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^ 
 
 THE WORLD-HOAX 
 
 and 
 THE DISILLUSIONED GENIUS 
 
 POEMS 
 By C. A. PAUL DACHSEL 
 
 Sent postpaid on receipt of price. Fifty 
 Cents, by the publisher, PAUL DACHSEL, 
 70 East 20th Street North, Portland, Ore. 
 
THE WORLD -HOAX 
 
 AND 
 
 POEMS 
 
 BY 
 
 C.A. PAUL DACHSEL 
 
 C A. PAUL DACHSEL 
 
 PORTLAND. OREGON 
 1917 
 

 (Copyright, 1917. by C. A. PAUL DACHSEL.) 
 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. 
 
 Printed by the 
 
 German Publishing Company 
 
 Portland, Ore. 
 
 FEB -s ion 
 
 "'^©CI,.A455485 
 
THE WORLD -HOAX 
 
 OR 
 
 3IU«0ttm 
 
 "'Fo?' each, ivho knows not how to rule 
 His inner self^ is only pleased too passing well 
 To sivay Ms neighbor's will, to suit his own proud mood.'"' 
 
 GOETHE, "Faust," Second Part. 
 
 ^^How, thsnf will tJwy weigh tragedy hy hutcher's weight?'^'' 
 ARISTOPHANES, "The Frogs," v. 797. 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 I have incorporated into "The World-Hoax" a 
 few paraphrases of certain striking paragraphs in 
 the works of Arthur Schopenhauer and of Eduard 
 Von Hartmann. In a prose composition I could have 
 duly quoted the authors named; but in a work poet- 
 ical in form this course is out of the question; so that 
 the requirements of justice must be fulfilled by giv- 
 ing due credit in the preface to those authors whose 
 words have been occasionally almost literally tran- 
 scribed. 
 
In an optimistically tinged outburst Schopen- 
 hauer (Principle of Sufficient Reason, Chapter V, 
 Paragraph 34), after remarking that a long since 
 prophesied epoch had dawned, that the church was 
 oscillating so violently that it was doubtful whether 
 it would regain its equilibrium, and that a shallow 
 materialism was casting ridicule upon the profound 
 mysteries of Christanity, ventures the following pre- 
 diction: ''There is a boiling-point on the scale of cul- 
 ture, where all belief, all revelation, all authorities 
 evanesce, man craves for insight and is willing to 
 be taught, but also convinced. He has dropped the 
 leading-strings of childhood and insists upon stand- 
 ing on his own legs. His metaphysical want, however, 
 is as indestructible as any physical want. Then the 
 desire for philosophy becomes serious, and needy 
 mankind appeals to all thinking minds it has ever 
 given birth to." 
 
 Hartmann also poses as a prophet when he says : 
 ' ' The lower animals and plants, since the commence- 
 ment of organic life, have been more and more dis- 
 placed by higher ones — the higher animals by man — , 
 and humanity will in time attain, on the average, a 
 pitch of intelligence and cosmic intuition which at 
 present only a cultured few have reached." Hart- 
 mann 's confidence in the rapid advancement of hu- 
 manity does not appear to be very strong, for he 
 
says: "Providence takes care that the anticipations 
 of the silent thinker do not disarrange the course of 
 history by prematurely gaining too many adher- 
 ents." I believe he was led to the above conclusion 
 by contemplating men's tendency to mistake means 
 for ends, as appears from his remark: ''Still more 
 pernicious, however, does the acquisitive instinct be- 
 come, if it forgets that property is only an intrinsic- 
 ally worthless means to further ends, and regarding 
 it as end in itself, turns into covetousness and 
 
 avarice." 
 
 Benjamin De Casseres in a masterly essay on 
 Emile Tardieu's book "L 'Ennui (in "The Interna- 
 tional, ' ' New York, October, 1913) characterizes life 
 in general in a very emphatic manner as follows: 
 "The reign of the Same is the Vision Malefic. Every 
 absurdity, any insanity, any inanity, — but not En- 
 nui! Men will die at the poles of the world and 
 
 thinkers will go stark mad at the poles of meta- 
 physical speculation rather than face Ennui. ' ' 
 
 The above quotations will serve to partially il- 
 lustrate the viewpoint from which "The World- 
 Hoax" was written. 
 
 C. A. PAUL DACHSEL. 
 
 PORTLAND, ORE., JANUARY, 1917. 
 
THE WORLD -HOAX 
 
 OR 
 
 3U«ai0n 
 
 PROLOGUE 
 
 In spring, when daily higher mounting sun 
 Extends the day and makes the glaciers run, 
 The naked trees renew their robe of green. 
 And splendor stalks the fir-clad hills between ; 
 The velvet breeze and golden, flatt'ring rays 5 
 
 Inspire lovers and their crooning lays; 
 From shroud of snow and fog in ev'ry land 
 The heart of nature hastens to expand 
 To joy triumphant in the favored child 
 
 With thrills of rapture scanning rythm wild. 10 
 
 This palingenesis the mind includes; 
 For, when from maple-trees the sap exudes, 
 A crop of gaudy dreams adorns the brain 
 And pants for exit with its gorgeous train. 
 Some minds are like volcanic, tropic isle, 15 
 
 Upon whose dells unfading sunbeams smile. 
 From upper terraces of cratered peak 
 To beach, where breakers waving date-palms seek. 
 Such restless, seething souls no spring await 
 
 7 
 
To intonate a song or start debate; 20 
 
 And like the evergreen no seasons know, 
 
 But seize on all that distant breezes blow 
 
 Within the sphere their soaring soul describes 
 
 For feast of reason or for butt of gibes. 
 
 As nature's Sunday-child is marked by fate 25 
 
 To hold a mirror to surrounding state, 
 
 His thirst ne'er slackens for that highest glee : 
 
 From worry's labyrinth his heart to free 
 
 And gaze about with Jove's Olympic frown 
 
 On man's convulsions e'en on bed of down, 30 
 
 On paradoxical and futile quest 
 
 To ever seck^ and yet to seek for rest. 
 
 Although he knows too well that all is vain, 
 
 Yet this can not his eloquence restrain ; 
 
 For that same force which paints the lilies' bloom 35 
 
 And has ordained the starry heaven's doom, 
 
 Directs his pen to give to light of day 
 
 His thoughts and feelings and their idle play. 
 
 When Aristophanes, with noble rage. 
 
 Puts Socrates among the clouds in cage 40 
 
 To feed on air and contemplate the sun 
 
 And in trepanning sophists find his fun ; 
 
 Or, when the master-jester places bards 
 
 In bog of Styx to wait for their awards : 
 
 It is a symptom of profound despair, 45 
 
 That life is futile as the empty air. 
 
 That poetry with painted shadows plays, 
 
 And boasting bombast bloats heroic lays. 
 
The keen Athenian this sorrow felt 
 
 And eased his spleen with bricks of wit to pelt 50 
 
 The proud pretenders and their stalking-horse 
 In caustic dialogue, a little coarse. 
 The Attic Wasp sank fearlessly his sting 
 Deep into frothy shell of ev'rything. 
 
 That flaming countersign of daring souls — , 55 
 
 The love of truth — , each honest pen controls. 
 As soon as author trims his words for pay, 
 He turns to ass content with bale of hay. 
 The polished magazines of modern times 
 Oft condescend to publish harmless rhymes, 60 
 
 Provided they contain no deeper view 
 Than vapid commonplace too tritely true. 
 To throw a sop to comic vein in man — , 
 Disgust with life's all too prosaic plan — , 
 A red-ink supplement of moss-grown jokes 65 
 
 The children tickles with its master strokes. 
 Some critics say the public has no taste. 
 This accusation I deny in haste. 
 Though men of genius rise above the mass, 
 
 Its judgment doth the final verdict pass. 70 
 
 The overwhelming bulk of magazines 
 Feeds cellar-furnace, but the public weans 
 From joy and profit in their idle time 
 With stilted fiction and denatured rhyme. 
 As soon as men perceive that deeper thought 75 
 
 Not in a journal's columns must be sought. 
 They quickly will improve their critic taste 
 Ignoring editor and pot and paste, 
 
 9 
 
And their own judgment with the pleasure tax 
 
 To view thought's beauties undefiled by hacks. 80 
 
 A single drop extracted from the sea 
 Must almost nothing to our senses be; 
 Yet hidden powers latent in a drop 
 Which on a sultry day from brow we mop 
 Make sport of dreadnoughts when the ocean roars 85 
 
 And scourges battered craft to wrecking shores. 
 A hermit may world-shaking thought evolve. 
 Which dies in silence, if not stern resolve 
 To fling it broadcast 'mong the busy throng 
 Subject to test of strength his creed or song. 90 
 
 Mankind is like the quickly changing deep 
 Responsive to the winds which o'er it sweep : 
 Man's ocean is his will ; his thought the wind 
 That doth the billows from their cage unbind. 
 Each sputters forth, in hope of wealth or fame, 95 
 
 Or from his conscience to achieve acclaim. 
 What suits his fancy and portrays his will 
 For chosen hobbies to exert his skill. 
 Colliding blasts of thought confound mankind 
 And mar the blooming fields and crack earth's rind : 100 
 
 Such havoc ruinous wreak gusts of thought, 
 When to a focus is their action brought. 
 So, too, when politics stir civic life, 
 A chorus fans the never-ceasing strife 
 
 Between the prancing of ambitious men 105 
 
 To win applause for more than common ken, 
 
 10 
 
To sway their fellows as the wind the grass, 
 And ride the current with the tides that pass. 
 
 No seer has yet divined the goal of man. 
 
 Though plodding scholars hoarded wisdom scan, 110 
 
 Still clouds of doubt obscure each vista fair, 
 
 And fixed opinions form a thorny lair 
 
 For those who love to soar with eagle's wing 
 
 And be the first to view what cheer may bring 
 
 The rising sun with rosy halo girt, 115 
 
 And rouse the laggards to a quickened spurt. 
 
 "The World-Hoax" is devoted to the aim 
 
 To cast some light upon the fitful game 
 
 Which man, an actor and spectator, too. 
 
 For ne'er a moment can dismiss from view. 120 
 
 Some may applaud and some may blame the scribe 
 
 For what they hold as truth or flippant gibe. 
 
 But be that as it may; he'll have his say; 
 
 And trusts the reader will enjoy this lay. 
 
