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diff --git a/old/rslcm10.txt b/old/rslcm10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ea6ed90 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/rslcm10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1064 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Rosa Alchemica, by W. B. Yeats +#4 in our series by W. B. Yeats + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: Rosa Alchemica + +Author: W. B. Yeats + +Release Date: May, 2004 [EBook #5794] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on September 1, 2002] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROSA ALCHEMICA *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team + + + + +ROSA ALCHEMICA + +BY + +W.B. YEATS + + O blessed and happy he, who knowing the mysteries of the gods, +sanctifies his life, and purifies his soul, celebrating orgies in the +mountains with holy purifications.--_Euripides._ + + + + ROSA ALCHEMICA. I + +It is now more than ten years since I met, for the last time, Michael +Robartes, and for the first time and the last time his friends and +fellow students; and witnessed his and their tragic end, and endured +those strange experiences, which have changed me so that my writings +have grown less popular and less intelligible, and driven me almost +to the verge of taking the habit of St. Dominic. I had just published +Rosa Alchemica, a little work on the Alchemists, somewhat in the +manner of Sir Thomas Browne, and had received many letters from +believers in the arcane sciences, upbraiding what they called my +timidity, for they could not believe so evident sympathy but the +sympathy of the artist, which is half pity, for everything which has +moved men's hearts in any age. I had discovered, early in my +researches, that their doctrine was no merely chemical phantasy, but +a philosophy they applied to the world, to the elements and to man +himself; and that they sought to fashion gold out of common metals +merely as part of an universal transmutation of all things into some +divine and imperishable substance; and this enabled me to make my +little book a fanciful reverie over the transmutation of life into +art, and a cry of measureless desire for a world made wholly of +essences. + +I was sitting dreaming of what I had written, in my house in one of +the old parts of Dublin; a house my ancestors had made almost famous +through their part in the politics of the city and their friendships +with the famous men of their generations; and was feeling an unwonted +happiness at having at last accomplished a long-cherished design, and +made my rooms an expression of this favourite doctrine. The +portraits, of more historical than artistic interest, had gone; and +tapestry, full of the blue and bronze of peacocks, fell over the +doors, and shut out all history and activity untouched with beauty +and peace; and now when I looked at my Crevelli and pondered on the +rose in the hand of the Virgin, wherein the form was so delicate and +precise that it seemed more like a thought than a flower, or at the +grey dawn and rapturous faces of my Francesca, I knew all a +Christian's ecstasy without his slavery to rule and custom; when I +pondered over the antique bronze gods and goddesses, which I had +mortgaged my house to buy, I had all a pagan's delight in various +beauty and without his terror at sleepless destiny and his labour +with many sacrifices; and I had only to go to my bookshelf, where +every book was bound in leather, stamped with intricate ornament, and +of a carefully chosen colour: Shakespeare in the orange of the glory +of the world, Dante in the dull red of his anger, Milton in the blue +grey of his formal calm; and I could experience what I would of human +passions without their bitterness and without satiety. I had gathered +about me all gods because I believed in none, and experienced every +pleasure because I gave myself to none, but held myself apart, +individual, indissoluble, a mirror of polished steel: I looked in the +triumph of this imagination at the birds of Hera, glowing in the +firelight as though they were wrought of jewels; and to my mind, for +which symbolism was a necessity, they seemed the doorkeepers of my +world, shutting out all that was not of as affluent a beauty as their +own; and for a moment I thought as I had thought in so many other +moments, that it was possible to rob life of every bitterness except +the bitterness of death; and then a thought which had followed this +thought, time after time, filled me with a passionate sorrow. All +those forms: that Madonna with her brooding purity, those rapturous +faces singing in the morning light, those bronze divinities with +their passionless dignity, those wild shapes rushing from despair to +despair, belonged to a divine world wherein I had no part; and every +experience, however profound, every perception, however exquisite, +would bring me the bitter dream of a limitless energy I could never +know, and even in my most perfect moment I would be two selves, the +one watching with heavy eyes the other's moment of content. I had +heaped about me the gold born in the crucibles of others; but the +supreme dream of the alchemist, the transmutation of the weary heart +into a weariless spirit, was as far from me as, I doubted not, it had +been from him also. I turned to my last purchase, a set of alchemical +apparatus which, the dealer in the Rue le Peletier