And, wouldst thou know of my supreme revenge, Poor tyrant, even now dethroned in heart, Realmless in soul, as tyrants ever are, Listen! and tell me if this bitter peak, This never-glutted vulture, and these chains 130 Shrink not before it; for it shall befit A sorrow-taught, unconquered Titan-heart. Men, when their death is on them, seem to stand On a precipitous crag that overhangs The abyss of doom, and in that depth to see, As in a glass, the features dim and vast Of things to come, the shadows, as it seems, Of what have been. Death ever fronts the wise; Not fearfully, but with clear promises Of larger life, on whose broad vans upborne, 140 Their outlook widens, and they see beyond The horizon of the Present and the Past, Even to the very source and end of things. Such am I now: immortal woe hath made My heart a seer, and my soul a judge Between the substance and the shadow of Truth. The sure supremeness of the Beautiful, By all the martyrdoms made doubly sure Of such as I am, this is my revenge, Which of my wrongs builds a triumphal arch, 150 Through which I see a sceptre and a throne. The pipings of glad shepherds on the hills, Tending the flocks no more to bleed for thee; The songs of maidens pressing with white feet The vintage on thine altars poured no more; The murmurous bliss of lovers underneath Dim grapevine bowers whose rosy bunches press Not half so closely their warm cheeks, unpaled By thoughts of thy brute lust; the hive-like hum Of peaceful commonwealths, where sunburnt Toil 160 Reaps for itself the rich earth made its own By its own labor, lightened with glad hymns To an omnipotence which thy mad bolts Would cope with as a spark with the vast sea,-- Even the spirit of free love and peace, Duty's sure recompense through life and death,-- These are such harvests as all master-spirits Reap, haply not on earth, but reap no less Because the sheaves are bound by hands not theirs; These are the bloodless daggers wherewithal 170 They stab fallen tyrants, this their high revenge: For their best part of life on earth is when, Long after death, prisoned and pent no more, Their thoughts, their wild dreams even, have become Part of the necessary air men breathe: When, like the moon, herself behind a cloud, They shed down light before us on life's sea, That cheers us to steer onward still in hope. Earth with her twining memories ivies o'er Their holy sepulchres; the chainless sea, 180 In tempest or wide calm, repeats their thoughts; The lightning and the thunder, all free things, Have legends of them for the ears of men. All other glories are as falling stars, But universal Nature watches theirs: Such strength is won by love of humankind.