{"id":3441,"date":"2013-07-13T01:48:33","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:48:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=3441"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:48:33","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:48:33","slug":"33-book-six-canto-two-vol-03-savitri-1954","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/02-other-editions\/01-savitri\/03-savitri-1954\/33-book-six-canto-two-vol-03-savitri-1954","title":{"rendered":"-33_Book_Six_Canto_Two.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\n\n
 <\/td>\n\n

\n

<\/p>\n

CANTO TWO<\/font> <\/font>
\n<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

THE WAY OF FATE AND THE PROBLEM<\/font>
\n<\/font><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nOF PAIN<\/font> <\/font><\/b>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A<\/font> SILENCE<\/font><\/b><\/span> sealed the irrevocable decree,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe word of Fate that fell from the heavenly lips<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFixing a doom no power could ever reverse<\/span><\/p>\n

\nUnless heaven’s will itself could change its course.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr so it seemed; yet from the silence rose<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOne voice that questioned changeless destiny.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA will that strove against the immutable Will,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA mother’s heart had heard the fateful speech<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThat rang like a sanction to the call of death<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd came like a chill close to life and hope.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nYet hope sank down like an extinguished fire.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nShe felt the leaden inevitable hand<\/span><\/p>\n

\nInvade the secrecy of her guarded soul<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd smite with sudden pain its still content<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd the empire of her hard-won quietude.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAwhile she fell to the level of human mind,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA field of mortal grief and Nature’s law<\/span><\/p>\n

\nShe shared, she bore the common lot of men<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd felt what common hearts endure in Time.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nVoicing earth’s question to the inscrutable power<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe queen now turned to the still immobile seer:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Assailed by the discontent in Nature’s depths,<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\t\t\t<\/font><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 495<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

Partner in the agony of dumb driven things<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd all the misery, all the ignorant cry,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPassionate like sorrow questioning heaven she spoke,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAwhile she lost her spirit’s tranquil poise,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAwhile she shared the lot of common souls<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd bore the heavy hand of Death and Time<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd felt the anguish in life’s stricken deeps.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLending her speech to the surface soul on earth<\/span><\/p>\n

\nShe uttered the suffering in the world’s dumb heart<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd man’s revolt against his ignorant fate.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n"O seer, in the earth’s strange twi-natured life,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBy what pitiless adverse Necessity<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr what cold freak of a Creator’s will,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBy what random accident or governed Chance<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThat shaped a rule out of fortuitous steps,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMade destiny from an hour’s emotion, came<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe direr mystery of grief and pain?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIs it thy God who made this cruel law?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr some disastrous Power has marred his work<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd he stands helpless to defend or save?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA fatal seed was sown in life’s false start<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhen evil twinned with good on earthly soil.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThen first appeared the malady of mind,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIts pang of thought, its quest for the aim of life.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIt twisted into forms of good and ill<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe frank simplicity of the animal’s acts;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It turned the straight path hewn by the body’s gods,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Followed the zigzag of the uncertain course<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Of life that wanders seeking for its aim<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nIn the pale starlight falling from thought’s skies;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

It guides the unsure idea, the wavering will.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLost was the instinct’s safe identity<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 496<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

With the arrow-point of being’s inmost sight,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMarred the sure steps of Nature’s simple walk<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd truth and freedom in the growing soul.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOut of some ageless innocence and peace,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPrivilege of souls not yet betrayed to birth,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCast down to suffer on this hard dangerous earth<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOur life was born in pain and with a cry.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAlthough earth-nature welcomes heaven’s breath<\/span><\/p>\n

\nInspiring Matter with the will to live,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA thousand ills assail the mortal’s hours<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd wear away the natural joy of life;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Our bodies are an engine cunningly made,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBut for all its parts as cunningly are planned,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nContrived ingeniously with demon skill,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIts apt inevitable heritage<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOf mortal danger and peculiar pain,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIts payment of the tax of Time and Fate,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIts way to suffer and its way to die.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThis is the ransom of our high estate,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe sign and stamp of our humanity.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA grisly company of maladies<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCome, licensed lodgers, into man’s bodily house,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPurveyors of death and torturers of life.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn the malignant hollows of the world,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn its subconscient cavern-passages<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAmbushed they lie waiting their hour to leap,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSurrounding with danger the sieged city of life:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Admitted into the citadel of man’s days<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThey mine his force and maim or suddenly kill.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOurselves within us lethal forces nurse;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

We make of our own enemies our guests:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Out of their holes like beasts they creep and gnaw<\/span><\/p>\n

\n<\/font><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 497<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

The chords of the divine musician’s lyre<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTill frayed and thin the music dies away<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr crashing snaps with a last tragic note.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAll that we are is like a fort beset:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

All that we strive to be alters like a dream<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

In the grey sleep of Matter’s ignorance.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nMind suffers lamed by the world’s disharmony<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And the unloveliness of human things.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nA treasure misspent or cheaply, fruitlessly sold<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