had assured me, +once belonged to Raymond Lully, and as I joined the _alembic_ to +the _athanor_ and laid the _lavacrum maris_ at their side, +I understood the alchemical doctrine, that all beings, divided from +the great deep where spirits wander, one and yet a multitude, are +weary; and sympathized, in the pride of my connoisseurship, with the +consuming thirst for destruction which made the alchemist veil under +his symbols of lions and dragons, of eagles and ravens, of dew and of +nitre, a search for an essence which would dissolve all mortal +things. I repeated to myself the ninth key of Basilius Valentinus, in +which he compares the fire of the last day to the fire of the +alchemist, and the world to the alchemist's furnace, and would have +us know that all must be dissolved before the divine substance, +material gold or immaterial ecstasy, awake. I had dissolved indeed +the mortal world and lived amid immortal essences, but had obtained +no miraculous ecstasy. As I thought of these things, I drew aside the +curtains and looked out into the darkness, and it seemed to my +troubled fancy that all those little points of light filling the sky +were the furnaces of innumerable divine alchemists, who labour +continually, turning lead into gold, weariness into ecstasy, bodies +into souls, the darkness into God; and at their perfect labour my +mortality grew heavy, and I cried out, as so many dreamers and men of +letters in our age have cried, for the birth of that elaborate +spiritual beauty which could alone uplift souls weighted with so many +dreams. + + + + +II + + +My reverie was broken by a loud knocking at the door, and I wondered +the more at this because I had no visitors, and had bid my servants +do all things silently, lest they broke the dream of my inner life. +Feeling a little curious, I resolved to go to the door myself, and, +taking one of the silver candlesticks from the mantlepiece, began to +descend the stairs. The servants appeared to be out, for though the +sound poured through every corner and crevice of the house there was +no stir in the lower rooms. I remembered that because my needs were +so few, my part in life so little, they had begun to come and go as +they would, often leaving me alone for hours. The emptiness and +silence of a world from which I had driven everything but dreams +suddenly overwhelmed me, and I shuddered as I drew the bolt. I found +before me Michael Robartes, whom I had not seen for years, and whose +wild red hair, fierce eyes, sensitive, tremulous lips and rough +clothes, made him look now, just as they used to do fifteen years +before, something between a debauchee, a saint, and a peasant. He had +recently come to Ireland, he said, and wished to see me on a matter +of importance: indeed, the only matter of importance for him and for +me. His voice brought up before me our student years in Paris, and +remembering the magnetic power ne had once possessed over me, a +little fear mingled with much annoyance at this irrelevant intrusion, +as I led the way up the wide staircase, where Swift had passed joking +and railing, and Curran telling stories and quoting Greek, in simpler +days, before men's minds, subtilized and complicated by the romantic +movement in art and literature, began to tremble on the verge of some +unimagined revelation. I felt that my hand shook, and saw that the +light of the candle wavered and quivered more than it need have upon +the Maenads on the old French panels, making them look like the first +beings slowly shaping in the formless and void darkness. When the +door had closed, and the peacock curtain, glimmering like many- +coloured flame, fell between us and the world, I felt, in a way I +could not understand, that some singular and unexpected thing was +about to happen. I went over to the mantlepiece, and finding that a +little chainless bronze censer, set, upon the outside, with pieces of +painted china by Orazio Fontana, which I had filled with antique +amulets, had fallen upon its side and poured out its contents, I +began to gather the amulets into the bowl, partly to collect my +thoughts and partly with that habitual reverence which seemed to me +the due of things so long connected with secret hopes and fears. 'I +see,' said Michael Robartes, 'that you are still fond of incense, and +I can show you an incense more precious than any you have ever seen,' +and as he spoke he took the censer out of my hand and put the amulets +in a little heap between the _athanor_ and the _alembic_. I +sat down, and he sat down at the side of the fire, and sat there for +awhile looking into the fire, and holding the censer in his hand. 'I +have come to ask you something,' he said, 'and the incense will fill +the room, and our thoughts, with its sweet odour while we are +talking. I got it from an old man in Syria, who said it was made from +flowers, of one kind with the flowers that laid their heavy purple +petals upon the hands and upon the hair and upon the feet of Christ +in the Garden of Gethsemane, and folded Him in their heavy breath, +until he cried against the cross and his destiny.' He shook some dust +into the censer out of a small silk bag, and set the censer upon the +floor and lit the dust which sent up a blue stream of smoke, that +spread out over the ceiling, and flowed downwards again until it was +like Milton's banyan tree. It filled me, as incense often does, with +a faint sleepiness, so that I started when he said, 'I have come to +ask you that question which I asked you in Paris, and which you left +Paris rather than answer.' + +He had turned his eyes towards me, and I saw them glitter in the +firelight, and through the incense, as I replied: 'You mean, will I +become an initiate of your Order of the Alchemical Rose? I would not +consent in Paris, when I was full of unsatisfied desire, and now that +I have at last fashioned my life according to my desire, am I likely +to consent?' + +'You have changed greatly since then,' he answered. 