Christmas Eve Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

Rhyme Scheme: A BCBDEFEFGGHIHIJJKKLM LMNNMMOOEEJPJPPPQRST TSSSUU A QQMSMSEEVVSSSSEEPPAA MMRPQSSPSWWSPPXYSSSQ SQJPPZEMJEMJSSA2A2EE EEB2B2QPQPPQ QEESSSSSC2C2SEEPPMJJ MD2EED2 A SPSPESESJMMJUUE2E2PP PPPPSPPSSSSQSQJJEEEE SSMMMMSJSJ Y JQJQSSJAB2B2PPPPJJDC MMPPJEJESSSSPPPPSSPS PSPPEQEQEESSYYF2SF2S PPMJMJWWECCESSMMARQP E PYPYEMEMEESSSSEEPPEP PESSPSSPYYSSEEG2G2UU SSEEPH2H2PSSSSEEQEEQ SSSPSPESSEYYSSSSSSSS PPMMI2I2EEJ2SJ2SPPPP PPEESSSSPPK2K2SESEPP D2D2 A EAQQQQPEPESSPPSSSSSS SPPSEEL2L2M2E A CCN2N2O2O2EEEEPPMMDM DMEESSSSE A EEEEEAASSPPSSPSPSF2P 2P2F2EESSEEPPAAEESSS SSQ2SQ2SSMMMMSSSSAAE E P EPPJSSJPR2PR2SMSMSQS QMMSSPPN2MN2MSSUUSSP SPS P SDCSS2S2SSF2T2SSSSPP MMPPU2U2PPPPEEV2V2W2 W2SSEEJJAAAAPPQQSSPP QQSSUUMMSSPPSSQQEEJJ PPE E EQQSSSSSSPPAAMMPPMMS SPPMMEESSPPQQSSPPSSS SSSEEEESSPPAAPPSSSSQ QQQMMESSSEESSSSSSSSP PSSSSAAMMPPSSSSSSQQS SJJSSX2X2PEPEF2SF2SQ QPPSSSSMMMMF2SF2SSPS P P PSPSY2Z2EESSPQQPQQPP SSSSSQSQSSSSQPPQESSE P SSSMSMSQSQMM S ESSEA3EB3QSSQSSSSJEJ EF2F2N2N2PQQPMSSMEEQ QPT2PT2SSJC3C3JPPPSS PPPMSMSQQPP S MQMQSSMMPPX2X2MMSSPJ PJPPEEO2O2MMMX2MX2SX 2SX2EESMSMSSSSJJQPPQ X2X2S S SEMMESSMMMMQMMQSSSSS SSSSSEJJESSSSJJEEESE SB3D3JJEESSQQSSSSSSC 3QQC3JMMJSSJJSSSSQEE QSSSSSSX2X2SSMMQQSSP PPPSSQQSSSSPEPESSQSQ SY2Y2EESS S SSX2X2JPJPJJSSSSEES2 ES2EPPQQSSSSSSPSSPSS SSMMPPPP S SE3E3SPPPPSSQX2QX2SS SSQQSSSSSSF3E3X2X2EE EEMMEEG3G3EEPPQQEEPP A3B3EESN2SN2PSSPSSSS PX2PX2 P SEESMMSSSSSSQPQPX2MX 2EB3PPH3QQ P C3C3QQMEESSPSPSSSEES SQQEESSMMSSMX2X2MMMS SSSPPMMSSSSSSSSX2X2M MSSQQQPPSSSX2X2QQQSX 2 P SSSSSMMQQ P SSSSX2X2SSSPSPSSSSX2 SX2SSSSSPPMMMMSSSSMM SSX2X2PPSSSSSSS2S2PP SSSSSSX2SSX2MPMPSSQQ QSQSX2X2X2X2PSPSSSN2 N2X2PPX2PMPMPPSQSQX2 SSX2SSSSSSX2X2SX2X2S PPSQQS

I	A
	-
Out of the little chapel I burst	B
Into the fresh night air again	C
Five minutes full I waited first	B
In the doorway to escape the rain	D
That drove in gusts down the common's centre	E
At the edge of which the chapel stands	F
Before I plucked up heart to enter	E
Heaven knows how many sorts of hands	F
Reached past me groping for the latch	G
Of the inner door that hung on catch	G
More obstinate the more they fumbled	H
Till giving way at last with a scold	I
Of the crazy hinge in squeezed or tumbled	H
One sheep more to the rest in fold	I
And left me irresolute standing sentry	J
In the sheepfold's lath and plaster entry	J
Six feet long by three feet wide	K
Partitioned off from the vast inside	K
I blocked up half of it at least	L
No remedy the rain kept driving	M
They eyed me much as some wild beast	L
That congregation still arriving	M
Some of them by the main road white	N
A long way past me into the night	N
Skirting the common then diverging	M
Not a few suddenly emerging	M
From the common's self through the paling gaps	O
They house in the gravel pits perhaps	O
Where the road stops short with its safeguard border	E
Of lamps as tired of such disorder	E
But the most turned in yet more abruptly	J
From a certain squalid knot of alleys	P
Where the town's bad blood once slept corruptly	J
Which now the little chapel rallies	P
And leads into day again its priestliness	P
Lending itself to hide their beastliness	P
So cleverly thanks in part to the mason	Q
And putting so cheery a whitewashed face on	R
Those neophytes too much in lack of it	S
That where you cross the common as I did	T
And meet the party thus presided	T
Mount Zion with Love lane at the back of it	S
They front you as little disconcerted	S
As bound for the hills her fate averted	S
And her wicked people made to mind him	U
Lot might have marched with Gomorrah behind him	U
	-
II	A
	-
Well from the road the lanes or the common	Q
In came the flock the fat weary woman	Q
Panting and bewildered down clapping	M
Her umbrella with a mighty report	S
Grounded it by me wry and flapping	M
A wreck of whalebones then with a snort	S
Like a startled horse at the interloper	E
Who humbly knew himself improper	E
But could not shrink up small enough	V
Round to the door and in the gruff	V
Hinge's invariable scold	S
Making my very blood run cold	S
Prompt in the wake of her up pattered	S