 11 
 
CHARACTERS. 
 
 Emerson Shop, a dabbler in philosophy. 
 Claude Cord, an amateur poet. 
 Mike, a brewer forced into retirement by prohibition. 
 Scene: Shop's study in one of the larger cities of the Pa- 
 cific Slope. 
 Time: Thanksgiving Day, 1916. 
 
 Shop 
 (Soliloquizing in his study.) 
 
 Wlien as a playful tot on parlor floor 125 
 
 I rolled my marbles from the stove to door. 
 My thought was centered on the fleeting hour, 
 And life unfolded like a dreaming flower. 
 Wlien bloom of manhood made its presence felt. 
 And love's first yearning joy transcendent dealt, 130 
 
 The future rose with golden gate ajar, 
 And bliss ecstatic beckoned from afar. 
 When manhood's prime had thinned illusion's veils 
 And to ensnare life's prizes trimmed its sails, 
 I found all paths beset with thorns and foes, 135 
 
 And my own heart a hydra gorged with woes. 
 When finally an humble place I won, 
 And little of my task remains undone. 
 The past, the present, and the future, too, 
 Blend into landscape of a changeful hue, 140 
 
 On which I meditate in idle hour 
 As on the rapid bloom of tropic flower, 
 
 12 
 
A gorgeous dot in wilderness of green, 
 A passing landmark in a shifting scene. 
 
 If consciousness be added to the bloom 145 
 
 Of gaudy flower in this living tomb, 
 And many tasks and quirks of joy and pain. 
 And thought distracting that all ends are vain; — 
 T feel that fate of man and bud's the same : 
 A spark emitted by eternal flame. — 150 
 
 The waving outlines of the eastern hills 
 Emerge from darkness when the morning's chills 
 Still find me snug in comfortable bed 
 And yawning at diurnal task ahead. 
 
 With deep disgust I quit my sleep profound 155 
 
 To find myself again on solid ground. 
 The daily morning paper then I scan 
 To learn the latest, great exploits of man. 
 This craving satisfied, I break my fast 
 And slowly masticate a light repast; 160 
 
 And thei^eupon I light a corncob pipe 
 And wait in patience till some thought grow ripe. 
 On many days no pen my fingers grip. 
 And in a dreamlike peace the minutes slip. 
 Though blazing visions of a checkei^d past, — 165 
 
 The glut of plenty and unwelcome fast — , 
 Like tropic rivers inundate the brain, 
 My private fortunes call my pen in vain. 
 It is my settled maxim to forget 
 
 The fond illusions which our childhood pet; 170 
 
 To seek for happiness in thought serene; 
 With equal mind survey the shifting scene. 
 Behold the Furies' rage, the Graces' charm, 
 
 13 
 
And greet the grasp of Death's extended arm. 
 With such a temper can it strange appear 175 
 
 That meditation is my greatest cheer? 
 Yet, 'tis not resignation I exact: 
 There is a time to think, a time to act. 
 Each one must learn through life itself his task 
 Ere with content he can in sunshine bask. 180 
 
 Man must be active; quiet is a hell 
 Whose fright no language perfectly can tell. 
 While hands the shovel wield or heavy flail. 
 No melancholy sighs the heart assail ; 
 
 Or while the brain is mapping out a scheme 185 
 
 To fill the purse or realize a dream. 
 Or keeps the fancy toiling to create 
 Strange characters or destinies of state. 
 While once in parlor I was sitting still, 
 
 November's dreary landscape cast a chill 190 
 
 Upon my heart and mind and idle hand. 
 Until like straggler sinking in the sand 
 Tall waves of deep disgust were whelming me, 
 And dead appeared all hope of jollity. 
 
 The utter uselessness of ev'ry pang 195 
 
 With shout triumphant loud its paean sang. 
 The air was chilly as a grave-yard shade. 
 And most unpleasant noise the clock's tick made. 
 The bookshelf stai'ed at me with dusty frown 
 And screeched revolting voidness of renown. 200 
 
 My body felt like automatic toy 
 Whose mainspring rotted with a strange alloy. 
 The joy in life was gone. As though from rack 
 Just freed, the nerves were lazy, dull and slack. 
 
 14 
 
The jaded brain refused to start to think 205 
 
 And shuddered at the sight of harmless ink. 
 
 A painful emptiness embraced my soul 
 
 As though a fainting-spell had full control 
 
 And paralized the once so potent will 
 
 With thrills of languor and with doubts that kill. 210 
 
 The heart was trembling in its citadel 
 
 Before the onward rushing of a hell, 
 
 As if expecting to be cast aside 
 
 Like some dishonored and rejected bride. 
 
 The inner gloom made outer world seem dark 215 
 
 Until dispelled by that undying spark 
 
 Which flared up fiercely when the sudden thought 
 
 This mood to picture by the mind was caught. 
 
 The thinking and resolve were single flash, 
 
 And this new pastime gloom away did dash. 220 
 
 If leisure forces us the time to kill, 
 
 "Why not employ the ever ready quill 
 
 To paint the dragon of profound despair 
 
 And make him yield the ghost at touch of air? 
 
 Enter Mike and Claude Cord. 
 
 Shop 
 'Tis long since we have met. How I exult 225 
 
 To greet the star of optimistic cult; 
 Mike, too, the quondam cook of cheering foam, 
 But now an exile in his ancient home! 
 
 Cord 
 Satiric rogue! your spleen still reeks with gall. 
 And former happiness your words recall. 230 
 
 15 
 
Mike 
 
 The time is out of joint. All goes to smash, 
 
 And soaring prices eat my ready cash. 
 
 My blood ferments whene'er I stop to think 
 
 How my possessions vanished in a wink 
 
 On fatal day, when bigots' phalanx swore 235 
 
 That jolly Bacchus should be shown the door. 
 
 As man of sense, I know 'tis waste of air 
 
 To cry for justice and invoke despair, 
 
 I seek myself with maxims to console 
 
 For quick destruction of the pompous role 240 
 
 Which once I played while fickle fortune smiled 
 
 And merry banquets cloudy days beguiled. 
 
 But evermore my heart reverts to grief. 
 
 And in consoling thought I've lost belief. 
 
 Cord 
 My gloomy friend! do not abandon hope! 245 
 
 Let coward hearts corrode and wail and mope! 
 Behold the poet, happy with a song! 
 Why wreck your happiness for fancied wrong? 
 Unveil your plaint to philosophic Shop. 
 Although he can not offer us a drop 250 
 
 Of juice which Christ at Cana made to flow 
 And which inspired Plato's lofty glow; 
 He may, if in the mood, such thought expound 
 As may prove balm upon the open wound 
 Which doubly smarts when we recall the days 255 
 
 We sang in chorus merry roundelays. 
 Though Shop with acid may his phrases mar, 
 With paradox your fixed opinions jar; 
 
 16 
 
Yet by and by his drift you'll comprehend, 
 
 If to his stories you attention lend. 260 
 
 Mike 
 
 Since I'm at leisure all the livelong day, 
 I will rejoice to hear what Shop will say. 
 
 Shop 
 Friend Cord! no one is dearer to my heart 
 Than you, whose smile surpasses work of art; 
 But deep in error is your mind entrapped, 265 
 
 If you believe that woe my soul has sapped. 
 In rosy youth, indeed, I oft did groan 
 At echo of the world's untiring moan, 
 Wlien melancholy stained my dreamy thought, 
 And passions with my prospects havoc wrought. 270 
 
 As ocean wave rolls wrinkles in the sand. 
 So feelings on the mind broad furrows brand. 
 But I've grown callous, and like you I smile 
 Upon illusions which the world beguile. 
 
 I scatter fancy's buds o'er barren field, 275 
 
 Determined not to foolish wail to yield. 
 I strive to make each day a work of art. 
 To dull the sting of mocking, passing smart 
 Which ev'ry change imprints upon the soul. 
 And, unconcerned, behold the cloudlets roll 280 
 
 Above my cottage in this peopled waste, 
 And watch the gathering storm, the growing haste 
 With which the human race to ruin leaps 
 And pyramids of skulls like hayricks heaps. 
 
 17 
 
Coed 
 O let the stricken hosts in peace repose! 285 
 
 Above their dust will bloom a redder rose. 
 Thus sang great Omar in his sweetest strain, 
 Convinced of adage that all things are vain. 
 Unstable equilibrium doth best 
 
 Define the nature of our state unblest. 290 
 
 As two thin gases join to form the air, 
 And other gases Neptune's realm prepare: 
 So consciousness and feeling join in soul, 
 That restless thing with thirst for world-control. 
 Of world-creation no pet view I hold; 295 
 
 But daily life this truth doth well unfold: 
 The joy in intellect as such is clean 
 As light refulgent of nocturnal queen. 
 The fount of feeling clasps a world of woe : 
 It is the drudge that makes the life-wheel go. 300 
 
 Display of feeling is construed bad taste; 
 But to extol the brain, what morbid haste ! 
 The intellect is like a parasite 
 Whose only function that of shedding light, 
 While other members of the body toil 305 
 
 That lantern to supply with fuel-oil. 
 Like true aristocrat, the intellect 
 Commands unwavering and deep respect. 
 The other organs, needful though they be. 
 Like common toilers, hold no high degree, 310 
 
 The world of feeling only dares to show 
 Its outcast face when poet's daring glow 
 Transfused its painful dross with sugared rhyme 
 And made man's very wretchedness sublime. 
 
 18 
 
Hence Plato from his State the poets banned 315 
 
 As men whom fancy's blaze for truth unmanned. 
 
 But there he erred; for poet concentrates 
 
 In pleasing stanzas all that life elates. 
 
 There is a prejudice 'gainst men of rhyme. 
 
 Another commentary on this time! 320 
 
 But no! perhaps myself am in the wrong 
 
 In blaming Plato for contempt of song, 
 
 Or scoring present day for lack of taste 
 
 And dubbing poetry a useless waste: 
 
 Perhaps true progress loves the naked truth 325 
 
 Without adorning veil of rhythm smooth; 
 
 Perhaps the future will be still more wry 
 
 When all the world is dull as lead and dry. 
 
 Shop 
 
 To dwell on carnage I do not intend, 
 
 Xor with prophetic air predict its end. 330 
 
 O'er ghastly scene I gladly draw the veil 
 And with delight more pleasing topic hail. 
 We often have conversed in pensive mood 
 About the destiny of human brood. 
 
