed from beauty makes us falter, and we speak to that form and the soul is not stirred. But an equaltemper arouses it. To whoever hails in it the lover, the hero, themagician, it will respond, but not to him who accosts it in the name andstyle of its outer self. How often do we not long to break through theveils which divide us from some one, but custom, convention, or a fearof being misunderstood prevent us, and so the moment passes whose heatmight have burned through every barrier. Out with it--out with it, thehidden heart, the love that is voiceless, the secret tender germ of aninfinite forgiveness. That speaks to the heart. That pierces throughmany a vesture of the Soul. Our companion struggles in some labyrinth ofpassion. We help him, we, think, with ethic and moralities. 

Ah, very well they are; well to know and to keep, but wherefore? Fortheir own sake? No, but that the King may arise in his beauty. We writethat in letters, in books, but to the face of the fallen who brings backremembrance? Who calls him by his secret name? Let a man but feel forwhat high cause is his battle, for what is his cyclic labor, and awarrior who is invincible fights for him and he draws upon divinepowers. Our attitude to man and to nature, expressed or not, hassomething of the effect of ritual, of evocation. As our aspiration sois our inspiration. We believe in life universal, in a brotherhoodwhich links the elements to man, and makes the glow-worm feel far offsomething of the rapture of the seraph hosts. Then we go out into theliving world, and what influences pour through us! We are "at leaguewith the stones of the field. " The winds of the world blow radiantlyupon us as in the early time. We feel wrapt about with love, with aninfinite tenderness that caresses us. Alone in our rooms as we ponder, what sudden abysses of light open within us! The Gods are so much nearerthan we dreamed. We rise up intoxicated with the thought, and reel outseeking an equal companionship under the great night and the stars. 

Let us get near to realities. We read too much. We think of that whichis "the goal, the Comforter, the Lord, the Witness, the resting-place, the asylum, and the Friend. " Is it by any of these dear and familiarnames? The soul of the modern mystic is becoming a mere hoarding-placefor uncomely theories. He creates an uncouth symbolism, and blinds hissoul within with names drawn from the Kabala or ancient Sanskrit, andmakes alien to himself the intimate powers of his spirit, things whichin truth are more his than the beatings of his heart. Could we not speakof them in our own tongue, and the language of today will be as sacredas any of the past. From the Golden One, the child of the divine, comesa voice to its shadow. It is stranger to our world, aloof from ourambitions, with a destiny not here to be fulfilled. It says: "You are ofdust while I am robed in opalescent airs. You dwell in houses of clay, I in a temple not made by hands. I will not go with thee, but thou mustcome with me. " And not alone is the form of the divine aloof but thespirit behind the form. It is called the Goal truly, but it has noending. It is the Comforter, but it waves away our joys and hopes likethe angel with the flaming sword. Though it is the Resting-place, itstirs to all heroic strife, to outgoing, to conquest. It is the Friendindeed, but it will not yield to our desires. Is it this strange, unfathomable self we think to know, and awaken to, by what is written, or by study of it as so many planes of consciousness? But in vain westore the upper chambers of the mind with such quaint furniture ofthought. No archangel makes his abode therein. They abide only in theshining. No wonder that the Gods do not incarnate. We cannot say we dopay reverence to these awful powers. We repulse the living truth byour doubts and reasonings. We would compel the Gods to fall in withour petty philosophy rather than trust in the heavenly guidance. Ah, tothink of it, those dread deities, the divine Fires, to be so enslaved!We have not comprehended the meaning of the voice which cried "Prepareye the way of the Lord, " or this, "Lift up your heads, O ye gates. Be yelifted up, ye everlasting doors, and the King of Glory shall come in. "Nothing that we read is useful unless it calls up living things in thesoul. To read a mystic book truly is to invoke the powers. If they donot rise up plumed and radiant, the apparitions of spiritual things, then is our labor barren. We only encumber the mind with uselesssymbols. They knew better ways long ago. "Master of the Green-wavingPlanisphere, ... Lord of the Azure Expanse, ... It is thus we invoke, "cried the magicians of old. 

And us, let us invoke them with joy, let us call upon them with love, the Light we hail, or the Divine Darkness we worship with silent breath. That silence cries aloud to the Gods. Then they will approach us. Thenwe may learn that speech of many colors, for they will not speak in ourmortal tongue; they will not answer to the names of men. Their names arerainbow glories. Yet these are mysteries, and they cannot be reasonedout or argued over. We cannot speak truly of them from report, ordescription, or from what another has written. A relation to the thingin itself alone is our warrant, and this means we must set aside ourintellectual self-sufficiency and await guidance. It will surely cometo those who wait in trust, a glow, a heat in the heart announcing theawakening of the Fire. And, as it blows with its mystic breath into thebrain, there is a hurtling of visions, a brilliance of lights, a soundas of great waters vibrant and musical in their flowing, and murmursfrom a single yet multitudinous being. In such a mood, when the farbecomes near, the strange familiar, and the infinite possible, he wrotefrom whose words we get the inspiration:

 To launch off with absolute faith, to sweep through the ceaseless rings and never be quiet again. 

Such a faith and such an unrest be ours: faith which is mistrust of thevisible; unrest which is full of a hidden surety and reliance. We, whenwe fall into pleasant places, rest and dream our strength away. Beforeevery enterprise and adventure of the soul we calculate in fear ourpower to do. But remember, "Oh, disciple, in thy work for thy brotherthou hast many allies; in the winds, in the air, in all the voices ofthe silent shore. " These are the far-wandered powers of our ownnature, and they turn again home at our need. We came out of the GreatMother-Life for the purposes of soul. Are her darlings forgotten wherethey darkly wander and strive? Never. Are not the lives of all herheroes proof? Though they seem to stand alone the eternal Mother keepswatch on them, and voices far away and unknown to them before arise inpassionate defense, and hearts beat warm to help them. Aye, if wecould look within we would see vast nature stirred on their behalf, andinstitutions shaken, until the truth they fight for triumphs, and theypass, and a wake of glory ever widening behind them trails down theocean of the years. 

Thus the warrior within us works, or, if we choose to phrase it so, itis the action of the spiritual will. Shall we not, then, trust in it andface the unknown, defiant and fearless of its dangers. Though we seem togo alone to the high, the lonely, the pure, we need not despair. Let noone bring to this task the mood of the martyr or of one who thinks hesacrifices something. Yet let all who will come. Let them enter thepath, facing all things in life and death with a mood at once gay andreverent, as beseems those who are immortal--who are children today, butwhose hands tomorrow may grasp the sceptre, sitting down with the Godsas equals and companions. "What a man thinks, that he is: that is theold secret. " In this self-conception lies the secret of life, the way ofescape and return. We have imagined ourselves into littleness, darkness, and feebleness. We must imagine ourselves into greatness. "If thou wiltnot equal thyself to God thou canst not understand God. The like is onlyintelligible by the like. " In some moment of more complete imaginationthe thought-born may go forth and look on the ancient Beauty. So it wasin the mysteries long ago, and may well be today. The poor dead shadowwas laid to sleep, forgotten in its darkness, as the fiery power, mounting from heart to head, went forth in radiance. Not then did itrest, nor ought we. The dim worlds dropped behind it, the lights ofearth disappeared as it neared the heights of the immortals. There wasOne seated on a throne, One dark and bright with ethereal glory. Itarose in greeting. The radiant figure laid its head against the breastwhich grew suddenly golden, and Father and Son vanished in that whichhas no place or name. 

III. 

 Who are exiles? as for me Where beneath the diamond dome Lies the light on hills or tree There my palace is and home. 

We are outcasts from Deity, therefore we defame the place of our exile. But who is there may set apart his destiny from the earth which borehim? I am one of those who would bring back the old reverence for theMother, the magic, the love. I think, metaphysician, you have goneastray. You would seek within yourself for the fountain of life. Yes, there is the true, the only light. But do not dream it will lead youfarther away from the earth, but rather deeper into its' heart. By ityou are nourished with those living waters you would drink. You areyet in the womb and unborn, and the Mother breathes for you the divinerairs. Dart out your farthest ray of thought to the original, and yet youhave not found a new path of your own. Your ray is still enclosed inthe parent ray, and only on the sidereal streams are you borne to thefreedom of the deep, to the sacred stars whose distance maddens, and tothe lonely Light of Lights. 

Let us, therefore, accept the conditions and address ourselves withwonder, with awe, with love, as we well may, to that being in whom wemove. I abate no jot of those vaster hopes, yet I would pursue thatardent aspiration, content as to here and today. I do not believe in anature red with tooth and claw. If indeed she appears so terrible to anyit is because they themselves have armed her. Again, behind the angerof the Gods there is a love. Are the rocks barren? Lay your brow againstthem and learn what memories they keep. Is the brown earth unbeautiful?Yet lie on the breast of the Mother and you shall be aureoled with thedews of faery. The earth is the entrance to the Halls of Twilight. Whatemanations are those that make radiant the dark woods of pine! Roundevery leaf and tree and over all the mountains wave the fiery tresses ofthat hidden sun which is the soul of the earth and parent of yoursoul. But we think of these things no longer. Like the prodigal we havewandered far from our home, but no more return. We idly pass or wait asstrangers in the halls our spirit built. 

 Sad or fain no more to live? I have pressed the lips of pain With the kisses lovers give Ransomed ancient powers again. 

I would raise this shrinking soul to a universal acceptance. What! doesit aspire to the All, and yet deny by its revolt and inner test thejustice of Law? From sorrow we take no less and no more than fromour joys. If the one reveals to the soul the mode by which the poweroverflows and fills it here, the other indicates to it the unalterablewill which checks excess and leads it on to true proportion and itsown ancestral ideal. Yet men seem for ever to fly from their destinyof inevitable beauty; because of delay the power invites and lures nolonger but goes out into the highways with a hand of iron. We look backcheerfully enough upon those old trials out of which we have passed; butwe have gleaned only an aftermath of wisdom, and missed the full harvestif the will has not risen royally at the moment in unison with thewill of the Immortal, even though it comes rolled round with terror andsuffering and strikes at the heart of clay. 

Through all these things, in doubt, despair, poverty, sick, feeble, or baffled, we have yet to learn reliance. "I will not leave thee orforsake thee" are the words of the most ancient spirit to the sparkwandering in the immensity of its own being. This high courage bringswith it a vision. It sees the true intent in all circumstance out ofwhich its own emerges to meet it. Before it the blackness melts intoforms of beauty, and back of all illusions is seen the old enchantertenderly smiling, the dark, hidden Father enveloping his children. 

All things have their compensations. For what is absent here there isalways, if we seek, a nobler presence about us. 

 Captive, see what stars give light In the hidden heart of clay: At their radiance dark and bright Fades the dreamy King of Day. 

We complain of conditions, but this very imperfection it is whichurges us to arise and seek for the Isles of the Immortals. What we lackrecalls the fullness. The soul has seen a brighter day than this and asun which never sets. Hence the retrospect: "Thou hast been in Edenthe garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, the jasper, the sapphire, emerald.... Thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked upand down in the midst of the stones of fire. " We would point out theseradiant avenues of return; but sometimes we feel in our hearts thatwe sound but cockney voices as guides amid the ancient temples, thecyclopean crypts sanctified by the mysteries. To be intelligible wereplace the opalescent shining by the terms of the scientist, and weprate of occult physiology in the same breath with the Most High. Yetwhen the soul has the divine vision it knows not it has a body. Let itremember, and the breath of glory kindles it no more; it is once againa captive. After all it does not make the mysteries clearer to speak inphysical terms and do violence to our intuitions. If we ever use thesecentres, as fires we shall see them, or they shall well up within usas fountains of potent sound. We may satisfy people's mind with asense correspondence, and their souls may yet hold aloof. We shall onlyinspire by the magic of a superior beauty. Yet this too has its dangers. "Thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness, " continuesthe seer. If we follow too much the elusive beauty of form we will missthe spirit. The last secrets are for those who translate vision intobeing. Does the glory fade away before you? Say truly in your heart, "I care not. I will wear the robes I am endowed with today. " You arealready become beautiful, being beyond desire and free. 

 Night and day no more eclipse Friendly eyes that on us shine, Speech from old familiar lips. Playmates of a youth divine. 

To childhood once again. We must regain the lost state. But it is tothe giant and spiritual childhood of the young immortals we must return, when into their dear and translucent souls first fell the rays ofthe father-beings. The men of old were intimates of wind and wave andplaymates of many a brightness long since forgotten. The rapture ofthe fire was their rest; their out-going was still consciously throughuniversal being. By darkened images we may figure something vaguelyakin, as when in rare moments under the stars the big dreamy heartof childhood is pervaded with quiet and brimmed full with love. Dearchildren of the world, so tired today--so weary seeking after the light. Would you recover strength and immortal vigor? Not one star alone, yourstar, shall shed its happy light upon you, but the All you must adore. Something intimate, secret, unspeakable, akin to thee, will emergesilently, insensibly, and ally itself with thee as thou gatherestthyself from the four quarters of the earth. We shall go back to theworld of the dawn, but to a brighter light than that which openedup this wondrous story of the cycles. The forms of elder years willreappear in our vision, the father-beings once again. So we shall growat home amid these grandeurs, and with that All-Presence about us maycry in our hearts, "At last is our meeting, Immortal. O starry one, nowis our rest!"

 Come away, oh, come away; We will quench the heart's desire Past the gateways of the day In the rapture of the fire. 

1896

THE HERO IN MAN

I. 

There sometimes comes on us a mood of strange reverence for people andthings which in less contemplative hours we hold to be unworthy; and insuch moments we may set side by side the head of the Christ and the headof an outcast, and there is an equal radiance around each, which makesof the darker face a shadow and is itself a shadow around the head oflight. We feel a fundamental unity of purpose in their presence here, and would as willingly pay homage to the one who has fallen as to himwho has become a master of life. I know that immemorial order decreesthat the laurel crown be given only to the victor, but in these momentsI speak of a profound intuition changes the decree and sets the aureoleon both alike. 

We feel such deep pity for the fallen that there must needs be a justicein it, for these diviner feelings are wiser in themselves and do notvaguely arise. They are lights from the Father. A justice lies inuttermost pity and forgiveness, even when we seem to ourselves to bemost deeply wronged, or why is it that the awakening of resentment orhate brings such swift contrition? We are ever self-condemned, and thedark thought which went forth in us brooding revenge, when suddenlysmitten by the light, withdraws and hides within itself in awfulpenitence. In asking myself why is it that the meanest are safe from ourcondemnation when we sit on the true seat of judgment in the heart, it seemed to me that their shield was the sense we have of a nobilityhidden in them under the cover of ignoble things; that their presentdarkness was the result of some too weighty heroic labor undertaken longago by the human spirit, that it was the consecration of past purposewhich played with such a tender light about their ruined lives, and itwas more pathetic because this nobleness was all unknown to thefallen, and the heroic cause of so much pain was forgotten in life'sprison-house. 

While feeling the service to us of the great ethical ideal which havebeen formulated by men I think that the idea of justice intellectuallyconceived tends to beget a certain hardness of heart. It is true thatmen have done wrong--hence their pain; but back of all this there issomething infinitely soothing, a light that does not wound, which saysno harsh thing, even although the darkest of the spirits turns to it inits agony, for the darkest of human spirits has still around him thisfirst glory which shines from a deeper being within, whose history maybe told as the legend of the Hero in Man. 

