Towards democracy

34 Towards Democracy

Hour after hour, hour after hour,—and I sleep, well content. XXIII Closer and closer will I come, till I lay hold of you —myself and none other. As one grasps a drowning man with a grasp that will not be relaxed, so will I grasp you—you shall not escape me.

Ah! Death, and Hell with thy gaping jaws, into thee at length I am curious to descend; curious am I to go where the old empty masks of Fear and Disaster are kept, and to see where they hang—hereafter useless for ever.

XXIV

Are you laughed at, are you scorned? Do they gaze at you and giggle to each other as you pass by? Do they despise you because you are mis-shapen, because you are awkward, because you are peculiar, because you fail in everything you do—and you know it is true?

Do you go to your chamber and hide yourself and think that no one thinks of you, or when they do only with contempt ?

My child, there is One that not only thinks of you, but who cannot get on at all without you.

Are you alone in the world?

Have you sinned? have you a terrible secret within you which must out, yet you dare not reveal it?

Have you a face so disfigured that no one will look straight in your eyes?