But let us return to the comparison, and collect the results of this experiment.--For a time, indeed, raised by that storm of grief and indignation into a companionship with the wind and the rain, and the lightning, and the thunder, the king 'strives in his little world of man,'--for that is the phrasing of the poetic report, to _out-scorn_ these elements. Nay, we ourselves hear, as the curtain rises on that ideal representative form of human suffering, the wild intonation of that human defiance--mounting and singing above the thunder, and drowning all the elemental crash with its articulation; for this is an experiment which the philosopher will try in the presence of his audience, and not report it merely. With that anguish in his heart, the crushed majesty, the stricken old man, the child-wounded father, laughs at the pains of _the senses_; the physical distress is welcome to him, he is glad of it. He does not care for anything that the _unconscious_, soulless elements can do to him, he calls to them from their heights, and bids them do their worst. Or it is only as they conspire with that _wilful human_ wrong, and serve to bring home to him anew the depth of it, by these tangible, sensuous effects,--it is only by that means that they are able to wound him. 'Nor rain, wind, thunder, fire, are my daughters,' _that_ is the argument. 'I tax you _not_, you elements, with _unkindness_.' Surely that is logical; that is a distinction not without a difference, and appreciable to the human mind, as it is constituted,--surely that is a point worth putting in the arts and sciences. 'I never gave you kingdoms, called you _children_; You _owe_ me no subscription; why, _then_, let fall Your horrible pleasure? Here I stand _your_ slave, A poor, infirm, weak, and despised old man; But _yet_, I call you _servile ministers_, That have with two pernicious daughters _joined_ Your high, engendered battles 'gainst a head _So old and white_ as this. O, O, '_tis foul_.' And in his calmer mood, when the storm has done its work upon him, and all the strength of his great passion is exhausted,--when his bodily powers are fast sinking under it, and like the subtle Hamlet's 'potent poison,' it begins at last to 'o'er-crow his spirit'--when he is faint with struggling with its fury, wet to the skin with it, and comfortless and shivering, he still maintains through his chattering teeth the argument; he will still defend his first position-- 'Thou thinkst 'tis much that this _contentious_ storm Invades _us_ to the skin; so 'tis to thee, But where the greater _malady_ is fixed, The _lesser_ is scarce felt.' 'The tempest in my mind Doth from my senses take all feeling else, Save what beats there.' 'In _such_ a night _To shut me out! Pour on_, I will endure. _In such a night as this_.'