Among the many immortals with whom ancient myth peopled the spiritualspheres of humanity are some figures which draw to themselves a moreprofound tenderness than the rest. Not Aphrodite rising in beauty fromthe faery foam of the first seas, not Apollo with sweetest singing, laughter, and youth, not the wielder of the lightning could exact thereverence accorded to the lonely Titan chained on the mountain, or tothat bowed figure heavy with the burden of the sins of the world;for the brighter divinities had no part in the labor of man, no suchintimate relation with the wherefore of his own existence so full ofstruggle. The more radiant figures are prophecies to him of his destiny, but the Titan and the Christ are a revelation of his more immediatestate; their giant sorrows companion his own, and in contemplating themhe awakens what is noblest in his own nature; or, in other words, inunderstanding their divine heroism he understands himself. For this intruth it seems to me to mean: all knowledge is a revelation of the selfto the self, and our deepest comprehension of the seemingly apart divineis also our farthest inroad to self-knowledge; Prometheus, Christ, arein every heart; the story of one is the story of all; the Titan and theCrucified are humanity. 

If, then, we consider them as representing the human spirit anddisentangle from the myths their meaning, we shall find that whateverreverence is due to that heroic love, which descended from heaven forthe redeeming of a lower nature, must be paid to every human being. Christ is incarnate in all humanity. Prometheus is bound for ever withinus. They are the same. They are a host, and the divine incarnationwas not spoken of one, but of all those who, descending into the lowerworld, tried to change it into the divine image, and to wrest out ofchaos a kingdom for the empire of light. The angels saw below them inchaos a senseless rout blind with elemental passion, for ever warringwith discordant cries which broke in upon the world of divine beauty;and that the pain might depart, they grew rebellious in the Master'speace, and descending to earth the angelic lights were crucified in men. They left so radiant worlds, such a light of beauty, for earth's graytwilight filled with tears, that through this elemental life mightbreathe the starry music brought from Him. If the "Fore-seer" be a truename for the Titan, it follows that in the host which he representswas a light which well foreknew all the dark paths of its journey;foreseeing the bitter struggle with a hostile nature, but foreseeingperhaps a gain, a distant glory o'er the hills of sorrow, and thatchaos, divine and transformed, with only gentle breathing, lit up bythe Christ-soul of the universe. There is a transforming power in thethought itself: we can no longer condemn the fallen, they who laid asidetheir thrones of ancient power, their spirit ecstasy and beauty onsuch a mission. Perhaps those who sank lowest did so to raise agreater burden, and of these most fallen it may in the hour of theirresurrection be said, "The last shall be first. "

So, placing side by side the head of the outcast with the head ofChrist, it has this equal beauty--with as bright a glory it sped fromthe Father in ages past on its redeeming labor. Of his present darknesswhat shall we say? "He is altogether dead in sin?" Nay, rather withtenderness forbear, and think the foreseeing spirit has taken its owndread path to mastery; that that which foresaw the sorrow foresaw alsobeyond it a greater joy and a mightier existence, when it would riseagain in a new robe, woven out of the treasure hidden in the deep of itssubmergence, and shine at last like the stars of the morning, and liveamong the Sons of God. 

II. 

Our deepest life is when we are alone. We think most truly, love best, when isolated from the outer world in that mystic abyss we call soul. Nothing external can equal the fullness of these moments. We may sit inthe blue twilight with a friend, or bend together by the hearth, halfwhispering or in a silence populous with loving thoughts mutuallyunderstood; then we may feel happy and at peace, but it is only becausewe are lulled by a semblance to deeper intimacies. When we think of afriend and the loved one draws nigh, we sometimes feel half-pained, forwe touched something in our solitude which the living presence shut out;we seem more apart, and would fain wave them away and cry, "Call me notforth from this; I am no more a spirit if I leave my throne. " But thesemoods, though lit up by intuitions of the true, are too partial, theybelong too much to the twilight of the heart, they have too dreamy atemper to serve us well in life. We would wish rather for our thoughtsa directness such as belongs to the messengers of the gods, swift, beautiful, flashing presences bent on purposes well understood. 

What we need is that this interior tenderness shall be elevated intoseership, that what in most is only yearning or blind love shall seeclearly its way and hope. To this end we have to observe more intentlythe nature of the interior life. We find, indeed, that it is not asolitude at all, but dense with multitudinous being: instead of beingalone we are in the thronged highways of existence. For our guidancewhen entering here many words of warning have been uttered, laws havebeen outlined, and beings full of wonder, terror, and beauty described. Yet there is a spirit in us deeper than our intellectual being which Ithink of as the Hero in man, who feels the nobility of its place in themidst of all this, and who would fain equal the greatness of perceptionwith deeds as great. The weariness and sense of futility which oftenfalls upon the mystic after much thought is due to this, that he hasnot recognized that he must be worker as well as seer, that here he hasduties demanding a more sustained endurance, just as the inner life isso much vaster and more intense than the life he has left behind. 

Now the duties which can be taken up by the soul are exactly those whichit feels most inadequate to perform when acting as an embodied being. What shall be done to quiet the heart-cry of the world: how answer thedumb appeal for help we so often divine below eyes that laugh? It is thesaddest of all sorrows to think that pity with no hands to heal, thatlove without a voice to speak should helplessly heap their pain uponpain while earth shall endure. But there is a truth about sorrow which Ithink may make it seem not so hopeless. There are fewer barriers than wethink: there is, in truth, an inner alliance between the soul who wouldfain give and the soul who is in need. Nature has well provided that notone golden ray of all our thoughts is sped ineffective through thedark; not one drop of the magical elixirs love distils is wasted. Let usconsider how this may be. There is a habit we nearly all have indulgedin. We weave little stories in our minds, expending love and pity uponthe imaginary beings we have created, and I have been led to think thatmany of these are not imaginary, that somewhere in the world beings areliving just in that way, and we merely reform and live over again inour life the story of another life. Sometimes these far-away intimatesassume so vivid a shape, they come so near with their appeal forsympathy that the pictures are unforgettable; and the more I ponder overthem the more it seems to me that they often convey the actual need ofsome soul whose cry for comfort has gone out into the vast, perhapsto meet with an answer, perhaps to hear only silence. I will supply aninstance. I see a child, a curious, delicate little thing, seated on thedoorstep of a house. It is an alley in some great city, and there is agloom of evening and vapor over the sky. I see the child is bending overthe path; he is picking cinders and arranging them, and as I ponderI become aware that he is laying down in gritty lines the walls of ahouse, the mansion of his dream. Here spread along the pavement arelarge rooms, these for his friends, and a tiny room in the centre, thatis his own. So his thought plays. Just then I catch a glimpse of thecorduroy trousers of a passing workman, and a heavy boot crushes throughthe cinders. I feel the pain in the child's heart as he shrinks back, his little lovelit house of dreams all rudely shattered. Ah, poor child, building the City Beautiful out of a few cinders, yet nigher, truer inintent than many a stately, gold-rich palace reared by princes, thouwert not forgotten by that mighty spirit who lives through the fallingof empires, whose home has been in many a ruined heart. Surely it wasto bring comfort to hearts like thine that that most noble of allmeditations was ordained by the Buddha. "He lets his mind pervade onequarter of the world with thoughts of Love, and so the second, and sothe third, and so the fourth. And thus the whole wide world, above, below, around, and everywhere does he continue to pervade with heart ofLove far-reaching, grown great and beyond measure. "

That love, though the very faery breath of life, should by itself, andso imparted have a sustaining power some may question, not those whohave felt the sunlight fall from distant friends who think of them; but, to make clearer how it seems to me to act, I say that love, Eros, is abeing. It is more than a power of the soul, though it is that also; ithas a universal life of its own, and just as the dark heaving waters donot know what jewel lights they reflect with blinding radiance, so thesoul, partially absorbing and feeling the ray of Eros within it, doesnot know that often a part of its nature nearer to the sun of loveshines with a brilliant light to other eyes than its own. Many peoplemove unconscious of their own charm, unknowing of the beauty and powerthey seem to others to impart. It is some past attainment of the soul, a jewel won in some old battle which it may have forgotten, but nonethe less this gleams on its tiara, and the star-flame inspires others tohope and victory. 

If it is true here that many exert a spiritual influence they areunconscious of, it is still truer of the spheres within. Once the soulhas attained to any possession like love, or persistent will, or faith, or a power of thought, it comes into spiritual contact with others whoare struggling for these very powers. The attainment of any of thesemeans that the soul is able to absorb and radiate some of the divinerelements of being. The soul may or may nor be aware of the position itis placed in or its new duties, but yet that Living Light, having founda way into the being of any one person, does not rest there, but sendsits rays and extends its influence on and on to illume the darkness ofanother nature. So it comes that there are ties which bind us to peopleother than those whom we meet in our everyday life. I think they aremost real ties, most important to understand, for if we let our lampgo out some far away who had reached out in the dark and felt a steadywill, a persistent hope, a compassionate love, may reach out once againin an hour of need, and finding no support may give way and fold thehands in despair. Often we allow gloom to overcome us and so hinder thebright rays in their passage; but would we do it so often if we thoughtthat perhaps a sadness which besets us, we do not know why, was causedby some one drawing nigh to us for comfort, whom our lethargy mightmake feel still more his helplessnes, while our courage, our faith mightcause "our light to shine in some other heart which as yet has no lightof its own"?

III. 

The night was wet, and as I was moving down the streets my mind was alsojourneying on a way of its own, and the things which were bodily presentbefore me were no less with me in my unseen traveling. Every now andthen a transfer would take place, and some of the moving shadows inthe street would begin walking about in the clear interior light. Thechildren of the city, crouched in the doorways or racing through thehurrying multitude and flashing lights, began their elfin play again inmy heart; and that was because I had heard these tiny outcasts shoutingwith glee. I wondered if the glitter and shadow of such sordid thingswere thronged with magnificence and mystery for those who were unawareof a greater light and deeper shade which made up the romance andfascination of my own life. In imagination I narrowed myself to theirignorance, littleness, and youth, and seemed for a moment to flit amidgreat uncomprehended beings and a dim wonderful city of palaces. 

Then another transfer took place, and I was pondering anew, for a faceI had seen flickering through the warm wet mist haunted me; it enteredinto the realm of the interpreter, and I was made aware by the palecheeks and by the close-shut lips of pain, and by some inward knowledge, that there the Tree of Life was beginning to grow, and I wondered why itis that it always springs up through a heart in ashes; I wonderedalso if that which springs up, which in itself is an immortal joy, hasknowledge that its shoots are piercing through such anguish; or, again, if it was the piercing of the shoots which caused the pain, and ifevery throb of the beautiful flame darting upward to blossom meantthe perishing of some more earthly growth which had kept the heart inshadow. 

Seeing, too, how many thoughts spring up from such a simple thing, Iquestioned whether that which started the impulse had any share in theoutcome, and if these musings of mine in any way affected their subject. I then began thinking about those secret ties on which I have speculatedbefore, and in the darkness my heart grew suddenly warm and glowing, for I had chanced upon one of these shining imaginations which are thewealth of those who travel upon the hidden ways. In describing thatwhich comes to us all at once, there is a difficulty in choosing betweenwhat is first and what is last to say; but, interpreting as best Ican, I seemed to behold the onward movement of a Light, one among manylights, all living, throbbing, now dim with perturbations and now againclear, and all subtly woven together, outwardly in some more shadowyshining, and inwardly in a greater fire, which, though it was invisible, I knew to be the Lamp of the World. This Light which I beheld I feltto be a human soul, and these perturbations which dimmed it were itsstruggles and passionate longings for something, and that was for a morebrilliant shining of the light within itself. It was in love with itsown beauty, enraptured by its own lucidity; and I saw that as thesethings were more beloved they grew paler, for this light is the lightwhich the Mighty Mother has in her heart for her children, and she meansthat it shall go through each one unto all, and whoever restrains it inhimself is himself shut out; not that the great heart has ceased in itslove for that soul, but that the soul has shut itself off from influx, for every imagination of man is the opening or the closing of a doorto the divine world; now he is solitary, cut off, and, seemingly tohimself, on the desert and distant verge of things; and then his thoughtthrows open the shut portals, he hears the chant of the seraphs in hisheart, and he is made luminous by the lighting of a sudden aureole. Thissoul which I watched seemed to have learned at last the secret love;for, in the anguish begotten by its loss, it followed the departingglory in penitence to the inmost shrine, where it ceased altogether;and because it seemed utterly lost and hopeless of attainment andcapriciously denied to the seeker, a profound pity arose in the soul forthose who, like it, were seeking, but still in hope, for they had notcome to the vain end of their endeavors. I understood that such pityis the last of the precious essences which make up the elixir ofimmortality, and when it is poured into the cup it is ready fordrinking. And so it was with this soul which grew brilliant with thepassage of the eternal light through its new purity of self-oblivion, and joyful in the comprehension of the mystery of the secret love, which, though it has been declared many times by the greatest ofteachers among men, is yet never known truly unless the Mighty Motherhas herself breathed it in the heart. 

And now that the soul has divined this secret, the shadowy shiningwhich was woven in bonds of union between it and its fellow lightsgrew clearer; and a multitude of these strands were, so it seemed, strengthened and placed in its keeping: along these it was to send themessage of the wisdom and the love which were the secret sweetness ofits own being. Then a spiritual tragedy began, infinitely more patheticthan the old desolation, because it was brought about by the verynobility of the spirit. This soul, shedding its love like rays of glory, seemed itself the centre of a ring of wounding spears: it sent forthlove, and the arrowy response came hate-impelled: it whispered peace, and was answered by the clash of rebellion: and to all this for defenseit could only bare more openly its heart that a profounder love from theMother Nature might pass through upon the rest. I knew this was what ateacher, who wrote long ago, meant when he said: "Put on the whole armorof God, " which is love and endurance, for the truly divine childrenof the Flame are not armed otherwise: and of those protests set up inignorance or rebellion against the whisper of the wisdom, I saw thatsome melted in the fierce and tender heat of the heart, and there camein their stead a golden response, which made closer the ties, and drewthese souls upward to an understanding and to share in the overshadowingnature. And this is part of the plan of the Great Alchemist, whereby thered ruby of the heart is transmuted into the tender light of the opal;for the beholding of love made bare acts like the flame of the furnace:and the dissolving passions, through an anguish of remorse, thelightnings of pain, and through an adoring pity are changed into theimage they contemplate, and melt in the ecstasy of self-forgetful love, the spirit which lit the thorn-crowned brows which perceived only inits last agony the retribution due to its tormentors, and cried out, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. "

Now, although the love of the few may alleviate the hurt due to theignorance of the mass, it is not in the power of any one to withstandfor ever this warfare; for by the perpetual wounding of the inner natureit is so wearied that the spirit must withdraw from a tabernacle growntoo frail to support the increase of light within and the jarring of thedemoniac nature without; and at length comes the call which means, for awhile, release and a deep rest in regions beyond the paradise of lessersouls. So, withdrawn into the divine darkness, vanished the light of mydream. And now it seemed as if this wonderful weft of souls intertwiningas one being must come to naught; and all those who through the gloomhad nourished a longing for the light would stretch out hands in vainfor guidance; but that I did not understand the love of the Mother, andthat, although few, there is no decaying of her heroic brood; for, asthe seer of old caught at the mantle of him who went up in the fierychariot, so another took up the burden and gathered the shining strandstogether: and of this sequence of spiritual guides there is no ending. 

Here I may say that the love of the Mother, which, acting throughthe burnished will of the hero, is wrought to its highest uses, isin reality everywhere, and pervades with profoundest tenderness thehomeliest circumstance of daily life, and there is not lacking, evenamong the humblest, an understanding of the spiritual tragedy whichfollows upon every effort of the divine nature, bowing itself down inpity to our shadowy sphere, an understanding where the nature of thelove is gauged through the extent of the sacrifice and the pain which isovercome. I recall the instance of an old Irish peasant, who, as he layin hospital wakeful from a grinding pain in the leg, forgot himself inmaking drawings, rude, yet reverently done, of incidents in the life ofthe Galilean Teacher. One of these which he showed me was a crucifixion, where, amidst much grotesque symbolism, were some tracings whichindicated a purely beautiful intuition; the heart of this crucifiedfigure, no less than the brow, was wreathed about with thorns andradiant with light: "For that, " said he, "was where he really suffered. "When I think of this old man, bringing forgetfulness of his own bodilypain through contemplation of the spiritual suffering of his Master, mymemory of him shines with something of the transcendent light he himselfperceived, for I feel that some suffering of his own, nobly undergone, had given him understanding, and he had laid his heart in love againstthe Heart of Many Sorrows, seeing it wounded by unnumbered spears, yetburning with undying love. 

