Ariel is that sublime sentiment of the perfectibility of man through whose virtue human clay is magnified and transformed in the realm of things for each one who lives by his light — even that miserable clay of which Ahriman spoke to Manfred... Ariel is, to nature, that crowning of its work which ends the ascending process of organic life with the call of the spirit. Ariel triumphant signifies ideality and order in life, noble inspiration in thought, unselfishness in conduct, high taste in art, heroism of action, delicacy and refinement in manners and usages. He is the eponymous hero in the épopée of man, the immortal protagonist, since first his presence inspired the feeble struggles of reason in primitive man, when he first knitted his brow in the effort to shape the flint, or to scratch rude drawings on a reindeer’s bones; since first with his arms he fanned the sacred fire which the ancient Aryan, progenitor of the peoples we call civilized, lit, by what mystery we know not, on the banks of the Ganges, and forged from the divine flame the sceptre of man’s mastery. Ariel accompanies him still, and onward, breeding races ever higher, until at the end he hovers radiant above those souls which have over-passed the natural limit of humanity; the same for Plato on the Sunium Promontory as for Francis of Assisi on the solitude of the Albem Mont. His invincible power has as its impulse every uplifting moment of a human life. Though overcome a thousand and one times by the untamable rebellion of Caliban, proscribed by the victorious barbarian, smothered in the clouds of battle, his bright wings spotted by trailing in “the eternal dunghill of Job,” Ariel ever rises again, immortally renews his beauty and his youth. Ariel runs nimbly as at the call of Prospero to all who really care for him and seek to find him. His kindly power goes even out at times to those who would deny him. He guides the blind forces of evil and ignorance often to aid, and unwittingly, in works of good. He crosses human history with a song, as in the “Tempest,’’ to inspire those who labour and those who fight until he brings about the fulfilment of that divine plan to them unknown — and he is permitted, as in Shakespeare’s play, to snap his bonds in twain and soar forever into his circle of diviner light.

And more than for these words of mine I would have you ever remember tenderly this little figure of Ariel. I would that the image, light and graceful, of this bronze, impress itself upon your inmost spirit.... Once I saw, in a museum, an old coin; worn and effaced I could still read its device, in the thin gold, the one word Esperanza. I pondered on the influence that simple inscription might have had on the many generations through whose hands the coin had passed; how many fainting spirits it had cheered, how many generous impulses it had fostered, how many desperate resolutions it had prevented. So may the figure of this bronze, graven in your hearts, fulfil in your lives this invisible yet determining part In dark hours of discouragement may it rekindle in your conscience the warmth of the ideal, return to your hearts the glow of a perishing hope. And Ariel, first enthroned behind the bastion of your inner life, may sally thence to the attack and conquering of other souls. I see the bright spirit smiling back upon you in future times, even though your own still works in shadow. I have faith in your will and in your strength, even more in those to whom you shall transfer your life, transmit your work. I dream in rapture of that day when realities shall convince the world that the Cordillera which soars above the continent of the Americas has been carved to be the pedestal of this statue, the altar of the cult of Ariel.

So spoke Prospero. The youths departed, after a filial grasping of the Master’s hand. Of his sweet words there lingered an echo in each one’s mind as when a finger is drawn across a musical glass. It was the last hour of eve. A ray of the dying sun fell through the shadowed hall, and touching the front of bronze seemed almost to animate the face of the figure with the unquiet spark of life; and the ray prolonged itself as if the genius imprisoned in the bronze were sending his last look toward the young men going away....

For a long time they walked in silence. Guarded by their common absorption each soul could feel that fine distilling of meditation that falls on thought like quiet dew on the wool of sleeping lambs. When the rough contact of the street crowds roused them, it was already night; a serene, soft night of summer. The grace and calm that dropped from its ebon urn over the land rose above the prosy realities of the things of men; only their presence brought the youths again back to earth. A soft breeze charged the air with a languid, delicious sense of abandon, like the trembling of the cup in a Bacchante’s hand. The darkness in the heavens was not of black, but rather of a deep azure that seemed expressive of a thoughtful calm. Enamelled in it the great stars blazed amid their infinite company: Aldebaran, arrayed in purple light; Sirius, like the hollow of a silver chalice turned toward the world; the Cross, whose arms are open over our America as if to guard and hold its final hope....

And then it was that after a prolonged silence the youngest of the group — they called him “Enjolrás” because of his ardent thought — spoke, pointing out first the idle movement of the human herd and then the radiant beauty of the skies:

“See... while the crowd goes by, it never looks up to the heavens: yet they look down upon the multitude... something descends upon the indifferent mass…the vibration of the stars reminds me of the waving arms of a sower, sowing seed…”

 

 

THE END

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