152
THE STAR IN THE
WEST
The vale
is black with
priests .
They fight ,
Wild
beasts , for food ,
The orphan's gold , the widow's right ,
The virgin's snood .
All in their maws are crammed within the night
That hides their chosen
wood ,
Where through the blackness sounds
the sickening noise
Of cannibals that gloat on monstrous
joys.?
Feeding perhaps first on man's body , the priest soon
found , after investing
his
victim
with
an
immortal
soul
,
that the soul would form
an
excellent basis for
blackmail
,
enabling man
to
buy
off
the terrors
of
hell
through
the medium
of
the priest who held the keys
of heaven
:
still death
reigns
,
and God and priests are fed
,
Man's blood for wine
,
man's
flesh for meat
and
bread
.?
And these priests are not dead yet
.
As
the human race throve
so
did their gods
,
the old
savage
of
man's early thoughts
grew
,
and growing
became
more evil
,
as
their gods
so
were men
,
and
as
men
so
were their gods
,
the
one
continually
acting
and reacting
on
the other
:
Of obscene
deities and apish men
,
Rivalling
their gods
in
petty
filthiness.3
Gods sprang from gods
:
For the old gods indeed
go
down
to
death
,
But the new gods arise from
rottenness
.4
The first cause
,
a
pervading terror
,
was grand
in
its
wilfulness compared with the degraded images which
1
Mysteries
:
Lyrical
and Dramatic
,
vol
.
i,
p
.
126
.
2
Ibid
.
vol
.
i,
p
.
106
.
3
The Tale
of
Archais
,
vol
.
i,
p
.
19
.
4
The Fatal Force
,
vol
.
i,
p
.
143
.