In the bazaar of a blind destiny,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A gift of priceless values from Time’s gods<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Lost or mislaid in an uncaring world,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Life is a marvel missed, an art gone wry;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A seeker in a dark and obscure place,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

An ill-armed warrior facing dreadful odds,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

An imperfect worker given a baffling task,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nAn ignorant judge of problems Ignorance made,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its heavenward nights reach closed and keyless gates,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its glorious outbursts peter out in mire.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

On Nature’s gifts to man a curse was laid.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

All walks inarmed by its own opposites,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Error is the comrade of our mortal thought,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nAnd falsehood lurks in the deep bosom of truth,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Sin poisons with its vivid flowers of joy<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Or leaves a red scar burnt across the soul;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Virtue is a grey bondage and a gaol.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAt every step is laid for us a snare.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAlien to reason and the spirit’s light,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOur fount of action from a darkness wells;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

In ignorance and nescience are our roots.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A growing register of calamities<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nIs the past’s account, the future’s book of Fate:<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 498<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

The centuries pile man’s follies and man’s crimes<\/span><\/p>\n

\nUpon the countless crowd of Nature’s ills;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

As if the world's stone load was not
\nenough<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA crop of miseries obstinately is sown<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBy his own hand in the furrows of the gods,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe vast increasing tragic harvest reaped<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFrom old misdeeds buried by oblivious Time.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe walks by his own choice into hell’s trap;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

This mortal creature is his own worst foe.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHis science is an artificer of doom;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He ransacks earth for means to harm his kind;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

He slays his happiness and others’ good.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nNothing has he learnt from time and its history;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Even as of old in the raw youth of Time,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhen earth ignorant ran on the highways of Fate,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOld forms of evil cling to the world’s soul:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

War making nought the sweet smiling calm of life,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBattle and rapine, ruin and massacre<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAre still the fierce pastimes of man’s warring tribes;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

An idiot hour destroys what centuries made,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His wanton rage or frenzied hate lays low<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The beauty and greatness by his genius wrought<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And the mighty output of a nation’s toil.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

All he has achieved he drags to the precipice.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His grandeur he turns to an epic of doom and fall;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His littleness crawls content through squalor and mud,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He calls heaven’s retribution on his head,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And wallows in his self-made misery.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A part author of the cosmic tragedy,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His will conspires with death and time and fate,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His brief appearance on the enigmaed earth<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Ever recurs, but brings no high result<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 499<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

To "this wanderer through the aeon-rings of God<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThat shut his life in their vast longevity.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHis soul’s wide search and ever returning hopes<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPursue the useless orbit of their course<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn a vain repetition of lost toils<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAcross a track of soon forgotten lives.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAll is an episode in a meaningless tale.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhy is it all and wherefore are we here?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIf to some being of eternal bliss<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIt is our spirit’s destiny to return<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr some still impersonal height of endless calm,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSince That we are and out of That we came,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhence rose the strange and sterile interlude<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLasting in vain through interminable Time?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr if these beings must be and their brief lives,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhat need had the soul of ignorance and tears?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhence rose the call for sorrow and for pain?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr all came helplessly without a cause?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhat power forced the immortal spirit to birth?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe eternal witness once of eternity,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA deathless sojoumer mid transient scenes,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe camps in life’s half-lit obscurity<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAmid the debris of his thoughts and dreams.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr who persuaded it to fall from bliss<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd forfeit its immortal privilege?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWho laid on it the ceaseless will to live<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA wanderer in this beautiful sorrowful world,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd bear its load of joy and grief and love?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr if no being watches the works of Time,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhat hard impersonal Necessity<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCompels the vain toil of brief living things?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA great Illusion then has built the stars.<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 500<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

But where then is the soul’s security,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIts poise in this circling of unreal suns?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr else it is a wanderer from its home<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWho strayed into a blind alley of Time and chance<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd finds no issue from a meaningless world.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr where begins and ends Illusion’s reign?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPerhaps the soul we feel is only a dream,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEternal self a fiction sensed in trance."<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Then after a silence Narad made reply:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Tuning his lips to earthly sound he spoke,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd something now of the deep sense of fate<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWeighted the fragile hints of mortal speech.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHis forehead shone with vision solemnised,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTurned to a tablet of supernal thoughts<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAs if characters of an unwritten tongue<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHad left in its breadth the inscriptions of the gods.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBare in that Light Time toiled, his unseen works<\/span><\/p>\n

\nDetected, the broad-flung far-seeing schemes<\/span><\/p>\n

\nUnfinished which his aeoned flight unrolls<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWere mapped already in that world-wide look:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

"Was then the sun a dream because there is night?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHidden in the mortal’s heart the Eternal lives:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He lives secret in the chamber of thy soul,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A light shines there nor pain nor grief can cross.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A darkness stands between thyself and him,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Thou canst not hear or feel the marvellous Guest,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Thou canst not see the beatific sun.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

O queen, thy thought is a light of the Ignorance,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its brilliant curtain hides from thee God’s face.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It illumines a world born from the Inconscience,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

But hides the Immortal’s meaning in the world.<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 501<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

