I heard it in my youth when first
The waters of my life outburst:

But, now their stream ebbs faint, I hear
That voice, still low, but fatal-clear—
As if all poets, God ever meant

Should save the world, and therefore lent
Great gifts to, but who, proud, refused

To do his work, or lightly used

Those gifts, or failed through weak endeavour,

So, mourn cast off by him for ever,—

As if these leaned in airy ring

To take me; this the song they sing.

"Lost, lost! yet come,

With our wan troop make thy home.
Come, come! for we

Will not breathe, so much as breathe
Reproach to thee,

Knowing what thou sink'st beneath.
So sank we in those old years,

We who bid thee, come! thou last
Who, living yet, hast life o'erpast.
And altogether we, thy peers,
Will pardon crave for thee, the last

Whose trial is done, whose lot is cast
With those who watch but work no more,

Who gaze on life but live no more.
Yet we trusted thou shouldst speak
The message which our lips, too weak,
Refused to utter,-shouldst redeem

Our fault such trust, and all a dream!
Yet we chose thee a birthplace

Where the richness ran to flowers:
Couldst not sing one song for grace?

Not make one blossom man's and ours?

Must one more recreant to his race

Die with unexerted powers,

And join us, leaving as he found

The world, he was to loosen, bound?

Anguish ever and for ever;
Still beginning, ending never.
Yet, lost and last one, come!
How couldst understand, alas,
What our pale ghosts strove to say,
As their shades did glance and pass
Before thee night and day?

Thou wast blind as we were dumb:

Once more, therefore, come, O come!

How should we clothe, how arm the spirit

Shall next thy post of life inherit—

How guard him from thy speedy ruin?

Tell us of thy sad undoing

Here, where we sit, ever pursuing

Our weary task, ever renewing

Sharp sorrow, far from God who gave

Our powers, and man they could not save!"

APRILE enters.

Ha, ha! our king that wouldst be, here at last?
Art thou the poet who shall save the world?

Thy hand to mine! Stay, fix thine eyes on mine!
Thou wouldst be king? Still fix thine eyes on mine!
Paracelsus. Ha, ha! why crouchest not? Am I not
king?

So torture is not wholly unavailing!

Have my fierce spasms compelled thee from thy lair?

Art thou the sage I only seemed to be,

Myself of after-time, my very self

With sight a little clearer, strength more firm,
Who robes him in my robe and grasps my crown

For just a fault, a weakness, a neglect?

I scarcely trusted God with the surmise

That such might come, and thou didst hear the while! Aprile. Thine eyes are lustreless to mine; my hair

Is soft, nay silken soft to talk with thee

Flushes my cheek, and thou art ashy-pale.

Truly, thou hast laboured, hast withstood her lips,

The siren's!

Yes, 't is like thou hast attained!

Tell me, dear master, wherefore now thou comest?

I thought thy solemn songs would have their meed
In after-time; that I should hear the earth
Exult in thee and echo with thy praise,

While I was laid forgotten in my grave.

Paracelsus. Ah fiend, I know thee, I am not thy dupe ! Thou art ordained to follow in my track, Reaping my sowing, as I scorned to reap

The harvest sown by sages passed away.

Thou art the sober searcher, cautious striver,

As if, except through me, thou hast searched or striven!

Ay, tell the world! Degrade me after all,

To an aspirant after fame, not truth

To all but envy of thy fate, be sure!

Aprile. Nay, sing them to me; I shall envy not:
Thou shalt be king! Sing thou, and I will sit
Beside, and call deep silence for thy songs,
And worship thee, as I had ne'er been meant
To fill thy throne: but none shall ever know!
Sing to me; for already thy wild eyes
Unlock my heart-strings, as some crystal-shaft
Reveals by some chance blaze its parent fount
After long time: so thou reveal'st my soul.
All will flash forth at last, with thee to hear!

Paracelsus. (His secret! I shall get his secret-fool!)

I am he that aspired to KNOW: and thou?

Aprile. I would LOVE infinitely, and be loved!
Paracelsus. Poor slave! I am thy king indeed.
Aprile.
Thou deem'st

That-born a spirit, dowered even as thou,
Born for thy fate-because I could not curb
My yearnings to possess at once the full
Enjoyment, but neglected all the means
Of realizing even the frailest joy,

Gathering no fragments to appease my want,
Yet nursing up that want till thus I die-
Thou deem'st I cannot trace thy safe sure march
O'er perils that o'erwhelm me, triumphing,
Neglecting nought below for aught above,
Despising nothing and ensuring all-

Nor that I could (my time to come again)
Lead thus my spirit securely as thine own.
Listen, and thou shalt see I know thee well.
I would love infinitely . . . Ah, lost! lost!
Oh ye who armed me at such cost,

How shall I look on all of ye

With your gifts even yet on me?

Paracelsus. (Ah, 't is some moonstruck creature after all!

Such fond fools as are like to haunt this den:

They spread contagion, doubtless: yet he seemed