On broken clogs the many tattered	S
Little old faced peaking sister turned mother	E
Of the sickly babe she tried to smother	E
Somehow up with its spotted face	P
From the cold on her breast the one warm place	P
She too must stop wring the poor ends dry	A
Of a draggled shawl and add thereby	A
Her tribute to the door mat sopping	M
Already from my own clothes' dropping	M
Which yet she seemed to grudge I should stand on	R
Then stooping down to take off her pattens	P
She bore them defiantly in each hand one	Q
Planted together before her breast	S
And its babe as good as a lance in rest	S
Close on her heels the dingy satins	P
Of a female something past me flitted	S
With lips as much too white as a streak	W
Lay far too red on each hollow cheek	W
And it seemed the very door hinge pitied	S
All that was left of a woman once	P
Holding at least its tongue for the nonce	P
Then a tall yellow man like the Penitent Thief	X
With his jaw bound up in a handkerchief	Y
And eyelids screwed together tight	S
Led himself in by some inner light	S
And except from him from each that entered	S
I got the same interrogation	Q
What you the alien you have ventured	S
To take with us the elect your station	Q
A carer for none of it a Gallio	J
Thus plain as print I read the glance	P
At a common prey in each countenance	P
As of huntsman giving his hounds the tallyho	Z
And when the door's cry drowned their wonder	E
The draught it always sent in shutting	M
Made the flame of the single tallow candle	J
In the cracked square lantern I stood under	E
Shoot its blue lip at me rebutting	M
As it were the luckless cause of scandal	J
I verily fancied the zealous light	S
In the chapel's secret too for spite	S
Would shudder itself clean off the wick	A2
With the airs of a Saint John's Candlestick	A2
There was no standing it much longer	E
Good folks thought I as resolve grew stronger	E
This way you perform the Grand Inquisitor	E
When the weather sends you a chance visitor	E
You are the men and wisdom shall die with you	B2
And none of the old Seven Churches vie with you	B2
But still despite the pretty perfection	Q
To which you carry your trick of exclusiveness	P
And taking God's word under wise protection	Q
Correct its tendency to diffusiveness	P
And bid one reach it over hot ploughshares	P
Still as I say though you've found salvation	Q
If I should choose to cry as now 'Shares '	-
See if the best of you bars me my ration	Q
I prefer if you please for my expounder	E
Of the laws of the feast the feast's own Founder	E
Mine's the same right with your poorest and sickliest	S
Supposing I don the marriage vestiment	S
So shut your mouth and open your Testament	S
And carve me my portion at your quickliest	S
Accordingly as a shoemaker's lad	S
With wizened face in want of soap	C2
And wet apron wound round his waist like a rope	C2
After stopping outside for his cough was bad	S
To get the fit over poor gentle creature	E
And so avoid distrubing the preacher	E
Passed in I sent my elbow spikewise	P
At the shutting door and entered likewise	P
Received the hinge's accustomed greeting	M
And crossed the threshold's magic pentacle	J
And found myself in full conventicle	J
To wit in Zion Chapel Meeting	M
On the Christmas Eve of 'Forty nine	D2
Which calling its flock to their special clover	E
Found all assembled and one sheep over	E
Whose lot as the weather pleased was mine	D2
	-
III	A
	-
I very soon had enough of it	S
The hot smell and the human noises	P
And my neighbor's coat the greasy cuff of it	S
Were a pebble stone that a child's hand poises	P
Compared with the pig of lead like pressure	E
Of the preaching man's immense stupidity	S
As he poured his doctrine forth full measure	E
To meet his audience's avidity	S
You needed not the wit of the Sibyl	J
To guess the cause of it all in a twinkling	M
No sooner our friend had got an inkling	M
Of treasure hid in the Holy Bible	J
Whene'er 't was the thought first struck him	U
How death at unawares might duck him	U
Deeper than the grave and quench	E2
The gin shop's light in hell's grim drench	E2
Than he handled it so in fine irreverence	P
