A VISION OF EDENS

By G. K. *
CHESTERTON *
IS the stern old story shattered, Questioned, doubted, or denied, Of the world wherein our father Fell from innocence to pride?
Is that wondrous antique tracing Of the giant primal bliss,
Is it lost, outgrown, abandoned, Rated, scouted—and for this?
Strange the talc was, rude of image: Full of symbols: eas!era, old, Yet one thought did burn into us From that glimmering age of gold.
From the Joins of oae great father Came each nation, race and horde.
I N the mystic eastern forest Where pomegranates' blood-red lips Here and there in the green twilight Gaped like moons in tierce eclipse;
In his gorgeous domed Eden, In the lustrous southern wood, Thoughtful, eager, swarthy, subtle, There the Semite father stood.
Twitched the brown hands, long and cunning,
Hands that, labouring night nod day, Piled the weird colossal temples That the ages cannot slay.
Gleamed in eyes like antique jewels Things then hid from human ken, Sudden voices, starry visions, Prayers and laws of mighty men.
"Are not all things mine to rule them, Fruits and foliage. moon and star, Am I not the latest, holiest, Wisest of the things that are?"
Loud his cry was through the forest; It was echoed by a cry
From his slighter, gentler help-mate Gathering reeds her bower auigh.
And between them lay a creature, Gyre on gyre, a burning thing. Evil-eyed and subtle-coloured, As of rainbows, ring on ring.
Whirred the pigeons from the cedar, Crashed the coveys from the brake, I N the yellow mists of morning, In the furthest east, below, Peaks of pale, fantastic mountains Flanked with rice-fields, capped with snow;
In the quaint-diled meads of sunrise,
In the twinkling orange wood, Moon-faced, pensive, blandly snail Cairn the first of Mongols stood.
Clattering with his wooden sandal, Wielding an asthetic rake, Tracing sunset-tinted vases Made to look al—and to break.
Making comic gods to worship, Painting them profanely blue; Lying on his back and smiling, Having nothing else to do.
"Are not all things mine to play with,
Sun, chrysantitem UM and sea;
Am I not the latest, sharpest, First of all things that shall be?"
Loud he chirped, but In his pathway Slow there rose a glittering thing, Dragon-fanged and fiery-cresied, Wreathed fantastic for a spring; From one raw red clay, awakened By the nostrils of the Lord.
Masqued by birth or creed or Kinghood, Still the living fact remained, Brother at the throat of brother. Brother crowned and brother chained.
You, who trace elsewhere the issue Of the primal man and wife; You who see through mists of ages Five great fountain heads of life—
Do not yield your story lightly ; No, nor blame It, nor fnrsake. Only read a NW, a vision That came to me, when you spake.
Lonely, lurid, fear-inspiring, Thus it raised its voice and spike: "Are not all things thine to govern. Art not thou the lord,of dust, Stronger than the laws that made thee.
Subtler than the Powers that trust?
"Grasp the reins of power and passion, Be as gods are where you stand, Master pleasure, vengeance, knowledge, IA the fruit is to your hand."
Smitten, swayed with fierce temptsdon,
Thrice he bowed and groped, afraid, Then his hand, abrupt, presumptuous —On the great pomegranate laid.
Came an utter darkness, noisy With the crashing of great woods, Earth's foundations choked and
cloven
With the roaring of old floods.
Screamed the chaos, screamed and dwindled And the twain, the fallen stand, Hand-in-hand upon the deserts Of a pathless morning land.
Swtpt the grey storks from the rushes, Sprawled the spiders from the brake, Blazing, coiling, limbless, endless, Thus it raised its voice and spoke: "Are not all things thine to govern, Art not thou the lord of dust, Stronger than the laws that made thee.
Subtler than the powers that trust?
"Grasp the reins of power and pattiOrl.
Be as gods are where you stand; Master pleasure, vengeance. knowledge.
Lo, the fruit is to your hand!"
