To uncontrollably crowding lust, beyond
All power of delight to utter, thence
Inwardly turned to anger and detesting!
Till, looking on us with strange eyes, man finds
We are not his desire: it was but sex
Inflamed, so that it roused the breaking forth
Of secret fury in him, consuming life,
Yea, even the life that would reach up to know
The heaven of gods above it.

_Ishtar_.
And what, for this,
Dost thou refuse?

_Vashti_.
I refuse woman's beauty!
Not merely to be feasting with delight
Man's senses, I refuse; but even his heart
I will not serve. Are we to be for ever
Love's passion in man, and never love itself?
Always the instrument, never the music?

_Ishtar_.
I have not done with man.--Thou sayest true,
Women are as a sin in life: for that
The gods have made mankind in double sex.
Sin of desiring woman is to be
The knowledgeable light within man's soul,
Whereby he kills the darken'd ache of being.
But shall I leave him there? or shall I leave