As to hug the book of books to pieces	P
And a patchwork of chapters and texts in severance	P
Not improved by the private dog's ears and creases	P
Having clothed his own soul with he'd fain see equipt yours	P
So tossed you again your Holy Scriptures	P
And you picked them up in a sense no doubt	S
Nay had but a single face of my neighbors	P
Appeared to suspect that the preacher's labors	P
Were help which the world could be saved without	S
'T is odds but I might have borne in quiet	S
A qualm or two at my spiritual diet	S
Or who can tell perchance even mustered	S
Somewhat to urge in behalf of the sermon	Q
But the flock sat on divinely flustered	S
Sniffing methought its dew of Hermon	Q
With such content in every snuffle	J
As the devil inside us loves to ruffle	J
My old fat woman purred with pleasure	E
And thumb round thumb went twirling faster	E
While she to his periods keeping measure	E
Maternally devoured the pastor	E
The man with the handkerchief untied it	S
Showed us a horrible wen inside it	S
Gave his eyelids yet another screwing	M
And rocked himself as the woman was doing	M
The shoemaker's lad discreetly choking	M
Kept down his cough 'T was too provoking	M
My gorge rose at the nonsense and stuff of it	S
So saying like Eve when she plucked the apple	J
I wanted a taste and now there's enough of it	S
I flung out of the little chapel	J
	-
IV	Y
	-
There was a lull in the rain a lull	J
In the wind too the moon was risen	Q
And would have shone out pure and full	J
But for the ramparted cloud prison	Q
Block on block built up in the West	S
For what purpose the wind knows best	S
Who changes his mind continually	J
And the empty other half of the sky	A
Seemed in its silence as if it knew	B2
What any moment might look through	B2
A chance gap in that fortress massy	P
Through its fissures you got hints	P
Of the flying moon by the shifting tints	P
Now a dull lion color now brassy	P
Burning to yellow and whitest yellow	J
Like furnace smoke just ere flames bellow	J
All a simmer with intense strain	D
To let her through then blank again	C
At the hope of her appearance failing	M
Just by the chapel a break in the railing	M
Shows a narrow path directly across	P
'T is ever dry walking there on the moss	P
Besides you go gently all the way up hill	J
I stooped under and soon felt better	E
My head grew lighter my limbs more supple	J
As I walked on glad to have slipt the fetter	E
My mind was full of the scene I had left	S
That placid flock that pastor vociferant	S
How this outside was pure and different	S
The sermon now what a mingled weft	S
Of good and ill Were either less	P
Its fellow had colored the whole distinctly	P
But alas for the excellent earnestness	P
And the truths quite true if stated succinctly	P
But as surely false in their quaint presentment	S
However to pastor and flock's contentment	S
Say rather such truths looked false to your eyes	P
With his provings and parallels twisted and twined	S
Till how could you know them grown double their size	P
In the natural fog of the good man's mind	S
Like yonder spots of our roadside lamps	P
Haloed about with the common's damps	P
Truth remains true the fault's in the prover	E
The zeal was good and the aspiration	Q
And yet and yet yet fifty times over	E
Pharaoh received no demonstration	Q
By his Baker's dream of Baskets Three	E
Of the doctrine of the Trinity	E
Although as our preacher thus embellished it	S
Apparently his hearers relished it	S
With so unfeigned a gust who knows if	Y
They did not prefer our friend to Joseph	Y
But so it is everywhere one way with all of them	F2
These people have really felt no doubt	S
A something the motion they style the Call of them	F2
And this is their method of bringing about	S
By a mechanism of words and tones	P
So many texts in so many groans	P
A sort of reviving and reproducing	M
More or less perfectly who can tell	J
The mood itself which strengthens by using	M
And how that happens I understand well	J
A tune was born in my head last week	W
Out of the thump thump and shriek shriek	W
Of the train as I came by it up from Manchester	E