 About the laws inexorably stern 335 
 
 Wliich rule us from the cradle to the urn, 
 About the meaning of the shows of life, 
 That gaudy drapery of cosmic strife. 
 We have agreed to shun poetic flights 
 
 And pitch our camp on reason's icy heights, 340 
 
 To form a true conception of the game 
 Which men call life, and its undying flame ; 
 To flee the net which vexing passion spreads 
 
 19 
 
And brush aside too fine-spun logic's threads; 
 
 In other words, to cast an icy stare 345 
 
 Upon confounding maze of cosmic glare. 
 
 The rush of time will soon our light make dim. 
 
 Why waste on trifles priceless thought and vim? 
 
 Mike. 
 I love to hear you preach on cosmic themes. 
 Although to me most systems are but dreams ; 350 
 
 Yet, I confess, your fascinating way 
 Reduces to a minute half a day ; 
 Because you bar with truly matchless skill 
 The use of words unknown to Jack and Jill. 
 What is the substance of your latest view 355 
 
 Upon the Goal of Life, the Good, the True? 
 Avoid the premises; I know them all; 
 For not in vain I followed once the call 
 Of spirit spurring idle mind to pore 
 Upon the depths of philosophic lore. 360 
 
 Shop. 
 
 All matter is but synonym for Force. 
 
 Electrons, atoms are the fruitful source 
 
 Of all that is or ever will exist; 
 
 Although perhaps to us eternal mist 
 
 Will shroud the secret of how force can act. 365 
 
 I will not speculate upon this fact, 
 
 Nor mask my ignorance with empty word 
 
 And run the risk of being deemed absurd. 
 
 Our Psychic Self displays two solar sides 
 
 Of Thought and Feeling. Utter darkness hides 370 
 
 20 
 
What to the conscious surface doth not rise. 
 The Reason is the Rational, the Wise; 
 That which distinguishes the man from brute 
 And from the instincts which in him lie mute 
 Until his mind's reflection lends them wings 375 
 
 And lurking demons to his Imowledge brings. 
 These instincts, feelings, passions in a word, — 
 A thousand names do honor to this herd — , 
 Make up what is Irrational in man. 
 
 No mind can comprehend the total plan 380 
 
 Which animates the quickly changing dust; 
 But this summation seems to me most just: 
 Our psychic substance, — call it what you will — , 
 To us remains an Endless Striving still. 
 Volition is our inner nature's core ; 385 
 
 Our intellect, a bald lawn-tennis floor. 
 Where action, roused by feeling, raps the ball 
 Of things perceived beneath the azure pall. 
 Our memory and reason teach us well 
 
 That kindled passion lights the road to hell ; 390 
 
 That disappointment follows ev'ry joy, 
 And weary grows the child at last of toy; 
 That pain and pleasure are but while they're felt, 
 While they compress the heart with iron belt. 
 A mummy in the mind is all they leave, 395 
 
 Though sighs unnumbered to the sky we heave 
 To feel again young love's transcendent pang 
 Or rapture kindled by sublime harangue. 
 Now, certain instincts rooted in man's heart 
 Play awful havoc with his selfish art 400 
 
 To harvest pleasure for himself alone 
 And live apart, a self-contented drone, 
 
 21 
 
When, from his inner soul's unconscious bight, 
 
 The Instinct rising like a plumed knight 
 
 With fire fills him and his reason flouts 405 
 
 In spite of concert of the warning shouts 
 
 Wliich parents, teachers, friends, profusely waste 
 
 To shield the stripling from his over-haste. 
 
 But instinct does not even deign to laugh, 
 
 Since lungs protesting are to it but chaff 410 
 
 By whirlwind blown along the dusty street. 
 
 And selfishness is crushed beneath its feet. 
 
 'Tis not philosophy that here I preach. 
 
 A hundred thousand novels likewise teach 
 
 In language much more eloquent than mine 415 
 
 How Jack, in courting fair Evangeline, 
 
 His stock of wisdom often rends to shreds. 
 
 Divorces reason and contrition weds. 
 
 The bliss is brief; enduring is the pang; 
 
 But instinct heeds not egotist harangue. 420 
 
 "\Miat lends to novels their eternal charm? 
 
 They flatter instinct and their readers harm. 
 
 The play of fancy weakens reason's sway; 
 
 And maudlin sentiments sound thought decay. 
 
 Though many novels common sense deride, 425 
 
 They hold attention till the maid is bride. 
 
 And till the partner of her future bliss 
 
 Abandons freedom with the nuptial lass. 
 
 Enchanting moonshine which romances fills ! 
 
 O instinct thirsting for transcendent thrills! 430 
 
 Love is a demon of almighty sway: 
 
 Not satisfied with lordship over clay, 
 
 The realm of letters also is his serf 
 
 And acts the barker for love's giddy turf. 
 
 22 
 
I do not rail at love — that were insane — ; 435 
 
 I merely show the eminent domain 
 That demon-instinct, next to will of life, 
 Exerts in ev'ry field when sex is rife. 
 The instinct to preserve the human race 
 To human morals sets the measured pace. 440 
 
 Though life is but an ever-bubbling spring, 
 ^Miose woes unnumbered herds of poets sing, 
 Where pride of pomp and itching lust of sway 
 To countless millions hell create each day; 
 So overpow'ring is that instinct's blaze — , 445 
 
 Which no philosophy's decrees obeys — , 
 That man will rather suffer utmost wrong. 
 Despoilment by the vicious and the strong, 
 The coming slavery of all his kin 
 
 Or quick destruction in a battle's din, 450 
 
 Than rise a rebel 'gainst that mighty urge 
 And from his mind love's luring phantoms purge. 
 E'en midst a carnival of carnage dire. 
 Love preys on all to feed its hungry fire. 
 ^ATiat is Irrational in man, is king. 455 
 
 The Rational is but a hammered spring- 
 That makes the watch go right when there's no dust 
 To clog thought's wheels and give the rein to lust. 
 
 Mike 
 All this is very fine, indeed. I know 
 
 That most philosophers have spoken so. 460 
 
 The world is but a mighty wirligig. 
 Some limp on crutches and some madly jig. 
 But I have hope that you will set us free 
 
 23 
 
From thoughtless gazing on its misery. 
 What say you to the trend of things to day? 
 What special instincts do the masses sway? 
 
 Cord 
 A most perplexing question now you ask. 
 You are no doubt aware what vexing task 
 It is to fathom one lone mortal's heart, 
 To gauge its springs, lay bare dissembling art, 
 To show what motives act upon the will 
 And weigh his reason's undulating skill. 
 The very heart of you and me is dark 
 To our own judgment save for transient spark 
 Of feeling lighting up the soul's dark deeps 
 When quick, spasmotic wavelet o'er it creeps. 
 How, then, can we degress on countless host 
 Of beings whom we do not know ? At most 
 We may indulge in speculative glance 
 Upon the trend of things, as in a trance 
 We sweep the eye across the ages past. 
 And view but bubbling turmoil, first and last, 
 
 Mike 
 I know as well as you that none can tell 
 Just what transpires in all hearts that swell 
 With ev'ry rising hope at ev'ry thought 
 That one by one before their mind is brought. 
 
 Cord 
 Friend Shop ! you feign an overmodest air. 
 Perhaps you need some moments to prepare 
 
 24 
 
A caustic answer to our kind request. 
 
 You never shirked reply at my behest. 490 
 
 Shop 
 T will not disappoint your love to know 
 What light I may upon this topic throw. 
 But, bear in mind, the theme is most complex; 
 And fear of error may my efforts vex. 
 
 Cord 
 Suppose you err. What does it signify 495 
 
 When all are steeped in error, passion, lie? 
 Consider too, mankind's ten thousand creeds 
 And rampant discord 'twixt their words and deeds : 
 The ebb and tide of ev'ry nation's aims 
 And ev'ry person's never stifled claims 500 
 
 To realize his morbid dreams on earth : 
 The reservation of a special berth 
 For his convenience in marble hall, 
 Wliile lust of flesh still holds him in its thrall; 
 And, after he has doffed the mask of life, 505 
 
 A spot in realm which knows not carnal strife. 
 You stated well: How little wisdom rules; 
 A myth in fact; a phantom in the schools. 
 So boldly don your speculative wing. 
 I feel that stunning thought your tongue will bring. 510 
 
 Shop 
 Ah me ! I wish I were a seer or bard. 
 The task would then be anything but hard; 
 For poets, as you know, can rave at will : 
 
 25 
 
Enraptured by their song, the crowd is still. 
 
 A seer with freedom can promulge his dreams, 515 
 
 Provided that the people's favor beams 
 
 Upon the lusty phantoms of his brain, 
 
 Though rank their purpose and their essence vain. 
 
 But such is not the case with my poor self. 
 
 My boiling fancy long rests on the shelf, 520 
 
 Enshrined in verses which in youth I wrote; 
 
 But now the love of truth has clutched my throat 
 
 And weighs my w^ords upon the golden scale; 
 
 And hence the breeze of thought must fill my sail 
 
 With due regard to stubborn, icy fact 525 
 
 To keep me distant from the cataract 
 
 Of triviality which swallows all 
 
 A^^io list to catch-words' overawing call. 
 
 Cord 
 Forget those halcyonic days of youth ! 
 
 I, too, begin to court the sober truth. 530 
 
 Think you I would a moment lose in talk 
 About the problems which the wisest balk, 
 If I had not a trace of that deep woe 
 Which spurs the reason and rejects a "No?" 
 I ask from you not wordy eloquence 535 
 
 Which heaps up epithets as children pence ; 
 But facts of life exposed to glaring light, 
 So that we may deduct the truth aright. 
 
 Shop 
 So be it. Therefore, shunning more ado. 
 The best I know I will expound to you. 540 
 
 26 
 
There are three stages in mankind's career 
 
 In search for happiness and lasting cheer. 
 
 In Graeco-Roman times men sought for bliss 
 
 This side the portals of the realm of Dis, 
 
 Until disgust at pleasure's quick decay 545 
 
 For metaphysic dogma paved the way. 
 
 The Grecian spirit never will return 
 
 And phoenix-like arise from Sappho's urn. 
 
