CUERVO - Biblioteca Nacional de Colombia

76 PARACELSUS
Much-and what laughter should be like I No less,
However, I forego that luxury,
Since it alarms the friend who brings it back.
True, laughter like my own must echo strange
To thinking men; a smile were better far­
So make me smile I If the exulting look
You wore but now be smiling, 'tis so long
Since I have smiled I Alas, such smiles are born
Alone of hearts like yours, or shepherds old
Of ancient time, whose eyes, calm as their flocks,
Saw in the stars mere garnishry of heaven,
In earth a stage for altars, nothing more.
Never change, Festus: I say, never change I
Festus. My God, if he be wretched after alII
Paracelsus. When last we parted, Festus, you declared,
-Or did your Michal's soft lips whisper words
I have preserved? She told me she believed
I should succeed (meaning, that in the search
I then engaged in, I should meet success),
And yet be wretched: now, she augured false.
Festus. Thank heaven I but you spoke strangely 1 could
I venture
To think bare apprehension lest your friend,
Dazzled by your resplendent course, might fi.nd
Henceforth less sweetness in his own, awakes
Such earnest mood in you? Fear not, dear friend,
That I shall leave you, inwardly repining
Your lot was not my own I
Paracelsus. And this, for ever I
For ever I gull who may, they will be blind I
They will not look nor think-'tis nothing new
In them; but surely he is not of them!
My Festus, do you know, I reckoned, you­
Though all beside were sand-blind-you, my friend,
Would look at me, once close, with piercing eye,
Untroubled by the faIse glare that confounds
A weaker vision; would remain serene,
Though singular, amid a gaping throng.
I feared you, or had come, sure, long ere this,
To Einsiedeln. \Vell, error has no end,
And Rbasis is a sage, and Basil boasts
A tribe of wits, and I am wise and blest
Past all dispute t 'Tis vain to fret at it.
I have vowed long since that my worshippers
Shall owe to their own deep sagacity
All further information, good or bad:
And little risk my repu tation runs,
Unless perchance the glance now searching me
Be fixed much longer-for it seems to spell,
©Biblioteca Nacional de Colombia