Though much may be learned by observance of the superficial lifeand actions of a spiritual teacher, it is only in the deeper life ofmeditation and imagination that it can be truly realized; for the soulis a midnight blossom which opens its leaves in dream, and its perfectbloom is unfolded only where another sun shines in another heaven; thereit feels what celestial dews descend on it and what influences draw itup to its divine archetype. Here in the shadow of earth root intercoilswith root, and the finer distinctions of the blossom are not perceived. If we knew also who they really are, who sometimes in silence andsometimes with the eyes of the world at gaze take upon them the mantleof teacher, an unutterable awe would prevail, for underneath a bodilypresence not in any sense beautiful may burn the glory of some ancientdivinity, some hero who has laid aside his sceptre in the enchantedland, to rescue old-time comrades fallen into oblivion; or, again, ifwe had the insight of the simple old peasant into the nature of hisenduring love, out of the exquisite and poignant emotions kindled wouldarise the flame of a passionate love, which would endure long aeons ofanguish that it might shield, though but for a little, the kingly heartswho may not shield themselves. 

But I, too, who write, have launched the rebellious spear, or inlethargy have oft times gone down the great drift numbering myself amongthose who, not being with must needs be against. Therefore I make noappeal: they only may call who stand upon the lofty mountains; but Ireveal the thought which arose like a star in my soul with such brightand pathetic meaning, leaving it to you who read to approve and applyit. 

1897

THE MEDITATION OF ANANDA

Ananda rose from his seat under the banyan tree. He passed his handunsteadily over his brow. Throughout the day the young ascetic had beenplunged in profound meditation; and now, returning from heaven to earth, he was bewildered like one who awakens in darkness and knows not wherehe is. All day long before his inner eye burned the light of the Lokas, until he was wearied and exhausted with their splendors; space glowedlike a diamond with intolerable lustre, and there was no end to thedazzling procession of figures. He had seen the fiery dreams of thedead in heaven. He had been tormented by the music of celestial singers, whose choral song reflected in its ripples the rhythmic pulse of being. He saw how these orbs were held within luminous orbs of wider circuit;and vaste and vaster grew the vistas, until at last, a mere speck oflife, he bore the burden of innumerable worlds. Seeking for Brahma, hefound only the great illusion as infinite as Brahma's being. 

If these things were shadows, the earth and the forests he returned to, viewed at evening, seemed still more unreal, the mere dusky flutter ofa moth's wings in space, so filmy and evanescent that if he had sunkas through transparent aether into the void, it would not have beenwonderful. 

Ananda, still half entranced, turned homeward. As he threaded the dimalleys he noticed not the flaming eyes which regarded him from thegloom; the serpents rustling amid the undergrowth; the lizards, fireflies, insects, and the innumerable lives of which the Indian forestwas rumorous; they also were but shadows. He paused near the villagehearing the sound of human voices, of children at play. He felt a pityfor these tiny beings, who struggled and shouted, rolling over eachother in ecstasies of joy. The great illusion had indeed devoured them, before whose spirits the Devas themselves once were worshippers. Then, close beside him, he heard a voice, whose low tone of reverence soothedhim; it was akin to his own nature, and it awakened him fully. A littlecrowd of five or six people were listening silently to an old man whoread from a palm-leaf manuscript. Ananda knew, by the orange-coloredrobes of the old man that here was a brother of the new faith, and hepaused with the others. What was his illusion? The old man lifted hishead for a moment as the ascetic came closer, and then continued asbefore. He was reading "The Legend of the Great King of Glory, " andAnanda listened while the story was told of the Wonderful Wheel, theElephant Treasure, the Lake and Palace of Righteousness, and of themeditation, how the Great King of Glory entered the golden chamber, andset himself down on the silver couch, and he let his mind pervade onequarter of the world with thoughts of love; and so the second quarter, and so the third, and so the fourth. And thus the whole wide world, above, below, around, and everywhere, did he continue to pervade withheart of Love, far reaching, grown great, and beyond measure. 

When the old man had ended Ananda went back into the forest. He hadfound the secret of the true, how the Vision could be left behind andthe Being entered. Another legend rose in his mind, a faery legend ofrighteousness expanding and filling the universe, a vision beautifuland full of old enchantment, and his heart sang within him. He seatedhimself again under the banyan tree. He rose up in soul. He saw beforehim images long forgotten of those who suffer in the sorrowful earth. He saw the desolation and loneliness of old age, the insults of thecaptive, the misery of the leper and outcast, the chill horror anddarkness of life in a dungeon. He drank in all their sorrow. From hisheart he went out to them. Love, a fierce and tender flame, arose; pity, a breath from the vast; sympathy, born of unity. This triple fire sentforth its rays; they surrounded those dark souls; they pervaded them;they beat down oppression. 

*****

While Ananda, with spiritual magic, sent forth the healing powersthrough the four quarters of the world, far away at that moment a kingsat enthroned in his hall. A captive was bound before him--bound, butproud, defiant, unconquerable of soul. There was silence in the halluntil the king spake the doom and torture for this ancient enemy. 

The king spake: "I had thought to do some fierce thing to thee andso end thy days, my enemy. But I remember now, with sorrow, the greatwrongs we have done to each other, and the hearts made sore by ourhatred. I shall do no more wrong to thee; thou art free to depart. Dowhat thou wilt. I will make restitution to thee as far as may be for thyruined state. "

Then the soul which no might could conquer was conquered utterly--theknees of the captive were bowed and his pride was overcome. "Mybrother, " he said, and could say no more. 

*****

To watch for years a little narrow slit high up in a dark cell, so highthat he could not reach up and look out, and there to see daily thechange from blue to dark in the sky, had withered a prisoner's soul. The bitter tears came no more, hardly even sorrow, only a dull, deadfeeling. But that day a great groan burst from him. He heard outside thelaugh of a child who was playing and gathering flowers under the high, gray walls. Then it all came over him--the divine things missed, thelight, the glory, and the beauty that the earth puts forth for herchildren. The arrow slit was darkened, and half of a little bronze faceappeared. 

"Who are you down there in the darkness who sigh so? Are you all alonethere? For so many years! Ah, poor man! I would come down to you if Icould, but I will sit here and talk to you for a while. Here are flowersfor you, " and a little arm showered them in by handfuls until the roomwas full of the intoxicating fragrance of summer. Day after day thechild came, and the dull heart entered once more into the great humanlove. 

*****

At twilight, by a deep and wide river, an old woman sat alone, dreamyand full of memories. The lights of the swift passing boats and thelight of the stars were just as in childhood and the old love-time. Old, feeble, it was time for her to hurry away from the place which changednot with her sorrow. 

"Do you see our old neighbor there?" said Ayesha to her lover. "Theysay she was once as beautiful as you would make me think I now am. Howlonely she must be! Let us come near and speak to her, " and the loverwent gladly. Though they spoke to each other rather than to her, yetsomething of the past, which never dies when love, the immortal, haspervaded it, rose up again as she heard their voices. She smiled, thinking of years of burning beauty. 

*****

A teacher, accompanied by his disciples, was passing by the waysidewhere a leper sat. 

The teacher said: "Here is our brother, whom we may not touch, but heneed not be shut out from truth. We may sit down where he can listen. "

He sat on the wayside near the leper, and his disciples stood aroundhim. He spoke words full of love, kindliness, and pity--the eternaltruths which make the soul grow full of sweetness and youth. A small, old spot began to glow in the heart of the leper, and the tears ran downhis blighted face. 

*****

All these were the deeds of Ananda the ascetic, and the Watcher who wasover him from all eternity made a great stride towards that soul. 

1893

THE MIDNIGHT BLOSSOM

 "Arhans are born at midnight hour, together with the holy flower that opes and blossoms in darkness. " --From an Eastern Scripture. 

We stood together at the door of our hut. We could see through thegathering gloom where our sheep and goats were cropping the sweet grasson the side of the hill. We were full of drowsy content as they were. We had naught to mar our happiness, neither memory nor unrest for thefuture. We lingered on while the vast twilight encircled us; we were onewith its dewy stillness. The lustre of the early stars first broke inupon our dreaming: we looked up and around. The yellow constellationsbegan to sing their choral hymn together. As the night deepened theycame out swiftly from their hiding-places in depths of still andunfathomable blue--they hung in burning clusters, they advanced inmultitudes that dazzled. The shadowy shining of night was strewn allover with nebulous dust of silver, with long mists of gold, with jewelsof glittering green. We felt how fit a place the earth was to live onwith these nightly glories over us, with silence and coolness upon ourlawns and lakes after the consuming day. Valmika, Kedar, Ananda, andI watched together. Through the rich gloom we could see far distantforests and lights, the lights of village and city in King Suddhodana'srealm. 

"Brothers, " said Valmika, "how good it is to be here and not yonder inthe city, where they know not peace, even in sleep. "

"Yonder and yonder, " said Kedar, "I saw the inner air full of a red glowwhere they were busy in toiling and strife. It seemed to reach up to me. I could not breathe. I climbed the hill at dawn to laugh where the snowswere, and the sun is as white as they are white. "

"But, brothers, if we went down among them and told them how happy wewere, and how the flower's grow on the hillside, they would surely comeup and leave all sorrow. They cannot know or they would come. " Anandawas a mere child, though so tall for his years. 

"They would not come, " said Kedar; "all their joy is to haggle andhoard. When Siva blows upon them with angry breath they will lament, orwhen the demons in fierce hunger devour them. "

"It is good to be here, " repeated Valmika, drowsily, "to mind the flocksand be at rest, and to hear the wise Varunna speak when he comes amongus. "

I was silent. I knew better than they that busy city which glowed beyondthe dark forests. I had lived there until, grown sick and weary, Ihad gone back to my brothers on the hillside. I wondered, would life, indeed, go on ceaselessly until it ended in the pain of the world. Isaid within myself: "O mighty Brahma, on the outermost verges of thydream are our lives. Thou old invisible, how faintly through our heartscomes the sound of thy song, the light of thy glory!" Full of yearningto rise and return, I strove to hear in my heart the music Anahata, spoken of in our sacred scrolls. There was silence and then I thoughtI heard sounds, not glad, a myriad murmur. As I listened theydeepened--they grew into passionate prayer and appeal and tears, as ifthe cry of the long-forgotten souls of men went echoing through emptychambers. My eyes filled with tears, for it seemed world-wide and tosigh from out many ages, long agone, to be and yet to be. 

"Ananda! Ananda! Where is the boy running to?" cried Valmika. Ananda hadvanished in the gloom. We heard his glad laugh below, and then anothervoice speaking. The tall figure of Varunna loomed up presently. Anandaheld his hand, and danced beside him. We knew the Yogi, and bowedreverently before him. We could see by the starlight his simple robe ofwhite. I could trace clearly every feature of the grave and beautifulface and radiant eyes. I saw not by the starlight, but by a silveryradiance which rayed a little way into the blackness around the darkhair and face. Valmika, as elder, first spoke:

"Holy sir, be welcome. Will you come in and rest?"

"I cannot stay now. I must pass over the mountains ere dawn; but you maycome a little way with me--such of you as will. "

We assented gladly, Kedar and I, Valmika remained. Then Ananda prayedto go. We bade him stay, fearing for him the labor of climbing and thechill of the snows. But Varunna said: "Let the child come. He is hardy, and will not tire if he holds my hand. "

So we set out together, and faced the highlands that rose and roseabove us. We knew the way well, even at night. We waited in silence forVarunna to speak; but for nigh an hour we mounted without words, savefor Ananda's shouts of delight and wonder at the heavens spread abovevalleys that lay behind us. Then I grew hungry for an answer to mythoughts, and I spake:

"Master, Valmika was saying, ere you came, how good it was to be hererather than in the city, where they are full of strife. And Kedarthought their lives would flow on into fiery pain, and no speech wouldavail. Ananda, speaking as a child, indeed, said if one went down amongthey would listen to his story of the happy life. But, Master, do notmany speak and interpret the sacred writings, and how few are they wholay to heart the words of the gods! They seem, indeed, to go on throughdesire into pain, and even here upon the hills we are not free, forKedar felt the hot glow of their passion, and I heard in my heart theirsobs of despair. Master, it was terrible, for they seemed to come fromthe wide earth over, and out of ages far away. 

 "In the child's words is the truth, " said Varunna, "for it isbetter to aid even in sorrow than to withdraw from pain to a happysolitude. Yet only the knowers of Brahma can interpret the sacredwritings truly, and it is well to be free ere we speak of freedom. Thenwe have power and many hearken. "

"But who would leave joy for sorrow? And who, being one with Brahma, would return to give counsel?"

"Brother, " said Varunna, "here is the hope of the world. Though manyseek only for the eternal joy, yet the cry you heard has been heard bygreat ones who have turned backwards, called by these beseeching voices. The small old path stretching far away leads through many wonderfulbeings to the place of Brahma. There is the first fountain, the world ofbeautiful silence, the light which has been undimmed since the beginningof time. But turning backwards from the gate the small old path windsaway into the world of men, and it enters every sorrowful heart. Thisis the way the great ones go. They turn with the path from the doorof Brahma. They move along its myriad ways, and overcome pain withcompassion. After many conquered worlds, after many races of purifiedand uplifted men, they go to a greater than Brahma. In these, thoughfew, is the hope of the world. These are the heroes for whose returningthe earth puts forth her signal fires, and the Devas sing their hymns ofwelcome. "

We paused where the plateau widened out. There was scarce a ripple inthe chill air. In quietness the snows glistened, a light reflected fromthe crores of stars that swung with glittering motion above us. Wecould hear the immense heart-beat of the world in the stillness. We hadthoughts that went ranging through the heavens, not sad, but full ofsolemn hope. 

"Brothers! Master! look! The wonderful thing! And another, and yetanother!" we heard Ananda calling. We looked and saw the holy blossom, the midnight flower. Oh, may the earth again put forth such beauty. It grew up from the snows with leaves of delicate crystal. A nimbusencircled each radiant bloom, a halo pale yet lustrous. I bowed over itin awe; and I heard Varunna say, "The earth indeed puts forth her signalfires, and the Devas sing their hymn. Listen!" We heard a music as ofbeautiful thoughts moving along the high places of the earth, full ofinfinite love and hope and yearning. 

"Be glad now, for one is born who has chosen the greater way. Kedar, Narayan, Ananda, farewell! Nay, no farther. It is a long way to return, and the child will tire. "

He went on and passed from our sight. But we did not return. We remainedlong, long in silence, looking at the sacred flower. -------------

Vow, taken long ago, be strong in our hearts today. Here, where the painis fiercer, to rest is more sweet. Here, where beauty dies away, it ismore joy to be lulled in dream. Here, the good, the true, our hope seembut a madness born of ancient pain. Out of rest, dream, or despair maywe arise, and go the way the great ones go. 

1894

THE CHILDHOOD OF APOLLO

It was long ago, so long that only the spirit of earth remembers truly. The old shepherd Admetus sat before the door of his hut waiting for hisgrandson to return. He watched with drowsy eyes the eve gather, andthe woods and mountains grow dark over the isles--the isles of ancientGreece. It was Greece before its day of beauty, and day was neverlovelier. The cloudy blossoms of smoke, curling upward from the valley, sparkled a while high up in the sunlit air, a vague memorial of theworld of men below. From that, too, the color vanished, and those otherlights began to shine which to some are the only lights of day. Theskies dropped close upon the mountains and the silver seas like a vastface brooding with intentness. There was enchantment, mystery, anda living motion in its depths, the presence of all-pervading Zeusenfolding his starry children with the dark radiance of aether. 

