31. 
And this beloved child thus felt the sway
Of my conceptions, gathering like a cloud
The very wind on which it rolls away: 
Hers too were all my thoughts, ere yet, endowed 940
With music and with light, their fountains flowed
In poesy; and her still and earnest face,
Pallid with feelings which intensely glowed
Within, was turned on mine with speechless grace,
Watching the hopes which there her heart had learned to trace. 945

32. 
In me, communion with this purest being
Kindled intenser zeal, and made me wise
In knowledge, which, in hers mine own mind seeing,
Left in the human world few mysteries: 
How without fear of evil or disguise 950
Was Cythna!—­what a spirit strong and mild,
Which death, or pain or peril could despise,
Yet melt in tenderness! what genius wild
Yet mighty, was enclosed within one simple child!

33. 
New lore was this—­old age with its gray hair, 955
And wrinkled legends of unworthy things,
And icy sneers, is nought:  it cannot dare
To burst the chains which life for ever flings
On the entangled soul’s aspiring wings,
So is it cold and cruel, and is made 960
The careless slave of that dark power which brings
Evil, like blight, on man, who, still betrayed,
Laughs o’er the grave in which his living hopes are laid.

34. 
Nor are the strong and the severe to keep
The empire of the world:  thus Cythna taught 965
Even in the visions of her eloquent sleep,
Unconscious of the power through which she wrought
The woof of such intelligible thought,
As from the tranquil strength which cradled lay
In her smile-peopled rest, my spirit sought 970
Why the deceiver and the slave has sway
O’er heralds so divine of truth’s arising day.

35. 
Within that fairest form, the female mind,
Untainted by the poison clouds which rest
On the dark world, a sacred home did find:  975
But else, from the wide earth’s maternal breast,
Victorious Evil, which had dispossessed
All native power, had those fair children torn,
And made them slaves to soothe his vile unrest,
And minister to lust its joys forlorn, 980
Till they had learned to breathe the atmosphere of scorn.

36. 
This misery was but coldly felt, till she
Became my only friend, who had endued
My purpose with a wider sympathy;
Thus, Cythna mourned with me the servitude 985
In which the half of humankind were mewed
Victims of lust and hate, the slaves of slaves,
She mourned that grace and power were thrown as food
To the hyena lust, who, among graves,
Over his loathed meal, laughing in agony, raves. 990