Sir T. I thought so; I believed so. But I found
The most ignoble strife; a jug of asps,
Where envy, vanity, avarice, wanton spite
Torment and are tormented; with such a gloss
Of tolerance and of fellowship—humour, tears,
That soothe the grit of misery into pearl!
St. J. Men cross to fortune on the stepping-stones
Of ruined rivals; matter exploits us so;
But which is better off, who triumphs most,
The ruined or the ruiner? That's reserved.
Sir T. I know, I know! And then the modern play!
St. J. Let us not think it!
Sir T. Only once it seems
A people has a theatre. Drama leaps
To instant being, power, supremacy:
From "Gorboduc" to "The Tempest" fifty years;
And nothing since. Nor can it come again,
Imagination being an outcast now,
Unsceptred, unrefreshed, unclad, unknown
In palace, hut, or hermitage: no home;
A wandering bedlam. When the world believed
In miracles of sorcery, potent drugs
Alchemical, and constellated fate
In heaven hung, then fancy had a lodge——
St. J. All this is so——
Sir T. Be patient! Here I snatch
A moment's ease, as in an interval
Of torture. While the worn-out squaws repose,
(Harpies or fiends: the laugh twists on my mouth!)
Devising keener pangs, I hear again
The fabulous music of the crystalline
Accordant spheres; so let this perfume fade,
Wind-wafted fragrance of a love-lorn scarf
Bidding farewell for ever and a day.
When elves and fairies haunted brakes and bowers,
And gods and goddesses were visitors
Hesternal at the latest; when Heaven and Hell
Was as a casket closed about the earth,
The universal jewel; and man himself
The awful judge of angels and the mate
Of God, worthy divine redemption, then
There broke a drama great and beautiful
Fresh from the dulcet brains and pregnant heart
Of England. Soul was clad; the mind, informed;
Imagination, armed, anointed, crowned;
But now all naked, empty, abject, stripped
And flayed! You understand?
St. J. I understand.
Men know there is no God, no Heaven and Hell:
They welcomed that in secret—all who thought.
But, God away, the Universe becomes
A vacuum, and the welcome turns to cursing.
They thought, "We need no God; we have our art,
"Our poetry: God is gone." But all else went
When God went: 'twas the breath of God that filled
The pipe of Pan, the bosom and the sigh
Of Aphrodite; goblins, loreleis,
Enchantments, witchcraft, ghosts, transcendent deeds,
Amazement, terror, beauty, rapture, tears,
Intolerable passions, agonies
Were of the warp and woof of God: God summed
Imagination.
Sir T. And there's no such God!
St. J. No God to speak of: the idea of God—
That's for the schoolmen: for the fatherless,
The girls that drown their bastards, broken hearts,
Incapables, incurables, castaways,
Endurers, heroes, poets, artists, kings,
Classes or masses, all who love their lives—
It helps them much to tell them of a God
Evolving slowly in the mind of man!