Hope · Religio Medici · Man's Limitation

Hope

Faith may break on reason,
Faith may prove a treason
     To that highest gift
     That is granted by Thy grace;
But Hope! Ah, let us cherish
Some spark that may not perish,
     Some tiny spark to cheer us,
     As we wander through the waste!

A little lamp beside us,
A little lamp to guide us,
     Where the path is rocky,
     Where the road is steep.
That when the light falls dimmer,
Still some God-sent glimmer
     May hold us steadfast ever,
     To the track that we should keep.

Hope for the trending of it,
Hope for the ending of it,
Hope for all around us,
     That it ripens in the sun.

Hope for what is waning,
Hope for what is gaining,
Hope for what is waiting
     When the long day is done.

Hope that He, the nameless,
May still be best and blameless,
     Nor ever end His highest
     With the earthworm and the slime.
Hope that o'er the border,
There lies a land of order,
With higher law to reconcile
     The lower laws of Time.

Hope that every vexed life,
Finds within that next life,
     Something that may recompense,
     Something that may cheer.
And that perchance the lowest one
Is truly but the slowest one,
     Quickened by the sorrow
     Which is waiting for him here.

Religio Medici

1
God's own best will bide the test,
     And God's own worst will fall;
But, best or worst or last or first,
     He ordereth it all.

2
For all is good, if understood,
     (Ah, could we understand!)
And right and ill are tools of skill
     Held in His either hand.

3
The harlot and the anchorite,
     The martyr and the rake,
Deftly He fashions each aright,
     Its vital part to take.

4
Wisdom He makes to form the fruit
     Where the high blossoms be;
And Lust to kill the weaker shoot,
     And Drink to trim the tree.

5
And Holiness that so the bole
     Be solid at the core;
And Plague and Fever, that the whole
     Be changing evermore.

6
He strews the microbes in the lung,
     The blood-clot in the brain;
With test and test He picks the best,
     Then tests them once again.

7
He tests the body and the mind,
     He rings them o'er and o'er;
And if they crack, He throws them back,
     And fashions them once more.

8
He chokes the infant throat with slime,
     He sets the ferment free;
He builds the tiny tube of lime
     That blocks the artery.

9
He lets the youthful dreamer store
     Great projects in his brain,
Until He drops the fungus spore
     That smears them out again.

10
He stores the milk that feeds the babe,
     He dulls the tortured nerve;
He gives a hundred joys of sense
     Where few or none might serve.

11
And still He trains the branch of good
     Where the high blossoms be,
And wieldeth still the shears of ill
     To prune and prime His tree.

Man's Limitation

Man says that He is jealous,
     Man says that He is wise,
Man says that He is watching
     From His throne beyond the skies.

But perchance the arch above us
     Is one great mirror's span,
And the Figure seen so dimly
     Is a vast reflected man.

If it is love that gave us
     A thousand blossoms bright,
Why should that love not save us
     From poisoned aconite?

If this man blesses sunshine
     Which sets his fields aglow,
Shall that man curse the tempest
     That lays his harvest low?

If you may sing His praises
     For health He gave to you,
What of this spine-curved cripple,
     Shall he sing praises too?

If you may justly thank Him
     For strength in mind and limb,
Then what of yonder weakling —
     Must he give thanks to Him?

Ah dark, too dark, the riddle!
     The tiny brain too small!
We call, and fondly listen,
     For answer to that call.

There comes no word to tell us
     Why this and that should be,
Why you should live with sorrow,
     And joy should live with me.