Thy mind’s light hides from thee the
\nEternal’s thought,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThy heart’s hopes hide from thee the Eternal’s will,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEarth’s joys shut from thee the Immortal’s bliss.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThence rose the need of a dark intruding god,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe world’s dread teacher, the creator, pain.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhere Ignorance is, there suffering too must come;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Thy grief is a cry of darkness to the Light;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Pain was the first-born of the Inconscience<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhich was thy body’s dumb original base;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Already slept there pain’s subconscient shape:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A shadow in a shadowy tenebrous womb,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Till life shall move, it waits to wake and be.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nIn one caul with joy came forth the dreadful Power.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

In life’s breast it was born hiding its twin;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

But pain came first, then only joy could be.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Pain ploughed the first hard ground of the world-drowse.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

By pain a spirit started from the clod,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

By pain Life stirred in the subliminal deep.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Interned, submerged, hidden in Matter’s trance<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Awoke to itself the dreamer, sleeping Mind;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It made a visible realm out of its dreams,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It drew its shapes from the subconscient depths,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Then turned to look upon the world it had made.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

By pain and joy, the bright and tenebrous twins,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The inanimate world perceived its sentient soul,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Else had the Inconscient never suffered change.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Pain is the hammer of the gods to break<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A dead resistance in the mortal’s heart,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His slow inertia as of living stone.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

If the heart were not forced to want and weep,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His soul would have lain down content, at ease,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And never thought to exceed the human start<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 502<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

And never learned to climb towards the Sun.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThis earth is full of labour, packed with pain;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Throes of an endless birth coerce her still;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

The centuries end, the ages vainly pass<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd yet the godhead in her is not born.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe ancient Mother faces all with joy,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCalls for the ardent pang, the grandiose thrill;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

For with pain and labour all creation comes.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThis earth is full of the anguish of the gods;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Ever they travail driven by Time’s goad,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd strive to work out the eternal will<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd shape the life divine in mortal forms.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHis will must be worked out in human breasts<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAgainst the Evil that rises from the gulfs,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAgainst man’s ignorance and his obstinate strength,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAgainst the deep folly of his human mind,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAgainst the blind reluctance of his human heart.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe spirit is doomed to pain till man is free.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThere is a clamour of battle, a tramp, a march:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

A cry arises like a moaning sea,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA desperate laughter under the blows of death,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA doom of blood and sweat and toil and tears.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMen die that man may live and God be born.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAn awful Silence watches tragic Time.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPain is the hand of Nature sculpturing men<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTo greatness: an inspired labour chisels<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWith heavenly cruelty an unwilling mould.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nImplacable in the passion of their will,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLifting the hammers of titanic toil<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe demiurges of the universe work;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

They shape with giant strokes their own; their sons<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAre marked with their enormous stamp of fire.<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 503<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Although the shaping god’s tremendous touch<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Is torture unbearable to mortal nerves,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The fiery spirit grows in strength within<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And feels a joy in every titan pang.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He who would save himself lives bare and calm;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He who would save the race must share its pain:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

This he shall know who obeys that grandiose urge.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe great who came to save this suffering world<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd rescue out of Time’s shadow and the Law,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMust pass beneath the yoke of grief and pain:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

They are caught by the Wheel that they had hoped to break,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nOn their shoulders they must bear man’s load of fate.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Heaven’s riches they bring, their sufferings count the price<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Or they pay the gift of knowledge with their lives.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The Son of God born as the Son of man<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Has drunk the bitter cup, owned Godhead’s debt,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The debt the Eternal owes to the fallen kind<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His will has bound to death and struggling life<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

That yearns in vain for rest and endless peace.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Now is the debt paid, wiped off the original score.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The Eternal suffers in a human form,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He has signed salvation’s testament with his blood:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

He has opened the doors of his undying peace.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe Deity compensates the creature’s claim,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe Creator bears the law of pain and death;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A retribution smites the incarnate God.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His love has paved the mortal’s road to Heaven:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

He has given his life and light to balance here<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe dark account of mortal ignorance.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIt is finished, the dread mysterious sacrifice,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOffered by God’s martyred body for the world;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Gethsemane and Calvary are his lot,<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 504<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He carries the cross on which man’s soul is nailed;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His escort is the curses of the crowd;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Insult and jeer are his right’s acknowledgment;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Two thieves slain with him mock his mighty death.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe has trod with bleeding brow the Saviour’s way.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe who has found his identity with God<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPays with the body’s death his soul’s vast light.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHis knowledge immortal triumphs by his death.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHewn, quartered on the scaffold as he falls<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHis crucified voice proclaims, "I, I am God;"<\/span><\/p>\n

\n"Yes, all is God," peals back Heaven’s deathless call.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe seed of Godhead sleeps in mortal hearts,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe flower of Godhead grows on the world-tree:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

All shall discover God in self and things,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

But when God’s messenger comes to help the world<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And lead the soul of earth to higher things,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He too must carry the yoke he came to unloose;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He too must bear the pang that he would heal:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Exempt and unafflicted by earth’s fate,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHow shall he cure the ills he never felt?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe covers the world’s agony with his calm;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