And when next week I take it back again	C
My head will sing to the engine's clack again	C
While it only makes my neighbor's haunches stir	E
Finding no dormant musical sprout	S
In him as in me to be jolted out	S
'T is the taught already that profits by teaching	M
He gets no more from the railway's preaching	M
Than from this preacher who does the rail's officer I	A
Whom therefore the flock cast a jealous eye on	R
Still why paint over their door Mount Zion	Q
To which all flesh shall come saith the pro phecy	P
	-
V	E
	-
But wherefore be harsh on a single case	P
After how many modes this Christmas Eve	Y
Does the self same weary thing take place	P
The same endeavor to make you believe	Y
And with much the same effect no more	E
Each method abundantly convincing	M
As I say to those convinced before	E
But scarce to be swallowed without wincing	M
By the not as yet convinced For me	E
I have my own church equally	E
And in this church my faith sprang first	S
I said as I reached the rising ground	S
And the wind began again with a burst	S
Of rain in my face and a glad rebound	S
From the heart beneath as if God speeding me	E
I entered his church door nature leading me	E
In youth I looked to these very skies	P
And probing their immensities	P
I found God there his visible power	E
Yet felt in my heart amid all its sense	P
Of the power an equal evidence	P
That his love there too was the nobler dower	E
For the loving worm within its clod	S
Were diviner than a loveless god	S
Amid his worlds I will dare to say	P
You know what I mean God's all man's naught	S
But also God whose pleasure brought	S
Man into being stands away	P
As it were a handbreadth off to give	Y
Room for the newly made to live	Y
And look at him from a place apart	S
And use his gifts of brain and heart	S
Given indeed but to keep forever	E
Who speaks of man then must not sever	E
Man's very elements from man	G2
Saying But all is God's whose plan	G2
Was to create man and then leave him	U
Able his own word saith to grieve him	U
But able to glorify him too	S
As a mere machine could never do	S
That prayed or praised all unaware	E
Of its fitness for aught but praise and prayer	E
Made perfect as a thing of course	P
Man therefore stands on his own stock	H2
Of love and power as a pin point rock	H2
And looking to God who ordained divorce	P
Of the rock from his boundless continent	S
Sees in his power made evident	S
Only excess by a million fold	S
O'er the power God gave man in the mould	S
For note man's hand first formed to carry	E
A few pounds' weight when taught to marry	E
Its strength with an engine's lifts a mountain	Q
Advancing in power by one degree	E
And why count steps through eternity	E
But love is the ever springing fountain	Q
Man may enlarge or narrow his bed	S
For the water's play but the water head	S
How can he multiply or reduce it	S
As easy create it as cause it to cease	P
He may profit by it or abuse it	S
But 't is not a thing to bear increase	P
As power does be love less or more	E
In the heart of man he keeps it shut	S
Or opes it wide as he pleases but	S
Love's sum remains what it was before	E
So gazing up in my youth at love	Y
As seen through power ever above	Y
All modes which make it manifest	S
My soul brought all to a single test	S
That he the Eternal First and Last	S
Who in his power had so surpassed	S
All man conceives of what is might	S
Whose wisdom too showed infinite	S
Would prove as infinitely good	S
Would never my soul understood	S
With power to work all love desires	P
Bestow e'en less than man requires	P
That he who endlessly was teaching	M
Above my spirit's utmost reaching	M
What love can do in the leaf or stone	I2
So that to master this alone	I2
This done in the stone or leaf for me	E
I must go on learning endlessly	E
Would never need that I in turn	J2
Should point him out defect unheeded	S
And show that God had yet to learn	J2
What the meanest human creature needed	S
Not life to wit for a few short years	P
Tracking his way through doubts and fears	P
While the stupid earth on which I stay	P
Suffers no change but passive adds	P
Its myriad years to myriads	P
