Produced by Paul Murray, Diane Monico, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net THE HEPTALOGIA By Algernon Charles Swinburne Taken from THE COLLECTED POETICAL WORKS OF ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE, VOL. V SWINBURNE'S POETICAL WORKS I. POEMS AND BALLADS (First Series). II. SONGS BEFORE SUNRISE, and SONGS OF TWO NATIONS. III. POEMS AND BALLADS (Second and Third Series), and SONGS OF THE SPRINGTIDES. IV. TRISTRAM OF LYONESSE, THE TALE OF BALEN, ATALANTA IN CALYDON, ERECHTHEUS. V. STUDIES IN SONG, A CENTURY OF ROUNDELS, SONNETS ON ENGLISH DRAMATIC POETS, THE HEPTALOGIA, ETC. VI. A MIDSUMMER HOLIDAY, ASTROPHEL, A CHANNEL PASSAGE AND OTHER POEMS. LONDON: WILLIAM HEINEMANN THE HEPTALOGIA By Algernon Charles Swinburne 1917 LONDON: WILLIAM HEINEMANN _First printed (Chatto), 1904 Reprinted 1904, '09, '10, '12 (Heinemann), 1917_ _London: William Heinemann, 1917_ * * * * * THE HEPTALOGIA THE HIGHER PANTHEISM IN A NUTSHELL 373 JOHN JONES'S WIFE 375 THE POET AND THE WOODLOUSE 396 THE PERSON OF THE HOUSE 400 LAST WORDS OF A SEVENTH-RATE POET 406 SONNET FOR A PICTURE 421 NEPHELIDIA 422 * * * * * SPECIMENS OF MODERN POETS THE HEPTALOGIA OR THE SEVEN AGAINST SENSE A CAP WITH SEVEN BELLS THE HIGHER PANTHEISM IN A NUTSHELL One, who is not, we see: but one, whom we see not, is: Surely this is not that: but that is assuredly this. What, and wherefore, and whence? for under is over and under: If thunder could be without lightning, lightning could be without thunder. Doubt is faith in the main: but faith, on the whole, is doubt: We cannot believe by proof: but could we believe without? Why, and whither, and how? for barley and rye are not clover: Neither are straight lines curves: yet over is under and over. Two and two may be four: but four and four are not eight: Fate and God may be twain: but God is the same thing as fate. Ask a man what he thinks, and get from a man what he feels: God, once caught in the fact, shows you a fair pair of heels. Body and spirit are twins: God only knows which is which: The soul squats down in the flesh, like a tinker drunk in a ditch. More is the whole than a part: but half is more than the whole: Clearly, the soul is the body: but is not the body the soul? One and two are not one: but one and nothing is two: Truth can hardly be false, if falsehood cannot be true. Once the mastodon was: pterodactyls were common as cocks: Then the mammoth was God: now is He a prize ox. Parallels all things are: yet many of these are askew: You are certainly I: but certainly I am not you. Springs the rock from the plain, shoots the stream from the rock: Cocks exist for the hen: but hens exist for the cock.