But though to the outward eye no sign appears<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd peace is given to our torn human hearts,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe struggle is there and paid the unseen price,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe fire, the strife, the wrestle are within.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe carries the suffering world in his own breast;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its sins weigh on his thoughts, its grief is his:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Earth’s ancient load lies heavy on his soul;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Night and its powers beleaguer his tardy steps,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe titan adversary’s clutch he bears;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

His march is a battle and a pilgrimage.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLife’s evil smites, he is stricken with the world’s pain:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 505<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

A million wounds gape in his secret heart.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe journeys sleepless through an unending night;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Antagonist forces crowd across his path;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

A siege, a combat is his inner life.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEven worse may be the cost, direr the pain:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

His large identity and all-harbouring love<\/span><\/p>\n

\nShall bring the cosmic anguish into his depths,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe sorrow of all living things shall come<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd knock at his doors and live within his house;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A dreadful cord of sympathy can tie<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

All suffering into his single grief and make<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

All agony in all the worlds his own.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He meets an ancient adversary Force,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He is lashed with the whips that tear the world’s worn heart;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The weeping of the centuries visits his eyes:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

He wears the blood-glued fiery Centaur’s shirt,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe poison of the world has stained his throat.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn the market-place of Matter’s capital<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAmidst the chafferings of the affair called life<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe is tied to the stake of a perennial Fire,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe burns on an unseen original verge<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThat Matter may be turned to spirit stuff:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He is the victim in his own sacrifice.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The Immortal bound to earth’s mortality<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Appearing and perishing on the roads of Time<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Creates God’s moment by eternity’s beats.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He dies that the world may be new-born and live.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Even if he escapes the fiercest fires,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Even if the world breaks not in, a drowning sea,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Only by hard sacrifice is high heaven earned:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

He must face the fight, the pang who would conquer Hell.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA dark concealed hostility is lodged<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 506<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

In the human depths, in the hidden heart of Time<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThat claims the right to change and mar God’s work.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA secret enmity ambushes the world’s march;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It leaves a mark on thought and speech and act:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It stamps stain and defect on all things done;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Till it is slain peace is forbidden on earth.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThere is no visible foe, but the unseen<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIs round us, forces intangible besiege,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTouches from alien realms, thoughts not our own<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOvertake us and compel the erring heart;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Our lives are caught in an ambiguous net.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAn adversary Force was born of old:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Invader of the life of mortal man,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIt hides from him the straight immortal path.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA power came in to veil the eternal Light,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA power opposed to the eternal will<\/span><\/p>\n

\nDiverts the messages of the infallible Word,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nContorts the contours of the cosmic plan:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A whisper lures to evil the human heart,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It seals up wisdom’s eyes, the soul’s regard,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It is the origin of our suffering here,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It binds earth to calamity and pain.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

This all must conquer who would bring down God’s peace.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

This hidden foe lodged in the human breast<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Man must overcome or miss his higher fate.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

This is the inner war without escape.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

Hard is the world-redeemer’s heavy task;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

The world itself becomes his adversary,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHis enemies are the beings he came to save.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThose he would save are his antagonists:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

This world is in love with its own ignorance,<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 507<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

Its darkness turns away from the saviour light,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIt gives the cross in payment for the crown.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHis work is a trickle of splendour in a long night;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He sees the long march of Time, the little won;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A few are saved, the rest strive on and fail:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

A Sun has passed, on earth Night’s shadow falls.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nYes, there are happy ways near to God’s sun;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

But few are they who tread the sunlit path;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Only the pure in soul can walk in light.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

An exit is shown, a road of hard escape<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

From the sorrow and the darkness and the chain;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

But how shall a few escaped release the world?<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The human mass lingers beneath the yoke.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Escape, however high, redeems not life,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Life that is left behind on a fallen earth.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Escape cannot uplift the abandoned race<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nOr bring to it victory and the reign of God.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A greater power must come, a larger light.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Although Light grows on earth and Night recedes,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Yet till the evil is slain in its own home<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nAnd Light invades the world’s inconscient base<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And perished has the adversary Force,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nHe still must labour on, his work half done.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

One yet may come armoured, invincible;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His will immobile meets the mobile hour;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The world’s blows cannot bend that victor head;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Calm and sure are his steps in the growing Night;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

The goal recedes, he hurries not his pace,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe turns not to high voices in the Night.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe asks no aid from the inferior gods;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

His eyes are fixed on the immutable aim.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMan turns aside or chooses easier paths;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

 <\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 508<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

He keeps to the one high and difficult road<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThat sole can climb to the Eternal’s peaks;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The ineffable planes already have felt his tread;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

He has made heaven and earth his instruments,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBut the limits fall from him of earth and heaven;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Their law he transcends but uses as his means.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He has seized life’s hands, he has mastered his own heart.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The feints of Nature mislead not his sight,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Inflexible his look towards Truth’s far end;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Fate’s deaf resistance cannot break his will.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

