No More Learning

Who shall break him off,
Who on the earth, from his huge twisted power?

_Another_.
For in his brain, as in a burning-glass
Wide glow of sun drawn to a pin of fire,
Are gathered into incredible fierceness all
The rays of the dark heat of heathen strength.

_Another_.
His eyes, they say, can kill a man.

_Another_.
And sure
No murder could approach his naming nights.

_Another_.
Unless it came as a woman at whose beauty
His lust hath never sipt; for into his flesh
To drink unknown desirable limbs as wine
Torments him still, like a thirst when fever pours
A man's life out in drenching sweats.

_Judith_.
Peace, peace;
The siege hath given you shameless tongues, and minds
No more your own: yea, the foul Ninevite
Hath mastered you already, for your thoughts
Dwell in his wickedness and marvel at it.
Hate not a thing too much, lest you be drawn
Wry from yourselves and close to the thing ye hate.

_A Citizen_.
We know thy wisdom, Judith; but our lives
Belong to death; and wisdom to a man
Dying, is water in a broken jar.

_Judith_.
Yea, if thou wilt die of a parching mouth.

_A Citizen_.
Thou art rich, and thou hast much cool store of wine.
But the town thirsts, and every beat of our blood
Hastens us on to maniac agony.
The Assyrians have our wells, and half the tanks
Are dry, and the pools shoal with baking mud:
The water left to us is pestilent.
And therefore have we asked the governors
For death: and it is granted us.

_Another_.
Five days
Hath Prince Ozias bidden us endure.

_Another_.
For there are still fools among us who dare trust
God has not made a bargain of our lives.

_Another_.
We are a small people, and our war is weak:
Who knows whether our God doth not desire
Armies and great plains full of spears and horses,
And cities made of bronze and hewn white stone
And scarlet awnings, throng'd with sworded men,
To shout his name up from the earth and kill
All crying at the gates of other heavens;
And hath grown tired of peaceable praise and folk
That in a warren of dry mountains dwell,
Whose few throats can make little noise in heaven.

_A Young Man_.
For sure God's love hath wandered to strange nations;
His pleasure in the breasts of Jerusalem
Is a delight grown old. Yea, he would change
That shepherd-woman of the earthly cities,
Whose mind is as the clear light of her hills,
Full of the sound of a hundred waters falling;
And poureth his desire out, belike,
Upon that queen the wealth of the world hath clad,
Babylon, for whose golden bed the gods
Wrangle like young men with great gifts and boasts;
Whose mind is as a carbuncle of fire,
Full of the sound of amazing flames of music.

_Another_.