Theos-Talk Archives (March 1996 Message tl00050)

	W. Q. J.

O hero of the iron age,
Upon thy grave we will not weep,
Nor yet consume away in rage
For thee and thy untimely sleep.
Our hearts a burning silence keep.

O martyr, in these iron days
One fate was sure for soul like thine:
Well you foreknew but went your ways.
The crucifixion is the sign,
The meed of all the kingly line.

We may not mourn -- though such a night
Has fallen on our earthly spheres
Bereft of love and truth and light
As never since the dawn of years; --
For tears give birth alone to tears.

One wreath upon thy grave we lay
(The silence of our bitter thought,
Words that would scorch their hearts of clay),
And turn to learn what thou hast taught,
To shape our lives as thine was wrought.
	_____________

It is with no feeling of sadness that I think of this withdrawal.
He would not have wished for that. But with a faltering hand I try
to express one of many incommunicable thoughts about the hero who
has departed. Long before I met him, before even written words of
his had been read, his name like an incantation stirred and
summoned forth some secret spiritual impulse in my heart. It was no
surface tie which bound us to him. No one ever tried less than he
to gain from men that adherence which comes from impressive manner.
I hardly thought what he was while he spoke; but on departing I
found my heart, wiser than my brain, had given itself away to him;
an inner exaltation lasting for months witnessed his power. It was
in that memorable convention in London two years ago that I first
glimpsed his real greatness. As he sat there quietly, one among
many, not speaking a word, I was overcome by a sense of spiritual
dilation, of unconquerable will about him, and that one figure with
the grey head became all the room to me. Shall I not say the truth
I think? Here was a hero out of the remote, antique, giant ages
come among us, wearing but on the surface the vesture of our little
day. We, too, came out of that past, but in forgetfulness; he with
memory and power soon regained. To him and one other we owe an
unspeakable gratitude for faith and hope and knowledge born again.
We may say now, using words of his early years: "Even in hell I
lift up my eyes to those who are beyond me and do not deny them."
Ah, hero, we know you would have stayed with us if it were
possible; but fires have been kindled that shall not soon fade,
fires that shall be bright when you again return. I feel no
sadness, knowing there are no farewells in the True: to whosoever
has touched on that real being there is comradeship with all the
great and wise of time. That he will again return we need not
doubt. His ideals were those which are attained only by Saviours
and Deliverers of nations. When or where he may appear I know not,
but foresee the coming when our need invokes him. Light of the
future aeons, I hail, I hail to thee!

AE (George Russell)
	-------------

[Irish Theosophist, April 1896; also ~Echoes of the Orient~ Vol. 2,
pp. 2-4]

--
Nicholas <> am455@lafn.org <> Los Angeles
 First of all, love truth for its own sake, for otherwise no recognition of
  it will follow.  HP Blavatsky