Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Heinemann Volume 4).djvu/193

Than, my life over there 'mong the Charleston merchants.
There was something hollow in the whole affair,
Something foreign at the bottom, something dubious behind it;—
I was never at home in their company,
Nor felt myself really one of the guild.
What tempted me into that galley at all?
To grub and grub in the bins of trade—
As I think it all over, I can't understand it;—
It <g>happened</g> so; that's the whole affair.—
  To be oneself on a basis of gold
Is no better than founding one's house on the sand.
For your watch, and your ring, and the rest of your trappings,
The good people fawn on you, grovelling to earth;
They lift their hats to your jewelled breast-pin;
But your ring and your breast-pin are not your Person.—^[1]
A prophet; ay, that is a clearer position.
At least one knows on what footing one stands.
If you make a success, it's yourself that receives
The ovation, and not your pounds-sterling and shillings.^[2]
One is what one is, and no nonsense about it;
One owes nothing to chance or to accident,
And needs neither licence nor patent to lean on.—
A prophet; ay, that is the thing for me.
And I slipped so utterly unawares into it,—
Just by coming galloping over the desert,
And meeting these children of nature en route.
The Prophet had come to them; so much was clear.
It was really not my intent to deceive——;
There's a difference 'twixt lies and oracular answers;

1. Or "ego."
2. In original, "Pundsterling og shilling."