"Ah!" murmured the old man, looking upward, "once it was living; once itspoke to me. It speaks not now; but it speaks to others I know--to thechild who looks and longs and trembles in the dewy night. Why does helinger now? He is beyond his hour. Ah, there now are his footsteps!"

A boy came up the valley driving the gray flocks which tumbled beforehim in the darkness. He lifted his young face for the shepherd to kiss. It was alight with ecstasy. Admetus looked at him with wonder. A goldenand silvery light rayed all about the child, so that his delicateethereal beauty seemed set in a star which followed his dancingfootsteps. 

"How bright your eyes!" the old man said, faltering with sudden awe. "Why do your limbs shine with moonfire light?"

"Oh, father, " said the boy Apollo, "I am glad, for everything is livingtonight. The evening is all a voice and many voices. While the flockswere browsing night gathered about me. I saw within it and it waseverywhere living. 

"The wind with dim-blown tresses, odor, incense, and secret falling dew, mingled in one warm breath. They whispered to me and called me 'Child ofthe Stars, ' 'Dew Heart, ' and 'Soul of Light. ' Oh, father, as I came upthe valley the voices followed me with song. Everything murmured love. Even the daffodils, nodding in the olive gloom, grew golden at my feet, and a flower within my heart knew of the still sweet secret of theflowers. Listen, listen!"

There were voices in the night, voices as of star-rays descending. 

 Now the roof-tree of the midnight spreading Buds in citron, green, and blue: From afar its mystic odors shedding, Child, on you. 

Then other sweet speakers from beneath the earth, and from the distantwaters and air, followed in benediction, and a last voice like a murmurfrom universal nature:

 Now the buried stars beneath the mountains And the vales their life renew, Jetting rainbow blooms from tiny fountains, Child, for you. 

 As within our quiet waters passing Sun and moon and stars we view, So the loveliness of life is glassing, Child, in you. 

 In the diamond air the sun-star glowing Up its feathered radiance threw; All the jewel glory there was flowing, Child, for you. 

 And the fire divine in all things burning Yearns for home and rest anew, From its wanderings far again returning, Child, to you. 

"Oh, voices, voices, " cried the child, "what you say I know not, but Igive back love for love. Father, what is it they tell me? They enfold mein light, and I am far away even though I hold your hand. "

"The gods are about us. Heaven mingles with the earth, " said Admetus, trembling. "Let us go to Diotima. She has grown wise brooding for manya year where the great caves lead to the underworld. She sees the brightones as they pass by, though she sits with shut eyes, her drowsy lipsmurmuring as nature's self. "

That night the island seemed no more earth set in sea, but a musicencircled by the silence. The trees, long rooted in antique slumber, were throbbing with rich life; through glimmering bark and drooping leafa light fell on the old man and boy as they passed, and vague figuresnodded at them. These were the hamadryad souls of the wood. They werebathed in tender colors and shimmering lights draping them from rootto leaf. A murmur came from the heart of every one, a low enchantmentbreathing joy and peace. It grew and swelled until at last it seemed asif through a myriad pipes Pan the earth spirit was fluting his magicalcreative song. 

They found the cave of Diotima covered by vines and tangled trailersat the end of the island where the dark-green woodland rose up from thewaters. Admetus paused, for he dreaded this mystic prophetess; but avoice from within called them:

"Come, child of light: come in, old shepherd, I know why you seek me!"

They entered, Admetus trembling with more fear than before. A fire wasblazing in a recess of the cavern, and by it sat a majestic figurerobed in purple. She was bent forward, her hand supporting her face, herburning eyes turned on the intruders. 

"Come hither, child, " she said, taking the boy by the hands and gazinginto his face. "So this pale form is to be the home of the god. The godsChoose wisely. They take no wild warrior, no mighty hero to be theirmessenger, but crown this gentle head. Tell me, have you ever seen alight from the sun falling on you in your slumber? No, but look now. Look upward. "

As she spoke she waved her hands over him, and the cavern with its duskyroof seemed to melt away, and beyond the heavens the heaven of heavenslay dark in pure tranquility, in a quiet which was the very hush ofbeing. In an instant it vanished, and over the zenith broke a wonderfullight. 

"See now, " cried Diotima, "the Ancient Beauty! Look how its petalsexpand, and what comes forth from its heart!" A vast and glowing breath, mutable and opalescent, spread itself between heaven and earth, andout of it slowly descended a radiant form like a god's. It drew nigh, radiating lights, pure, beautiful, and star-like. It stood for a momentby the child and placed its hand on his head, and then it was gone. Theold shepherd fell upon his face in awe, while the boy stood breathlessand entranced. 

"Go now, " said the Sybil, "I can teach thee naught. Nature herself willadore you, and sing through you her loveliest song. But, ah, the lightyou hail in joy you shall impart in tears. So from age to age theeternal Beauty bows itself down amid sorrows, that the children ofmen may not forget it, that their anguish may be transformed, smittenthrough by its fire. "

THE MASK OF APOLLO

A tradition rises within me of quiet, unarmored years, ages before thedemigods and heroes toiled at the making of Greece, long ages before thebuilding of the temples and sparkling palaces of her day of glory. Theland was pastoral, and over all the woods hung a stillness as of dawnand of unawakened beauty deep breathing in rest. Here and there littlevillages sent up their smoke and a dreamy people moved about. They grewup, toiled a little at their fields, followed their sheep and goats, wedded, and gray age overtook them, but they never ceased to bechildren. They worshipped the gods in little wooden temples, withancient rites forgotten in later years. 

Near one of these shrines lived a priest--an old man--who was held inreverence by all for his simple and kindly nature. To him, sitting onesummer evening before his hut, came a stranger whom he invited to sharehis meal. The stranger seated himself and began to tell the priest manywonderful things--stories of the magic of the sun and of the brightbeings who move at the gateways of the day. The old man grew drowsy inthe warm sunlight and fell asleep. Then the stranger, who was Apollo, arose, and in the guise of the priest entered the little temple, and thepeople came in unto him one after the other. 

First came Agathon, the husbandman, who said: "Father, as I bend overthe fields or fasten up the vines I sometimes remember that you said thegods can be worshipped by doing these things as by sacrifice. How isit, father, that the pouring of cold water over roots or training up thevines can nourish Zeus? How can the sacrifice appear before his thronewhen it is not carried up in the fire and vapor?"

To him Apollo, in the guise of the old man, replied: "Agathon, thefather omnipotent does not live only in the aether. He runs invisiblywithin the sun and stars, and as they whirl round and round they breakout into streams and woods and flowers, and the clouds are shaken awayfrom them as the leaves from off the roses. Great, strange, and bright, he busies himself within, and at the end of time his light shall shine, through, and men shall see it moving in a world of flame. Think then, asyou bend over your fields, of what you nourish and what rises up withinthem. Know that every flower as it droops in the quiet of the woodlandfeels within and far away the approach of an unutterable life and isglad. They reflect that life as the little pools the light of the stars. Agathon, Agathon, Zeus is no greater in the aether than he is in theleaf of grass, and the hymns of men are no sweeter to him than a littlewater poured over one of his flowers. "

Agathon, the husbandman, went away, and he bent tenderly in dreams overhis fruit and his vines, and he loved them more than before, and he grewwise as he watched them and was happy working for the gods. 

Then spake Damon, the shepherd Father, "while the flocks are browsingdreams rise up within me. They make the heart sick with longing. Theforests vanish, and I hear no more the lambs' bleat or the rustling ofthe fleeces. Voices from a thousand depths call me; they whisper, theybeseech me. Shadows more lovely than earth's children utter music, notfor me though I faint while I listen. Father, why do I hear the thingsothers hear not--voices calling to unknown hunters of wide fields, or toherdsmen, shepherds of the starry flocks?"

Apollo answered the shepherd: "Damon, a song stole from the silencewhile the gods were not yet, and a thousand ages passed ere they came, called forth by the music; and a thousand ages they listened, and thenjoined in the song. Then began the worlds to glimmer shadowy about them, and bright beings to bow before them. These, their children, began intheir turn to sing the song that calls forth and awakens life. He ismaster of all things who has learned their music. Damon, heed not theshadows, but the voices. The voices have a message to thee from beyondthe gods. Learn their song and sing it over again to the people untiltheir hearts, too, grow sick with longing, and they can hear the songwithin themselves. Oh, my son, I see far off how the nations shall joinin it as in a chorus, and, hearing it, the rushing planets shall ceasefrom their speed and be steadfast. Men shall hold starry sway. "

The face of the god shone through the face of the old man, and it wasso full of secretness that, filled with awe, Damon, the herdsman, passedfrom the presence, and a strange fire was kindled in his heart. Thesongs that he sang thereafter caused childhood and peace to pass fromthe dwellers in the woods. 

Then the two lovers, Dion and Nemra, came in and stood before Apollo, and Dion spake: "Father, you who are so wise can tell us what love is, so that we shall never miss it. Old Tithonus nods his gray head at us aswe pass. He says only with the changeless gods has love endurance, andfor men the loving time is short, and its sweetness is soon over. "

Neaera added: "But it is not true, father, for his drowsy eyes lightwhen he remembers the old days, when he was happy and proud in love aswe are. "

Apollo answered: "My children, I will tell you the legend how love cameinto the world, and how it may endure. On high Olympus the gods heldcouncil at the making of man, and each had brought a gift, and eachgave to man something of their own nature. Aphrodite, the loveliest andsweetest, paused, and was about to add a new grace to his person; butEros cried: 'Let them not be so lovely without; let them be lovelierwithin. Put your own soul in, O mother. ' The mighty mother smiled, andso it was. And now, whenever love is like hers, which asks not return, but shines on all because it must, within that love Aphrodite dwells, and it becomes immortal by her presence. "

Then Dion and Neaera went out, and as they walked home through theforest, purple and vaporous in the evening light, they drew closertogether. Dion, looking into the eyes of Neaera, saw there a new gleam, violet, magical, shining--there was the presence of Aphrodite; there washer shrine. 

After came in unto Apollo the two grand-children of old Tithonus, andthey cried: "See the flowers we have brought you! We gathered them foryou in the valley where they grow best!" Apollo said: "What wisdomshall we give to children that they may remember? Our most beautiful forthem!" And as he stood and looked at them the mask of age and secretnessvanished. He appeared radiant in light. They laughed in joy at hisbeauty. Bending down he kissed each upon the forehead, then faded awayinto the light which is his home. 

As the sun sank down amid the blue hills, the old priest awoke witha sigh, and cried out: "Oh, that we could talk wisely as we do in ourdreams!"

1893

THE CAVE OF LILITH

Out of her cave came the ancient Lilith; Lilith the wise; Lilith theenchantress. There ran a little path outside her dwelling; it wound awayamong the mountains and glittering peaks, and before the door one of theWise Ones walked to and fro. Out of her cave came Lilith, scornful ofhis solitude, exultant in her wisdom, flaunting her shining and magicalbeauty. 

"Still alone, star gazer! Is thy wisdom of no avail? Thou hast yet tolearn that I am more powerful, knowing the ways of error, than you whoknow the ways of truth. "

The Wise One heeded her not, but walked to and fro. His eyes were turnedto the distant peaks, the abode of his brothers. The starlight fellabout him; a sweet air came down the mountain path, fluttering his whiterobe; he did not cease from his steady musing. Lilith wavered in hercave like a mist rising between rocks. Her raiment was violet, withsilvery gleams. Her face was dim, and over her head rayed a shadowydiadem, like that which a man imagines over the head of his beloved: andone looking closer at her face would have seen that this was the crownhe reached out to; that the eyes burnt with his own longing; that thelips were parted to yield to the secret wishes of his heart. 

"Tell me, for I would know, why do you wait so long? I, here in my cavebetween the valley and the height, blind the eyes of all who would pass. Those who by chance go forth to you, come back to me again, and but onein ten thousand passes on. My illusions are sweeter to them than truth. I offer every soul its own shadow. I pay them their own price. I havegrown rich, though the simple shepards of old gave me birth. Men havemade me; the mortals have made me immortal. I rose up like a vapor fromtheir first dreams, and every sigh since then and every laugh remainswith me. I am made up of hopes and fears. The subtle princes lay outtheir plans of conquest in my cave, and there the hero dreams, and therethe lovers of all time write in flame their history. I am wise, holdingall experience, to tempt, to blind, to terrify. None shall pass by. Why, therefore, dost thou wait?"

The Wise One looked at her, and she shrank back a little, and a littleher silver and violet faded, but out of her cave her voice stillsounded:

"The stars and the starry crown are not yours alone to offer, andevery promise you make I make also. I offer the good and the badindifferently. The lover, the poet, the mystic, and all who would drinkof the first fountain, I delude with my mirage. I was the Beatrice wholed Dante upwards: the gloom was in me, and the glory was mine also, and he went not out of my cave. The stars and the shining of heaven wereillusions of the infinite I wove about him. I captured his soul with theshadow of space; a nutshell would have contained the film. I smote onthe dim heart-chords the manifold music of being. God is sweeter in thehuman than the human in God. Therefore he rested in me. "

She paused a little, and then went on: "There is that fantastic fellowwho slipped by me. Could your wisdom not retain him? He returned to mefull of anguish, and I wound my arms round him like a fair melancholy;and now his sadness is as sweet to him as hope was before his fall. Listen to his song!" She paused again. A voice came up from the depthschanting a sad knowledge:

 What of all the will to do? It has vanished long ago, For a dream-shaft pierced it through From the Unknown Archer's bow. 

 What of all the soul to think? Some one offered it a cup Filled with a diviner drink, And the flame has burned it up. 

 What of all the hope to climb? Only in the self we grope To the misty end of time, Truth has put an end to hope. 

 What of all the heart to love? Sadder than for will or soul, No light lured it on above: Love has found itself the whole. 

"Is it not pitiful? I pity only those who pity themselves. Yet he ismine more surely than ever. This is the end of human wisdom. How shallhe now escape? What shall draw him up?"

"His will shall awaken, " said the Wise One. "I do not sorrow over him, for long is the darkness before the spirit is born. He learns in yourcaves not to see, not to hear, not to think, for very anguish flyingyour illusions. "

"Sorrow is a great bond, " Lilith said. 

"It is a bond to the object of sorrow. He weeps what thou canst nevergive him, a life never breathed in thee. He shall come forth, and thoushalt not see him at the time of passing. When desire dies the swift andinvisible will awakens. He shall go forth; and one by one the dwellersin your caves will awaken and pass onward. This small old path will betrodden by generation after generation. Thou, too, O shining Lilith, shalt follow, not as mistress, but as handmaiden. "

"I will weave spells, " Lilith cried. "They shall never pass me. I willdrug them with the sweetest poison. They shall rest drowsily and contentas of old. Were they not giants long ago, mighty men and heroes? Iovercame them with young enchantment. Shall they pass by feeble andlonging for bygone joys, for the sins of their exultant youth, while Ihave grown into a myriad wisdom?"

The Wise One walked to and fro as before, and there was silence: and Isaw that with steady will he pierced the tumultuous gloom of the cave, and a spirit awoke here and there from its dream. And I though I sawthat Sad Singer become filled with a new longing for true being, andthat the illusions of good and evil fell from him, and that he came atlast to the knees of the Wise One to learn the supreme truth. Inthe misty midnight I hear these three voices--the Sad Singer, theEnchantress Lilith, and the Wise One. From the Sad Singer I learnedthat thought of itself leads nowhere, but blows the perfume from everyflower, and cuts the flower from every tree, and hews down every treefrom the valley, and in the end goes to and fro in waste places--gnawingitself in a last hunger. I learned from Lilith that we weave our ownenchantment, and bind ourselves with out own imagination. To think ofthe true as beyond us or to love the symbol of being is to darken thepath to wisdom, and to debar us from eternal beauty. From the Wise OneI learned that the truest wisdom is to wait, to work, and to will insecret. Those who are voiceless today, tomorrow shall be eloquent, andthe earth shall hear them and her children salute them. Of these threetruths the hardest to learn is the silent will. Let us seek for thehighest truth. 