 The love of beauty, with instinctive sway, 
 
 Embellished dream of mind and form of clay. 550 
 
 The old Hellenic soul, confined to earth. 
 
 Proclaimed as goal of life the present mirth, 
 
 With gay festoons to wreathe the flowing bowl, 
 
 With hymns to Bacchus drown the over-soul. 
 
 To celebrate with orgies feast of state, 555 
 
 In marble columns noble deeds relate. 
 
 To dedicate to joy the passing days. 
 
 And cherish art, though all the rest decays. 
 
 The sober Eoman aped the Grecian style 
 
 While marble gods adorned the Forum's aisle. 560 
 
 When Eome had reached the limit of her sway. 
 
 The inner ferment brought about decay. 
 
 The Golden Rule announced from Palestine 
 
 Began demolishing the heathen shrine; 
 
 And thus commenced historic second stage, 565 
 
 The scene of priestly and barbaric rage. 
 
 For near two thousand years the Christian creed 
 
 Gigantic efforts made to fill the need 
 
 Of greedy mortals for consoling shore 
 
 With realm ideal when we breathe no more. 570 
 
 This stage is passing 'neath the hammer-blows 
 
 27 
 
Which light scientific on all myths bestows. 
 
 Yet thirst for happiness unslaked remains, — 
 
 Because the will-to-live contemns all chains, — 
 
 And must be coddled to conform to drift 575 
 
 With which humanity's affairs make shift. 
 
 The third stage centers on affairs of earth, 
 
 On growing comfort and increasing mirth, 
 
 On most emphatic paving of the way 
 
 That coming races bask in brighter day; 580 
 
 And hence the urgent haste to kill all joys 
 
 And from man's tissues bar all base alloys 
 
 That threaten haim to children yet unborn; 
 
 In future races hope for golden morn, 
 
 For lofty goal of ever-craving will, 585 
 
 The final conquest of devouring ill! 
 
 This is the real spirit of this age 
 
 Which has outlived the first and second stage. 
 
 Its symptoms brightly blaze in ev'ry sphere, 
 
 In war for world-control on land and mere, 590 
 
 In changes violent of habits old. 
 
 In growing lordship over nature's mold. 
 
 To sum these symptoms in a single word : 
 
 To choke the present for the future herd. 
 
 'Tis but another mask of nature's will 595 
 
 To tempt her creatures Danaus' cask to fill. 
 
 The frenzied bigot, whether Buddhist, Turk, 
 
 Or Christian sectary, unconscious work 
 
 Perform as slaves to nature's flaming word: 
 
 That slowly shall improve the human herd 600 
 
 Through paths diversified as spider's threads, 
 
 With gust volcanic that destruction spreads, 
 
 28 
 
With cataclysms wrenching human soul; 
 And all for what ? That spirit may control ; 
 The spirit restless of ne'er sleeping will 605 
 
 To decorate itself with highest thrill 
 By changing ways of life and trains of thought, 
 Until supreme self-consciousness is wrought 
 That ev'ry stage of life on earth is vain 
 Except as moral to a poet's strain, 610 
 
 The craze which sweeps at present o'er mankind 
 Is not a scintillation of its mind, 
 But voiceless, deep conviction that each clan 
 Is doomed to punishment in nature's plan. 
 Unless with almost superhuman might 615 
 
 And prudence bordering clairvoyant sight. 
 The private citizen is taught to kill 
 Those selfish joys which to the state bode ill. 
 Hence instinct agitates that reckless man 
 Obeisance yield to nature's cruel plan 620 
 
 Which makes his person mere connecting link. 
 Whose appetites before the whole must shrink. 
 The state exists for man ; yet man in turn 
 Upon its altars must his incense burn. 
 
 As weaklings can not form a potent state 625 
 
 Which can defy begrudging neighbor's hate. 
 The state insists that citizens be strong 
 In mind and body to avenge each wrong 
 Which may be done to honor of the state 
 And that the public trust may not abate. 630 
 
 Yet such full freedom should each man enjoy 
 That dread of tyranny will not alloy 
 The fleeting pleasures of his brief career 
 
 29 
 
'Tween rocking cradle and sepulchral bier. 
 
 When, too meticulous, the laAvs oppress, 635 
 
 The love of guarding them grows less and less. 
 
 The love of freedom is a deathless flame. 
 
 Though blinded mobs its holy mandates shame 
 
 And seek to squelch a portion of that right 
 
 Which forms the basis of the nation's might, 640 
 
 Such bursts of frantic rage will soon die out 
 
 And flee before more sober thought in rout. 
 
 If there's a purpose in this vale of tears 
 
 The long experience of countless years 
 
 Has not established us on stable ground, 645 
 
 And greater hopelessness broods all around. 
 
 Mike 
 According to your doctrine, instinct sways 
 The life of men in most recondite ways. 
 I'm sure that of the millions voting "dry" 
 But very few the real cause espy. 650 
 
 A goodly number always welcomes change. 
 E'en though new schemes their present plans derange. 
 Ennui is potent factor with the mass 
 Wliich ever thirsts for something new to pass. 
 The dull monotony of daily life 655 
 
 Romantic souls for escapades makes rife. 
 E'en unromantic hearts with fire burn 
 New tactics to adopt through voting-urn; 
 From gray monotony of dull routine 
 
 The ever-aching heart away to wean 660 
 
 With prospect of a change that hurts them not 
 And some apparent evil out doth blot. 
 As long as man's on earth he will not rest 
 
 30 
 
To force on others what he thinks is best. 
 
 The others quickly will retort in kind 665 
 
 As soon as they have got their second wind. 
 
 This see-saw game of force opposing force 
 
 To sense of inner void must trace its source ; 
 
 For men devoted to improve their soul 
 
 Through lofty reasoning and self-control 670 
 
 By their example work more lasting good 
 
 Than all the world-reformers' brotherhood. 
 
 Cord 
 
 Ennui ! this magic name a dragon bears 
 Who shouts in triumph when a man despairs 
 Whose fond illusions packed their tents and fled 675 
 
 And left him wrestling with abstractions dead. 
 As rainbow hues in jet of fountain play, 
 Wlien intersected by the solar ray, 
 So gorgeous clouds the rising wishes deck 
 Wliile ignorance the dragon holds in check. 680 
 
 With swelling knowledge grows the dragon's might 
 And one by one illusions puts to flight, 
 The mists of ignorance dissolves in air, 
 And with its blazing eyes illumes its lair. 
 His gaping maAv forever craves new shows 685 
 
 And decks the stage for never-ending woes. 
 According to the mental pedigree 
 The soul, with changing speed, would fain be free 
 From clinging garment of the dream of bliss, 
 When seven heavens still lurk in a kiss, 690 
 
 Till fancy's robe is all to tatters rent; 
 "W^iat time the best of life is mostly spent. 
 When inner evolution nears its aim, 
 
 31 
 
Despondingly we Lear the sage proclaim : 
 Behold ! there's nought which has a lasting worth 695 
 
 Upon or this or any other earth ; 
 For life has neither fundament nor goal 
 And vainly seeks a happy state of soul; 
 For all at birth are doomed to wear away, 
 To suffer and to smart in robe of clay. 700 
 
 This knowledge is as ancient as the hills ; 
 Yet it improves us not, nor heals our ills; 
 Because our soul is rooted in despair. 
 That conscious vortex of ambitious air. 
 The sage, enjoying comfortable home 705 
 
 And learning's wealth within his thinking-dome. 
 May feign an air of transcendental scorn 
 Concerning habits of the meaner-born, 
 And graze the dreaded dragon of ennui 
 
 By meditating on the thing fer se, 710 
 
 And from the world of sense withdraw his claws 
 To contemplate life's never changing laws. 
 But e'en this pleasure loses charm in time. 
 And wearisome becomes e'en thought sublime. 
 How happy is the crowd of common men, 715 
 
 At nightfall laying down their ax or pen, 
 Convinced of heresy that constant bliss 
 Their proper mood should be in world like this! 
 Accordingly, when close the workshop's gates 
 And idle hour on their lordships waits, 720 
 
 Behold the haste to fan the spark of joy 
 With wine, tobacco, and what sense doth cloy ! 
 And why? Because the dragon wants his share. 
 And only mighty minds his gaze can dare. 
 All human acts ere tinged with endless curse: 725 
 
 32 
 
Fatality, banality, and worse; 
 
 Perpetual return of stupid play 
 
 To turn the waving grass to bundled hay. 
 
 The greatest bari who ever wielded pen, 
 
 The mighty Shakespeare, trots out hosts of men 730 
 
 Who rend with thunder-words the patient air 
 
 To symbolize the root of all, — despair. 
 
 His jesting butchers and his tragic clowns, 
 
 The mirth of Eosalind and Hamlet's frowns. 
 
 The rage of Lear and lago's guile, 735 
 
 The curse of Timon and Miranda's smile, — 
 
 These matchless forms of superhuman art. 
 
 Which paint the ebb and flow of mortal heart, — 
 
 Portray the unextinguished blaze of will, 
 
 The dragon feeding on himself when still. 740 
 
 With glance intuitive the spring he found 
 
 And read the riddle on its misty ground: 
 
 The truceless war by restless dragon waged 
 
 To be amused, deluded, and assuaged. 
 
 E'en Christ — the Savior justly called by men — 745 
 
 With scorn unspeakable despised that ken 
 
 Which founds its hope on prey of moth and rust 
 
 And idolizes passing forms of dust. 
 
 His transcendental doctrine plainly calls 
 
 To slay the dragon who the soul appalls, 750 
 
 With such a peace no understanding knows. 
 
 Before whose calm evaporate all shows, 
 
 Wliich symbolizes as the final end 
 
 That happiness where Nought and Being blend ; 
 
 Which realizes God where life-throbs cease, 755 
 
 And chains the dragon bind to hold the peace. 
 