Dazed, bewitched and fascinated Stood the Mongol, rose at last, Saw the orange gleam above him, Sprang aloft and held it fast.
Dragon-clouds came o'er the sundisc,
Rose the sea in spires of spray, Fruit trees danced and wild flowers scampered.
All the Eden raved away.
Snapt convolvulus and lily,
Vanished heights and surf and grain. And the fallen stood together On a never-ending plain. I N the ghostly virgin forests
Of the windy, grassy west,
Where the squirrel fills the garner, Where the blue jay builds the nest; In the never-ending darkness, In the dense, unbroken wood, Serpent-bodied, copper-visaged. Grim the earliest red man stood.
Bending on his bow of ash-tree, Watching where, on uplands brown, Lay the great deer of the woodland That a single shaft brought down.
"Are not all these mine to marshal, Tree and squirrel, down and deer, Am I not the latest, lightest, Swiftest of the creatures here?"
Lightly to his squaw he turned him, But there blackened on his sight One huge coil of living darkness, Like a giant birth of night.
Flashed the rabbits from the burrows, Whirled the wild fowl from the lake; Dusky, shapeless, orbed in circles, Thus it raised its voice and spike: "Are not all things thine to govern, Art not thou the lord of dust, Stronger titan the laws that made thee, Subtler than the powers that trust?
MID the trunks and roots gigantic Of the primal forests grey, Where the damp mist hid the torrent
And the white wolf dogged the prey,
In the voiceless, leafy vistas, In the vasty Northern wood, Strong of limb and frank of feature, Proud the Aryan father stood.
In his eyes the star of conquest, In his hand the axe of stone; Might within him, worlds before him, All he looked on was his own.
"Are not all thing mine to rule them, Road and river, herd and hound, Am I not the latest, fairest, Bravest of the things around?"
In the thickets crashed a something, Heavy, long, it cleared a place, And the grey jaws of a monster Yawned above his lifted face.
Slunk the grey swine from the apples, Dived the herons from the brake; Gaping, glaring, forest-rending, Thus It raised its voice and spoke: "Are not all things thine to govern. Art not thou the lord of dust.
I N the inmost fieriest circle Of the secret southern lands Where the ernerald-roofed oasis With its bamboo columns stands,
Ringed with tall, fantastic palm trees, Like a ingle-filiest wood, Black and gaunt as Behemoth, There the pr:mal Negro stood. "Grasp the reins of power and passion.
Be as gods are where you stand, Master p)easure, vengeance, knowledge.
Lo, the fruit is to your hand!"
Stared aloft the wild red giant, High his painted arms he flung, Where, amid the tasselled tree boughs.
Knots of glistening berries swung.
Broke beyond a deafening thunder, Reeled end bent the rending woods, And with sound and foam and dark ness Came the desolating floods.
O'er there coming, domed the tempest, Lightning flare and thunder's yell, Under them the woods and wigwams Tumbled hopeless and pell-mell.
Sank the forests. sank the torrents. And the twain stood hand in hand In the grey, unbroken circle Of a bare and level land.
Stronger than the laws that made thee, Subtler than the Powers that trust?
"Seize the reins of power and passion.
Be as gods are where you stand. Master pleasure, vengeance, knowledge, La, the fruit is to your hand."
Pale with pa.ss:ort grew the Aryan, Madly to the tree he strode;
'Neath his arms the great boughs splintered, In his hand the apple glowed.
Woke the four great winds of heaven, Rushed together with one sound, Sank the circle of the forests, Reeled and swayed the riven ground.
Horrors, noises, deafness, darkness, Clutched and drowned them like a tide;
And upon a trackless level Stood the fallen, side by side.
Bowed his massy, glistening shoulders, Bared his might), grinning teeth, Screwed his blind and heavy es elids Scarce a glister shot beneath.
"...ire not all things ntine to pleae ate, Feather, Atone (banana too), Am I not the latest, largest, Strongest of the things in view?" Grinned the dreamer, and before him Reared a creeping goblin-growth, Heavy-headed, many-jointed, Dragged its ugly length in sloth.
Flared the red flamingoes upwards. Sailed the ihis in their wake;
Sullen, Coating, squat, flat-headed, Thus it raised its voice and spike:
"Are nor all things thine to govern, Art Ilea than the lord of dust, Stronger than the laws that made thee, Subtler than the Powers that trust?
"Grasp the reins of power and passion, Be as gods are where you stand,
0NL great plain and five great chieftains
Drawing nearer each to each, Rearing fast, like broods of giants, Sons to foster and to teach.
As a wolf-pack on the mountains Suddenly its fellows scents, So the five vast tribal musters Sighted one another's tents.
Then the the chiefs pealed summons For each other's place and birth, And the five roared back together: "lam father of the earth!"
Then the outskirts swayed and jostled, Questioned, quarrelled and defied, Till one wild man, blind with passion, Smote another, that he died.
And the red blood on the prairie For a moment Rimmed and curled, Then in five great torrents o'er it Met the first fight of the world, And the screaming human oceans, Black, white, yellow, red and brown, Over continents and ages Surged and struggled up and down.
First the white-skinned men came trampling,
Bold of heart and strong of hand, Then the yellow race came swarming• From Its yellow eastern land.
First the ms dads out of Aide Swept the fiery sons of Shem, Then the star-led Semites, turning, Took and did the same to them.
To and fro the racial battle Trampled o'er the primal earth,
Drove and crashed and smote and
shouted For the secret of their birth.
Now the Mongol scourged the Aryan For a stranger, for a pest,
Now the Aryan stoned the Mongol In his cities in the West.
Now the Semite spurned the Aryan, "Hold aloof: we are the Lord's." Now the Aryan held the Semite, Beaten, branded, bound with cords.
Now the red man flayed the white man,
Scorched and scalped with knife and flame;
Now the white man shot the red man like a brainless head of game.
Now the white man held the black man Toiling in a shameless law; Now the black man took the white man, Took Isim peppered: took him raw. Master pleasure. vengeance, knowledge.
Lo, the fruit is to your hand."
Slow, the giant, round whose temples Danced the palm leaves like a wreath, Squirmed, and took the big banana With one clash of his great teeth.
At his face there sprang a darkness, Dizzy, stunning, like a blow, And he never told what followed, Seeing that he did not know.
Till at last the twain woke slowly. Rubbed their knees and stared and smiled.
For they slat alone together On a dumb and dismal wild.
To and fro the blinded struggled, Shocked and staggered, reeled and swirled, For the case was undecided, Which was father of the world.
And the family enquiry To this day is going on; Once with rended trees and boulders, Now with batters and gun.
Yet the vision was not ended, a For methought upon a land iNeeth a crested will of mountains Met the five kings, hand to hand.
And when morning reddened darkly On the high and shelving heath, Lay the five great rulers moaning, Stricken nigh unto the death.
And above them, on the upland, Did a tail, weird being show, Limbs in red clay cast gigantic, Hair and beard like blinding snow.
And his voice like the low thunder Of an old forgotten flood:
"What is this that tears my substance, What is this that sheds my blood?"
In the ten wild eyes upgazing, Sprang a memory and a pain: "Father Adam, Father Adam, Hast thou shown thyself again?
"We were blind and had forgotten, See our banners are unfurled; Father Adam, Father Adam, Thou wed father of the world!"
Yet the vision was not ended, Ere it fled, a gleam, a word, Nations round the knees of Adam, Hand in hand before the Lord.
Varied, tolerant, united, Satisfying diverse needs; Where the Mongol stained his vases, And the Indian strung his beads.
Where the harmless Ethiopian Ate and hunted, laughed and fought, Where the rod of Europe governed And the harp of Israel taught.
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