he sigh’d;
  “And giv’st thou but the little and the more? 
  Does thy truth dwindle to the gauge of gold,
  A sum that man may smaller or less small
  Possess and count—­subtract or add to—­still? 
  Is not TRUTH one and indivisible? 
  Take from the Harmony a single tone
  A single tint take from the Iris bow—­
  And lo! what once was all, is nothing—­while
  Fails to the lovely whole one tint or tone!”

They stood within the temple’s silent dome,
And, as the young man paused abrupt, his gaze
Upon a veil’d and giant IMAGE fell: 
Amazed he turn’d unto his guide—­“And what
Towers, yonder, vast beneath the veil?”
“THE TRUTH,”
Answered the Priest. 
“And have I for the truth
Panted and struggled with a lonely soul,
And yon the thin and ceremonial robe
That wraps her from mine eyes?”
Replied the Priest,
“There shrouds herself the still Divinity. 
Hear, and revere her best:  ’Till I this veil
Lift—­may no mortal-born presume to raise;
And who with guilty and unhallow’d hand
Too soon profanes the Holy and Forbidden—­
He,’ says the goddess.”—­
“Well?”
“‘SHALL SEE THE TRUTH!’”
“And wond’rous oracle; and hast thou never
Lifted the veil?”
“No! nor desired to raise!”
“What! nor desired?  O strange, incurious heart,
Here the thin barrier—­there reveal’d the truth!”
Mildly return’d the priestly master:  “Son,
More mighty than thou dream’st of, Holy Law
Spreads interwoven in yon slender web,
Air-light to touch—­lead-heavy to the soul!”

The young man, thoughtful, turn’d him to his home,
And the sharp fever of the Wish to Know
Robb’d night of sleep.  Around his couch he roll’d,
Till midnight hatch’d resolve—­
“Unto the shrine!”
Stealthily on, the involuntary tread
Bears him—­he gains the boundary, scales the wall,
And midway in the inmost, holiest dome,
Strides with adventurous step the daring man.

Now halts he where the lifeless Silence sleeps
In the embrace of mournful Solitude;—­
Silence unstirr’d—­save where the guilty tread
Call’d the dull echo from mysterious vaults!

  High from the opening of the dome above,
  Came with wan smile the silver-shining moon. 
  And, awful as some pale presiding god,
  Dim-gleaming through the hush of that large gloom,
  In its wan veil the Giant Image stood.

With an unsteady step he onward past,
Already touch’d the violating hand
The Holy—­and recoil’d! a shudder thrill’d
His limbs, fire-hot and icy-cold in turns,
As if invisible arms would pluck the soul
Back from the deed. 
“O miserable man! 
What would’st thou?” (Thus within the inmost heart
Murmur’d the warning whisper.) “Wilt thou dare
The All-hallow’d to profane?  ‘No mortal-born’
(So spake the oracular word)—­’may lift the veil
Till I myself shall raise!’ Yet said it not—­