 33 
 
Shop 
 The first stage bankrupt went in heathen Rome; 
 The second stage conceived Saint Peter's Dome; 
 The third stage of the world-iUusion now 
 Upon the earth is causing mighty row. 760 
 
 Men seek the happiness of future race 
 Through numberless reforms which should efface 
 All evil from the surface of the earth 
 And make this den of woe a park of mirth. 
 Some are dissatisfied with babes they have : 765 
 
 Behold Eugenics promise healing salve. 
 Some men mistrust the mettle of their brain : 
 Here Female Suffrage sings the soothing strain. 
 Some men like turkeys dread the landlord's ax : 
 A mightj^ chorus shouts for Single Tax. 770 
 
 Some men oppose the hoarding of great wealth : 
 Behold them girding socialistic belt. 
 Some others pity wretched mothers' toil : 
 Here Birth-Control is hailed as magic oil. 
 Another batch, and they are wondrous strong, 775 
 
 Declare that sipping wine is moral wrong. 
 I could extend this list to fill a book; 
 But let us now upon our problem look: 
 What means that craze which takes the world by storm 
 To poke aclown its throat such stern reform, 780 
 
 To regulate the life of tiny cell. 
 And make of earth's domain a happy hell? 
 
 Mike 
 The "Martyrdom of Man" is still the cry 
 In pathless jungle and where engines ply. 
 
 34 
 
To save their country millions dj^'e the plain 
 When hollow trumpet blows the martial strain. 
 So, too, in peace profound a countless host 
 Oft find security an idle boast 
 AVhen passing whims of fellow burghers seize 
 Upon their hoarded Avealth and means of ease. 
 Although I am at heart an optimist, 
 Yet I am not so blind as to insist 
 That human progress never should cause grief 
 To sluggards in arrears with their belief. 
 My heart goes out to him who bares his breast 
 To shrapnel, poison gases and the rest 
 Of all the flesh-destroying schemes of man. 
 When arms he dons at calling of his clan. 
 Stern duty forces him to sleep in trench, 
 Of fallen comrades to endure the stench. 
 To starve and bleed and die for those at home 
 And turn away his eyes from heaven's dome, 
 To banish all that's noblest in his thought. 
 To be again the savage beast which fought 
 In glacial age with weapons made of stone 
 To wrest from fellow cavemen rotting bone. 
 A carnival of carnage rages now 
 And feeble hands must guide the heavy plow. 
 While nervy arms the cannon push o'er hill 
 To shoot to fragments cottage, barn and mill. 
 Some day the thunder of the guns will stop, 
 And weary warriors their brows will mop 
 With bloody kerchiefs, and their masters ask: 
 "Wliat fruit is there of all that ghastly task?" 
 I know not what the lords of men will say 
 
 35 
 
When widows, cripples, orphans curse the day 
 
 Which made e'en womankind don war-array, 
 
 And bloom of manhood sentenced to decay, 
 
 To death, to torture, to corruption vile. 
 
 To all that hell upon mankind could pile, 820 
 
 And sowed the seed of hate in ev'ry soul, 
 
 And made man think that devils had control. 
 
 Cord 
 
 A nihilistic longing of the soul, 
 That would be free on earth from pain and dole, 
 Has grown a passion with a host of men 825 
 
 And tinged with cowardice their shrunken ken. 
 If they would stoop to scan historic page. 
 The world's convulsions, and the tiger rage 
 Which churned in vortex ev'ry human tribe 
 And crowned pacific hopes with leering gibe, 830 
 
 They would recoil in horror from the sight 
 And learn how from destruction's awful blight 
 A flimsy curtain separates their all. 
 Each day they'd dread to hear the tocsin call 
 The citizens to arm and to defend 835 
 
 Their wealth and freedom to the bitter end. 
 No patriotic song will shield our shore; 
 Not hymns to saints will stay a sea of gore. 
 When nations mobilize for lust of prey, 
 Not scraps of paper will blockade their way. 840 
 
 'Tis false philosophy to hope for luck 
 That dragon will not sparrow's feathers pluck. 
 The weak must perish. God has willed it so. 
 If right or wrong, the fact is true ; we know. 
 
 36 
 
Shop 
 Consider well the basic law of life, 845 
 
 That Force is Umpire in the cosmic strife ; 
 That states were formed to raise to higher plane 
 The jungle-savage, and to give domain 
 To Right and Freedom — Justice, in a word, — 
 To pledge each member of the human herd 850 
 
 To fight, to perish, if the case demand, 
 Enforcing rules made by the fatherland. 
 Yet Right is negative in its content: 
 The liberty to do without dissent 
 
 What can not work our fellow beings harm; 855 
 
 And laws of state extend their mighty arm 
 To squelch the malefactor small or great, 
 And guard ideal peace in civil state. 
 Without the commonwealth's imposing hosts, 
 Right, Liberty, and Justice are but ghosts 860 
 
 That vainly for their incarnation look. 
 Or shades defying iron grappling-hook. 
 If justice in the world of men held sway. 
 It were sufficient to have baked the clay. 
 
 And built the hut, and squat about the hearth. 865 
 
 This were our right, as 'tis construed on earth. 
 Without the laws of state our so-called right 
 Would vanish with a foe's exulting might. 
 In order to extent the rule of right 
 
 And make mankind obey a common light, 870 
 
 A central power must the scepter hold, 
 One parliament the rule of right imfold; 
 For masters two one house can not contain. 
 And discord quickly rends the roof in twain. 
 
 37 
 
But let star-gazers build Utopian dreams! 
 While life-evoking sun upon us beams, 
 And races many-hued strive to excel 
 And others to obedience compel, 
 The dream of universal peace is vain; 
 
 And thus with commonsense we must again 880 
 
 Imj)ress upon our minds that primal fact, 
 And guide our course with wisdom and with tact. 
 We've built a house magnificentlj^ great, 
 A monumental and ideal state. 
 
 Shall we supinely view a rising storm 885 
 
 And wriggle like defenseless, trodden worm? 
 Or shall we shine like Pallas clad in mail. 
 Invulnerable to the hostile hail? 
 Awake, Columbia ! from hypnotic thrall, 
 For portents ominous to action call. 890 
 
 Beyond thy eastern shore the Avorld's aflame; 
 And to the west an empire starts the game 
 Of flinging its proud banner o'er the sea 
 Dividing Mongol serf from Yankee free. 
 As faithful collie guards the grazing flocks; 895 
 
 As pilot guides the vessel past the rocks 
 That lurk beneath the surface of the bay 
 With demon patience for their easy prey; 
 As wise enshrine their gold in vaults of steel ; 
 As trusty guardsmen make the prowler feel 900 
 
 That 'tis not safe for him to try the door. 
 Or through a sky-light drop on banking-floor: 
 So ought we guard the world's most precious spot 
 From foes who threaten and from thoughts that rot. 
 Unmindful of the danger close at hand, 905 
 
 38 
 
Its head the ostrich buries in the sand ; 
 
 And thus imagines to ekide the dart 
 
 By savage brandished with consummate art. 
 
 Shall we like stupid bird expose our manse 
 
 To perforation by the foeman's lance? 910 
 
 Or weld an armor that will cause respect 
 
 And make a foe both tremble and reflect 
 
 Before he challenges Old Glory's hosts 
 
 To trace in Yankee blood his war-god's boasts? 
 
 Mike 
 Without the commonwealth's protecting arm 915 
 
 The life of men were one intense alarm; 
 All culture would be nipped like leaves by frost, 
 And painful toil of years ten thousand lost. 
 
 Cord 
 All philosophic minds therein agree, 
 
 That "Country First" must still the watchword be; 920 
 
 And greatest is the might of modern state, 
 In which the citizens with skill debate 
 The problems rising fresh with ev'ry sun, 
 Which call by turns for statesman's pen or gun. 
 
 Mike 
 A chain of steel binds man to native soil. 925 
 
 No matter what our common land embroil. 
 In our opinion it is always right. 
 And for its conservation we must fight, 
 Regardless of sophisticated view 
 
 Concerning what is right and what is true. 930 
 
 39 
 
This patriotic instinct must prevail; 
 
 Else in distress our might will droop and fail. 
 
 Shop 
 E'en nations singly feel themselves too weak 
 In world-affairs deciding word to speak; 
 Hence leagues are formed to make their will the law, 935 
 
 And with united strength inspire awe. 
 This process is the same with mighty lands 
 As with the primal, savage, roving bands: 
 A ceaseless struggle to obtain control. 
 
 And make of hostile parts organic whole. 950 
 
 It may be possible in future time 
 That one republic cover ev'ry clime. 
 What then may happen, it were hard to guess; 
 But men will still be human none the less. 
 I called the passion for reform a craze; 945 
 
 Hence it behooves me to explain the maze 
 Of fact and thought which justifies that word. 
 He, whom the stern reality has stirred 
 To fearless contemplation of the soul 
 
 And potent instincts which our acts control, 950 
 
 Will soon discover as the inmost core 
 Of all that breathes upon this mundane floor 
 A restless striving after happiness 
 And struggle 'gainst the hydra of distress. 
 More simply still, our nature is a Will, 955 
 
 And nothing earthly can its longing still. 
 The will forever satisfaction craves; 
 And human functions are its bonded slaves. 
 Because a ceaseless Willing is the Will, 
 
 40 
 
No satisfaction can its coffers fill. 960 
 
 As happiness means "Willing Satisfied," 
 
 It is as plain as day our mind has lied 
 
 ^Vhen it to fond illusion paved the way 
 
 That human race will ever see the day 
 
 When happiness is reached, the final goal, 965 
 
 And wisdom holds the reins of world-control. 
 
 The will in man is fundamental force ; 
 
 The mind mere pilot who directs the course; 
 
 Hence need of laws to hold the will in check. 
 
 Or ancient savageness the home would fleck. 970 
 
 Since social instinct drove together men. 
 
 They have exhausted all their wit and ken 
 
 To formulate the most progressive laws 
 
 And extirpate the most persisting flaws. 
 
 Such as his pristine longing to be free 975 
 
 From irksome fetters of society. 
 
 Just think of Saturn's feast in ancient Kome, 
 
 \^nien Bacchic revelry transformed the home. 
 
 The stern old Romans even felt the need 
 
 To once a year dispense with sober screed. 980 
 
 Yet we surpass the Romans even here, 
 
 Since many states have banished Bacchic cheer, 
 
 And perfect soberness the whole year reigns. 
 
 And laughter riotous our saints disdains. 
 
 Cord 
 
 O yes, the will in man sports varied freaks 985 
 
 Of which each drama eloquently speaks ; 
 But also real life shows many ways 
 
 41 
 
The hermit and the schemer spend their days. 
 
 Each seeks to happiness some special road. 
 
