There he directed sometimes with Love, sometimes alone, the life of
everything in the universe, or in unison with her animated men with his
breath.

He did this sometimes willingly, sometimes reluctantly, with greater or
less strength, according to the nearness he had attained to his heavenly
home; but when he had succeeded in reaching its circle of light, he
returned wonderfully invigorated. Then whoever Love and he joined in
animating with their breath became an artist.

There was also a thoroughly comic figure and one with many humorous
touches. Intellect's page, Instinct, who had risen from the lily with
him, was a comical fellow. When he tried to follow his master's flight
he fell after the first few strokes of his wings, and usually among
nettles. Only when some base advantage was to be gained on earth did
this servant succeed better than his master. The mother, Matter, whom
for the sake of the verse I called by her Greek name Hyle, was also
invested with a shade of comedy as a dissatisfied wife and the mother-
in-law of Intellect.

In regard to the whole Poem of the World I will observe that, up to the
time I finished the last line, I had never studied the kindred systems of
the Neo-Platonics or the Gnostics.

The verses which described the moment when Matter drew her fiery children
to her heart and thus warmed it, another passage in which men who were
destitute of intellect sought to destroy themselves and Love resolved to
sacrifice her own life, and, lastly, the song where Intellect rises from
the lily, besides many others, were worthy, in my opinion, of being
preserved.