'I have read your +books, and now I see you among all these images, and I understand you +better than you do yourself, for I have been with many and many +dreamers at the same cross-ways. You have shut away the world and +gathered the gods about you, and if you do not throw yourself at +their feet, you will be always full of lassitude, and of wavering +purpose, for a man must forget he is miserable in the bustle and +noise of the multitude in this world and in time; or seek a mystical +union with the multitude who govern this world and time.' And then he +murmured something I could not hear, and as though to someone I could +not see. + +For a moment the room appeared to darken, as it used to do when he +was about to perform some singular experiment, and in the darkness +the peacocks upon the doors seemed to glow with a more intense +colour. I cast off the illusion, which was, I believe, merely caused +by memory, and by the twilight of incense, for I would not +acknowledge that he could overcome my now mature intellect; and I +said: 'Even if I grant that I need a spiritual belief and some form +of worship, why should I go to Eleusis and not to Calvary?' He leaned +forward and began speaking with a slightly rhythmical intonation, and +as he spoke I had to struggle again with the shadow, as of some older +night than the night of the sun, which began to dim the light of the +candles and to blot out the little gleams upon the corner of picture- +frames and on the bronze divinities, and to turn the blue of the +incense to a heavy purple; while it left the peacocks to glimmer and +glow as though each separate colour were a living spirit. I had +fallen into a profound dream-like reverie in which I heard him +speaking as at a distance. 'And yet there is no one who communes with +only one god,' he was saying, 'and the more a man lives in +imagination and in a refined understanding, the more gods does he +meet with and talk with, and the more does he come under the power of +Roland, who sounded in the Valley of Roncesvalles the last trumpet of +the body's will and pleasure; and of Hamlet, who saw them perishing +away, and sighed; and of Faust, who looked for them up and down the +world and could not find them; and under the power of all those +countless divinities who have taken upon themselves spiritual bodies +in the minds of the modern poets and romance writers, and under the +power of the old divinities, who since the Renaissance have won +everything of their ancient worship except the sacrifice of birds and +fishes, the fragrance of garlands and the smoke of incense. The many +think humanity made these divinities, and that it can unmake them +again; but we who have seen them pass in rattling harness, and in +soft robes, and heard them speak with articulate voices while we lay +in deathlike trance, know that they are always making and unmaking +humanity, which is indeed but the trembling of their lips.' + +He had stood up and begun to walk to and fro, and had become in my +waking dream a shuttle weaving an immense purple web whose folds had +begun to fill the room. The room seemed to have become inexplicably +silent, as though all but the web and the weaving were at an end in +the world. 'They have come to us; they have come to us,' the voice +began again; 'all that have ever been in your reverie, all that you +have met with in books. There is Lear, his head still wet with the +thunder-storm, and he laughs because you thought yourself an +existence who are but a shadow, and him a shadow who is an eternal +god; and there is Beatrice, with her lips half parted in a smile, as +though all the stars were about to pass away in a sigh of love; and +there is the mother of the God of humility who cast so great a spell +over men that they have tried to unpeople their hearts that he might +reign alone, but she holds in her hand the rose whose every petal is +a god; and there, O swiftly she comes! is Aphrodite under a twilight +falling from the wings of numberless sparrows, and about her feet are +the grey and white doves.' In the midst of my dream I saw him hold +out his left arm and pass his right hand over it as though he stroked +the wings of doves. I made a violent effort which seemed almost to +tear me in two, and said with forced determination: 'You would sweep +me away into an indefinite world which fills me with terror; and yet +a man is a great man just in so far as he can make his mind reflect +everything with indifferent precision like a mirror.' I seemed to be +perfectly master of myself, and went on, but more rapidly: 'I command +you to leave me at once, for your ideas and phantasies are but the +illusions that creep like maggots into civilizations when they begin +to decline, and into minds when they begin to decay.' I had grown +suddenly angry, and seizing the _alembic_ from the table, was +about to rise and strike him with it, when the peacocks on the door +behind him