HKB
if they were but willing to weigh their own case, could they think themselves free from punishment whom wickedness, worst of all evils, has not only touched, but deeply tainted?
'See, also, from the opposite standpoint--the standpoint of the good--what a penalty attends upon the wicked. Thou didst learn a little since that whatever is is one, and that unity itself is good. Accordingly, by this way of reckoning, whatever falls away from goodness ceases to be; whence it comes to pass that the bad cease to be what they were, while only the outward aspect is still left to show they have been men. Wherefore, by their perversion to badness, they have lost their true human nature. Further, since righteousness alone can raise men above the level of humanity, it must needs be that unrighteousness degrades below man's level those whom it has cast out of man's estate. It results, then, that thou canst not consider him human whom thou seest transformed by vice. The violent despoiler of other men's goods, enflamed with covetousness, surely resembles a wolf. A bold and restless spirit, ever wrangling in law-courts, is like some yelping cur. The secret schemer, taking pleasure in fraud and stealth, is own brother to the fox. The passionate man, phrenzied with rage, we might believe to be animated with the soul of a lion. The coward and runaway, afraid where no fear is, may be likened to the timid deer. He who is sunk in ignorance and stupidity lives like a dull ass. He who is light and inconstant, never holding long to one thing, is for all the world like a bird. He who wallows in foul and unclean lusts is sunk in the pleasures of a filthy hog. So it comes to pass that he who by forsaking righteousness ceases to be a man cannot pass into a Godlike condition, but actually turns into a brute beast.'
SONG III.
CIRCE'S CUP.
Th' Ithacan discreet, And all his storm-tossed fleet, Far o'er the ocean wave The winds of heaven drave-- Drave to the mystic isle, Where dwelleth in her guile That fair and faithless one, The daughter of the Sun. There for the stranger crew With cunning spells she knew To mix th' enchanted cup. For whoso drinks it up, Must suffer hideous change To monstrous shapes and strange. One like a boar appears; This his huge form uprears, Mighty in bulk and limb-- An Afric lion--grim With claw and fang. Confessed A wolf, this, sore distressed When he would weep, doth howl; And, strangely tame, these prowl The Indian tiger's mates.
And though in such sore straits, The pity of the god Who bears the mystic rod Had power the chieftain brave From her fell arts to save; His comrades, unrestrained, The fatal goblet drained. All now with low-bent head, Like swine, on acorns fed; Man's speech and form were reft, No human feature left; But steadfast still, the mind, Unaltered, unresigned, The monstrous change bewailed.
How little, then, availed The potencies of ill! These herbs, this baneful skill, May change each outward part, But cannot touch the heart. In its true home, deep-set, Man's spirit liveth yet. Those poisons are more fell, More potent to expel Man from his high estate, Which subtly penetrate, And leave the body whole, But deep infect the soul.
IV.
Then said I: 'This is very true. I see that the vicious, though they keep the outward form of man, are rightly said to be changed into beasts in respect of their spiritual nature; but, inasmuch as their cruel and polluted minds vent their rage in the destruction of the good, I would this license were not permitted to them.'