But because the bard is called to affirm, to inspire, to _serve_, he is also called to be worn. To become the beautiful image, the marble must be lopped and cut; the vine to bear sweeter fruit must be trimmed, and the soul must go through a baptism of fire.... Growth, progress is thus ever the casting off of an old self, and _Scheiden thut weh_. Detachment hurts. A new birth can take place only amid throes of agony. Hence the following lines of Pushkin on the poet:-- ... No sooner the heavenly word His keen ear hath reached, Then up trembles the singer's soul Like an awakened eagle. "The world's pastimes now weary him And mortals' gossip now he shuns. . . . . . . . . . . Wild and stem rushes he Of tumult full and sound To the shores of desert wave Into the wildly whispering wood." 9. This is as yet only discernment that the bard must needs suffer; by-and-by comes also the fulfilment, the recognition of the wisdom of the sorrow, and with it its joyful acceptance in the poem of "The Prophet." "And out he tore my sinful tongue . . . . . . . . . . And ope he cut with sword my breast And out he took my trembling heart And a coal with gleaming blaze Into the opened breast he shoved. Like a corpse I lay in the desert. And God's Voice unto me called: Arise, O prophet, and listen, and guide. Be thou filled with my will And going over land and sea Fire with the word the hearts of men!" "Be thou filled with my will!" His ideal began with abandonment of self-will; it ended with complete surrender of self-will. When we have done all the thinking and planning and weighing, and pride ourselves upon _our_ wisdom, we are not yet wise. One more step remains to be taken, without which we only may avoid the wrong; with which, however, we shall surely come upon the right. We must still say, Teach us, Thou, to merge our will in Thine.... II. INNER LIFE.