appeared to grow immense; and then the _alembic_ fell +from my fingers and I was drowned in a tide of green and blue and +bronze feathers, and as I struggled hopelessly I heard a distant +voice saying: 'Our master Avicenna has written that all life proceeds +out of corruption.' The glittering feathers had now covered me +completely, and I knew that I had struggled for hundreds of years, +and was conquered at last. I was sinking into the depth when the +green and blue and bronze that seemed to fill the world became a sea +of flame and swept me away, and as I was swirled along I heard a +voice over my head cry, 'The mirror is broken in two pieces,' and +another voice answer, 'The mirror is broken in four pieces,' and a +more distant voice cry with an exultant cry, 'The mirror is broken +into numberless pieces'; and then a multitude of pale hands were +reaching towards me, and strange gentle faces bending above me, and +half wailing and half caressing voices uttering words that were +forgotten the moment they were spoken. I was being lifted out of the +tide of flame, and felt my memories, my hopes, my thoughts, my will, +everything I held to be myself, melting away; then I seemed to rise +through numberless companies of beings who were, I understood, in +some way more certain than thought, each wrapped in his eternal +moment, in the perfect lifting of an arm, in a little circlet of +rhythmical words, in dreaming with dim eyes and half-closed eyelids. +And then I passed beyond these forms, which were so beautiful they +had almost ceased to be, and, having endured strange moods, +melancholy, as it seemed, with the weight of many worlds, I passed +into that Death which is Beauty herself, and into that Loneliness +which all the multitudes desire without ceasing. All things that had +ever lived seemed to come and dwell in my heart, and I in theirs; and +I had never again known mortality or tears, had I not suddenly fallen +from the certainty of vision into the uncertainty of dream, and +become a drop of molten gold falling with immense rapidity, through a +night elaborate with stars, and all about me a melancholy exultant +wailing. I fell and fell and fell, and then the wailing was but the +wailing of the wind in the chimney, and I awoke to find myself +leaning upon the table and supporting my head with my hands. I saw +the _alembic_ swaying from side to side in the distant corner it +had rolled to, and Michael Robartes watching me and waiting. 'I will +go wherever you will,' I said, 'and do whatever you bid me, for I +have been with eternal things.' 'I knew,' he replied, 'you must need +answer as you have answered, when I heard the storm begin. You must +come to a great distance, for we were commanded to build our temple +between the pure multitude by the waves and the impure multitude of +men.' + + + + +III + + +I did not speak as we drove through the deserted streets, for my mind +was curiously empty of familiar thoughts and experiences; it seemed +to have been plucked out of the definite world and cast naked upon a +shoreless sea. There were moments when the vision appeared on the +point of returning, and I would half-remember, with an ecstasy of joy +or sorrow, crimes and heroisms, fortunes and misfortunes; or begin to +contemplate, with a sudden leaping of the heart, hopes and terrors, +desires and ambitions, alien to my orderly and careful life; and then +I would awake shuddering at the thought that some great imponderable +being had swept through my mind. It was indeed days before this +feeling passed perfectly away, and even now, when I have sought +refuge in the only definite faith, I feel a great tolerance for those +people with incoherent personalities, who gather in the chapels and +meeting-places of certain obscure sects, because I also have felt +fixed habits and principles dissolving before a power, which was +_hysterica passio_ or sheer madness, if you will, but was so +powerful in its melancholy exultation that I tremble lest it wake +again and drive me from my new-found peace. + +When we came in the grey light to the great half-empty terminus, it +seemed to me I was so changed that I was no more, as man is, a moment +shuddering at eternity, but eternity weeping and laughing over a +moment; and when we had started and Michael Robartes had fallen +asleep, as he soon did, his sleeping face, in which there was no sign +of all that had so shaken me and that now kept me wakeful, was to my +excited mind more like a mask than a face. The fancy possessed me +that the man behind it had dissolved away like salt in water, and +that it laughed and sighed, appealed and denounced at the bidding of +beings greater or less than man. 