Though I he gave it to decay	P
Seeing death come and choose about me	E
And my dearest ones depart without me	E
No love which on earth amid all the shows of it	S
Has ever been seen the sole good of life in it	S
The love ever growing there spite of the strife in it	S
Shall arise made perfect from death's repose of it	S
And I shall behold thee face to face	P
O God and in thy light retrace	P
How in all I loved here still wast thou	K2
Whom pressing to then as I fain would now	K2
I shall find as able to satiate	S
The love thy gift as my spirit's wonder	E
Thou art able to quicken and sublimate	S
With this sky of thine that I now walk under	E
And glory in thee for as I gaze	P
Thus thus Oh let men keep their ways	P
Of seeking thee in a narrow shrine	D2
Be this my way And this is mine	D2
	-
VI	A
	-
For lo what think you suddenly	E
The rain and the wind ceased and the sky	A
Received at once the full fruition	Q
Of the moon's consummate apparition	Q
The black cloud barricade was riven	Q
Ruined beneath her feet and driven	Q
Deep in the West while bare and breathless	P
North and South and East lay ready	E
For a glorious thing that dauntless deathless	P
Sprang across them and stood steady	E
'T was a moon rainbow vast and perfect	S
From heaven to heaven extending perfect	S
As the mother moon's self full in face	P
It rose distinctly at the base	P
With its seven proper colors chorded	S
Which still in the rising were compressed	S
Until at last they coalesced	S
And supreme the spectral creature lorded	S
In a triumph of whitest white	S
Above which intervened the night	S
But above night too like only the next	S
The second of a wondrous sequence	P
Reaching in rare and rarer frequence	P
Till the heaven of heavens were circumflexed	S
Another rainbow rose a mightier	E
Fainter flushier and flightier	E
Rapture dying along its verge	L2
Oh whose foot shall I see emerge	L2
Whose from the straining topmost dark	M2
On to the keystone of that are	E
	-
VII	A
	-
This sight was shown me there and then	C
Me one out of a world of men	C
Singled forth as the chance might hap	N2
To another if in a thunderclap	N2
Where I heard noise and you saw flame	O2
Some one man knew God called his name	O2
For me I think I said Appear	E
Good were it to be ever here	E
If thou wilt let me build to thee	E
Service tabernacles three	E
Where forever in thy presence	P
In ecstatic acquiescence	P
Far alike from thriftless learning	M
And ignorance's undiscerning	M
I may worship and remain	D
Thus at the show above me gazing	M
With upturned eyes I felt my brain	D
Glutted with the glory blazing	M
Throughout its whole mass over and under	E
Until at length it burst asunder	E
And out of it bodily there streamed	S
The too much glory as it seemed	S
Passing from out me to the ground	S
Then palely serpentining round	S
Into the dark with mazy error	E
	-
VIII	A
	-
All at once I looked up with terror	E
He was there	E
He himself with his human air	E
On the narrow pathway just before	E
I saw the back of him no more	E
He had left the chapel then as I	A
I forgot all about the sky	A
No face only the sight	S
Of a sweepy garment vast and white	S
With a hem that I could recognize	P
I felt terror no surprise	P
My mind filled with the cataract	S
At one bound of the mighty fact	S
I remember he did say	P
Doubtless that to this world's end	S
Where two or three should meet and pray	P
He would be in the midst their friend	S
Certainly he was there with them	F2
And my pulses leaped for joy	P2
Of the golden thought without alloy	P2
That I saw his very vesture's hem	F2
Then rushed the blood back cold and clear	E
With a fresh enhancing shiver of fear	E
And I hastened cried out while I pressed	S
To the salvation of the vest	S
But not so Lord It cannot be	E
That thou indeed art leaving me	E
Me that have despised thy friends	P
Did my heart make no amends	P
Thou art the love of God above	A
His power didst hear me place his love	A
And that was leaving the world for thee	E
Therefore thou must not turn from me	E
As I had chosen the other part	S
Folly and pride o'ercame my heart	S
Our best is bad nor bears thy test	S
