Explore "Palladium" by Matthew Arnold on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Set where the upper streams of Simois flow / Was the Palladium, high 'mid rock and wood; / And Hector was in Ilium, far below, / And fought, and saw it not, but there it stood!
It stood; and sun and moonshine rain'd their light / On the pure columns of its glen-built hall.
Backward and forward roll'd the waves of fight / Round Troy; but while this stood, Troy could not fall.
So, in its lovely moonlight, lives the soul.
Mountains surround it, and sweet virgin air; / Cold plashing, past it, crystal waters roll; / We visit it by moments, ah! too rare!
We shall renew the battle in the plain / To-morrow; red with blood will Xanthus be; / Hector and Ajax will be there again; / Helen will come upon the wall to see.
Then we shall rust in shade, or shine in strife, / And fluctuate 'twixt blind hopes and blind despairs, / And fancy that we put forth all our life, / And never know how with the soul it fares.
Still doth the soul, from its lone fastness high, / Upon our life a ruling effluence send; / And when it fails, fight as we will, we die, / And while it lasts, we cannot wholly end.