In the dreadful passages, the fatal paths,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Invulnerable his soul, his heart unslain,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He lives through the opposition of earth’s Powers<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And Nature’s ambushes and the world’s attacks.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His spirit stature transcending pain and bliss<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He fronts evil and good with calm and equal eyes.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He too must grapple with the riddling Sphinx<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And plunge into her long obscurity.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He has broken into the Inconscient’s depths<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

That veil themselves even from their own regard:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He has seen God’s slumber shape these magic worlds.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He has watched the dumb God fashioning Matter’s frame,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Dreaming the dreams of its unknowing sleep,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And watched the unconscious Force that built the stars.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He has learnt the Inconscient’s workings and its law,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its incoherent thoughts and rigid acts,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its hazard wastes of impulse and idea,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The chaos of its mechanic frequencies,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its random calls, its whispers falsely true,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Misleaders of the hooded listening soul.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

All things come to its ear but nothing abides;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

All rose from the silence, all goes back to its hush.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

 <\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 509<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its somnolence founded the universe,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its obscure waking makes the world seem vain.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Arisen from Nothingness and towards Nothingness turned<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its dark and potent nescience was earth’s start;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It is the waste stuff from which all was made;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Into its deeps creation can collapse.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its opposition clogs the march of the soul,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It is the mother of our ignorance.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He must call light into its dark abysms,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Else never can Truth conquer Matter’s sleep<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And all earth look into the eyes of God.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

All things obscure his knowledge must relume,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

All things perverse his power must unknot:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He must pass to the other shore of falsehood’s sea,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nHe must enter the world’s dark to bring there light.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The heart of evil must be bared to his eyes,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He must learn its cosmic dark Necessity,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its right and its dire roots in Nature’s soil.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nHe must know the thought that moves the demon act<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And justifies the Titan’s erring pride<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nAnd the falsehood lurking in earth’s crooked dreams;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He must enter the eternity of Night<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And know God’s darkness as he knows his Sun.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

For this he must go down into the pit,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

For this he must invade the dolorous Vasts.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Imperishable and wise and infinite,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He still must travel Hell the world to save.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Into the eternal Light he shall emerge<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

On borders of the meeting of all worlds;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

There on the verge of Nature’s summit steps<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe secret Law of each thing is fulfilled,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAll contraries heal their long dissidence.<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 510<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

There meet and clasp the eternal opposites,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThere pain becomes a violent fiery joy,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEvil turns back to its original good,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd sorrow lies upon the breasts of Bliss:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

She has learnt to weep glad tears of happiness,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHer gaze is charged with a wistful ecstasy.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThen shall be ended here the Law of Pain.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEarth shall be made a home of Heaven’s light,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA seer heaven-born shall lodge in human breasts;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

The superconscient beam shall touch men’s eyes<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd the truth-conscious world come down to earth<\/span><\/p>\n

\nInvading Matter with the Spirit’s ray<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAwaking its silence to immortal thoughts,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAwaking the dumb heart to the living Word.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThis mortal life shall house Eternity’s bliss,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe body’s self taste immortality.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThen shall the world-redeemer’s task be done.<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

Till then must life carry its seed of death<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd sorrow’s plaint be heard in the slow Night.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nO mortal, bear this great world’s law of pain,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn thy hard passage through a suffering world<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLean for thy soul’s support on Heaven’s strength,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTurn towards high Truth, aspire to love and peace.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA little bliss is lent thee from above,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA touch divine upon thy human days:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Make of thy daily way a pilgrimage,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

For through small joys and griefs thou mov’st towards God.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Haste not towards Godhead on a dangerous road,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Open not thy doorways to a nameless Power,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Climb not to Godhead by the Titan’s road.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Against the Law he pits his single will,<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 511<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

Across its way he throws his pride of might.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHeavenward he clambers on a stair of storms<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAspiring to live near the deathless Sun.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe strives with a giant strength to wrest by force<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFrom life and Nature the immortals’ right;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

He takes by storm the world and fate and heaven.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe comes not to the high world-maker’s seat,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe waits not for the outstretched hand of God<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTo raise him out of his mortality.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAll he would make his own, leave nothing free,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nStretching his small self to cope with the infinite.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nObstructing the gods’ open ways he makes<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHis own estate of the earth’s air and light;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A monopolist of the world-energy,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He dominates the life of common men.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nHis pain and others’ pain he makes his means:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

On death and suffering he builds his throne.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn the hurry and clangour of his acts of might,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn a riot and excess of fame and shame,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBy his magnitudes of hate and violence,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBy the quaking of the world beneath his tread<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe matches himself against the Eternal’s calm<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd feels in himself the greatness of a god:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Power is his image of celestial self.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The Titan’s heart is a sea of fire and force;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

He exults in the death of things and ruin and fall,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe feeds his strength with his own and others’ pain;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

In the world’s pathos and passion he takes delight,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHis pride, his might call for the struggle and pang.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe glories in the sufferings of the flesh<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd covers the stigmata with the Stoic’s name.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHis eyes blinded and visionless stare at the sun,<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 512<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