Still it should be our very best	S
I thought it best that thou the spirit	S
Be worshipped in spirit and in truth	Q2
And in beauty as even we require it	S
Not in the forms burlesque uncouth	Q2
I left but now as scarcely fitted	S
For thee I knew not what I pitied	S
But all I felt there right or wrong	M
What is it to thee who curest sinning	M
Am I not weak as thou art strong	M
I have looked to thee from the beginning	M
Straight up to thee through all the world	S
Which like an idle scroll lay furled	S
To nothingness on either side	S
And since the time thou wast descried	S
Spite of the weak heart so have I	A
Lived ever and so fain would die	A
Living and dying thee before	E
But if thou leavest me	E
	-
IX	P
	-
Less or more	E
I suppose that I spoke thus	P
When have mercy Lord on us	P
The whole face turned upon me full	J
And I spread myself beneath it	S
As when the bleacher spreads to seethe it	S
In the cleansing sun his wool	J
Steeps in the flood of noontide whiteness	P
Some defiled discolored web	R2
So lay I saturate with brightness	P
And when the flood appeared to ebb	R2
Lo I was walking light and swift	S
With my senses settling fast and steadying	M
But my body caught up in the whirl and drift	S
Of the vesture's amplitude still eddying	M
On just before me still to be followed	S
As it carried me after with its motion	Q
What shall I say as a path were hollowed	S
And a man went weltering through the ocean	Q
Sucked along in the flying wake	M
Of the luminous water snake	M
Darkness and cold were cloven as through	S
I passed upborne yet walking too	S
And I turned to myself at intervals	P
So he said so it befalls	P
God who registers the cup	N2
Of mere cold water for his sake	M
To a disciple rendered up	N2
Disdains not his own thirst to slake	M
At the poorest love was ever offered	S
And because my heart I proffered	S
With true love trembling at the brim	U
He suffers me to follow him	U
Forever my own way dispensed	S
From seeking to be influenced	S
By all the less immediate ways	P
That earth in worships manifold	S
Adopts to reach by prayer and praise	P
The garment's hem which lo I hold	S
	-
X	P
	-
And so we crossed the world and stopped	S
For where am I in city or plain	D
Since I am 'ware of the world again	C
And what is this that rises propped	S
With pillars of prodigious girth	S2
Is it really on the earth	S2
This miraculous Dome of God	S
Has the angel's measuring rod	S
Which numbered cubits gem from gem	F2
'T wixt the gates of the New Jerusalem	T2
Meted it out and what he meted	S
Have the sons of men completed	S
Binding ever as he bade	S
Columns in the colonnade	S
With arms wide open to embrace	P
The entry of the human race	P
To the breast of what is it yon building	M
Ablaze in front all paint and gilding	M
With marble for brick and stones of price	P
For garniture of the edifice	P
Now I see it is no dream	U2
It stands there and it does not seem	U2
Forever in pictures thus it looks	P
And thus I have read of it in books	P
Often in England leagues away	P
And wondered how these fountains play	P
Growing up eternally	E
Each to a musical water tree	E
Whose blossoms drop a glittering boon	V2
Before my eyes in the light of the moon	V2
To the granite lavers underneath	W2
Liar and dreamer in your teeth	W2
I the sinner that speak to you	S
Was in Rome this night and stood and knew	S
Both this and more For see for see	E
The dark is rent mine eye is free	E
To pierce the crust of the outer wall	J
And I view inside and all there all	J
As the swarming hollow of a hive	A
The whole Basilica alive	A
Men in the chancel body and nave	A
Men on the pillars' architrave	A
Men on the statues men on the tombs	P
With popes and kings in their porphyry wombs	P
All famishing in expectation	Q
Of the main altar's consummation	Q
For see for see the rapturous moment	S
Approaches and earth's best endowment	S
Blends with heaven's the taper fires	P
Pant up the winding brazen spires	P
Heave loftier yet the baldachin	Q
The incense gaspings long kept in	Q
Suspire in clouds the organ blatant	S
Holds his breath and grovels latent	S
As if God's hushing finger grazed him	U