 To one ideal point all dreams which goad. 990 
 
 In deep seclusion, melancholy thought, 
 
 The hermit seeks for happiness not bought 
 
 By waste of passion in the fretful game, 
 
 Where wealth and honor oft are marred by shame. 
 
 Another's pillow grows a bed of thorns, 995 
 
 Unless his presence herald noisy horns, 
 
 And awe-struck rabble deftly bend the knee 
 
 To hail the prototype of vanity. 
 
 Shop 
 You know man's story just as well as I : 
 
 The tragedy of government, the cry 1000 
 
 "Which issues from a discontented crowd 
 In despot kingdom or republic proud, 
 No matter whether granaries are filled 
 Or blood of millions on the field is spilled. 
 WHiat is it but the aching of the will 1005 
 
 For change of scene its baseless maw to fill ? 
 Behold the people of the fairest land. 
 With all the charms of peace at their command, 
 Forever restless in their present state, 
 
 Forever agitating to elate 1010 
 
 Their inner self up to so high a key 
 That they xieglect the laws of equity. 
 For instance, very many able men. 
 Swayed by the force of philosophic ken. 
 
 Have sworn hostility to juice of grape; 1015 
 
 Because its odor makes of man an ape 
 
 42 
 
Forgetting all about the "how" and "why" 
 
 And deaf to worried mind's discordant cry 
 
 For insight into meaning of the play, 
 
 Life's manifold and universal fray, 1020 
 
 AAliat is the meaning of Bacchantic glee, 
 
 Of ecstasy of soul that w^ould be free 
 
 For fleeting moments from the chains of thought, 
 
 As birds from net in which by fowler caught? 
 
 The Preacher says : "With knowledge sorrow grows." 1025 
 
 Now, Bacchus freedom on the soul bestows 
 
 By silencing the leaden voice of Care 
 
 Wlien joyous notes his brazen cymbals blare. 
 
 When his sweet nectar sets the cheeks ablaze, 
 
 It drowns in Lethe vexing puzzles' haze 1030 
 
 And trims the soul to swift, poetic flight 
 
 Away from dull routine of day and night. 
 
 A momentary freedom of the soul 
 
 From choking dust's o'ermastering control; 
 
 A slackening of chain which binds the mind 1035 
 
 Fresh victims for the Moloch Will to find; 
 
 A respite from the drudging workhouse-toils. 
 
 Where fancy perishes and envy boils: 
 
 Such is the gift which Bacchus takes away 
 
 When sordid frenzy blocks his cheering sway. 1040 
 
 The Puritanic mind regards as sin 
 
 The slightest pleasure which on earth we win. 
 
 They propagate the creed that earth's a hell. 
 
 In which he's doubly damned who lives too well. 
 
 Uncontradicted is this gloomy fact, 1045 
 
 The solid bottom to each pious tract 
 
 Asserting hell wdll lose its winning score 
 
When for a moment man forgets life's sore. 
 The founders of our state did well decree 
 That all religion should be wholly free. 1050 
 
 Yet, at the present day I view with dread 
 Fanatic frenzy shame our honored dead. 
 If juice of grape my famished soul instil 
 With word-defying, superhuman thrill, 
 
 In which I worship dust's transcendent glow 1055 
 
 As life's most precious gem, and great thoughts flow 
 In torrents from the liberated mind 
 To cheer my heart and elevate mankind: — 
 Must I submit to Puritanic zeal 
 
 That would degrade this freemen's commonweal 1060 
 
 To pesthouse smoking out all higher bliss 
 Than hugging dollars and the Judas kiss? 
 Because unskillful men abused his gift. 
 They turned the jolly god of wine adrift. 
 To punish sober man to help a sot 1065 
 
 Is gayest bud of sentimental rot. 
 Why not in prison put the human race, 
 Because some fighting men may scratch their face? 
 Why not the churches level to the ground, 
 Because some wolves in sable cloth are found? 1070 
 
 Why not like Puritans the plain truth tell 
 That man on earth must be prepared for hell? 
 Though Bacchus exiled be to foreign shore. 
 And happy roisterers exult no more; 
 
 Yet he took with him to another stage 1075 
 
 The godlike frenzy, and we keep the rage : 
 The thirst the desert-void of heart to fill. 
 With icy reason face despondent thrill 
 
 44 
 
In vain attempt to rouse a joy supreme 
 
 Without aromas that from wine-cups stream; 1080 
 
 To gaze with leaden eye on cheerless day, 
 The sullen victim of the soul's decay. 
 The festive garland turns to withered grass 
 When underneath repining shadows pass. 
 
 When joy triumphant dies in sober brains 1085 
 
 And leads a flick'ring life in poet's strains, 
 Mankind has lost the better part of life 
 And for a lower plane is getting rife. 
 Where all the programme is prescribed for you. 
 Your food, your drink, your clothes, your fancy, too, 1090 
 In perfect state, you'll be a perfect cog, 
 And freedom's longing squelched in stagnant bog. 
 A just appreciation is the thing 
 To block all chaos and contentment bring. 
 Was not the Author of the Golden Eule 1095 
 
 By rabble hooted as ambitious fool ? 
 Go search the volumes of historic lore, 
 Wliose ev'ry line flares red with human gore ; 
 Or scan the extras of the daily press 
 
 And learn to know man's utter savageness. 1100 
 
 We fain would close our eyes to naked truth, 
 And lay the blame on this or that, forsooth ; 
 But deeper insight soon the fact reveals 
 That from the dawn of time 'tis Fate that deals 
 The bloody cards denoting legions slain 1105 
 
 For purpose ultimate we seek in vain. 
 Again, our ignorance a giant looms 
 When nations perish 'neath the mighty brooms 
 Which Fate employs to make a pathway clear 
 
 46 
 
At price of all which men do hold most dear. 1110 
 
 O ask not Why ? For Fate is mute as death ; 
 Our question, folly and abuse of breath. 
 'Tis human reason's unrelenting task 
 To evermore the self -same questions ask; 
 
 And 'tis the nature of the human will 1115 
 
 With fresh desires panting heart to fill. 
 The endless chains of life all things embrace, 
 And all are scourged along in madding race. 
 Suppose that cranks prevailed to pass a law 
 Forbidding men and maids to coo or caw 1120 
 
 Before the parson had pronounced them One: 
 What cry of horror Avould through nation run ? 
 This is no jest. 'Tis law in many lands, 
 'Neath Moslem Crescent and on Christian strands. 
 Thus habit makes an abject slave of man 1125 
 
 Allien progress is tabooed in sluggish clan. 
 The leading thought that w^ll not quit my mind. 
 Is that some common aims our natures bind. 
 Mankind may be compared to endless chain 
 Which sex and hunger on this earth maintain. 1130 
 
 The endless wants of man to states give rise; 
 And countless states fresh worlds of laws devise 
 To ease the burden of increasing care 
 That gnaAvs on pauper and on millionaire, 
 Wlien man's ne'er glutted wishes ask for more 1135 
 
 Than decent comfort from the common store. 
 This to Utopias the death-knell sounds; 
 For human will is thing which knows no bounds. 
 Though joy in cup by law you may restrain 
 Till obsolescence makes such action vain : 1140 
 
 46 
 
Have you reflected what will take its place? 
 
 What novel vices will mankind disgrace? 
 
 It is no easy task to draw^ the line 
 
 AMiere virtue and where vices intertwine. 
 
 A foreign thinker showed us how this is 1145 
 
 The case with lavishness and avarice. 
 
 The gist of his remarks from sober prose 
 
 To English meters here I will transpose. 
 
 "The spendthrift is a fool who squanders all 
 
 For brief enjoyment of a bacchanal. 1150 
 
 The coming future weighs not on his mind 
 
 That values but delights of carnal kind. 
 
 Steep is the price the spendthrift has to pay 
 
 For hollow, fleeting pleasures of a clay, 
 
 For fawning parasites' insulting smile, 1155 
 
 For entertainment of a rabble vile; 
 
 Since pinching want and sorrow are the price 
 
 The spendthrift payeth for his wretched vice. 
 
 His presence should be shunned like plague or dope ; 
 
 For some day he will act the misanthrope 1160 
 
 Like Timon, and his friends the sorry role 
 
 Delightfully portrayed in Shakespeare's scroll. 
 
 Who wastes his fortune as a thing of air, 
 
 Will manage not his fellows' pelf with care. 
 
 The path from waste to poverty is short; 1165 
 
 And spendthrifts oft at last to crimes resort. 
 
 But avarice has plenty in its wake; 
 
 And who at plenty e'er his head did shake? 
 
 The avaricious has this maxim right: 
 
 That vain and negative is all delight; 1170 
 
 That a chimera is all happiness, 
 
 And positive and real all distress. 
 
 47 
 
In order to escape from real ills, 
 He abdicates the thought of pleasure's thrills. 
 He knows the possibilities of woe, 1175 
 
 What dangers lurk whatever paths we go; 
 Surrounds himself as with a triple wall 
 To hold in banishment misfortune's call. 
 For who can tell when care becomes too great? 
 ^Vho can confine malignity of fate? 1180 
 
 E'en though his treasures ne'er the miser use. 
 His zeal excessive no one doth abuse. 
 Upon his death his heirs will feel a pride 
 The hoarded gold 'mong traders to divide; 
 For ducats are but counters, nothing more; 1185 
 
 And bread will circulate, though money soar. 
 A spendthrift's friendship is of no account. 
 A miser's friendship often doth amount 
 To something, when a swift misfortune knocks 
 And e'en his calculating heart unlocks. 1190 
 
 O avarice ! quintessence of all vice ! 
 If carnal pleasure lead man in a trice 
 Away from path he ought to follow straight, 
 It is the animal in him has weight 
 
 To make him yield to momentary charm, 1195 
 
 Unmindful of the coming, certain harm. 
 But when the vices he would never quit. 
 While for delight of senses he was fit. 
 Begin to leave him when the muscles groan, 
 The mental greed survives the pleasures flown. 1200 
 
 The abstract representative of wealth. 
 Of all the instruments of joy and health, 
 Becomes the withered trunk to which his lust 
 Clings like the shadow to the fleeting dust; 
 
 48 
 
And gold to him an abstract symbol grew 1205 
 
 Of carnal pleasures which in youth he knew. 
 
 Hence, avarice the aged doth ensnare, 
 
 And with extravagance the striplings fare." 
 