1894

THE STORY OF A STAR

The emotions that haunted me in that little cathedral town would be mostdifficult to describe. After the hurry, rattle, and fever of the city, the rare weeks spent here were infinitely peaceful. They were full ofa quaint sense of childhood, with sometimes a deeper chord touched--thegiant and spiritual things childhood has dreams of. The little room Islept in had opposite its window the great gray cathedral wall; it wasonly in the evening that the sunlight crept round it and appeared inthe room strained through the faded green blind. It must have been thissilvery quietness of color which in some subtle way affected me with thefeeling of a continual Sabbath; and this was strengthened by the bellschiming hour after hour. The pathos, penitence, and hope expressed bythe flying notes colored the intervals with faint and delicate memories. They haunted my dreams, and I heard with unutterable longing the dreamychimes pealing from some dim and vast cathedral of the cosmic memory, until the peace they tolled became almost a nightmare, and I longed forutter oblivion or forgetfulness of their reverberations. 

More remarkable were the strange lapses into other worlds and times. Almost as frequent as the changing of the bells were the changes fromstate to state. I realized what is meant by the Indian philosophy ofMaya. Truly my days were full of Mayas, and my work-a-day city life wasno more real to me than one of those bright, brief glimpses of thingslong past. I talk of the past, and yet these moments taught me how falseour ideas of time are. In the Ever-living yesterday, today, and tomorroware words of no meaning. I know I fell into what we call the past andthe things I counted as dead for ever were the things I had yet toendure. Out of the old age of earth I stepped into its childhood, andreceived once more the primal blessing of youth, ecstasy, and beauty. But these things are too vast and vague to speak of, the words we usetoday cannot tell their story. Nearer to our time is the legend thatfollows. 

I was, I thought, one of the Magi of old Persia, inheritor of itsunforgotten lore, and using some of its powers. I tried to piercethrough the great veil of nature, and feel the life that quickened itwithin. I tried to comprehend the birth and growth of planets, and todo this I rose spiritually and passed beyond earth's confines into thatseeming void which is the Matrix where they germinate. On one of thesejourneys I was struck by the phantasm, so it seemed, of a planet I hadnot observed before. I could not then observe closer, and coming againon another occasion it had disappeared. After the lapse of many monthsI saw it once more, brilliant with fiery beauty. Its motion was slow, revolving around some invisible centre. I pondered over it, and seemedto know that the invisible centre was its primordial spiritual state, from which it emerged a little while and into which it then withdrew. Short was its day; its shining faded into a glimmer, and then intodarkness in a few months. I learned its time and cycles; I madepreparations and determined to await its coming. 

The Birth of a Planet

At first silence and then an inner music, and then the sounds of songthroughout the vastness of its orbit grew as many in number as therewere stars at gaze. Avenues and vistas of sound! They reeled to and fro. They poured from a universal stillness quick with unheard things. Theyrushed forth and broke into a myriad voices gay with childhood. From ageand the eternal they rushed forth into youth. They filled the void withreveling and exultation. In rebellion they then returned and enteredthe dreadful Fountain. Again they came forth, and the sounds faded intowhispers; they rejoiced once again, and again died into silence. 

And now all around glowed a vast twilight; it filled the cradle of theplanet with colorless fire. I felt a rippling motion which impelled meaway from the centre to the circumference. At that began to curdle, a milky and nebulous substance rocked to and fro. At every motion thepulsation of its rhythm carried it farther and farther away from thecentre; it grew darker, and a great purple shadow covered it so that Icould see it no longer. I was now on the outer verge, where the twilightstill continued to encircle the planet with zones of clear transparentlight. 

As night after night I rose up to visit it they grew many-colored andbrighter. I saw the imagination of nature visibly at work. I wanderedthrough shadowy immaterial forests, a titanic vegetation built upof light and color; I saw it growing denser, hung with festoons andtrailers of fire, and spotted with the light of myriad flowers such asearth never knew. Coincident with the appearance of these things I feltwithin myself, as if in harmonious movement, a sense of joyousness, anincrease of self-consciousness: I felt full of gladness, youth, and themystery of the new. I felt that greater powers were about to appear, those who had thrown outwards this world and erected it as a place inspace. 

I could not tell half the wonder of this strange race. I could notmyself comprehend more than a little of the mystery of their being. Theyrecognized my presence there, and communicated with me in such a waythat I can only describe it by saying that they seemed to enter into mysoul, breathing a fiery life; yet I knew that the highest I could reachto was but the outer verge of their spiritual nature, and to tell youbut a little I have many times to translate it; for in the first unitywith their thought I touched on an almost universal sphere of life, I peered into the ancient heart that beats throughout time; and thisknowledge became change in me, first into a vast and nebulous symbology, and so down through many degrees of human thought into words which holdnot at all the pristine and magical beauty. 

I stood before one of this race, and I thought, "What is the meaningand end of life here?" Within me I felt the answering ecstasy thatilluminated with vistas of dawn and rest: It seemed to say:

"Our spring and our summer are unfolding into light and form, and ourautumn and winter are a fading into the infinite soul. "

I questioned in my heart, "To what end is this life poured forth andwithdrawn?"

He came nearer and touched me; once more I felt the thrill of being thatchanged itself into vision. 

"The end is creation, and creation is joy. The One awakens out ofquiescence as we come forth, and knows itself in us; as we return weenter it in gladness, knowing ourselves. After long cycles the world youlive in will become like ours; it will be poured forth and withdrawn; amystic breath, a mirror to glass your being. "

He disappeared while I wondered what cyclic changes would transmute ourball of mud into the subtle substance of thought. 

In that world I dared not stay during its period of withdrawal; havingentered a little into its life, I became subject to its laws; the Powerson its return would have dissolved my being utterly. I felt with a wildterror its clutch upon me, and I withdrew from the departing glory, fromthe greatness that was my destiny--but not yet. 

From such dreams I would be aroused, perhaps, by a gentle knock at mydoor, and my little cousin Margaret's quaint face would peep in with a"Cousin Robert, are you not coming down to supper?"

Of these visions in the light of after thought I would speak alittle. All this was but symbol, requiring to be thrice sublimed ininterpretation ere its true meaning can be grasped. I do not knowwhether worlds are heralded by such glad songs, or whether any have sucha fleeting existence, for the mind that reflects truth is deluded withstrange phantasies of time and place in which seconds are rolled outinto centuries and long cycles are reflected in an instant of time. There is within us a little space through which all the threads of theuniverse are drawn; and, surrounding that incomprehensible centre, themind of man sometimes catches glimpses of things which are true only inthose glimpses; when we record them the true has vanished, and a shadowystory--such as this--alone remains. Yet, perhaps, the time is notaltogether wasted in considering legends like these, for they reveal, though but in phantasy and symbol, a greatness we are heirs to, adestiny which is ours though it be yet far away. 

1894

A DREAM OF ANGUS OGE

The day had been wet and wild, and the woods looked dim and drenchedfrom the window where Con sat. All the day long his ever restless feetwere running to the door in a vain hope of sunshine. His sister, Norah, to quiet him had told him over and over again the tales which delightedhim, the delight of hearing which was second only to the delight ofliving them over himself, when as Cuculain he kept the ford which led toUlla, his sole hero heart matching the hosts of Meave; or as Fergus hewielded the sword of light the Druids made and gave to the champion, which in its sweep shore away the crests of the mountains; or asBrian, the ill-fated child of Turann, he went with his brothers in theocean-sweeping boat farther than ever Columbus traveled, winning one byone in dire conflict with kings and enchanters the treasures which wouldappease the implacable heart of Lu. 

He had just died in a corner of the room from his many wounds whenNorah came in declaring that all these famous heroes must go to bed. He protested in vain, but indeed he was sleepy, and before he hadbeen carried half-way to the room the little soft face drooped withhalf-closed eyes, while he drowsily rubbed his nose upon her shoulderin an effort to keep awake. For a while she flitted about him, looking, with her dark, shadowy hair flickering in the dim, silver light likeone of the beautiful heroines of Gaelic romance, or one of the twilight, race of the Sidhe. Before going she sat by his bed and sang to him someverses of a song, set to an old Celtic air whose low intonations werefull of a half-soundless mystery:

 Over the hill-tops the gay lights are peeping; Down in the vale where the dim fleeces stray Ceases the smoke from the hamlet upcreeping: Come, thou, my shepherd, and lead me away. 

"Who's the shepherd?" said the boy, suddenly sitting up. 

"Hush, alannah, I will tell you another time. " She continued still moresoftly:

 Lord of the Wand, draw forth from the darkness, Warp of the silver, and woof of the gold: Leave the poor shade there bereft in its starkness: Wrapped in the fleece we will enter the Fold. 

 There from the many-orbed heart where the Mother Breathes forth the love on her darlings who roam, We will send dreams to their land of another Land of the Shining, their birthplace and home. 

He would have asked a hundred questions, but she bent over him, enveloping him with a sudden nightfall of hair, to give him hisgood-night kiss, and departed. Immediately the boy sat up again; all hissleepiness gone. The pure, gay, delicate spirit of childhood was dartingat ideas dimly perceived in the delicious moonlight of romance whichsilvered his brain, where may airy and beautiful figures were moving:The Fianna with floating locks chasing the flying deer; shapes moresolemn, vast, and misty, guarding the avenues to unspeakable secrets;but he steadily pursued his idea. 

"I guess he's one of the people who take you away to faeryland. Wonderif he'd come to me? Think it's easy going away, " with an intuitiveperception of the frailty of the link binding childhood to earth in itsdreams. (As a man Con will strive with passionate intensity to regainthat free, gay motion in the upper airs. ) "Think I'll try if he'llcome, " and he sang, with as near an approach as he could make to theglimmering cadences of his sister's voice:

 Come, thou, my shepherd, and lead me away. 

He then lay back quite still and waited. He could not say whether hoursor minutes had passed, or whether he had slept or not, until he wasaware of a tall golden-bearded man standing by his bed. Wonderfullylight was this figure, as if the sunlight ran through his limbs; aspiritual beauty was on the face, and those strange eyes of bronze andgold with their subtle intense gaze made Con aware for the first time ofthe difference between inner and out in himself. 

"Come, Con, come away!" the child seemed to hear uttered silently. 

"You're the Shepherd!" said Con, "I'll go. " Then suddenly, "I won't comeback and be old when they're all dead?" a vivid remembrance of Ossian'sfate flashing upon him. 

A most beautiful laughter, which again to Con seemed half soundless, came in reply. His fears vanished; the golden-bearded man stretched ahand over him for a moment, and he found himself out in the night, nowclear and starlit. Together they moved on as if borne by the wind, pastmany woods and silver-gleaming lakes, and mountains which shone like arange of opals below the purple skies. The Shepherd stood still for amoment by one of these hills, and there flew out, riverlike, a melodymingled with a tinkling as of innumerable elfin hammers, and there, wasa sound of many gay voices where an unseen people were holding festival, or enraptured hosts who were let loose for the awakening, the new daywhich was to dawn, for the delighted child felt that faeryland was comeover again with its heroes and battles. 

"Our brothers rejoice, " said the Shepherd to Con. 

"Who are they?" asked the boy. 

"They are the thoughts of our Father. "

"May we go in?" Con asked, for he was fascinated by the melody, mystery, and flashing lights. 

"Not now. We are going to my home where I lived in the days past whenthere came to me many kings and queens of ancient Eire, many heroes andbeautiful women, who longed for the Druid wisdom we taught. "

"And did you fight like Finn, and carry spears as tall as trees, andchase the deer through the Woods, and have feastings and singing?"

"No, we, the Dananns, did none of those things--but those who were wearyof battle, and to whom feast and song brought no pleasure, came to usand passed hence to a more wonderful land, a more immortal land thanthis. "

As he spoke he paused before a great mound, grown over with trees, andaround it silver clear in the moonlight were immense stones piled, the remains of an original circle, and there was a dark, low, narrowentrance leading within. He took Con by the hand, and in an instantthey were standing in a lofty, cross-shaped cave, built roughly of hugestones. 

"This was my palace. In days past many a one plucked here the purpleflower of magic and the fruit of the tree of life. "

"It is very dark, " said the child disconsolately. He had expectedsomething different. 

"Nay, but look: you will see it is the palace of a god. " And even as hespoke a light began to glow and to pervade the cave and to obliteratethe stone walls and the antique hieroglyphs engraved thereon, and tomelt the earthen floor into itself like a fiery sun suddenly uprisenwithin the world, and there was everywhere a wandering ecstasy ofsound: light and sound were one; light had a voice, and the music hungglittering in the air. 

"Look, how the sun is dawning for us, ever dawning; in the earth, inour hearts, with ever youthful and triumphant voices. Your sun is but asmoky shadow, ours the ruddy and eternal glow; yours is far way, ours isheart and hearth and home; yours is a light without, ours a fire within, in rock, in river, in plain, everywhere living, everywhere dawning, whence also it cometh that the mountains emit their wondrous rays. "

As he spoke he seemed to breathe the brilliance of that mysticalsunlight and to dilate and tower, so that the child looked up to a giantpillar of light, having in his heart a sun of ruddy gold which shed itsblinding rays about him, and over his head there was a waving of fieryplumage and on his face an ecstasy of beauty and immortal youth. 

"I am Angus, " Con heard; "men call me the Young. I am the sunlight inthe heart, the moonlight in the mind; I am the light at the end of everydream, the voice for ever calling to come away; I am the desire beyondyou or tears. Come with me, come with me, I will make you immortal;for my palace opens into the Gardens of the Sun, and there are thefire-fountains which quench the heart's desire in rapture. " And inthe child's dream he was in a palace high as the stars, with dazzlingpillars jeweled like the dawn, and all fashioned out of living andtrembling opal. And upon their thrones sat the Danann gods with theirsceptres and diadems of rainbow light, and upon their faces infinitewisdom and imperishable youth. In the turmoil and growing chaos of hisdream he heard a voice crying out, "You remember, Con, Con, Conaire Mor, you remember!" and in an instant he was torn from himself and had grownvaster, and was with the Immortals, seated upon their thrones, theylooking upon him as a brother, and he was flying away with them into theheart of the gold when he awoke, the spirit of childhood dazzled withthe vision which is too lofty for princes. 

1897

DEIRDRE

A LEGEND IN THREE ACTS

Dramatis Personae:

 CONCOBAR............... Ardrie of Ulla. NAISI AINLE, ARDAN............ Brothers of Naisi. FERGUS BUINNE, ILANN.......... Sons of Fergus CATHVAH................. A Druid DEIRDRE LAVARCAN................ A Druidess Herdsman, Messenger

ACT I. 

SCENE. --The dun of DEIRDRE'S captivity. LAVARCAM, a Druidess, sitsbefore the door in the open air. DEIRDRE comes out of the dun. 

DEIRDRE--Dear fostermother, how the spring is beginning! The music ofthe Father's harp is awakening the flowers. Now the winter's sleep isover, and the spring flows from the lips of the harp. Do you not feelthe thrill in the wind--a joy answering the trembling strings? Dearfostermother, the spring and the music are in my heart!

LAVARCAM--The harp has but three notes; and, after sleep and laughter, the last sound is of weeping. 

DEIRDRE--Why should there be any sorrow while I am with you? I am happyhere. Last night in a dream I saw the blessed Sidhe upon the mountains, and they looked on me with eyes of love. 

(An old HERDSMAN enters, who bows before LAVARCAM. )

HERDSMAN--Lady, the High King is coming through the woods. 

LAVARCAM--Deirdre, go to the grianan for a little. You shall tell meyour dream again, my child. 

DEIRDRE--Why am I always hidden from the King's sight. 

