And darkness for no hope.'?And she spake on,
As ye may read who can unwearied pass
465 Onward from the antichamber0 of this dream, entry room Where even at the open doors awhile
I must delay, and glean my memory
Of her high phrase: perhaps no further dare.
Canto 2
'Mortal, that thou may'st understand aright,
I humanize my sayings to thine ear,
Making comparisons of earthly things;7
Or thou might'st better listen to the wind,
5 Whose language is to thee a barren noise,
Though it blows legend-laden through the trees.
In melancholy realms big tears are shed,
More sorrow like to this, and such-like woe,
Too huge for mortal tongue, or pen of scribe,
io The Titans fierce, self-hid, or prison-bound,
Groan for the old allegiance once more,
Listening in their doom for Saturn's voice.
But one of our whole eagle-brood still keeps
His sov'reignty, and rule, and majesty;
is Blazing Hyperion on his orbed fire Still sits, still snuffs the incense teeming up
From man to the Sun's God: yet unsecure;
For as upon the earth dire prodigies8
Fright and perplex, so also shudders he:
20 Nor at dog's howl, or gloom-bird's even screech,
Or the familiar visitings of one
Upon the first toll of his passing bell:9 But horrors portion'd0 to a giant nerve proportioned. Make great Hyperion ache. His palace bright,
25 Bastion'd with pyramids of glowing gold,
And touch'd with shade of bronzed obelisks,
Glares a blood red through all the thousand courts,
Arches, and domes, and fiery galeries:
And all its curtains of Aurorian clouds
so Flush angerly: when he would taste the wreaths
Of incense breath'd aloft from sacred hills,
Instead of sweets, his ample palate takes
Savour of poisonous brass, and metals sick.
7. Cf. ihe angel Raphael's words as he begins to ever, at such portents as a dog's howl or the eve- recount to Adam the history of the rebellion in ning screech of the owl or with the well-known heaven: 'what surmounts the reach / Of human feelings ['visitings'] of someone when he hears the sense, I shall delineate so, / By lik'ning spiritual to first stroke of his own death knell.' It had been the corporal forms' (Paradise Lost 5.571?73). English custom to ring the church bell when a per
8. Terrifying omens. son was close to death, to invite hearers to pray for 9. Lines 20?22 might be paraphrased: 'Not, how-his departing soul.
.
THIS LIVING HAND, NOW WARM AND CAPABLE / 93 9
Wherefore when harbour'd in the sleepy west,
35 After the full completion of fair day,
For rest divine upon exalted couch
And slumber in the arms of melody,
He paces through the pleasant hours of ease,
With strides colossal, on from hall to hall;
40 While, far within each aisle and deep recess,