The seeker’s sight receding from his heart<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCan find no more the light of eternity;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

He sees the beyond as an emptiness void of soul<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd takes his night for a dark infinite.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHis nature magnifies the unreal’s blank<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd sees in Nought the sole reality:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He would stamp his single figure on the world,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Obsess the world’s rumours with his single name.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His moments centre the vast universe.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He sees his little self as very God.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His little "I" has swallowed the whole world,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His ego has stretched into infinity.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His mind, a beat in original Nothingness,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Ciphers his thought on a slate of hourless Time.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

He builds on a mighty vacancy of soul<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A huge philosophy of Nothingness.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

In him Nirvana lives and speaks and acts<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Impossibly creating a universe.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

An eternal zero is his formless self,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His spirit the void impersonal absolute.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Take not that stride, O growing soul of man;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Cast not thy self into that night of God.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe soul suffering is not eternity’s key,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr ransom by sorrow heaven’s demand on life.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nO mortal, bear, but ask not for the stroke,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nToo soon will grief and anguish find thee out.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nToo enormous is that venture for thy will;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Only in limits can man’s strength be safe;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Yet is infinity thy spirit’s goal;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Its bliss is there behind the world’s face of tears.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA power is in thee that thou knowest not;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Thou art a vessel of the imprisoned spark.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\t\t\t<\/font><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 513<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

It seeks relief from Time’s envelopment,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd while thou shutst it in, the seal is pain:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Bliss is the Godhead’s crown, eternal, free,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nUnburdened by life’s blind mystery of pain:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Pain is the signature of the Ignorance<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAttesting the secret god denied by life:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Until life finds him pain can never end.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Calm is self’s victory overcoming fate.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Bear; thou shalt find at last thy road to bliss.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Bliss is the secret stuff of all that lives,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Even pain and grief are garbs of world-delight,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It hides behind thy sorrow and thy cry.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Because thy strength is a part and not God’s whole,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Because afflicted by the little self<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Thy consciousness forgets to be divine<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

As it walks in the vague penumbra of the flesh<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And cannot bear the world’s tremendous touch,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Thou criest out and sayst that there is pain.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Indifference, pain and joy, a triple disguise,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Attire of the rapturous Dancer in the ways,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Withhold from thee the body of God’s bliss.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Thy spirit’s strength shall make thee one with God,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Thy agony shall change to ecstasy,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Indifference deepen into infinity’s calm<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And joy laugh nude on the peaks of the Absolute.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nO mortal who complainst of death and fate,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAccuse none of the harms thyself hast called;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

This troubled world thou hast chosen for thy home,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThou art thyself the author of thy pain.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOnce in the immortal boundlessness of Self,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn a vast of Truth and Consciousness and Light<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 514<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The soul looked out from its felicity.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It felt the Spirit’s interminable bliss,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It knew itself deathless, timeless, spaceless, one,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It saw the Eternal, lived in the Infinite.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Then, curious of a shadow thrown by Truth,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It strained towards some otherness of self,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It was drawn to an unknown Face peering through night.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It sensed a negative infinity,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A void supernal whose immense excess<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Imitating God and everlasting Time<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Offered a ground for Nature’s adverse birth<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And Matter’s rigid hard unconsciousness<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Harbouring the brilliance of a transient
\nsoul<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

That lights up birth and death and ignorant life.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A Mind arose that stared at Nothingness<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Till figures formed of what could never be,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It housed the contrary of all that is.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A Nought appeared as Being’s huge sealed cause,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its dumb support in a blank infinite,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

In whose abysm spirit must disappear:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

A darkened Nature lived and held the seed<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOf Spirit hidden and feigning not to be.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe eternal Consciousness became the home<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOf some unsouled almighty Inconscient;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

One breathed no more the spirit’s native air.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA stranger in the insentient universe,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBliss was the incident of a mortal hour.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAs one drawn by the grandeur of the Void<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe soul attracted leaned to the Abyss:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

It longed for the adventure of Ignorance<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd the marvel and surprise of the Unknown<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd the endless possibility that lurked<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 515<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

In the womb of Chaos and in Nothing’s gulf<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr looked from the unfathomed eyes of Chance.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIt tired of its unchanging happiness,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIt turned away from immortality:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

It was drawn to hazard’s call and danger’s charm,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIt yearned to the pathos of grief, the drama of pain,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPerdition’s peril, the wounded bare escape,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe music of ruin and its glamour and crash,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe savour of pity and the gamble of love<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd passion and the ambiguous face of Fate.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA world of hard endeavour and difficult toil<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd battle on extinction’s perilous verge,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA clash of forces, a vast incertitude,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe joy of creation out of Nothingness,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nStrange meetings on the roads of Ignorance<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd the companionship of half-known souls<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr the solitary greatness and lonely force<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOf a separate being conquering its world,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCalled it from its too safe eternity.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA huge descent began, a giant fall:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

For what the spirit sees, creates a truth<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And what the soul imagines is made a world.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A Thought that leaped from the Timeless can become,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Indicator of cosmic consequence<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And the itinerary of the gods,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A cyclic movement in eternal Time.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nThus came, born from a blind tremendous choice,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

