Pulls us forward with sweet yearning now. Upon our graves, so deeply lost in thought The youth thou art who ages long hast stood From a far shore, born under the clear sky of Hellas, came a singer to Palestine, and gave up his whole heart to the wonder-child: Words inexhaustible and the most joyful tidings fell like sparks of a divine spirit from his friendly lips. Like flowers sprang up a strange new life in his presence. Ere long the most childlike souls, by true love marvellously possessed, gathered about him. With deifying fervor the prophetic eye of the blooming child beheld the years to come, foresaw, untroubled over the earthly lot of his own days, the beloved offspring of his divine stem. In solitude the heavenly heart unfolded to a flower-chalice of almighty love-upturned toward the supreme face of the father, and resting on the bliss-foreboding bosom of the sweetly solemn mother. In the name of the distant future, they did him homage with lustre and fragrance, the highest wonders of Nature.
The foreboding, rich-blossoming wisdom of the East at once recognized the beginning of the new age-A star showed the way to the humble cradle of the king. Among the people who too early were become of all the most scornful and insolently estranged from the blessed innocence of youth, appeared the New World with a face never seen before-in the poverty of a poetic shelter-a son of the first virgin and mother-the eternal fruit of mysterious embrace. The Night became the mighty womb of revelations-into it the gods went back-and fell asleep, to go abroad in new and more glorious shapes over the transfigured world. No longer was the Light the abode of the gods, and the heavenly token of their presence-they drew over themselves the veil of the Night. Into the deeper sanctuary, into the more exalted region of feeling, the soul of the world retired with all its earthly powers, there to rule until the dawn should break of universal Glory. The far depths of heaven filled with glowing worlds. A cold north wind blew unkindly over the rigid plain, and the rigid wonderland first froze, then evaporated into ether. Gone was wonder-working Faith, and its all-transforming, all-uniting angel-comrade, the Imagination. Into dust and air the priceless blossoms of life fell away in words obscure. Dry Number and rigid Measure bound it with iron chains. The gods vanished with their retinue-Nature stood alone and lifeless.
The pleasure-garden of the young race withered away-up into more open, desolate regions, forsaking his childhood, struggled the growing man.
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