And if, in the closing piece of this section--_A Tentação de Xenocrates_--(The Temptation of Xenocrates) the courtesan’s charms seem more convincing than the resistance of the victorious philosopher, it must be because Bilac himself subtly sided with the temptress, and spoke with her when she protested that she had vowed to tame a man, not a stone. If, in the manner of the Freudians, we are to look upon the poem as a wish that the poet could on occasion show such scorn of feminine blandishments, it is doubly interesting to note that, though the moral victory lies with Xenocrates, the poet has willy-nilly made the courtesan’s case the more sympathetic. What, indeed, are the fruits of a philosophy that denies the embraces of a Laïs? Just as Olavo Bilac’s voluptuousness brings to him inevitably thoughts of death, so does his cult of form lead him at times to a sense of the essential uselessness of all words and all forms. He has expressed this nowhere so well as in the sonnet _Inania Verba_ from the section _Alma Inquieta_: Ah! Quem ha-de exprimir, alma impotente e escrava, O que a bocca não diz, o que a mão não escreve? --Ardes, sangras, pregada á tua cruz, e, em breve, Olhas, desfeito em lodo, o que te deslumbrava.… O Pensameto erve, e é um turbilhão de lava: A Fórma, fria e espessa, é um sepulcro de neve.… E a Palavra pesada abafa a Idéa leve, Que, perfume e clarão, refulgia e voava. Quem o molde achara para a expressão de tudo? Ai! quem ha-de dezir as ansias infinitas Do sonho? e o céo que foge a mão que se levanta? E a ira muda? e o asco mudo? e o desespero mudo? E as palavras de fé que nunca foram ditas? E as confissões de amor que morrem na garganta?[10] Alma Inquieta reaches its climax with _A Alvorada de Amor_ (The Dawn of Love). It is important enough to be quoted in full, as one of the sincerest and most passionate outbursts of the Brazilian muse, in which Olavo Bilac’s countrymen find mirrored that sensual part of themselves which is the product of climate, racial blend and the Adam and Eve in all of us. Um horror grande e mudo, um silencio profundo No dia do Peccado amortalhava o mundo. E Adão, vendo fechar-se a porta do Eden, vendo Que Eva olhava o deserto e hesitava tremendo, Disse: Chega-te a mim! entra no meu amor, E á minha carne entrega a tua carne em flor! Preme contra o meu peito o teu seio agitado, E aprende a amar o Amor, renovando o peccado! Abençóo o teu crime, acolho o teu desgosto, Bebo-te, de uma em uma, as lagrimas do rosto!