Nymphs
(Who are to the shepherd voices, and nothing more):
"Our service hath ceased for you, shepherds!
We fade from your days and your dreams,
With the grace that was lithe as a leopard's,
The joy that was swift as a stream's!
To the musical reeds, and the grasses;
To the forest, the copse, and the dell;
To the mist and the rainbow that passes,
The vine, and the goblet, farewell!
Go, drink from the fountains that flow not!
Our songs and our whispers are dumb:—
But the thing ye are doing ye know not,
Nor dream of the thing that shall come."
In Scene IV., Deukalion, leading Pyrrha, passes into a cavern, the last mouth of Hades left on the earth. Presently, the two emerge upon "a shadowy, colorless landscape," and are greeted by a chorus of ghosts, which very explicitly formulates that dreary impossibility of growth which I pointed out in the last lecture as incident to the old conception of personality.
"Chorus of Ghosts.
"Away!
Ashes that once were fires,
Darkness that once was day,
Dead passions, dead desires,
Alone can enter here!
In rest there is no strife,
Like some forgotten star,
What first we were, we are,
The past is adamant:
The future will not grant
That, which in all its range
We pray for—change."
In spite of these warnings, they push on, find Charon at his old place by the dark river, but are left to row themselves across, Charon pleading age and long-unused joints; and, after many adventures, find Prometheus, who very distinctly declares to Prince Deukalion and Pyrrha their mission.