'This is not Michael Robartes at +all: Michael Robartes is dead; dead for ten, for twenty years +perhaps,' I kept repeating to myself. I fell at last into a feverish +sleep, waking up from time to time when we rushed past some little +town, its slated roofs shining with wet, or still lake gleaming in +the cold morning light. I had been too pre-occupied to ask where we +were going, or to notice what tickets Michael Robartes had taken, but +I knew now from the direction of the sun that we were going westward; +and presently I knew also, by the way in which the trees had grown +into the semblance of tattered beggars flying with bent heads towards +the east, that we were approaching the western coast. Then +immediately I saw the sea between the low hills upon the left, its +dull grey broken into white patches and lines. + +When we left the train we had still, I found, some way to go, and set +out, buttoning our coats about us, for the wind was bitter and +violent. Michael Robartes was silent, seeming anxious to leave me to +my thoughts; and as we walked between the sea and the rocky side of a +great promontory, I realized with a new perfection what a shock had +been given to all my habits of thought and of feelings, if indeed +some mysterious change had not taken place in the substance of my +mind, for the grey waves, plumed with scudding foam, had grown part +of a teeming, fantastic inner life; and when Michael Robartes pointed +to a square ancient-looking house, with a much smaller and newer +building under its lee, set out on the very end of a dilapidated and +almost deserted pier, and said it was the Temple of the Alchemical +Rose, I was possessed with the phantasy that the sea, which kept +covering it with showers of white foam, was claiming it as part of +some indefinite and passionate life, which had begun to war upon our +orderly and careful days, and was about to plunge the world into a +night as obscure as that which followed the downfall of the classical +world. One part of my mind mocked this phantastic terror, but the +other, the part that still lay half plunged in vision, listened to +the clash of unknown armies, and shuddered at unimaginable +fanaticisms, that hung in those grey leaping waves. + +We had gone but a few paces along the pier when we came upon an old +man, who was evidently a watchman, for he sat in an overset barrel, +close to a place where masons had been lately working upon a break in +the pier, and had in front of him a fire such as one sees slung under +tinkers' carts. I saw that he was also a voteen, as the peasants say, +for there was a rosary hanging from a nail on the rim of the barrel, +and I saw I shuddered, and I did not know why I shuddered. We had +passed him a few yards when I heard him cry in Gaelic, 'Idolaters, +idolaters, go down to Hell with your witches and your devils; go down +to Hell that the herrings may come again into the bay'; and for some +moments I could hear him half screaming and half muttering behind us. +'Are you not afraid,' I said, 'that these wild fishing people may do +some desperate thing against you?' + +'I and mine,' he answered, 'are long past human hurt or help, being +incorporate with immortal spirits, and when we die it shall be the +consummation of the supreme work. A time will come for these people +also, and they will sacrifice a mullet to Artemis, or some other fish +to some new divinity, unless indeed their own divinities, the Dagda, +with his overflowing cauldron, Lug, with his spear dipped in poppy- +juice lest it rush forth hot for battle. Aengus, with the three birds +on his shoulder, Bodb and his red swineherd, and all the heroic +children of Dana, set up once more their temples of grey stone. Their +reign has never ceased, but only waned in power a little, for the +Sidhe still pass in every wind, and dance and play at hurley, and +fight their sudden battles in every hollow and on every hill; but +they cannot build their temples again till there have been martyrdoms +and victories, and perhaps even that long-foretold battle in the +Valley of the Black Pig.' + +Keeping close to the wall that went about the pier on the seaward +side, to escape the driving foam and the wind, which threatened every +moment to lift us off our feet, we made our way in silence to the +door of the square building. Michael Robartes opened it with a key, +on which I saw the rust of many salt winds, and led me along a bare +passage and up an uncarpeted stair to a little room surrounded with +bookshelves. A meal would be brought, but only of fruit, for I must +submit to a tempered fast before the ceremony, he explained, and with +it a book on the doctrine and method of the Order, over which I was +to spend what remained of the winter daylight. He then left me, +promising to return an hour before the ceremony. I began searching +among the bookshelves, and found one of the most exhaustive +alchemical libraries I have ever seen. There were the works of +Morienus, who hid his immortal body under a shirt of hair-cloth; of +Avicenna, who was a drunkard and yet controlled numberless legions of +spirits; of Alfarabi, who put so many spirits into his lute that he +could make men laugh, or weep, or fall in deadly trance as he would; +of Lully, who transformed himself into the likeness of a red cock; of +Flamel, who with his wife Parnella achieved the elixir many hundreds +of years ago, and is fabled to live still in Arabia among the +Dervishes; and of many of less fame. There were very few mystics but +alchemical mystics, and because, I had little doubt, of the devotion +to one god of the greater number and of the limited sense of beauty, +which Robartes would hold an inevitable consequence; but I did notice +a complete set of facsimiles of the prophetical writings of William +Blake, and probably because of the multitudes that thronged his +illumination and were 'like the gay fishes on the wave when the moon +sucks up the dew.' I noted also many poets and prose writers of every +age, but only those who were a little weary of life, as indeed the +greatest have been everywhere, and who cast their imagination to us, +as a something they needed no longer now that they were going up in +their fiery chariots. + +Presently I