 Apply this moral to the use of wine, — 
 
 That moderation is the path divine — , 1210 
 
 And all is said that Christ Himself would say, 
 
 Were He to reappear this present day. 
 
 Mike 
 My gloom grows deeper since I heard your talk. 
 Although I am disposed to mark with chalk 
 Of blazing red this pleasant afternoon, 1215 
 
 A tropic flower on a barren dune, 
 Yet there's no consolation I can find 
 In what you have unrolled before my mind. 
 My humble fortune's gone. I am too old 
 For competition with the young and bold. 1220 
 
 T am not gifted with poetic spark 
 To emulate in verse the morning lark; 
 Nor can I boast the patience of a saint 
 On mental mirror all the world to paint, 
 
 And glut my heart with philosophic gaze 1225 
 
 On universal and perplexing maze. 
 
 Shop 
 
 You are quite right. Consoling thought there's none, 
 Except our lucubrations serve as one. 
 The swift-succeeding races of mankind 
 
 Like shadows on the wall or moaning wind 1230 
 
 No impress leave on life's eternal tide, 
 
 49 
 
A^liose giant waves soon all our glories hide. 
 
 Although our life be cradled in despair, 
 
 And Wisdom's form a ragged garment wear, 
 
 Though happiness upon deception rests 1235 
 
 And fades when insight plies its acid tests : 
 
 Yet, notwithstanding, truth should be our goal, 
 
 To render less opaque the play of soul, 
 
 Though quickly fall illusions right and left, 
 
 And blissful day-dreams are of joy bereft. 1240 
 
 Through growing loneliness of desert waste 
 
 To rend the Isis-veil to shreds we haste. 
 
 With confidence one may chimeras slay. 
 
 If Imowledge of one's worth all fear allay. 
 
 Before this confidence all trouble fades 1245 
 
 As falls the grass before Toledo blades. 
 
 But when illusions fly, and pangs remain 
 
 To sear the heart with their constricting chain, 
 
 And worthless Nothing stares behind the veil ; — 
 
 Beware the Gorgon starting from her jail! 1250 
 
 Cord 
 
 And yet the warfare 'gainst the god of wine 
 In one respect approaches the divine. 
 'Tis known that grape produces transient bliss, 
 A joy as fleeting as a maiden's kiss. 
 
 Displeasure follows when the bliss is o'er 1255 
 
 Of grape or kiss: 'gainst wine why such a roar? 
 So is it with each single aim in life. 
 When after almost superhuman strife 
 We have obtained the tempting, dazzling bait, 
 We are at once reduced to ancient strait 1260 
 
 Of setting up new goal for itching will, 
 
 50 
 
Or letting vapid gloom our spirit fill. 
 
 It seems the aim of life to spread a snare 
 
 To tempt its creatures ev'ry step to dare 
 
 To sound the depths and shallows of the will 1265 
 
 Until the pendulum at last is still; 
 
 And hence the notice to the heathen god 
 
 To take his luggage from our saintly sod. 
 
 T will not prophesy his coming wrath, 
 
 For this is knowledge that no mortal hath. 1270 
 
 Meanwhile, we'll rave and dream a fitful day 
 
 Until our atoms strike and go their way. 
 
 Shop. 
 
 The plain philistine hearkens to the voice 
 Proclaiming it his duty to rejoice 
 
 [n life as some unqualified affair 1275 
 
 And not a goblin of the light and air; 
 Hence his persistent chase to trap the spot 
 A^'liich fancy's rainbows with allurements dot. 
 The college graduate philistine looks 
 
 On certain methods as unfailing hooks 1280 
 
 To spear elusive truth's elastic shape 
 And with scholastic frills her garment drape. 
 But neither happiness nor truth can e'er 
 Be rendered captive in the ''when" and ''where." 
 Their shadow-pictures only haunt us here 1285 
 
 Our course consistent to their star to steer. 
 Life is a tongue which doth a lesson give. 
 Could this be otherwise, we would not live. 
 The school of life no maxims can supplant 
 Which others copied from the world-soul's rant. 1290 
 
 51 
 
As the Apostles Pentecostal Day 
 
 In his own tongue appeared to each to pray, 
 
 So life a diverse language speaks to each, 
 
 And just that which he needs to him doth teach. 
 
 Cord 
 You have portrayed in simple style the fate 1295 
 
 Inseparable from all conscious state: 
 That metaphysic base of life is will; 
 And hence no finite scheme its thirst can still. 
 This tale can be re-echoed thousandfold. 
 
 But the entire truth can not be told. 1300 
 
 The day will come when English song no more 
 Will glad the ear along Pacific shore; 
 When ceaseless circuit of the restless race 
 Our tongue will mangle and our name efface ; 
 When constant mingling of the wand'ring tribes 1305 
 
 Our present idols makes the theme of gibes. 
 From dawn of time man westward turned his way. 
 Lured by hypnotic spell of setting ray. 
 Fate's book is writ in sympathetic ink. 
 
 The pi*esent only forces us to think. 1310 
 
 The present day is fresh as morning dew. 
 The past and future vanish from our view. 
 Vast floes of ice unnumbered years ago 
 Once pressed the fields where tropic breezes blow. 
 In course of time the sun will lose its force, 1315 
 
 And tropic jungles yield to polar gorse. 
 The ever changing flux of suns and tides 
 Makes rest a phantom and ambition chides. 
 As -Aristophanes with blasting scorn 
 
 52 
 
Pillories demagogues who toot their horn, 1320 
 
 Pokes fun at peasant of a reason dense, 
 And rifts the cloud which masks the seer's pretense: 
 So nature scatters what to sense appears 
 Like smoke which from a hidden fire rears. 
 For, all that is at last appears a fraud, 1325 
 
 And nature only the immortal bawd 
 Who spreads her tempting and licentious snares 
 To catch the stripling gulls most unawares. 
 Most men like nags are wedded to their bit; 
 Hence their hostility to drastic wit 1330 
 
 That scorns the harness of despondent heart. 
 And pyrotechnics makes of stinging smart. 
 Methinks that flagon did but little wrong 
 Compared with world-reformers' siren song. 
 When godlike frenzy of the poet, too, 1335 
 
 Is doomed the greyish husks of truth to woo. 
 rhe earnest bigot, like short-winded horse. 
 Drops halfway in the race and blocks the course, 
 rhe bigot and the grafter, hand in hand, 
 rhus far have blasted ev'ry happy land. 1340 
 
 WTiile serves his hobby-horse for battle-cry, 
 rhe plainest tnith the zealot will deny, 
 rhe ever-bubbling fount of human will, — 
 LTnfathomable source of good and ill, — 
 
 Will conjure up ten thousand phantoms more 1345 
 
 Fo vex all patriots from shore to shore 
 With laws prohibitive to curb their will 
 rill indignation with an earthquake thrill 
 Protests against the mummeries of those 
 ^Vlio on a mouldy wine-cask feast their nose. 1350 
 
 53 
 
THE DISILLUSIONED GENIUS 
 
 OR 
 
 ffill^ (UruhU of inn (|m}otf . 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 Miguel De Cervantes Saavedra, born October 9, 
 1547, at Alcala' de Henares, led a changeful and at 
 times adventurous life, and died at Madrid April 23, 
 1616, the day of death of William Shakespeare. He 
 commenced writing verses at an early age. His pas- 
 toral "Filena" attracted the attention of Cardinal 
 Acquaviva, whom he accompanied to Italy as page. 
 He served in the war against the Turks and lost the 
 use of his left hand in the naval battle of Lepanto, 
 October 8, 1571. In 1575, while returning to Spain, 
 he was captured by the corsair Arnaut Mami and 
 sold in Algiers as a slave. In 1580 he was ransomed 
 by his friends and relatives, and, rejoining his old 
 regiment, he fought in the naval battle and subse- 
 quent storming of Terceira. In 1583, he retired from 
 military service, and in 1584 he published his pas- 
 toral "Galatea", and subsequently thirty dramas, 
 among which the tragedy '^Numancia" ranks first. 
 This play treats of the heroic defense of the ancient 
 Spanish city against the Romans under Scipio. From 
 1588 to 1599 he lived retired at Seville, where he 
 
held a small office. He spent some time in ]Drison 
 for alleged irregularities in his accounts. It was 
 during his incarceration that he is supposed to have 
 conceived the plan of his immortal masterpiece "Don 
 Quijote," the first part of which was published at 
 Madrid in 1605. 
 
 Heinrich Heine, in the Second Book of his cri- 
 tique "The Romantic School," says: "There is much 
 
 talk among us about this 'humorous irony' But 
 
 it is merely a sign of our political oppression (Un- 
 freiheit) ; and, just as Cervantes at the time of the 
 Inquisition had to have recourse to a humorous irony 
 in order to indicate his thoughts without giving the 
 Familiars of the Holy Office a tangible hold, so also 
 Goethe was in the habit of expressing in the tone of 
 a humorous irony that which, as a statesman and 
 courtier, he dared not say openlj^ Goethe has never 
 suppressed the truth; but he has clothed it in humor 
 and irony wherever he dared not show it naked. 
 Writers who suffer under censorship and intellectual 
 restraints of all sorts and yet cannot suppress the 
 opinions dear to their hearts, are compelled to have 
 recourse particularly to the ironical and humorous 
 
 foiTQ These two men, the author of 'Hamlet' 
 
 and the author of 'Don Quijote,' are the greatest 
 
 poets whom modern times have produced 'Don 
 
 Quijote,' together with 'Hamlet' and 'Faust', are 
 
 perhaps the favorite reading of the Germans 
 
 Those who have arrived at the knowledge that all is 
 vain, that all human efforts are fruitless, give the 
 preference to Cervantes' novel. They see in it a per- 
 
siflage of all enthusiasm, and all our contemporary 
 knights who fight and suffer for an idea appear to 
 them as so many Don Quijotes. Did Cervantes sus- 
 pect what application a later period would make of 
 his works? Did he really wish to parody idealistic 
 enthusiasm in the shape of his lank and tall knight, 
 and the matter-of-fact understanding in the shape 
 of his plump 3^eoman? .... Or did the deep-thinking 
 Spaniard desire to scoff still more profoundly at 
 human nature? Did he represent allegorically our 
 intellect in the shape of Don Quijote and our body 
 in the shape of Sancho Panza? " 
 
THE DISILLUSIONED GENIUS 
 
 OR 
 
 ®l|^ (HmhU 0f ion (^m\tiU. 
 
