CHORUS.

Worlds on worlds are rolling ever

From creation to decay, Like the bubbles on a river

Sparkling, bursting, borne away. But they are still immortal

Who, through birth's orient portal
And death's dark chasm hurrying to and fro,
Clothe their unceasing flight

In the brief dust and light
Gathered around their chariots as they go;
New shapes they still may weave,

New gods, new laws receive,

Bright or dim are they as the robes they last On Death's bare ribs had cast.

A power from the unknown God,
A Promethean conqueror came;

Like a triumphal path he trod

The thorns of death and shame.
A mortal shape to him

Was like the vapour dim

Which the orient planet animates with light; Hell, Sin, and Slavery came,

Like blood-hounds mild and tame,

Nor preyed, until their Lord had taken flight; The moon of Mahomet

Arose, and it shall set:

While blazoned as on heaven's immortal noon The cross leads generations on.

Swift as the radiant shapes of sleep

From one whose dreams are Paradise Fly, when the fond wretch wakes to weep, And day peers forth with her blank eyes; So fleet, so faint, so fair,

The Powers of earth and air

Fled from the folding star of Bethlehem :
Apollo, Pan, and Love,

And even Olympian Jove

Grew weak, for killing Truth had glared on them; Our hills and seas and streams

Dispeopled of their dreams,

Their waters turned to blood, their dew to tears, Wailed for the golden years.

Hellas.

CHORUS.

The world's great age begins anew,
The golden years return,

The earth doth like a snake renew
Her winter weeds outworn :

Heaven smiles, and faiths and empires gleam,
Like wrecks of a dissolving dream.

A brighter Hellas rears its mountains

From waves serener far;

A new Peneus rolls his fountains
Against the morning-star.

Where fairer Tempes bloom, there sleep
Young Cyclads on a sunnier deep.

A loftier Argo cleaves the main,
Fraught with a later prize;
Another Orpheus sings again,

And loves, and weeps, and dies.
A new Ulysses leaves once more
Calypso for his native shore.

O, write no more the tale of Troy,

If earth Death's scroll must be ! Nor mix with Laian rage the joy Which dawns upon the free: Although a subtler Sphinx renew Riddles of death Thebes never knew.

Another Athens shall arise,

And to remoter time

Bequeath, like sunset to the skies,
The splendour of its prime;

And leave, if nought so bright may live,
All earth can take or Heaven can give.

Saturn and Love their long repose

Shall burst, more bright and good
Than all who fell, than One who rose,
Than many unsubdued :

Not gold, not blood, their altar dowers
But votive tears and symbol flowers.

O cease! must hate and death return?
Cease! must men kill and die?
Cease! drain not to its dregs the urn
Of bitter prophecy.

The world is weary of the past,

O might it die or rest at last!

Hellas.

THE NEW WORLD.

DEMOGORGON.

THOU, Earth, calm empire of a happy soul,
Sphere of divinest shapes and harmonies,
Beautiful orb! gathering as thou dost roll
The love which paves thy path along the skies:

THE EARTH.

I hear: I am as a drop of dew that dies.

DEMOGORGON.

Thou, Moon, which gazest on the nightly Earth
With wonder, as it gazes upon thee;

Whilst each to men, and beasts, and the swift birth
Of birds, is beauty, love, calm, harmony;

THE MOON.

I hear: I am a leaf shaken by thee!

DEMOGORGON.

Ye kings of suns and stars, Dæmons and Gods,
Ætherial Dominations, who possess

Elysian, windless, fortunate abodes

Beyond Heaven's constellated wilderness: