BRAND.
He shall, none the less, be fell’d,—
But in secret, unbeheld,
Not before the eyes of all.
Now I see, I judged astray
Where the Folk’s salvation lay.
Not by high heroic charges
Can you make the People whole;
That which faculty enlarges
Does not heal the fissured soul.
It is Will alone that matters,
Will alone that mars or makes,
Will, that no distraction scatters,
And that no resistance breaks.—
[Turns towards the hamlet, where the shades of night are beginning to fall.]
Come then, Men, who downcast roam
The pent valley of my home;—
Close conversing we will try
Our own souls to purify,
Slackness curb and falsehood kill,
Rouse the lion’s cub of Will!
Manly, as the hands that smite,
Are the bands that hold the hoe;
There’s o n c end for all,-to grow
Tablets whereon God may write.
[He is going. EINAR confronts hint.]