Like Behemoth when he praised him	U
At the silver bell's shrill tinkling	M
Quick cold drops of terror sprinkling	M
On the sudden pavement strewed	S
With faces of the multitude	S
Earth breaks up time drops away	P
In flows heaven with its new day	P
Of endless life when He who trod	S
Very man and very God	S
This earth in weakness shame and pain	Q
Dying the death whose signs remain	Q
Up yonder on the accursed tree	E
Shall come again no more to be	E
Of captivity the thrall	J
But the one God All in all	J
King of kings Lord of lords	P
As His servant John received the words	P
I died and live forevermore	E
	-
XI	E
	-
Yet I was left outside the door	E
Why sit I here on the threshold stone	Q
Left till He return alone	Q
Save for the garment's extreme fold	S
Abandoned still to bless my hold	S
My reason to my doubt replied	S
As if a book were opened wide	S
And at a certain page I traced	S
Every record undefaced	S
Added by successive years	P
The harvestings of truth's stray ears	P
Singly gleaned and in one sheaf	A
Bound together for belief	A
Yes I said that he will go	M
And sit with these in turn I know	M
Their faith's heart beats though her head swims	P
Too giddily to guide her limbs	P
Disabled by their palsy stroke	M
From propping mine Though Rome's gross yoke	M
Drops off no more to be endured	S
Her teaching is not so obscured	S
By errors and perversities	P
That no truth shines athwart the lies	P
And he whose eye detects a spark	M
Even where to man's the whole seems dark	M
May well see flame where each beholder	E
Acknowledges the embers smoulder	E
But I a mere man fear to quit	S
The clue God gave me as most fit	S
To guide my footsteps through life's maze	P
Because himself discerns all ways	P
Open to reach him I a man	Q
Able to mark where faith began	Q
To swerve aside till from its summit	S
Judgment drops her damning plummet	S
Pronouncing such a fatal space	P
Departed from the founder's base	P
He will not bid me enter too	S
But rather sit as now I do	S
Awaiting his return outside	S
'T was thus my reason straight replied	S
And joyously I turned and pressed	S
The garment's skirt upon my breast	S
Until afresh its light suffusing me	E
My heart cried What has been abusing me	E
That I should wait here lonely and coldly	E
Instead of rising entering boldly	E
Baring truth's face and letting drift	S
Her veils of lies as they choose to shift	S
Do these men praise him I will raise	P
My voice up to their point of praise	P
I see the error but above	A
The scope of error see the love	A
Oh love of those first Christian days	P
Fanned so soon into a blaze	P
From the spark preserved by the trampled sect	S
That the antique sovereign Intellect	S
Which then sat ruling in the world	S
Like a change in dreams was hurled	S
From the throne he reigned upon	Q
You looked up and he was gone	Q
Gone his glory of the pen	Q
Love with Greece and Rome in ken	Q
Bade her scribes abhor the trick	M
Of poetry and rhetoric	M
And exult with hearts set free	E
In blessed imbecility	S
Scrawled perchance on some torn sheet	S
Leaving Sallust incomplete	S
Gone his pride of sculptor painter	E
Love while able to acquaint her	E
While the thousand statues yet	S
Fresh from chisel pictures wet	S
From brush she saw on every side	S
Chose rather with an infant's pride	S
To frame those portents which impart	S
Such unction to true Christian Art	S
Gone music too The air was stirred	S
By happy wings Terpander's bird	S
That when the cold came fled away	P
Would tarry not the wintry day	P
As more enduring sculpture must	S
Till filthy saints rebuked the gust	S
With which they chanced to get a sight	S
Of some dear naked Aphrodite	S
They glanced a thought above the toes of	A
By breaking zealously her nose off	A
Love surely from that music's lingering	M
Might have filched her organ fingering	M
Nor chosen rather to set prayings	P
To hog grunts praises to horse neighings	P
Love was the startling thing the new	S
Love was the all sufficient too	S
And seeing that you see the rest	S
As a babe can find its mother's breast	S
As well in darkness as in light	S
Love shut our eyes and all seemed right	S