LAVARCAM--It is the King's will you should see no one except these agedservants. 

DEIRDRE--Am I indeed fearful to look upon, foster-mother? I do not thinkso, or you would not love me. 

LAVARCAM--It is the King's will. 

DEIRDRE--Yet why must it be so, fostermother? Why must I hide away? Whymust I never leave the valley?

LAVARCAM--It is the king's will. 

While she is speaking CONCOBAR enters. He stands still and looks onDEIRDRE. DEIRDRE gazes on the KING for a moment, and then covering herface with her hands, she hurries into the dun. The HERDSMAN goes out. LAVARCAM sees and bows before the KING. 

CONCOBAR--Lady, is all well with you and your charge?

LAVARCAM--All is well. 

CONCOBAR--Is there peace in Deirdre's heart?

LAVARCAM--She is happy, not knowing a greater happiness than to roam thewoods or to dream of the immortal ones can bring her. 

CONCOBAR--Fate has not found her yet hidden in this valley. 

LAVARCAM--Her happiness is to be here. But she asks why must she neverleave the glen. Her heart quickens within her. Like a bird she listensto the spring, and soon the valley will be narrow as a cage. 

CONCOBAR--I cannot open the cage. Less ominous the Red Swineherd at afeast than this beautiful child in Ulla. You know the word of the Druidsat her birth. 

LAVARCAM--Aye, through her would come the destruction of the Red Branch. But sad is my heart, thinking of her lonely youth. 

CONCOBAR--The gods did not guide us how the ruin might be averted. TheDruids would have slain her, but I set myself against the wise ones, thinking in my heart that the chivalry of the Red Branch would bealready gone if this child were slain. If we are to perish it shall benobly, and without any departure from the laws of our order. So I havehidden her away from men, hoping to stay the coming of fate. 

LAVARCAM--King, your mercy will return to you, and if any of the RedBranch fall, you will not fall. 

CONCOBAR--If her thoughts turned only to the Sidhe her heart would growcold to the light love that warriors give. The birds of Angus cannotbreathe or sing their maddening song in the chill air that enfolds thewise. For this, Druidess, I made thee her fosterer. Has she learned toknow the beauty of the ever-living ones, after which the earth fades andno voice can call us back?

LAVARCAM--The immortals have appeared to her in vision and looked on herwith eyes of love. 

CONCOBAR--Her beauty is so great it would madden whole hosts, and turnthem from remembrance of their duty. We must guard well the safety ofthe Red Branch. Druidess, you have seen with subtle eyes the shininglife beyond this. But through the ancient traditions of Ulla, which thebards have kept and woven into song, I have seen the shining law entermen's minds, and subdue the lawless into love of justice. A greattradition is shaping a heroic race; and the gods who fought at Moyturaare descending and dwelling in the heart of the Red Branch. Deeds willbe done in our time as mighty as those wrought by the giants who battledat the dawn; and through the memory of our days and deeds the gods willbuild themselves an eternal empire in the mind of the Gael. Wise woman, guard well this beauty which fills my heart with terror. I go now, andwill doubly warn the spearmen at the passes, but will come hither againand speak with thee of these things, and with Deirdre I would speakalso. 

LAVARCAM--King of Ulla, be at peace. It is not I who will break throughthe design of the gods. (CONCOBAR goes through the woods, after lookingfor a time at the door of the dun. ) But Deirdre is also one of theimmortals. What the gods desire will utter itself through her heart. Iwill seek counsel from the gods. 

[DEIRDRE comes slowly through the door. ]

DEIRDRE--Is he gone? I fear this stony king with his implacable eyes. 

LAVARVAM--He is implacable only in his desire for justice. 

DEIRDRE--No! No! There is a hunger in his eyes for I know not what. 

LAVARCAM--He is the wisest king who ever sat on the chair of Macha. 

DEIRDRE--He has placed a burden on my heart. Oh! fostermother, the harpof life is already trembling into sorrow!

LAVARCAM--Do not think of him. Tell me your dream, my child. 

[DEIRDRE comes from the door of the dun and sits on a deerskin atLAVARCAM's feet. ]

DEIRDRE--Tell me, do happy dreams bring happiness, and do our dreams ofthe Sidhe ever grow real to us as you are real to me? Do their eyes drawnigh to ours, and can the heart we dream of ever be a refuge for ourhearts. 

LAVARCAM--Tell me your dream. 

DEIRDRE--Nay; but answer first of all, dear fostermother--you who arewise, and who have talked with the Sidhe. 

LAVARCAM--Would it make you happy to have your dream real, my darling?

DEIRDRE--Oh, it would make me happy!

[She hides her face on LAVARCAM's knees. ]

LAVARCAM--If I can make your dream real, I will, my beautiful fawn. 

DEIRDRE--Dear fostermother, I think my dream is coming near to me. It iscoming to me now. 

LAVARCAM--Deirdre, tell me what hope has entered your heart?

DEIRDRE--In the night I saw in a dream the top of the mountain yonder, beyond the woods, and three hunters stood there in the dawn. The sunsent its breath upon their faces, but there was a light about them neverkindled at the sun. They were surely hunters from some heavenly field, or the three gods whom Lu condemned to wander in mortal form, and theyare come again to the world to seek some greater treasure. 

LAVARCAM--Describe to me these immortal hunters. In Eire we know no godswho take such shape appearing unto men. 

DEIRDRE--I cannot now make clear to thee my remembrance of two of thehunters, but the tallest of the three--oh, he stood like a flame againstthe flameless sky, and the whole sapphire of the heavens seemed to livein his fearless eyes! His hair was darker than the raven's wing, hisface dazzling in its fairness. He pointed with his great flame-brightspear to the valley. His companions seemed in doubt, and pointed eastand west. Then in my dream I came nigh him and whispered in his ear, andpointed the way through the valley to our dun. I looked into hiseyes, and he started like one who sees a vision; and I know, dearfostermother, he will come here, and he will love me. Oh, I would die ifhe did not love me!

LAVARCAM--Make haste, my child, and tell me was there aught elsememorable about this hero and his companions?

DEIRDRE--Yes, I remember each had the likeness of a torch shedding raysof gold embroidered on the breast. 

LAVARCAM--Deirdre, Deirdre, these are no phantoms, but living heroes!O wise king, the eyes of the spirit thou wouldst open have seen fartherthan the eyes of the body thou wouldst blind! The Druid vision has onlyrevealed to this child her destiny. 

DEIRDRE--Why do you talk so strangely, fostermother?

LAVARCAM--Concobar, I will not fight against the will of the immortals. I am not thy servant, but theirs. Let the Red Branch fall! If the godsscatter it they have chosen to guide the people of Ulla in another Ipath. 

DEIRDRE--What has disturbed your mind, dear foster-mother? What haveI to do with the Red Branch? And why should the people of Ulla fallbecause of me?

LAVARCAM--O Deirdre, there were no warriors created could overcome theRed Branch. The gods have but smiled on this proud chivalry throughthine eyes, and they are already melted. The waving of thy hand ismore powerful to subdue than the silver rod of the king to sustain. Thygolden hair shall be the flame to burn up Ulla. 

DEIDRE--Oh, what do you mean by these fateful prophecies? You fill mewith terror. Why should a dream so gentle and sweet portend sorrow?

LAVARCAM--Dear golden head, cast sorrow aside for a time. The Father hasnot yet struck the last chords on the harp of life. The chords of joyhave but begun for thee. 

DEIRDRE--You confuse my mind, dear fostermother, with your speech of joyand sorrow. It is not your wont. Indeed, I think my dream portends joy. 

LAVARCAM--It is love, Deirdre, which is coming to thee. Love, which thouhast never known. 

DEIRDRE--But I love thee, dearest and kindest of guardians. 

LAVARCAM--Oh, in this love heaven and earth will be forgotten, and yourown self unremembered, or dim and far off as a home the spirit fives inno longer. 

DEIRDRE--Tell me, will the hunter from the hills come to us? I think Icould forget all for him. 

LAVARCAM--He is not one of the Sidhe, but the proudest and bravest ofthe Red Branch, Naisi, son of Usna. Three lights of valor among theUltonians are Naisi and his brothers. 

DEIRDRE--Will he love me, fostermother, as you love me, and will he livewith us here?

LAVARCAM--Nay, where he goes you must go, and he must fly afar to livewith you. But I will leave you now for a little, child, I would divinethe future. 

[LAVARCAM kisses DEIRDRE and goes within the dun. DEIRDRE walks to andfro before the door. NAISI enters. He sees DEIRDRE, who turns and looksat him, pressing her hands to her breast. Naisi bows before DEIRDRE. ]

NAISI--Goddess, or enchantress, thy face shone on me at dawn on themountain. Thy lips called me hither, and I have come. 

DEIRDRE--I called thee, dear Naisi. 

NAISI--Oh, knowing my name, never before having spoken to me, thou mustknow my heart also. 

DEIRDRE--Nay, I know not. Tell me what is in thy heart. 

NAISI--O enchantress, thou art there. The image of thine eyes is thereand thy smiling lips, and the beating of my heart is muffled in a cloudof thy golden tresses. 

DEIRDRE--Say on, dear Naisi. 

NAISI--I have told thee all. Thou only art in my heart. 

DEIRDRE--But I have never ere this spoken to any man. Tell me more. 

NAISI--If thou hast never before spoken to any man, then indeed art thouone of the immortals, and my hope is vain. Hast thou only called me tothy world to extinguish my life hereafter in memories of thee?

DEIRDRE--What wouldst thou with me, dear Naisi?

NAISI--I would carry thee to my dun by the sea of Moyle, O beautifulwoman, and set thee there on an ivory throne. The winter would not chillthee there, nor the summer burn thee, for I would enfold thee with mylove, enchantress, if thou camest--to my world. Many warriors are thereof the clan Usna, and two brothers I have who are strong above anyhosts, and they would all die with me for thy sake. 

DEIRDRE (taking the hands of NAISI)--I will go with thee where thougoest. (Leaning her head on NAISI's shoulder. ) Oh, fostermother, tootruly hast thou spoken! I know myself not. My spirit has gone from me tothis other heart for ever. 

NAISI--Dost thou forego thy shining world for me?

LAVARCAM--(coming out of the dun). Naisi, this is the Deirdre of theprophecies. 

NAISI--Deirdre! Deirdre! I remember in some old tale of my childhoodthat name. (Fiercely. ) It was a lying prophecy. What has this girl to dowith the downfall of Ulla?

LAVARCAM--Thou art the light of the Ultonian's, Naisi, but thou artnot the star of knowledge. The Druids spake truly. Through her, but notthrough her sin, will come the destruction of the Red Branch. 

NAISI--I have counted death as nothing battling for the Red Branch; andI would not, even for Deirdre, war upon my comrades. But Deirdre I willnot leave nor forget for a thousand prophecies made by the Druidsin their dotage. If the Red Branch must fall, it will fall throughtreachery; but Deirdre I will love, and in my love is no dishonor, norany broken pledge. 

LAVARCAM--Remember, Naisi, the law of the king. It is death to thee tobe here. Concobar is even now in the woods, and will come hither again. 

DEIRDRE--Is it death to thee to love me, Naisi? Oh, fly quickly, andforget me. But first, before thou goest, bend down thy head--low--restit on my bosom. Listen to the beating of my heart. That passionatetumult is for thee! There, I have kissed thee. I have sweet memories forever-lasting. Go now, my beloved, quickly. I fear--I fear for thee thisstony king. 

NAISI--I do not fear the king, nor will I fly hence. It is due to thechief of the Red Branch that I should stay and face him, having set mymill against his. 

LAVARCAM--You cannot remain now. 

NAISI--It is due to the king. 

LAVARCAM--You must go; both must go. Do not cloud your heart with dreamsof a false honor. It is not your death only, but Deirdre's which willfollow. Do you think the Red Branch would spare her, after your death, to extinguish another light of valor, and another who may wander here?

NAISI--I will go with Deirdre to Alba. 

DEIRDRE--Through life or to death I will go with thee, Naisi. 

[Voices of AINLE and ARDAN are heard in the wood. ]

ARDAN--I think Naisi went this way. 

AINLE--He has been wrapt in a dream since the dawn. See! This is hisfootstep in the clay!

ARDAN--I heard voices. 

AINLE--(entering with ARDAN) Here is our dream-led brother. 

NAISI--Ainle and Ardan, this is Deirdre, your sister. I have brokenthrough the command of the king, and fly with her to Alba to avoidwarfare with the Red Branch. 

ARDAN--Our love to thee, beautiful sister. 

AINLE--Dear maiden, thou art already in my heart with Naisi. 

LAVARCAM--You cannot linger here. With Concobar the deed follows swiftlythe counsel; tonight his spearmen will be on your track. 

NAISI--Listen, Ainle and Ardan. Go you to Emain Macha. It may be the RedBranch will make peace between the king and myself. You are guiltless inthis flight. 

AINLE--Having seen Deirdre, my heart is with you, brother, and I also amguilty. 

ARDAN--I think, being here, we, too, have broken the command of theking. We will go with thee to Alba, dear brother and sister. 

LAVARCAM--Oh, tarry not, tarry not! Make haste while there is yet time. The thoughts of the king are circling around Deirdre as wolves aroundthe fold. Try not the passes of the valley, but over the hills. Thepasses are all filled with the spearmen of the king. 

NAISI--We will carry thee over the mountains, Deirdre, and tomorrow willsee us nigh to the isles of Alba. 

DEIRDRE--Farewell, dear fostermother. I have passed the faery sea sincedawn, and have found the Island of Joy. Oh, see! what bright birds arearound us, with dazzling wings! Can you not hear their singing? Oh, bright birds, make music for ever around my love and me!

LAVARCAM--They are the birds of Angus. Their singing brings love--anddeath. 

DEIRDRE--Nay, death has come before love, dear fostermother, and all Iwas has vanished like a dewdrop in the sun. Oh, beloved, let us go. Weare leaving death behind us in the valley. 

[DEIRDRE and the brothers go through the wood. LAVARCAM watches, andwhen they are out of sight sits by the door of the dun with her headbowed to her knees. After a little CONCOBAR enters. ]

CONCOBAR--Where is Deirdre?

LAVARCAM--(not lifting her head). Deirdre has left death behind her, andhas entered into the Kingdom of her Youth. 

CONCOBAR--Do not speak to me in portents. Lift up your head, Druidess. Where is Deirdre?

LAVARCAM--(looking up). Deirdre is gone!

CONCOBAR--By the high gods, tell me whither, and who has dared to takeher hence?

LAVARCAM--She has fled with Naisi, son of Usna, and is beyond yourvengeance, king. 

CONCOBAR--Woman, I swear by Balor, Tethra, and all the brood of demons, I will have such a vengeance a thousand years hereafter shall befrightened at the tale. If the Red Branch is to fall, it will sink atleast in the seas of the blood of the clan Usna. 

LAVARCAM--O king, the doom of the Red Branch had already gone forth whenyou suffered love for Deirdre to enter your heart. 

[Scene closes. ]

ACT II. 

SCENE. --In a dun by Loch Etive. Through the open door can be seen lakesand wooded islands in a silver twilight. DEIRDRE stands at the doorlooking over the lake. NAISI is within binding a spearhead to the shaft. 

DEIRDRE--How still is the twilight! It is the sunset, not of one, butof many days--so still, so still, so living! The enchantment of Dana isupon the lakes and islands and woods, and the Great Father looks downthrough the deepening heavens. 

NAISI--Thou art half of their world, beautiful woman, and it seemsfair to me, gazing on thine eyes. But when thou art not beside me theflashing of spears is more to be admired than a whole heaven-full ofstars. 

DEIRDRE--O Naisi! still dost thou long, for the Red Branch and the perilof battles and death. 

NAISI--Not for the Red Branch, nor the peril of battles, nor death, do Ilong. But--

DEIRDRE--But what, Naisi? What memory of Eri hast thou hoarded in thyheart?