heard a tap at the door, and a woman came in and laid a +little fruit upon the table. I judged that she had once been +handsome, but her cheeks were hollowed by what I would have held, had +I seen her anywhere else, an excitement of the flesh and a thirst for +pleasure, instead of which it doubtless was an excitement of the +imagination and a thirst for beauty. I asked her some question +concerning the ceremony, but getting no answer except a shake of the +head, saw that I must await initiation in silence. When I had eaten, +she came again, and having laid a curiously wrought bronze box on the +table, lighted the candles, and took away the plates and the +remnants. So soon as I was alone, I turned to the box, and found that +the peacocks of Hera spread out their tails over the sides and lid, +against a background, on which were wrought great stars, as though to +affirm that the heavens were a part of their glory. In the box was a +book bound in vellum, and having upon the vellum and in very delicate +colours, and in gold, the alchemical rose with many spears thrusting +against it, but in vain, as was shown by the shattered points of +those nearest to the petals. The book was written upon vellum, and in +beautiful clear letters, interspersed with symbolical pictures and +illuminations, after the manner of the Splendor Soils. + +The first chapter described how six students, of Celtic descent, gave +themselves separately to the study of alchemy, and solved, one the +mystery of the Pelican, another the mystery of the green Dragon, +another the mystery of the Eagle, another that of Salt and Mercury. +What seemed a succession of accidents, but was, the book declared, +the contrivance of preternatural powers, brought them together in the +garden of an inn in the South of France, and while they talked +together the thought came to them that alchemy was the gradual +distillation of the contents of the soul, until they were ready to +put off the mortal and put on the immortal. An owl passed, rustling +among the vine-leaves overhead, and then an old woman came, leaning +upon a stick, and, sitting close to them, took up the thought where +they had dropped it. Having expounded the whole principle of +spiritual alchemy, and bid them found the Order of the Alchemical +Rose, she passed from among them, and when they would have followed +she was nowhere to be seen. They formed themselves into an Order, +holding their goods and making their researches in common, and, as +they became perfect in the alchemical doctrine, apparitions came and +went among them, and taught them more and more marvellous mysteries. +The book then went on to expound so much of these as the neophyte was +permitted to know, dealing at the outset and at considerable length +with the independent reality of our thoughts, which was, it declared, +the doctrine from which all true doctrines rose. If you imagine, it +said, the semblance of a living being, it is at once possessed by a +wandering soul, and goes hither and thither working good or evil, +until the moment of its death has come; and gave many examples, +received, it said, from many gods. Eros had taught them how to +fashion forms in which a divine soul could dwell, and whisper what +they would into sleeping minds; and Ate forms from which demonic +beings could pour madness, or unquiet dreams, into sleeping blood; +and Hermes, that if you powerfully imagined a hound at your bedside +it would keep watch there until you woke, and drive away all but the +mightiest demons, but that if your imagination was weakly, the hound +would be weakly also, and the demons prevail, and the hound soon die; +and Aphrodite, that if you made, by a strong imagining, a dove +crowned with silver and had it flutter over your head, its soft +cooing would make sweet dreams of immortal love gather and brood over +mortal sleep; and all divinities alike had revealed with many +warnings and lamentations that all minds are continually giving birth +to such beings, and sending them forth to work health or disease, joy +or madness. If you would give forms to the evil powers, it went on, +you were to make them ugly, thrusting out a lip, with the thirsts of +life, or breaking the proportions of a body with the burdens of life; +but the divine powers would only appear in beautiful shapes, which +are but, as it were, shapes trembling out of existence, folding up +into a timeless ecstasy, drifting with half-shut eyes, into a sleepy +stillness. The bodiless souls who descended into these forms were +what men called the moods; and worked all great changes in the world; +for just as the magician or the artist could call them when he would, +so they could call out of the mind of the magician or the artist, or +if they were demons, out of the mind of the mad or the ignoble, what +shape they would, and through its voice and its gestures pour +themselves out upon the world. In this way all great events were +accomplished; a mood, a divinity, or a demon, first descending like a +faint sigh into men's minds and then changing their thoughts and +their actions until hair that was yellow had grown black, or hair +that was black had grown yellow, and empires moved their border, as +though they were but drifts of leaves. The rest of the book contained +symbols of form, and sound, and colour, and their attribution to +divinities and demons, so that the initiate might fashion a shape for +any divinity or any demon, and be as powerful as