This great perplexed and discontented world,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

This haunt of Ignorance, this home of Pain:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

There are pitched desire’s tents, grief’s headquarters.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA vast disguise conceals the Eternal’s bliss."<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 516<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Then Aswapathy answered to the seer:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

"Is then the spirit ruled by an outward world?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nO seer, is there no remedy within?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBut what is fate if not the spirit’s will<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAfter long time fulfilled by cosmic Force?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nI deemed a mighty Power had come with her;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Is not that Power the high compeer of Fate?"<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBut Narad answered covering truth with truth:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

"O Aswapathy, random seem the ways<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Along whose banks your footsteps stray or run<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

In casual hours and moments of the gods,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Yet your least stumblings are foreseen above.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Infallibly the curves of life are drawn<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Following the stream of Time through the unknown,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

They are led by a clue the calm immortals keep.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

This blazoned hieroglyph of prophet moons<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A meaning more sublime in symbols writes<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Than sealed Thought wakes to, but of this high script<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

How shall my voice convince the mind of earth?<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Heaven’s wiser love rejects the mortal’s prayer;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Unblinded by the breath of his desire,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nUnclouded by the mists of fear and hope,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIt bends above the strife of love with death;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

It keeps for her her privilege of pain.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA greatness in thy daughter’s soul resides<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThat can transform herself and all around,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBut must cross on stones of suffering to its goal.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAlthough designed like a nectar cup of heaven,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOf heavenly ether made she sought this air,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nShe too must share the human need of grief<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd all her cause of joy transmute to pain.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe mind of mortal man is led by words,<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 517<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

His sight retires behind the walls of Thought<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd looks out only through half-opened doors.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe cuts the boundless Truth into sky-strips<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd every strip he takes for all the heavens.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe stares at infinite Possibility<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd gives to the plastic Vast the name of Chance.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe sees the long results of an all-wise Force<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPlanning a sequence of steps in endless Time,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBut in its links imagines a senseless chain<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr the dead hand of cold Necessity;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

He answers not to the mystic Mother’s heart,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMisses the ardent heavings of her breast<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd feels cold rigid limbs of lifeless Law.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe will of the Timeless working out in Time<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn the free absolute steps of cosmic Truth<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAppears a hard machine or meaningless Fate.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA Magician’s formulas have made Matter’s laws<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd while they last, all things by them are bound;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

But the Spirit’s consent is needed for each act<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd freedom walks in the same pace with Law.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAll here can change if the Magician choose.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIf human will could be made one with God’s,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIf human thought could echo the thoughts of God,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMan might be all-knowing and omnipotent;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

But now he walks in Nature’s doubtful ray.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nYet can the mind of man receive God’s light,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe force of man can be driven by God’s force,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThen is he a miracle doing miracles.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFor only so can he be Nature’s King.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIt is decreed and Satyavan must die;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

The hour is fixed, chosen the fatal stroke.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhat else shall be is written in her soul.<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 518<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

But till the hour reveals the fateful script<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe writing waits illegible and mute.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFate is Truth working out in Ignorance.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nO King, thy fate is a transaction done<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAt every hour between Nature and thy soul<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWith God for its foreseeing arbiter.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFate is a balance drawn in Destiny’s book.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMan can accept his fate, he can refuse.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEven if the One maintains the unseen decree<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe writes thy refusal in thy credit page:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

For doom is not a close, a mystic seal.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nArisen from the tragic crash of life,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nArisen from the body’s torture and death,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe spirit rises mightier by defeat;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its godlike wings grow wider with each fall.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its splendid failures sum to victory.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

O<\/font> man, the events that meet thee on thy road,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Though they smite thy body and soul with joy and grief,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Are not thy fate; they touch thee awhile and pass;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Even death can cut not short thy spirit’s walk:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Thy goal, the road thou choosest are thy fate.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

On the altar throwing thy thoughts, thy heart, thy works,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Thy fate is a long sacrifice to the gods<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Till they have opened to thee thy secret self<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And made thee one with the indwelling God.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

O soul, intruder in Nature’s ignorance,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Armed traveller to the unseen supernal heights,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Thy spirit’s fate is a battle and ceaseless march<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Against invisible opponent Powers,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A passage from Matter into timeless Self.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Adventurer through blind unforeseeing Time,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A forced advance through a long line of lives,<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 519<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It pushes its spearhead through the centuries.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Across the dust and mire of the earthly plain,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

On many-guarded lines and dangerous fronts,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

In dire assaults, in wounded slow retreats,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Or holding the ideal’s battered fort<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Or fighting against odds in lonely posts,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nOr camped in night around the bivouac’s fires<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Awaiting the tardy trumpets of the dawn,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

In hunger and in plenty and in pain,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Through peril and through triumph and through fall,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Through life’s green lanes and over her desert sands,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Up the bald moor, along the sunlit ridge<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

In serried columns with a straggling rear<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Led by its nomad vanguard’s signal fires,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Marches the army of the waylost god.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Then late the joy ineffable is felt,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Then he remembers his forgotten self;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

