Page:Prometheus Bound, and other poems.djvu/24

18 And war rose up between their starry brows,—

Some choosing to cast Chronos from his throne,

That Zeus might king it there; and some in haste

With opposite oaths that they would have no Zeus

To rule the gods for ever,—I, who brought

The counsel I thought meetest, could not move

The Titans, children of the Heaven and Earth,—

Because, disdaining in their rugged souls

My subtle machinations, they assumed

It was an easy thing for force to take

The mastery of fate. My mother, then,

Who is called not only Themis, but Earth too,

(Her single beauty joys in many names,)

Did teach me, with reiterant prophecy,

What future should be,—and how conquering gods

Should not prevail by strength and violence,

But by guile only. When I told them so,

They would not deign to contemplate the truth

On all sides round;—and thus, I deemed it best

To lead my mother upwards, willingly,

And set my Themis face to face with Zeus,

As willing to receive her! Tartarus,

With its abysmal cloister of the Dark,

Because I gave that counsel, covers up

The antique Chronos and his siding hosts;

And, by that counsel helped, the king of gods

Hath recompensed me by these bitter pangs—

For kingship wears a cancer at the heart,—

To have no faith in friends. And then, ye ask,

What crime it is for which he tortures me—

It shall be clear before you. When at first

He filled his father's throne, he made direct

And various gifts of glory to the gods,

And dealt the empire out. Alone, of men,