The World and the Quietist

    “WHY, when the world’s great mind     Hath finally inclined, Why,” you say, Critias, “be debating still?     Why, with these mournful rhymes     Learned in more languid climes,     Blame our activity     Who, with such passionate will,     Are what we mean to be?”     Critias, long since, I know     (For Fate decreed it so), Long since the world hath set its heart to live;     Long since, with credulous zeal     It turns life’s mighty wheel,     Still doth for laborers send     Who still their labor give,     And still expects an end.     Yet, as the wheel flies round,     With no ungrateful sound Do adverse voices fall on the world’s ear.     Deafened by his own stir     The rugged laborer     Caught not till then a sense     So glowing and so near     Of his omnipotence.     So, when the feast grew loud     In Susa’s palace proud, A white-robed slave stole to the Great King’s side.     He spake—the Great King heard;     Felt the slow-rolling word     Swell his attentive soul;     Breathed deeply as it died,     And drained his mighty bowl.