He has refound the skies from which he fell.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAt length his front’s indomitable line<\/span><\/p>\n

\nForces the last passes of the Ignorance:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Advancing beyond Nature’s last known bounds,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nReconnoitring the formidable unknown,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBeyond the landmarks of things visible,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIt mounts through a miraculous upper air<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTill climbing the mute summit of the world<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe stands upon the splendour-peaks of God.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn vain thou mournst that Satyavan must die;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

His death is a beginning of greater life,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Death is the spirit’s opportunity.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A vast intention has brought the souls close<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And love and death conspire towards one great end.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nFor out of danger and pain heaven-bliss shall come,<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 520<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

Time’s unforeseeing event. God’s secret plan.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThis world was not built with random bricks of chance;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

A blind god is not destiny’s architect,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA conscious power has drawn the plan of life,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThere is a meaning in each curve and line.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIt is an architecture high and grand<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBy many named and nameless masons built<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn which unseeing hands obey the Unseen,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd of its master-builders she is one.<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Queen, strive no more to change the secret will;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Time’s accidents are steps in its vast scheme.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBring not thy brief and helpless human tears<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAcross the fathomless moments of a heart<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThat knows its single will and God’s as one:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It can embrace its hostile destiny;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

It sits apart with grief and facing death,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAffronting adverse fate armed and alone.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn this enormous world standing apart<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn the mightiness of her silent spirit’s will,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIn the passion of her soul of sacrifice<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHer lonely strength facing the universe,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAffronting fate, asks not man’s help nor god’s:<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Sometimes one life is charged with earth’s destiny,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

It cries not for succour from the time-bound powers.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Alone she is equal to her mighty task.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Intervene not in a strife too great for thee,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

A struggle too deep for mortal thought to sound,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its question to this Nature’s rigid bounds<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

When the soul fronts nude of garbs the infinite,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its too vast theme of a lonely mortal will<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Pacing the silence of eternity.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

As a star, uncompanioned, moves in heaven<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 521<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

Unastonished by the immensities of space,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTravelling infinity by its own light,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe great are strongest when they stand alone.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA God-given might of being is their force,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA ray from self’s solitude of light the guide;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

The soul that can live alone with itself meets God;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Its lonely universe is their rendezvous.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nA day may come when she must stand unhelped<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

On a dangerous brink of the world’s doom and hers,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nCarrying the world’s future on her lonely breast,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nCarrying the human hope in a heart left sole<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

To conquer or fail on a last desperate verge.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nAlone with death and close to extinction’s edge,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Her single greatness in that last dire scene,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nShe must cross alone a perilous bridge in Time<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

And reach an apex of world-destiny<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Where all is won or all is lost for man.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

In that tremendous silence lone and lost<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Of a deciding hour in the world’s fate,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

In her soul’s climbing beyond mortal time<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

When she stands sole with Death or sole with God<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Apart upon a silent desperate brink,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Alone with her self and death and destiny<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

As on some verge between Time and Timelessness<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nWhen being must end or life rebuild its base,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Alone she must conquer or alone must fall.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

No human aid can reach her in that hour,<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

No armoured God stand shining at her side.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

Cry not to heaven, for she alone can save.<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nFor this the silent Force came missioned down;<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

In her the conscious Will took human shape:<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nShe only can save herself and save the world.<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 522<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

"O queen, stand back from that stupendous scene,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCome not between her and her hour of Fate.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHer hour must come and none can intervene;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Think not to turn her from her heaven-sent task,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nStrive not to save her from her own high will.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThou hast no place in that tremendous strife;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Thy love and longing are not arbiters there,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLeave the world’s fate and her to God’s sole guard.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEven if he seems to leave her to her lone strength,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEven though all falters and falls and sees an end<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd the heart fails and only are death and night,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nGod-given her strength can battle against doom<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEven on a brink where Death alone seems close<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd no human strength can hinder or can help.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThink not to intercede with the hidden Will,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIntrude not twixt her spirit and its force<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBut leave her to her mighty self and Fate."<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

He spoke and ceased and left the earthly scene.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAway from the strife and suffering on our globe,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe turned towards his far-off blissful home.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA brilliant arrow pointing straight to heaven,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe luminous body of the eternal seer<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAssailed the purple glory of the noon<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd disappeared like a receding star<\/span><\/p>\n

\nVanishing into the light of the Unseen;<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

But still a cry was heard in the infinite,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd still to the listening soul on mortal earth<\/span><\/p>\n

\nA high and far imperishable voice<\/span><\/p>\n

\nChanted the anthem of eternal love.<\/span><\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/font>
\nPage \u2013 523<\/font><\/span><\/td>\n

 <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  CANTO TWO   THE WAY OF FATE AND THE PROBLEM OF PAIN   A SILENCE sealed the irrevocable decree, The word of Fate that…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[78],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3441","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-03-savitri-1954","wpcat-78-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3441","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3441"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3441\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3441"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3441"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3441"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}