Avicenna among those +who live under the roots of tears and of laughter. + + + + +IV + + +A couple of hours after Sunset Michael Robartes returned and told me +that I would have to learn the steps of an exceedingly antique dance, +because before my initiation could be perfected I had to join three +times in a magical dance, for rhythm was the wheel of Eternity, on +which alone the transient and accidental could be broken, and the +spirit set free. I found that the steps, which were simple enough, +resembled certain antique Greek dances, and having been a good dancer +in my youth and the master of many curious Gaelic steps, I soon had +them in my memory. He then robed me and himself in a costume which +suggested by its shape both Greece and Egypt, but by its crimson +colour a more passionate life than theirs; and having put into my +hands a little chainless censer of bronze, wrought into the likeness +of a rose, by some modern craftsman, he told me to open a small door +opposite to the door by which I had entered. I put my hand to the +handle, but the moment I did so the fumes of the incense, helped +perhaps by his mysterious glamour, made me fall again into a dream, +in which I seemed to be a mask, lying on the counter of a little +Eastern shop. Many persons, with eyes so bright and still that I knew +them for more than human, came in and tried me on their faces, but at +last flung me into a corner with a little laughter; but all this +passed in a moment, for when I awoke my hand was still upon the +handle. I opened the door, and found myself in a marvellous passage, +along whose sides were many divinities wrought in a mosaic, not less +beautiful than the mosaic in the Baptistery at Ravenna, but of a less +severe beauty; the predominant colour of each divinity, which was +surely a symbolic colour, being repeated in the lamps that hung from +the ceiling, a curiously-scented lamp before every divinity. I passed +on, marvelling exceedingly how these enthusiasts could have created +all this beauty in so remote a place, and half persuaded to believe +in a material alchemy, by the sight of so much hidden wealth; the +censer filling the air, as I passed, with smoke of ever-changing +colour. + +I stopped before a door, on whose bronze panels were wrought great +waves in whose shadow were faint suggestions of terrible faces. Those +beyond it seemed to have heard our steps, for a voice cried: 'Is the +work of the Incorruptible Fire at an end?' and immediately Michael +Robartes answered: 'The perfect gold has come from the +_atbanor_.' The door swung open, and we were in a great circular +room, and among men and women who were dancing slowly in crimson +robes. Upon the ceiling was an immense rose wrought in mosaic; and +about the walls, also in mosaic, was a battle of gods and angels, the +gods glimmering like rubies and sapphires, and the angels of the one +greyness, because, as Michael Robartes whispered, they had renounced +their divinity, and turned from the unfolding of their separate +hearts, out of love for a God of humility and sorrow. Pillars +supported the roof and made a kind of circular cloister, each pillar +being a column of confused shapes, divinities, it seemed, of the +wind, who rose as in a whirling dance of more than human vehemence, +and playing upon pipes and cymbals; and from among these shapes were +thrust out hands, and in these hands were censers. I was bid place my +censer also in a hand and take my place and dance, and as I turned +from the pillars towards the dancers, I saw that the floor was of a +green stone, and that a pale Christ on a pale cross was wrought in +the midst. I asked Robartes the meaning of this, and was told that +they desired 'To trouble His unity with their multitudinous feet.' +The dance wound in and out, tracing upon the floor the shapes of +petals that copied the petals in the rose overhead, and to the sound +of hidden instruments which were perhaps of an antique pattern, for I +have never heard the like; and every moment the dance was more +passionate, until all the winds of the world seemed to have awakened +under our feet. After a little I had grown weary, and stood under a +pillar watching the coming and going of those flame-like figures; +until gradually I sank into a half-dream, from which I was awakened +by seeing the petals of the great rose, which had no longer the look +of mosaic, falling slowly through the incense-heavy air, and, as +they fell, shaping into the likeness of living beings of an +extraordinary beauty. Still faint and cloud-like, they began to +dance, and as they danced took a more and more definite shape, so +that I was able to distinguish beautiful Grecian faces and august +Egyptian faces, and now and again to name a divinity by the staff in +his hand or by a bird fluttering over his head; and soon every mortal +foot danced by the white foot of an immortal; and in the troubled +eyes that looked into untroubled shadowy eyes, I saw the brightness +of uttermost desire as though they had found at length, after +unreckonable wandering, the lost love of their youth. Sometimes, but +only for a moment, I saw a faint solitary figure with a Rosa veiled +face, and carrying a faint torch, flit among the dancers, but like a +dream within a dream, like a shadow of a shadow, and I knew by an +understanding born from a deeper fountain than thought, that it was +Eros himself, and that his face was veiled because no man or woman +from the