NAISI--(bending over his spear) It is nothing, Deirdre. 

DEIRDRE--It is a night of many days, Naisi. See, all the bright day hadhidden is revealed! Look, there! A star! and another star! They couldnot see each other through the day, for the hot mists of the sun wereabout them. Three years of the sun have we passed in Alba, Naisi, andnow, O star of my heart, truly do I see you, this night of many days. 

NAISI--Though my breast lay clear as a crystal before thee, thou couldstsee no change in my heart. 

DEIRDRE--There is no change, beloved; but I see there one memory warringon thy peace. 

NAISI--What is it then, wise woman?

DEIRDRE--O Naisi, I have looked within thy heart, and thou hast thereimagined a king with scornful eyes thinking of thy flight. 

NAISI--By the gods, but it is true! I would give this kingdom I have wonin Alba to tell the proud monarch I fear him not. 

DEIRDRE--O Naisi, that thought will draw thee back to Eri, and to I knownot what peril and death beyond the seas. 

NAISI--I will not war on the Red Branch. They were ever faithfulcomrades. Be at peace, Deirdre. 

DEIRDRE--Oh, how vain it is to say to the heart, "Be at peace, " when theheart will not rest! Sorrow is on me, beloved, and I know not wherefore. It has taken the strong and fast place of my heart, and sighs therehidden in my love for thee. 

NAISI--Dear one, the songs of Ainle and the pleasant tales of Ardan willdrive away thy sorrow. 

DEIRDRE--Ainle and Ardan! Where are they? They linger long. 

NAISI--They are watching a sail that set hitherward from the south. 

DEIRDRE--A sail!

NAISI--A sail! What is there to startle thee in that? Have not athousand galleys lain in Loch Etive since I built this dun by the sea. 

DEIRDRE--I do not know, but my spirit died down in my heart as youspake. I think the wind that brings it blows from Eri, and it is it hasbrought sorrow to me. 

NAISI--My beautiful one, it is but a fancy. It is some merchant comeshither to barter Tyrian cloths for the cunning work of our smiths. Butglad would I be if he came from Eri, and I would feast him here for anight, and sit round a fire of turves and hear of the deeds of the RedBranch. 

DEIRDRE--Your heart for ever goes out to the Red Branch, Naisi. Werethere any like unto thee, or Ainle, or Ardan?

NAISI--We were accounted most skilful, but no one was held to be braverthan another. If there were one it was great Fergus who laid aside thesilver rod which he held as Ardrie of Ulla, but he is in himself greaterthan any king. 

DEIRDRE--And does one hero draw your heart back to Eri?

NAISI--A river of love, indeed, flows from my heart unto Fergus, forthere is no one more noble. But there were many others, Conal, and theboy we called Cuculain, a dark, sad child, who was the darling of theRed Branch, and truly he seemed like one who would be a world-famouswarrior. There were many held him to be a god in exile. 

DEIRDRE--I think we, too, are in exile in this world. But tell me whoelse among the Red Branch do you think of with love?

NAISI--There was the Ardrie, Concobar, whom no man knows, indeed, for heis unfathomable. But he is a wise king, though moody and passionateat times, for he was cursed in his youth for a sin against one of theSidhe. 

DEIRDRE--Oh, do not speak of him! My heart falls at the thought of himas into a grave, and I know I will die when we meet. 

NAISI--I know one who will die before that, my fawn. 

DEIRDRE--Naisi! You remember when we fled that night; as I lay by thyside--thou wert yet strange to me--I heard voices speaking out of theair. The great ones were invisible, yet their voices sounded solemnly. "Our brother and our sister do not remember, " one said; and anotherspake: "They will serve the purpose all the same, " and there was morewhich I could not understand, but I knew we were to bring some greatgift to the Gael. Yesternight, in a dream, I heard the voices again, andI cannot recall what they said; but as I woke from sleep my pillow waswet with tears falling softly, as out of another world, and I saw beforeme thy face, pale and still, Naisi, and the king, with his implacableeyes. Oh, pulse of my heart, I know the gift we shall give to the Gaelwill be a memory to pity and sigh over, and I shall be the priestess oftears. Naisi, promise me you will never go back to Ulla--swear to me, Naisi. 

NAISI--I will, if--

[Here AINLE and ARDAN enter. ]

AINLE--Oh, great tidings, brother!

DEIRDRE--I feel fate is stealing on us with the footsteps of those welove. Before they speak, promise me, Naisi. 

AINLE--What is it, dear sister? Naisi will promise thee anything, and ifhe does not we will make him do it all the same. 

DEIDRE--Oh, let me speak! Both Death and the Heart's Desire are speedingto win the race. Promise me, Naisi, you will never return to Ulla. 

ARDAN--Naisi, it were well to hear what tale may come from Emain Macha. One of the Red Branch displays our banner on a galley from the South. Ihave sent a boat to bring this warrior to our dun. It may be Concobar isdead. 

DEIRDRE--Why should we return? Is not the Clan Usna greater here thanever in Eri. 

AINLE--Dear sister, it is the land which gave us birth, which ever likea mother whispered to us, and its whisper is sweeter than the promiseof beloved lips. Though we are kings here in Alba we are exiles, and theheart is afar from its home. [A distant shout is heard. ]

NAISI--I hear a call like the voice of a man of Eri. 

DEIRDRE--It is only a herdsman calling home his cattle. (She puts herarms round NAISI's neck. ) Beloved, am I become so little to you thatyour heart is empty, and sighs for Eri?

NAISI--Deirdre, in my flight I have brought with me many whose desire isafar, while you are set as a star by my side. They have left their ownland and many a maiden sighs for the clansmen who never return. There isalso the shadow of fear on my name, because I fled and did not face theking. Shall I swear to keep my comrades in exile, and let the shame offear rest on the chieftain of their clan?

DEIRDRE--Can they not go? Are we not enough for each other, for surelyto me thou art hearth and home, and where thou art there the dream ends, and beyond it. There is no other dream. [A voice is heard without, moreclearly calling. ]

AINLE--It is a familiar voice that calls! And I thought I heard thyname, Naisi. 

ARDAN--It is the honey-sweet speech of a man of Eri. 

DEIRDRE--It is one of our own clansmen. Naisi, will you not speak? Thehour is passing, and soon there will be naught but a destiny. 

FERGUS--(without) Naisi! Naisi!

NAISI--A deep voice, like the roar of a storm god! It is Fergus whocomes from Eri. 

ARDAN--He comes as a friend. There is no treachery in the Red Branch. 

AINLE. --Let us meet him, and give him welcome! [The brothers go tothe door of the dun. DEIRDRE leans against the wall with terror in hereyes. ]

DEIRDRE--(in a low broken voice). Naisi! (NAISI returns to her side. AINLE and ARDAN go out. DEIRDRE rests one hand on NAISI's shoulders andwith the other points upwards. ) Do you not see them? The bright birdswhich sang at our flight! Look, how they wheel about us as they sing!What a heart-rending music! And their plumage, Naisi! It is all dabbledwith crimson; and they shake a ruddy dew from their wings upon us! Yourbrow is stained with the drops. Let me clear away the stains. They pourover your face and hands. Oh! [She hides her face on NAISI's breast. ]

NAISI--Poor, frightened one, there are no birds! See, how clear are myhands! Look again on my face. 

DEIRDRE--(looking up for an instant). Oh! blind, staring eyes. 

NAISI--Nay, they are filled with love, light of my heart. What hastroubled your mind? Am I not beside you, and a thousand clansmen aroundour dun?

DEIRDRE--They go, and the music dies out. What was it Lavarcam said?Their singing brings love and death. 

NAISI--What matters death, for love will find us among the Ever LivingOnes. We are immortals and it does not become us to grieve. 

DEIRDRE--Naisi, there is some treachery in the coming of Fergus. 

NAISI--I say to you, Deirdre, that treachery is not to be spoken of withFergus. He was my fosterer, who taught me all a chieftain should feel, and I shall not now accuse him on the foolish fancy of a woman. (Heturns from DEIRDRE, and as he nears the door FERGUS enters with handslaid affectionately on a shoulder of each of the brothers; BUINNE andILANN follow. ) Welcome, Fergus! Glad is my heart at your coming, whetheryou bring good tidings or ill!

FERGUS--I would not have crossed the sea of Moyle to bring thee illtidings, Naisi. (He sees DEIRDRE. ) My coming has affrighted thy lady, who shakes like the white wave trembling before its fall. I swear tothee, Deirdre, that the sons of Usna are dear to me as children to afather. 

DEIRDRE--The Birds of Angus showed all fiery and crimson as you came!

BUINNE--If we are not welcome in this dun let us return!

FERGUS--Be still, hasty boy. 

ILANN--The lady Deirdre has received some omen or warning on ouraccount. When the Sidhe declare their will, we should with due aweconsider it. 

ARDAN--Her mind has been troubled by a dream of some ill to Naisi. 

NAISI--It was not by dreaming evils that the sons of Usna grew to bechampions in Ulla. And I took thee to my heart, Deirdre, though theDruids trembled to murmur thy name. 

FERGUS--If we listened to dreamers and foretellers the sword would neverflash from its sheath. In truth, I have never found the Sidhe send omensto warriors; they rather bid them fly to herald our coming. 

DEIRDRE--And what doom comes with thee now that such omens fled beforethee? I fear thy coming, warrior. I fear the Lights of Valor will besoon extinguished. 

FERGUS--Thou shalt smile again, pale princess, when thou hast heard mytale. It is not to the sons of Usna I would bring sorrow. Naisi, thouart free to return to Ulla. 

NAISI--Does the king then forego his vengeance?

DEIRDRE--The king will never forego his vengeance. I have looked on hisface--the face of one who never changes his purpose. 

FERGUS--He sends forgiveness and greetings. 

DEIRDRE--O Naisi, he sends honied words by the mouth of Fergus, but thepent-up death broods in his own heart. 

BUINNE--We were tempest-beaten, indeed, on the sea of Moyle, but thestorm of this girl's speech is more fearful to face. 

FERGUS--Your tongue is too swift, Buinne. I say to you, Deirdre, that ifall the kings of Eri brooded ill to Naisi, they dare not break throughmy protection. 

NAISI--It is true, indeed, Fergus, though I have never asked anyprotection save my own sword. It is a chill welcome you give to Fergusand his sons, Deirdre. Ainle, tell them within to make ready thefeasting hall. [AINLE goes into an inner room. ]

DEIRDRE--I pray thy pardon, warrior. Thy love for Naisi I do not doubt. But in this holy place there is peace, and the doom that Cathvah theDruid cried cannot fall. And oh, I feel, too, there, is One here amongus who pushes us silently from the place of life, and we are driftingaway--away from the world, on a tide which goes down into the darkness!

ARDAN--The darkness is in your mind alone, poor sister. Great is our joyto hear the message of Fergus. 

NAISI--It is not like the king to change his will. Fergus, what haswrought upon his mind?

FERGUS--He took counsel with the Druids and Lavarcam, and thereafterspake at Emain Macha, that for no woman in the world should the sons ofUsna be apart from the Red Branch. And so we all spake joyfully; and Ihave come with the king's message of peace, for he knew that for noneelse wouldst thou return. 

NAISI--Surely, I will go with thee, Fergus. I long for the shiningeyes of friends and the fellowship of the Red Branch, and to see my owncountry by the sea of Moyle. I weary of this barbarous people in Alba. 

DEIRDRE--O children of Usna, there is death in your going! Naisi, willyou not stay the storm bird of sorrow? I forehear the falling of tearsthat cease not, and in generations unborn the sorrow of it all that willnever be stilled!

NAISI--Deirdre! Deirdre! It is not right for you, beautiful woman, to come with tears between a thousand exiles and their own land! Manybattles have I fought, knowing well there would be death and weepingafter. If I feared to trust to the word of great kings and warriors, itis not with tears I would be remembered. What would the bards sing ofNaisi--without trust! afraid of the outstretched hand!--freighted by awoman's fears! By the gods, before the clan Usna were so shamed I wouldshed my blood here with my own hand. 

DEIRDRE--O stay, stay your anger! Have pity on me, Naisi! Your words, like lightnings, sear my heart. Never again will I seek to stay thee. But speak to me with love once more, Naisi. Do not bend your brows on mewith anger; for, oh! but a little time remains for us to love!

FERGUS--Nay, Deirdre, there are many years. Thou shalt yet smile back onthis hour in thy old years thinking of the love and laughter between. 

AINLE--(entering) The feast is ready for our guests. 

ARDAN--The bards shall sing of Eri tonight. Let the harpers sound theirgayest music. Oh, to be back once more in royal Emain!

NAISI--Come, Deirdre, forget thy fears. Come, Fergus, I long to hearfrom thy lips of the Red Branch and Ulla. 

FERGUS--It is geasa with me not to refuse a feast offered by one of theRed Branch. 

[FERGUS, BUINNE, ILANN, and the sons of Usna go into the inner room. DEIRDRE remains silently standing for a time, as if stunned. The soundof laughter and music floats in. She goes to the door of the dun, looking out again over the lakes and islands. ]

DEIRDRE--Farewell O home of happy memories. Though thou art bleak toNaisi, to me thou art bright. I shall never see thee more, save asshadows we wander here, weeping over what is gone. Farewell, O gentlepeople, who made music for me on the hills. The Father has struck thelast chord on the Harp of Life, and the music I shall hear hereafterwill be only sorrow. O Mother Dana, who breathed up love through the dimearth to my heart, be with me where I am going. Soon shall I lie closeto thee for comfort, where many a broken heart has lain and many aweeping head. [Music of harps and laughter again floats in. ]

VOICES--Deirdre! Deirdre! Deirdre!

[DEIRDRE leaves the door of the dun, and the scene closes as she flingsherself on a couch, burying her face in her arms. ]

ACT III. 

SCENE. --The House of the Red Branch at Emain Macha. There is a doorcovered with curtains, through which the blue light of evening can beseen. CONCOBAR sits at a table on which is a chessboard, with figuresarranged. LAVARCAM stands before the table. 

CONCOBAR--The air is dense with omens, but all is uncertain. Cathvah, for all his Druid art, is uncertain, and cannot foresee the future;and in my dreams, too, I again see Macha, who died at my feet, and shepasses by me with a secret exultant smile. O Druidess, is the sin of myboyhood to be avenged by this woman who comes back to Eri in a cloud ofprophecy?

LAVARCAM--The great beauty has passed from Deirdre in her wanderingsfrom place to place and from island to island. Many a time has she slepton the bare earth ere Naisi won a kingdom for himself in Alba. Surelythe prophecy has already been fulfilled, for blood has been shed forDeirdre, and the Red Branch divided on her account. To Naisi the RedBranch are as brothers. Thou hast naught to fear. 

CONCOBAR--Well, I have put aside my fears and taken thy counsel, Druidess. For the sake of the Red Branch I have forgiven the sons ofUsna. Now, I will call together the Red Branch, for it is my purposeto bring the five provinces under our sway, and there shall be but onekingdom in Eri between the seas. [A distant shouting of many voices isheard. LAVARCAM starts, clasping her hands. ]

Why dost thou start, Druidess? Was it not foretold from of old, that thegods would rule over one people in Eri? I sometimes think the warriorsoul of Lu shines through the boy Cuculain, who, after me, shall guidethe Red Branch; aye, and with him are many of the old company who foughtat Moytura, come back to renew the everlasting battle. Is not this theIsle of Destiny, and the hour at hand? [The clamor is again renewed. ]

What, is this clamor as if men hailed a king? (Calls. ) Is thereone without there? (ILANN enters. ) Ah! returned from Alba with thefugitives!

ILANN--King, we have fulfilled our charge. The sons of Usna are with usin Emain Macha. Whither is it your pleasure they should be led?

CONCOBAR--They shall be lodged here, in the House of the Red Branch. (ILANN is about to withdraw. ) Yet, wait, what mean all these cries as ofastonished men?