 A Ballad. 
 
 His cheek on his right hand resting, 
 
 At a table in prison-cell, 
 Cervantes was deep in plodding 
 
 To escape from the gloomy spell, 
 
 From desolate dungeon-twilight 
 
 And the dearth of inspiring talk, 
 
 From moan of the tortured culprits 
 And the jailer's untiring walk. 
 
 He gazed on his left arm's remnant, 
 On the mark of Lepanto's fight. 
 
 Where Turk and his battered frigates 
 Courted safety in rapid flight. 
 
 He thought of his Afric prison, 
 
 And the priceless, long years bewailed 
 
 Of thankless and servile toiling 
 
 When the corsair his galley scaled. 
 59 
 
He sighed for his thoughtless country 
 That ignored his surpassing worth 
 
 As brave and resourceful soldier 
 As did ever adorn the earth. 
 
 He longed for the sea and tempest, 
 
 For the freedom from durance vile, 
 
 For summons to gird his sabre 
 
 And on Mussulman vent his bile. 
 
 But vain is attempt at freedom 
 
 While the irons his ankle maim; 
 
 And idle his dreamy ravings 
 Of heroic, but futile aim. 
 
 His heart had been stung quite early 
 By the irony stern of life: — 
 
 That genius is linked with sorrow 
 In the vulgar and jealous strife 
 
 For gold and for empty honor, 
 
 For the brazen applause of knaves, 
 
 For courtesan's smile illusive 
 
 And the compliments cheap of slaves ;- 
 
 By irony universal 
 
 Of that comical, tragic game. 
 The playground of brutish instincts 
 
 And of phantom delights of fame, 
 60 
 
Of lofty pretense of honor, 
 
 And of personal, secret spring 
 
 Which sets up a trap for peoples 
 
 For a shadow their necks to wring; — 
 
 By Sisyphus plight of genius 
 
 And its barren and hopeless task 
 
 To broaden the soul of rabble 
 
 Who adoi'e a transparent mask, 
 
 Idolater dull of custom, 
 
 With a fetich their bloody god. 
 The Moloch at ancient Carthage, 
 
 With his lungs into furnace wrought, 
 
 Or Allah in Algiers modern. 
 
 With his battle-cry "Death to all 
 
 Who Koran do not acknowledge 
 
 And Mohammed usurper call"; — 
 
 By gravity ultra-comic 
 
 Of the rattlehead's empty face ; — 
 By tragic array of muskets 
 
 And the drill for a useless race 
 
 To gain what alone pure reason 
 
 With mankind can e'er bring about, 
 
 A peaceful Olympic contest, 
 
 Whei^e the victor is hailed with shout 
 61 
 
Of triumph and joy exulting 
 By the nations of all the earth, 
 
 And laurel and palm are trophies 
 
 For the kings of the arts of mirth. 
 
 Cervantes acknowledged meekly 
 To himself in his inner soul: 
 
 "What shadows have I been chasing 
 With a prison my final goal? 
 
 One arm I have lost in scaling 
 
 The steep prow of a Turkish ship, 
 
 And nearly six years I dreaded 
 
 The long reach of a Moorish whip. 
 
 And now I adorn a dungeon 
 
 On some utterly stupid charge, 
 
 Wliile cowards and knaves and braggards 
 Are cavorting about at large. 
 
 O wonderful end of glory 
 
 And of chivalry and romance! 
 
 The rushlights of youthful fancy 
 Surely led me a merry dance. 
 
 Perhaps my whole life was error, 
 A mad race for phantastic goal, 
 
 A courtship of endless hardships 
 For the dregs of a bitter bowl. 
 62 
 
In various plays and novels 
 
 I attempted Parnassus' heights; 
 
 But meager reward I gathered 
 
 From my many and soaring flights. 
 
 The youth of my native country 
 Are devouring absurd romance, 
 
 The fables of bold knight-errant 
 
 Who a steed can upraise with lance ; 
 
 And fiction of bloodless ladies 
 Who impossible task intrust 
 
 Upon their knight-errant lovers, 
 
 And the commonsense-man disgust. 
 
 To reason against the fashion, 
 
 Which exalts these phantastic tales 
 
 With arguments philosophic 
 
 And a scorn which the fools impales. 
 
 Would surely fall flat like sermon 
 
 That is preached to the deaf and dumb ; 
 
 But here I recall a maxim, — 
 
 And it comes like a saving crumb, — 
 
 That fiend must be fought with fire, 
 His own element be his death; 
 
 And hence I will write a story 
 
 That will take away reader's breath. 
 63 
 
Knight-errant I'll clothe with halo 
 
 That will sweep them from off their feet 
 
 And wrench a convulsive laughter 
 
 From the judge on his solemn seat. 
 
 Yes, laugh! and the world laughs with you; 
 
 For a jest is a priceless gift 
 Which flares like a flash of lightning 
 
 And in night's blackest clouds makes rift. 
 
 My book will become the lightning 
 That will show till the end of time 
 
 The rifts in the hero's armor 
 
 And the fate of all aim sublime. 
 
 So down with all thought despondent ! 
 
 As a soldier I will not yield. 
 Though sabre be notched and rusty, 
 
 Let my fancy and art be shield 
 
 To serve as a mighty breastwork 
 
 'Gainst the shadow of coming want ; 
 
 My jestings shall be the gunners 
 To dispel the phantasma gaunt 
 
 Which harrass the self- forgetting 
 In Castile and in heathen land, 
 
 And those who have squandered treasure 
 
 Of their brain and their heart and hand 
 64 
 
For those who will not acknowledge 
 An unselfish and noble aim, 
 
 Whose eyes ne'er behold the heavens 
 
 And whose pinions of thought are lame. 
 
 The hero may rot in prison, 
 
 While the jester grows fat at court. 
 'Tis thus in the Afric jungle 
 
 And where bulls in the circus snort. 
 
 Away with profound reflection 
 
 And with thought of a higher life ! 
 
 Away with all introspection 
 
 In the maddening whirl of strife! 
 
 Just tickle the rib of dullard 
 
 With a jest of a low degree. 
 And O ! how the pesos rattle 
 
 And the spectres of hunger flee." 
 
 His wisdom begot cool courage 
 
 And dispelled his dejected state 
 
 And idle complaint of fortune 
 And the pitiless shears of fate. 
 
 He built in his mind the framework 
 Of a tale of enchanting mirth, 
 
 Narrating the great adventures 
 On this dull and prosaic earth 
 65 
 
Of hero with mind diverted 
 
 From the lusts of the common herd 
 
 And seeking a realm ideal 
 
 With the might of his deed and word. 
 
 The hero's name, Don Quijote 
 
 De La Mancha is known to all. 
 
 His yeoman was Sancho Panza 
 
 Who ne'er shirked at his master's call. 
 
 Three centuries "Don Quijote" 
 
 Has delighted the reading world. 
 
 His droll and his tragic mishaps 
 
 Into laughter both worlds have hurled. 
 
 About this knight-errant peerless 
 
 Are a score of romances wove 
 Whic^ gloss with poetic beauty 
 
 The adventures in war and love 
 
 Of maidens and youths, the victims 
 
 Of the ever-refulgent beams 
 Which dart from the eyes in springtime, 
 
 When the incense from meadow streams. 
 
 But theirs is a trance too common 
 
 To deserve an especial note, 
 Except in the eye of cynic 
 
 Who on all with a sneer will dote. 
 66 
 
The project, which promised freedom 
 To Cervantes and lasting fame, 
 
 Made wings of his dungeon-fetters; 
 Of the twilight, a sunrise flame. 
 
 Unhampered by Inquisition, 
 
 Of a madman he could make sport, 
 
 Who squandered in rainbow-chasing 
 The last brick of his ancient fort. 
 
 Exulting in joy of triumph 
 
 In the vision which brought relief, 
 Cervantes thus pondered sagely 
 
 On his victory over grief : 
 
 "I'll picture all human nature 
 
 In a tale which pretends to mock 
 
 The dupes of knight-errant fables 
 And of cold disillusion's shock. 
 
 The world is a boundless prison, 
 
 And the chains which the many clutch 
 
 Are made of a finer metal 
 
 Then the steel which my ankles touch. 
 
 They'll laugh when they read the antics 
 Of La Manchr-'s ambitious knight. 
 
 The windmill-assailing hero, 
 
 And of Panza, the humble wight. 
 67 
 
They'll laugh and they'll shriek for ages; 
 
 For their shadow it is they see 
 Emblazed in immortal pages, 
 
 And the bankrupt ghosts, Truth and Glee. 
 
 And double will be my triumph, 
 Wlien I sketch in a comic vein 
 
 The whim of my youthful frenzy 
 To be leader of martial train. 
 
 To reap the reward of glory, 
 
 To be lord of a castle fair, — 
 And end in a lonely dungeon, 
 
 A lost sigh in the world-despair. 
 
 The night from my cell will vanish 
 As my dream into words I mold 
 
 And hear the undying laughter 
 Of the universe greedy, cold 
 
 At plight of the honest hero 
 
 And his simple and guileless heart, 
 
 ^¥ho trusted in current phrases 
 
 And mistook the light veil of art 
 
 For solemnly real substance, 
 
 And on images glued his eye. 
 And thus with my early errors 
 
 Everlasting renown I'll buy. 
 68 
 
Well may I exult in triumph, 
 
 While on earth my old lungs hold out, 
 That poverty's dire specter 
 
 With my wit I have put to rout. 
 
 I feel that a thinking reader 
 
 Will excuse the transparent gauze 
 
 Of flimsy and silly fiction 
 
 And perceive the eternal laws 
 
 Which rear an illusive cloudland 
 In the cavern of plodding brain, 
 
 And force an unwilling dreamer 
 To his Pegasus throw the rein. 
 
 To laugh at our sad contortions 
 
 And with grimace obscure the smart, 
 
 To scan in a glass life's folly. 
 Are eternal domain of art. 
 
 So let the world laugh and titter 
 And attempt to be wise and gay 
 
 And worship fresh tinsel's glitter 
 
 Till the dawn of the Judgment Day!" 
 
 The End. 
 
 69 
 
3477-17^ 
 Lot 53 
 
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