beginning of the world has ever known what love is, or +looked into his eyes, for Eros alone of divinities is altogether a +spirit, and hides in passions not of his essence if he would commune +with a mortal heart. So that if a man love nobly he knows love +through infinite pity, unspeakable trust, unending sympathy; and if +ignobly through vehement jealousy, sudden hatred, and unappeasable +desire; but unveiled love he never knows. While I thought these +things, a voice cried to me from the crimson figures: 'Into the +dance! there is none that can be spared out of the dance; into the +dance! into the dance! that the gods may make them bodies out of the +substance of our hearts'; and before I could answer, a mysterious +wave of passion, that seemed like the soul of the dance moving within +our souls, took Alchemica. hold of me, and I was swept, neither +consenting nor refusing, into the midst. I was dancing with an immortal +august woman, who had black lilies in her hair, and her dreamy gesture +seemed laden with a wisdom more profound than the darkness that is +between star and star, and with a love like the love that breathed upon +the waters; and as we danced on and on, the incense drifted over us +and round us, covering us away as in the heart of the world, and ages +seemed to pass, and tempests to awake and perish in the folds of our +robes and in her heavy hair. + +Suddenly I remembered that her eyelids had never quivered, and that +her lilies had not dropped a black petal, or shaken from their +places, and understood with a great horror that I danced with one who +was more or less than human, and who was drinking up my soul as an ox +drinks up a wayside pool; and I fell, and darkness passed over me. + +I awoke suddenly as though something had awakened me, and saw that I +was lying on a roughly painted floor, and that on the ceiling, which +was at no great distance, was a roughly painted rose, and about me on +the walls half-finished paintings. The pillars and the censers had +gone; and near me a score of sleepers lay wrapped in disordered +robes, their upturned faces looking to my imagination like hollow +masks; and a chill dawn was shining down upon them from a long window +I had not noticed before; and outside the sea roared. I saw Michael +Robartes lying at a little distance and beside him an overset bowl of +wrought bronze which looked as though it had once held incense. As I +sat thus, I heard a sudden tumult of angry men and women's voices mix +with the roaring of the sea; and leaping to my feet, I went quickly +to Michael Robartes, and tried to shake him out of his sleep. I then +seized him by the shoulder and tried to lift him, but he fell +backwards, and sighed faintly; and the voices became louder and +angrier; and there was a sound of heavy blows upon the door, which +opened on to the pier. Suddenly I heard a sound of rending wood, and +I knew it had begun to give, and I ran to the door of the room. I +pushed it open and came out upon a passage whose bare boards +clattered under my feet, and found in the passage another door which +led into an empty kitchen; and as I passed through the door I heard +two crashes in quick succession, and knew by the sudden noise of feet +and the shouts that the door which opened on to the pier had fallen +inwards. I ran from the kitchen and out into a small yard, and from +this down some steps which descended the seaward and sloping side of +the pier, and from the steps clambered along the water's edge, with +the angry voices ringing in my ears. This part of the pier had been +but lately refaced with blocks of granite, so that it was almost +clear of seaweed; but when I came to the old part, I found it so +slippery with green weed that I had to climb up on to the roadway. I +looked towards the Temple of the Alchemical Rose, where the fishermen +and the women were still shouting, but somewhat more faintly, and saw +that there was no one about the door or upon the pier; but as I +looked, a little crowd hurried out of the door and began gathering +large stones from where they were heaped up in readiness for the next +time a storm shattered the pier, when they would be laid under blocks +of granite. While I stood watching the crowd, an old man, who was, I +think, the voteen, pointed to me, and screamed out something, and the +crowd whitened, for all the faces had turned towards me. I ran, and +it was well for me that pullers of the oar are poorer men with their +feet than with their arms and their bodies; and yet while I ran I +scarcely heard the following feet or the angry voices, for many +voices of exultation and lamentation, which were forgotten as a dream +is forgotten the moment they were heard, seemed to be ringing in the +air over my head. + +There are moments even now when I seem to hear those voices of +exultation and lamentation, and when the indefinite world, which has +but half lost its mastery over my heart and my intellect, seems about +to claim a perfect mastery; but I carry the rosary about my neck, and +when I hear, or seem to hear them, I press it to my heart and say: +'He whose name is Legion is at our doors deceiving our intellects +with subtlety and flattering our hearts with beauty, and we have no +trust but in Thee'; and then the war that rages within me at other +times is still, and I am at peace. + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Rosa Alchemica, by W. 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