ILANN--The lady, Deirdre, has come with us, and her beauty is a wonderto the gazers in the streets, for she moves among them like one of theSidhe, whiter than ivory, with long hair of gold, and her eyes, like theblue flame of twilight, make mystery in their hearts. 

CONCOBAR--(starting up) This is no fading beauty who returns! You hear, Druidess!

ILANN--Ardrie of Ulla, whoever has fabled to thee that the beauty ofDeirdre is past has lied. She is sorrowful, indeed, but her sadness onlybows the heart to more adoration than her joy, and pity for her seemssweeter than the dream of love. Fading! Yes, her yesterday fades behindher every morning, and every changing mood seems only an unveiling tobring her nearer to the golden spirit within. But how could I describeDeirdre? In a little while she will be here, and you shall see her withyour own eyes. [ILLAN bows and goes out]

CONCOBAR--I will, indeed, see her with my own eyes. I will not, on thereport of a boy, speak words that shall make the Red Branch to drip withblood. I will see with my own eyes. (He goes to the door. ) But I swearto thee, Druidess, if thou hast plotted deceit a second time with Naisi, that all Eri may fall asunder, but I will be avenged. 

[He holds the curtain aside with one hand and looks out. As he gazeshis face grows sterner, and he lifts his hand above his head in menace. LAVARCAM looks on with terror, and as he drops the curtain and looksback on her, she lets her face sink in her hands. ]

CONCOBAR--(scornfully) A Druid makes prophecies and a Druidess schemesto bring them to pass! Well have you all worked together! A fadingbeauty was to return, and the Lights of Valor to shine again in theRed-Branch! And I, the Ardrie of Ulla and the head of the Red Branch, topass by the broken law and the after deceit! I, whose sole thought wasof the building up of a people, to be set aside! The high gods may judgeme hereafter, but tonight shall see the broken law set straight, andvengeance on the traitors to Ulla!

LAVARCAM--It was all my doing! They are innocent! I loved Deirdre, Oking! let your anger be on me alone. 

CONCOBAR--Oh, tongue of falsehood! Who can believe you! The fate of Ullawas in your charge, and you let it go forth at the instant wish of aman and a girl's desire. The fate of Ulla was too distant, and you mustbring it nigher--the torch to the pile! Breakers of the law and makersof lies, you shall all perish together!

[CONCOBAR leaves the room. LAVARCAM remains, her being shaken with sobs. After a pause NAISI enters with DEIRDRE. AINLE, ARDAN, ILANN, and BUINNEfollow. During the dialogue which ensues, NAISI is inattentive, and iscuriously examining the chess-board. ]

DEIRDRE--We are entering a house of death! Who is it that weeps so? I, too, would weep, but the children of Usna are too proud to let tears beseen in the eyes of their women. (She sees LAVARCAM, who raises her headfrom the table. ) O fostermother, for whom do you sorrow? Ah! it is forus. You still love me dear fostermother; but you, who are wise, couldyou not have warned the Lights of Valor? Was it kind to keep silence, and only meet us here with tears?

LAVARCAM--O Deirdre, my child! my darling! I have let love and longingblind my eyes. I left the mountain home of the gods for Emain Macha, and to plot for your return. I--I deceived the king. I told him yourloveliness was passed, and the time of the prophecy gone by. I thoughtwhen you came all would be well. I thought wildly, for love had made ablindness in my heart, and now the king has discovered the deceit; and, oh! he has gone away in wrath, and soon his terrible hand will fall!

DEIRDRE--It was not love made you all blind, but the high gods havedeserted us, and the demons draw us into a trap. They have lured us fromAlba, and they hover here above us in red clouds--cloud upon cloud--andawait the sacrifice. 

LAVARACAM--Oh, it is not yet too late! Where is Fergus? The king darenot war on Fergus. Fergus is our only hope. 

DEIRDRE--Fergus has bartered his honor for a feast. He remained withBaruch that he might boast he never refused the wine cup. He feasts withBaruch, and the Lights of Valor who put their trust in him--must die. 

BUINNE--Fergus never bartered his honor. I do protest, girl, againstyour speech. The name of Fergus alone would protect you throughout allEri; how much more here, where he is champion in Ulla. Come, brother, weare none of us needed here. [BUINNE leaves the room. ]

DEIRDRE--Father and son alike desert us! O fostermother, is this the endof all? Is there no way out? Is there no way out?

ILANN--I will not desert you, Deirdre, while I can still thrust a spear. But you, fear overmuch without a cause. 

LAVARACAM--Bar up the door and close the windows. I will send a swiftmessenger for Fergus. If you hold the dun until Fergus comes all willyet be well. [LAVARCAM hurries out. ]

DEIRDRE---(going to NAISI)--Naisi, do you not hear? Let the door bebarred! Ainle and Ardan, are you still all blind? Oh! must I close themwith my own hand!

[DEIRDRE goes to the Window, and lays her hand on the bars NAISI followsher. ]

NAISI--Deirdre, in your girlhood you have not known of the ways of theRed Branch. This thing you fear is unheard of in Ulla. The king maybe wrathful; but the word, once passed, is inviolable. If he whisperedtreachery to one of the Red Branch he would not be Ardrie tomorrow. Nay, leave the window unbarred, or they will say the sons of Usna havereturned timid as birds! Come, we are enough protection for thee. See, here is the chessboard of Concobar, with which he is wont to divine, playing a lonely game with fate. The pieces are set. We will finish thegame, and so pass the time until the feast is ready. (He sits down) Thegolden pieces are yours and the silver mine. 

AINLE--(looking at the board) You have given Deirdre the weaker side. 

NAISI--Deirdre always plays with more cunning skill. 

DEIRDRE--O fearless one, if he who set the game played with fate, thevictory is already fixed, and no skill may avail. 

NAISI--We will see if Concobar has favourable omens. It is geasa for himalways to play with silver pieces. I will follow his game. It is yourmove. Dear one, will you not smile? Surely, against Concobar you willplay well. 

DEIRDRE--It is too late. See, everywhere my king is threatened!

ARDAN--Nay, your game is not lost. If you move your king back all willbe well. 

MESSENGER--(at the door) I bear a message from the Ardrie to the sons ofUsna. 

NAISI--Speak out thy message, man. Why does thy voice tremble? Who artthou? I do not know thee. Thou art not one of the Red Branch. Concobaris not wont to send messages to kings by such as thou. 

MESSENGER--The Red Branch are far from Emain Macha--but it matters not. The king has commanded me to speak thus to the sons of Usna. You havebroken the law of Ulla when you stole away the daughter of Felim. Youhave broken the law of the Red Branch when you sent lying messagesthrough Lavarcam plotting to return. The king commands that the daughterof Felim be given up, and--

AINLIE--Are we to listen to this?

ARDAN--My spear will fly of itself if he does not depart. 

NAISI--Nay, brother, he is only a slave. (To the MESSENGER. ) Return toConcobar, and tell him that tomorrow the Red Branch will choose anotherchief. There, why dost thou wait? Begone! (To DEIRDRE. ) Oh, wise woman, truly did you see the rottenness in this king!

DEIRDRE--Why did you not take my counsel, Naisi? For now it is toolate--too late. 

NAISI--There is naught to fear. One of us could hold this dun againsta thousand of Concobar's household slaves. When Fergus comes tomorrowthere will be another king in Emain Macha. 

ILANN--It is true, Deirdre. One of us is enough for Concobar's householdslaves. I will keep watch at the door while you play at peace withNaisi. 

[ILANN lifts the curtain of the door and goes outside. The Play at chessbegins again. AINLE and ARDAN look on. ]

AINLE--Naisi, you play wildly. See, your queen will be taken. [Adisturbance without and the clash of arms. ]

ILANN--(Without) Keep back! Do you dare?

NAISI--Ah! the slaves come on, driven by the false Ardrie! When the gameis finished we will sweep them back and slay them in the Royal Housebefore Concobar's eyes. Play! You forget to move, Deirdre. [The clash ofarms is renewed. ]

ILANN--(without) Oh! I am wounded. Ainle! Ardan! To the door!

[AINLE and ARDAN rush out. The clash of arms renewed. ]

DEIRDRE--Naisi, I cannot. I cannot. The end of all has come. Oh, Naisi![She flings her arms across the table, scattering the pieces over theboard. ]

NAISI--If the end has come we should meet it with calm. It is not withsighing and tears the Clan Usna should depart. You have not played thisgame as it ought to be played. 

DEIRDRE--Your pride is molded and set like a pillar of bronze. Owarrior, I was no mate for you. I am only a woman, who has given herlife into your hands, and you chide me for my love. 

NAISI--(caressing her head with his hands) Poor timid dove, I hadforgotten thy weakness. I did not mean to wound thee, my heart. Oh, many will shed hotter tears than these for thy sorrow! They will perishswiftly who made Naisi's queen to weep! [He snatches up a spear andrushes out. There are cries, and then a silence. ]

LAVARCAM--(entering hurriedly) Bear Deirdre swiftly away through thenight. (She stops and looks around. ) Where are the sons of Usna? Oh! Istepped over many dead bodies at the door. Surely the Lights of Valorwere not so soon overcome! Oh, my darling! come away with me from thisterrible house. 

DEIRDRE--(Slowly) What did you say of the Lights of Valor?That--they--were dead?

[NAISI, AINLE, and ARDAN re-enter. DEIRDRE clings to NAISI. ]

NAISI--My gentle one, do not look so pale nor wound me with thoseterror-stricken eyes. Those base slaves are all fled. Truly Concobar isa mighty king without the Red Branch!

LAVARCAM--Oh, do not linger here. Bear Deirdre away while there is time. You can escape through the city in the silence of the night. The kinghas called for his Druids; soon the magic of Cathvah will enfold you, and your strength will be all withered away. 

NAISI--I will not leave Emain Macha until the head of this false king isapart from his shoulders. A spear can pass as swiftly through his Druidas through one of his slaves. Oh, Cathvah, the old mumbler of spells andof false prophecies, who caused Deirdre to be taken from her mother'sbreast! Truly, I owe a deep debt to Cathvah, and I Will repay it. 

LAVARCAM--If you love Deirdre, do not let pride and wrath stay yourflight. You have but an instant to fly. You can return with Fergus anda host of warriors in the dawn. You do not know the power of Cathvah. Surely, if you do not depart, Deirdre will fall into the king's hands, and it were better she had died in her mother's womb. 

DEIRDRE--Naisi, let us leave this house of death. [The sound offootsteps without]

LAVARCAM--It is too late!

[AINLE and ARDAN start to the door, but are stayed at the sound ofCATHVAH'S voice. DEIRDRE clings to NAISI. CATHVAH (chanting without)]

Let the Faed Fia fall; Mananaun Mac Lir. Take back the day Amid daysunremembered. Over the warring mind Let thy Faed Fia fall, Mananaun MacLir!

NAISI--Why dost thou weep, Deirdre, and cling to me so? The sea is calm. Tomorrow we will rest safely at Emain Macha with the great Ardrie, whohas forgiven all. 

LAVARCAM--The darkness is upon his mind. Oh, poor Deirdre!

CATHVAH (without)--

 Let thy waves rise, Mananaun Mac Lir. Let the earth fail Beneath their feet, Let thy Waves flow over them, Mananaun: Lord of ocean!

NAISI--Our galley is sinking--and no land in sight! I did not think theend would come so soon. O pale love, take courage. Is death so bitter tothee? We shall go down in each other's arms; our hearts shall beat outtheir love together, and the last of life we shall know will be ourkisses on each other's lips. (AINLE and ARDAN stagger outside. Thereis a sound of blows and a low cry. ) Ainle and Ardan have sunk in thewaters! We are alone. Still weeping! My bird, my bird, soon we shall flytogether to the bright kingdom in the West, to Hy Brazil, amid the opalseas. 

DEIRDRE--Naisi, Naisi, shake off the magic dream. It is here in EmainMacha we are. There are no waters. The spell of the Druid and histerrible chant have made a mist about your eyes. 

NAISI--Her mind is wandering. She is distraught with terror of the king. There, rest your head on my heart. Hush! hush! The waters are flowingupward swiftly. Soon, when all is over, you will laugh at your terror. The great Ardrie will sorrow over our death. 

DEIRDRE--I cannot speak. Lavarcam, can you not break the enchantment?

LAVARCAM--My limbs are fixed here by the spell. 

NAISI--There was music a while ago. The swans of Lir, with their slow, sweet faery singing. There never was a sadder tale than theirs. Theymust roam for ages, driven on the sea of Moyle, while we shall go handin hand through the country of immortal youth. And there is Mananaun, the dark blue king, who looks at us with a smile of welcome. Ildathachis lit up with its shining mountains, and the golden phantoms areleaping there in the dawn! There is a path made for us! Come, Deirdre, the god has made for us an island on the sea. (NAISI goes throughthe door, and falls back, smitten by a spear-thrust. ) The DruidCathvah!--The king!--O Deirdre! [He dies. DEIRDRE bends over the body, taking the hands in hers. ]

LAVARCAM--O gentle heart, thy wounds will be more bitter than his. Speakbut a word. That silent sorrow will kill thee and me. My darling, it wasfate, and I was not to blame. Come, it will comfort thee to weep besidemy breast. Leave the dead for vengeance, for heavy is the vengeance thatshall fall on this ruthless king. 

DEIRDRE--I do not fear Concobar any more. My spirit is sinking away fromthe world, I could not stay after Naisi. After the Lights of Valorhad vanished, how could I remain? The earth has grown dim and old, fostermother. The gods have gone far away, and the lights from themountains and the Lions of the Flaming Heart are still, O fostermother, when they heap the cairn over him, let me be beside him in the narrowgrave. I will still be with the noble one. 

[DEIRDRE lays her head on NAISI's body. CONCOBAR enters, standing in thedoorway. LAVARCAM takes DEIRDRE'S hand and drops it. ]

LAVARCAM--Did you come to torture her with your presence? Was not thedeath of Naisi cruelty enough? But now she is past your power to wound. 

CONCOBAR--The death of Naisi was only the fulfilling of the law. Ullacould not hold together if its ancient laws were set aside. 

LAVARCAM--Do you think to bind men together when you have brokentheir hearts? O fool, who would conquer all Eri! I see the Red Branchscattered and Eri rent asunder, and thy memory a curse after manythousand years. The gods have overthrown thy dominion, proud king, withthe last sigh from this dead child; and out of the pity for her theywill build up an eternal kingdom in the spirit of man. [An uproarwithout and the clash of arms. ]

VOICES--Fergus! Fergus! Fergus!

LAVARCAM--The avenger has come! So perishes the Red Branch! [She hurriesout wildly. ]

CONCOBAR--(Slowly, after a pause) I have two divided kingdoms, and oneis in my own heart. Thus do I pay homage to thee, O Queen, who willrule, being dead. [He bends over the body of DEIRDRE and kisses herhand. ]

FERGUS--(without) Where is the traitor Ardrie?

[CONCOBAR starts up, lifting his spear. FERGUS appears at the doorway, and the scene closes. ]

1901

NOTE TO THOUGHTS FOR A CONVENTION

I was asked to put into shape for publication ideas and suggestions foran Irish settlement which had been discussed among a group whose membersrepresented ah extremes in Irish opinion. The compromise arrived atwas embodied in documents written by members of the group privatelycirculated, criticized and again amended. I make special acknowledgmentsto Colonel Maurice Moore, Mr. James G. Douglas, Mr. Edward E. Lysaght, Mr. Joseph Johnston, F. T. C. D. , Mr. Alec Wilson and Mr. Diarmuid Coffey. For the tone, method of presentation, and general arguments used, Ialone am responsible. And if any are offended at what I have said, I amto be blamed, not my fellow-workers. 

The author desires to make acknowledgment to The Times for permission toinclude an article on "The Spiritual Conflict. "