it is true, that I look back upon my rush
and blaze of battle with no real regret. What a vain thing it was,
the perpetual clash and resonance of a victory that no one could
withstand; the mockery that conquest must be to an immortal whom no
one can ever really oppose;--no veritable difficulty to overcome,
no genuine resistance to meet, nothing positively tussled with and
thrown, nothing but ghostly armies shrinking and melting a little
way in front of my advancing eagles! That can never happen again,
and even through the pang of losing my laurel and my wings, I did
not genuinely deplore it. Nothing but the sheer intoxication of my
immortality had kept me at the pitch. And now that it is gone, oh
wisest of the gods, it is for you to tell me how, in this mortal
state, I can remain happy and yet be _me_.

AESCULAPIUS.

You are on the high road to happiness; you see its towers over
the dust, for you dare to know yourself.

NIKE.

Myself, Aesculapius?

AESCULAPIUS.

Yes; you have that signal, that culminating courage.

NIKE.

But it is because I do _not_ know my way that I come to you.

AESCULAPIUS.

To recognise the way is one thing, it is much; but to recognise
yourself is infinitely more, and includes the way.

NIKE.

Ah! I see. I think I partly see. The element of real victory was
absent where no defeat could be.

AESCULAPIUS [_eagerly_].

Dismal, sooty, raven-coloured robes of the Eumenides!

NIKE.

And it may be present even where no final conquest can ensue?

AESCULAPIUS.

Ah! how white they grow! How the serpents drop out of their
tresses.

NIKE.

I am feeling forward with my finger-tips, like a blind woman
searching.... And the real splendour of victory may consist in the
helpless mortal state; may blossom there, while it only budded in
our immortality?

AESCULAPIUS.

May consist, really, of the effort, the desire, the act of
gathering up the will to make the plunge. This will be victory
now, it will be the drawing of the bow-string and not the mere
cessation of the arrow-flight.

XII

[_The main terrace, soon after dawn. In the centre_ ZEUS _sits
alone, throned and silent. One by one the Gods come out of
the house, and arrange themselves in a semicircle, to the
left and right, each as he passes making obeisance to_ ZEUS.
_It is a perfectly still morning, and a dense white mist
hangs over the woods, completely hiding the sea a