Part 5 — SCENE III.—JULIAN on the summit of a mountain-peak. The stars are brilliant around a crescent moon, hanging half-way between the mountain and the zenith. Below lies a sea of vapour. Beyond rises a loftier pinnacle, across which is stretched a bar of cloud. LILY lies on the cloud, looking earnestly into the mist below.
Reading edition
Julian (gazing upward). And thou wast with me all the time, my God, Even as now! I was not far from thee. Thy spirit spoke in all my wants and fears, And hopes and longings. Thou art all in all. I am not mine, but thine. I cannot speak The thoughts that work within me like a sea. When on the earth I lay, crushed down beneath A hopeless weight of empty desolation, Thy loving face was lighted then, O Christ, With expectation of my joy to come, When all the realm of possible ill should lie Under my feet, and I should stand as now Heart-sure of thee, true-hearted, only One. Was ever soul filled to such overflowing With the pure wine of blessedness, my God! Filled as the night with stars, am I with joys; Filled as the heavens with thee, am I with peace; For now I wait the end of all my prayers— Of all that have to do with old-world things: What new things come to wake new prayers, my God, Thou know'st; I wait on thee in perfect peace.
[He turns his gaze downward.—From the fog-sea below half-rises a woman-form, which floats toward him.]
Lo, as the lily lifts its shining bosom From the lone couch of waters where it slept, When the fair morn toucheth and waketh it; So riseth up my lily from the deep Where human souls are vexed in awful dreams!
[LILY spies her mother, darts down, and is caught in her arms. They land on JULIAN'S peak, and climb, LILY leading her mother.]
Lily. Come faster, mother dear; father is waiting.
Lilia. Have patience with me, darling. By and by, I think, I shall do better.—Oh my Julian!
Julian. I may not help her. She must climb and come.
[He reaches his hand, and the three are clasped in an infinite embrace.]
O God, thy thoughts, thy ways, are not as ours: They fill our longing hearts up to the brim.
[The moon and the stars and the blue night close around them; and the poet awakes from his dream.]