Ay, my brave chronicler, and this same hour As well as any: now, let my time be! Now! I can go no farther; well or ill, 'T is done. I must desist and take my chance. I cannot keep on the stretch: 't is no back-shrinking-- For let but some assurance beam, some close To my toil grow visible, and I proceed At any price, though closing it, I die. Else, here I pause. The old Greek's prophecy Is like to turn out true: "I shall not quit His chamber till I know what I desire!" Was it the light wind sang it o'er the sea? An end, a rest! strange how the notion, once Encountered, gathers strength by moments! Rest! Where has it kept so long? this throbbing brow To cease, this beating heart to cease, all cruel And gnawing thoughts to cease! To dare let down My strung, so high-strung brain, to dare unnerve My harassed o'ertasked frame, to know my place, My portion, my reward, even my failure, Assigned, made sure forever! To lose myself Among the common creatures of the world, To draw some gain from having been a man, Neither to hope nor fear, to live at length! Even in failure, rest! But rest in truth And power and recompense ... I hoped that once! What, sunk insensibly so deep? Has all Been undergone for this? This the request My labor qualified me to present With no fear of refusal? Had I gone Slightingly through my task, and so judged fit To moderate my hopes; nay, were it now My sole concern to exculpate myself, End things or mend them,--why, I could not choose A humbler mood to wait for the event! No, no, there needs not this; no, after all, At worst I have performed my share of the task: The rest is God's concern; mine, merely this, To know that I have obstinately held By my own work. The mortal whose brave foot Has trod, unscathed, the temple-court so far That he descries at length the shrine of shrines, Must let no sneering of the demons' eyes, Whom he could pass unquailing, fasten now Upon him, fairly past their power; no, no-- He must not stagger, faint, fall down at last, Having a charm to baffle them; behold, He bares his front: a mortal ventures thus Serene amid the echoes, beams and glooms! If he be priest henceforth, if he wake up The god of the place to ban and blast him there, Both well! What's failure or success to me? I have subdued my life to the one purpose Whereto I ordained it; there alone I spy, No doubt, that way I may be satisfied.