Ard. Be 't so,
Each birth is a high venture of the soul
Feeling an untried way for deity's dream,
And none may know where th' deep and twilight trail
Shall flash with God-rift, and the dawn be his.
Ber. O, bravest, bow thy head——
Ard. Nay, nay, my lord!
Lock up your spirit, let mine rule this hour,
Or be with me the flame of faith that leaps
To deed in God. For we do help him, dear.
Our parcelled strength is whole and new in His,
A power born that touches us again,
Breeding our greater self that yet gives back
His own increase, until the way is strewn
Even with his miracles and ours. So works
The unending drama out, where every act
Begets an act yet greater than itself.
Ber. Let me but kiss thy hands.
Ard. You will not help?
You'll not believe? Is it so strange
That you should live?
Ber. That hate should let me live.
Ard. Is it more strange that halo should grow love-still,
Than that the wind should cease, as now it does,
To strip the bloom from yonder bough, and lie
Unfelt within its silent place? More strange
That life should keep its flow in your warm veins
Than that the sun now creeping on the peaks
Should wander down and on and lay in gold
The valleys of the world, moved by no hand
We see or name, but know, but know!
[Biondel, Vigard, and Banissat re-enter]
Ard. He lives!
Bion. He lives. Speak the conditions, prince.