The Equinox (Volume I, Number VI)

54 THE RITES OF ELEUSIS [SCORPIO, as if alarmed at the interruption,flees ta tbrane of MARS and there with MARS defies the rabble. BRO. ARIES rallies PROBATIONERS.] So, all is over. I admit Futility the lord of will. Life was an episode for me, As for the meanest monad, knit To man by mightier bonds than skill Of subtle-souled psychology May sever, Aim in chaos? None. The soul rolls senseless as the sun, [All are driven back μῤto altar. BRO. CAPRICORNUS [emis]. “ There is no God.” MARS [leaps?ושand goes ta altar with uplifted sword]. I. Silence ! [a flame]. There is no God—«but God! [ARIES and PROBATIONERS dance a war dance. [CAPRICORNUSslink:from temple. [MARS recites. This is the day which down the void abysm At the Earth~born’s spell yawns for Heaven’s despotism, And Conquest is dragged captive through the deep ; Love, from its awful throne of patient power In the wise heart, from the last giddy hour Of dead endurance, from the slippery steep, And narrow verge of crag~like agony, springs And folds over the world its healing wings. Gentleness, Virtue, Wisdom, and Endurance— These are the seals of that most firm assurance Which bars the pit over Destruction’s strength ; And if, with infirm hand, Eternity, Mother of many acts and hours, should free The serpent that would clasp her with his length, These are the spells by which to reassume An empire o’er the disentangled doom. To suffer woes which Hope thinks infinite ; Το forgive wrongs darker than death or night;