Is there not blood before thine eyes even now?
Our lost Actaeon's blood, whom long ago
His own red hounds through yonder forest dim
Tore unto death, because he vaunted him
Against most holy Artemis? Oh, beware,
And let me wreathe thy temples. Make thy prayer
With us, and walk thee humbly in God's sight.

Down with that hand! Aroint thee to thy rite,
Nor smear on me thy foul contagion!

                                                       This
Thy folly's head and prompter shall not miss
The justice that he needs!—Go, half my guard,
Forth to the rock-seat where he dwells in ward
O'er birds and wonders; rend the stone with crow
And trident; make one wreck of high and low,
And toss his bands to all the winds of air!
  Ha, have I found the way to sting thee, there?
The rest, forth through the town! And seek amain
This girl-faced stranger, that hath wrought such bane
To all Thebes, preying on our maids and wives.
Seek till ye find; and lead him here in gyves,
Till he be judged and stoned, and weep in blood
The day he troubled Pentheus with his God!

Hard heart, how little dost thou know what seed
Thou sowest! Blind before, and now indeed
Most mad!—Come, Cadmus, let us go our way,
And pray for this our persecutor, pray
For this poor city, that the righteous God
Move not in anger.—Take thine ivy rod
And help my steps, as I help thine. 'Twere ill,
If two old men should fall by the roadway. Still,
Come what come may, our service shall be done
To Bacchios, the All-Father's mystic son.
  O Pentheus, named of sorrow! Shall he claim
From all thy house fulfilment of his name,
Old Cadmus?—Nay, I speak not from mine art,
But as I see—blind words and a blind heart!

        Thou Immaculate on high;
        Thou Recording Purity;
        Thou that stoopest, Golden Wing,
        Earthward, manward, pitying,
        Hearest thou this angry King?
        Hearest thou the rage and scorn
          'Gainst the Lord of Many Voices,
        Him of mortal mother born,
          Him in whom man's heart rejoices,
        Girt with garlands and with glee,
        First in Heaven's sovranty?
          For his kingdom, it is there,
          In the dancing and the prayer,
        In the music and the laughter,
          In the vanishing of care,
        And of all before and after;
        In the Gods' high banquet, when
          Gleams the grape-blood, flashed to heaven;
        Yea, and in the feasts of men
        Comes his crownèd slumber; then
          Pain is dead and hate forgiven!