The Bride of Corinth and Other Poems Author:Anatole France General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1920 Original Publisher: John Lane Subjects: Drama / General Drama / English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh Drama / Continental European Literary Criticism / Drama Poetry / Continental European Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustra... more »tions and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. Excerpt: PREFACE N this book I touch on high matters, and delicate to handle ; on religious matters. I have dreamed again the dream of the ages of faith ; I have illuded myself with lively belief. To have treated what is pious with impiety would have been to lack the sense of harmony. I bring a sincere respect to bear on matters sacred. I know that there is no certainty outside science. But I know also that the worth of scientific truth lies in the methods of its discovery, and that these methods are not to be arrived at by the common run of mankind. It is hardly scientific to hold that science may one day replace religion. So long as man sucks milk of woman, so long will he be consecrated hi the temple, and initiated in some sort in divine mystery. He will dream. And what matter if the dream be false, so it be beautiful ? Is it not man's destiny to be steeped in perpetual illusion ? Indeed, is not such illusion the very condition of Life ? A. F. MAIDEN HELLAS, young, with lyre in hand, Innocent child with kissed and hon- eyed mouth, Whose smile gave back the greeting of thy land, The sparkle of the sea and sky and south, Thy days and hours sped by on even feet, And when dark night had silvered all the ways, Thou, well content, cicalas shrilling sweet, Wouldst brood upon mankind its works and days. Child of the sea, on tawny beaches prone, Thy breast voluptuous in beauty swelled, What waves of har...« less