The shade which is our form invests us round; Else we are shapeless as our mother Night.

PROMETHEUS.

I laugh your power, and his who sent you here, To lowest scorn. Pour forth the cup of pain.

FIRST FURY.

Thou thinkest we will rend thee bone from bone, And nerve from nerve, working like fire within?

PROMETHEUS.

Pain is my element, as hate is thine.

Ye rend me now: I care not.

SECOND FURY.

Dost imagine

We will but laugh into thy lidless eyes?

PROMETHEUS.

I weigh not what ye do, but what ye suffer, Being evil. Cruel was the power which called You, or aught else so wretched, into light.

THIRD FURY.

Thou think'st we will live through thee, one by

one,

Like animal life, and though we can obscure not The soul which burns within, that we will dwell Beside it, like a vain loud multitude

་ །

Vexing the self-content of wisest men:

That we will be dread thought beneath thy brain,

And foul desire round thine astonished heart,
And blood within thy labyrinthine veins
Crawling like agony?

PROMETHEUS.

Why, ye are thus now;

Yet am I king over myself, and rule

The torturing and conflicting throngs within, As Jove rules you when Hell grows mutinous.

CHORUS OF FURIES.

From the ends of the earth, from the ends of the

earth,

Where the night has its grave and the morning its birth,

Come, come, come!

O ye who shake hills with the scream of your

mirth,

When cities sink howling in ruin; and ye
Who with wingless footsteps trample the sea,
And close upon shipwreck and famine's track,
Sit chattering with joy on the foodless wreck;
Come, come, come!

Leave the bed, low, cold, and red,
Strewed beneath a nation dead;
Leave the hatred, as in ashes

Fire is left for future burning:
It will burst in bloodier flashes

When ye stir it, soon returning:
Leave the self-contempt implanted
In young spirits, sense-enchanted,
Misery's yet unkindled fuel :
Leave Hell's secrets half unchanted

To the maniac dreamer-cruel
More than ye can be with hate
Is he with fear.

Come, come, come !

We are steaming up from Hell's wide gate
And we burthen the blasts of the atmosphere,
But vainly we toil till ye come here.

IONE.

Sister, I hear the thunder of new wings.

PANTHEA.

'These solid mountains quiver with the sound Even as the tremulous air: their shadows make The space within my plumes more black than night.

FIRST FURY.

Your call was as a winged car,
Driven on whirlwinds fast and far
It rapt us from red gulfs of war.

SECOND FURY.

From wide cities, famine-wasted;

THIRD FURY.

Groans half heard, and blood untasted;

FOURTH FURY.

Kingly conclaves, stern and cold,

Where blood with gold is bought and sold

FIFTH FURY.

From the furnace, white and hot,

In which

A FURY.

Speak not; whisper not:

I know all that ye would tell,

But to speak might break the spell
Which must bend the Invincible,
The stern of thought;

He yet defies the deepest power of Hell.

FURY.

Tear the veil !

ANOTHR FURY.

It is torn.

CHORUS.

The pale stars of the morn

Shine on a misery, dire to be borne.

Dost thou faint, mighty Titan? We laugh thee

to scorn.

Dost thou boast the clear knowledge thou

waken'dst for man?

Then was kindled within him a thirst which out

ran

Those perishing waters; a thirst of fierce fever, Hope, love, doubt, desire, which consume him for

ever.

One came forth of gentle worth,
Smiling on the sanguine earth:

His words outlived him, like swift poison
Withering up truth, peace, and pity.
Look! where round the wide horizon
Many a million-peopled city
Vomits smoke in the bright air;
Mark that outery of despair!
'Tis his mild and gentle ghost

Wailing for the faith he kindled:
Look again! the flames almost

To a glow-worm's lamp have dwindled: The survivors round the embers

Gather in dread.

Joy, joy, joy!

Past ages crowd on thee, but each one remembers; And the future is dark, and the present is spread Like a pillow of thorns for thy slumberless head.

SEMICHORUS I.

Drops of bloody agony flow

From his white and quivering brow.

Grant a little respite now :
See! a disenchanted nation

Springs like day from desolation;

To Truth its state is dedicate,

And Freedom leads it forth, her mate;