True the world's eyes are open now	Q
Less need for me to disallow	Q
Some few that keep Love's zone unbuckled	S
Peevish as ever to be suckled	S
Lulled by the same old baby prattle	J
With intermixture of the rattle	J
When she would have them creep stand steady	S
Upon their feet or walk already	S
Not to speak of trying to climb	X2
I will be wise another time	X2
And not desire a wall between us	P
When next I see a church roof cover	E
So many species of one genus	P
All with foreheads bearing lover	E
Written above the earnest eyes of them	F2
All with breasts that beat for beauty	S
Whether sublimed to the surprise of them	F2
In noble daring steadfast duty	S
The heroic in passion or in action	Q
Or lowered for sense's satisfaction	Q
To the mere outside of human creatures	P
Mere perfect form and faultless features	P
What with all Rome here whence to levy	S
Such contributions to their appetite	S
With women and men in a gorgeous bevy	S
They take as it were a padlock clap it tight	S
On their southern eyes restrained from feeding	M
On the glories of their ancient reading	M
On the beauties of their modern singing	M
On the wonders of the builder's bringing	M
On the majesties of Art around them	F2
And all these loves late struggling incessant	S
When faith has at last united and bound them	F2
They offer up to God for a present	S
Why I will on the whole be rather proud of it	S
And only taking the act in reference	P
To the other recipients who might have allowed it	S
I will rejoice that God had the preference	P
	-
XII	P
	-
So I summed up my new resolves	P
Too much love there can never be	S
And where the intellect devolves	P
Its function on love exclusively	S
I a man who possesses both	Y2
Will accept the provision nothing loth	Z2
Will feast my love then depart elsewhere	E
That my intellect may find its share	E
And ponder O soul the while thou departest	S
And see thou applaud the great heart of the artist	S
Who examining the capabilities	P
Of the block of marble he has to fashion	Q
Into a type of thought or passion	Q
Not always using obvious facilities	P
Shapes it as any artist can	Q
Into a perfect symmetrical man	Q
Complete from head to foot of the life size	P
Such as old Adam stood in his wife's eyes	P
But now and then bravely aspires to consummate	S
A Colossus by no means so easy to come at	S
And uses the whole of his block for the bust	S
Leaving the mind of the public to finish it	S
Since cut it ruefully short he must	S
On the face alone he expends his devotion	Q
He rather would mar than resolve to diminish it	S
Saying Applaud me for this grand notion	Q
Of what a face may be As for completing it	S
In breast and body and limbs do that you	S
All hail I fancy how happily meeting it	S
A trunk and legs would perfect the statue	S
Could man carve so as to answer volition	Q
And how much nobler than petty cavils	P
Were a hope to find in my spirit travels	P
Some artist of another ambition	Q
Who having a block to carve no bigger	E
Has spent his power on the opposite quest	S
And believed to begin at the feet was best	S
For so may I see ere I die the whole figure	E
	-
XIII	P
	-
No sooner said than out in the night	S
My heart beat lighter and more light	S
And still as before I was walking swift	S
With my senses settling fast and steadying	M
But my body caught up in the whirl and drift	S
Of the vesture's amplitude still eddying	M
On just before me still to be followed	S
As it carried me after with its motion	Q
What shall I say as a path were hollowed	S
And a man went weltering through the ocean	Q
Sucked along in the flying wake	M
Of the luminous water snake	M
	-
XIV	S
	-
Alone I am left alone once more	E
Save for the garment's extreme fold	S
Abandoned still to bless my hold	S
Alone beside the entrance door	E
Of a sort of temple perhaps a college	A3
Like nothing I ever saw before	E
At home in England to my knowledge	B3
The tall old quaint irregular town	Q
It may be though which I can't affirn any	S
Of the famous middle age towns of Germany	S
And this flight of stairs where I sit down	Q
Is it Halle Weimar Cassel Frankfort	S
Or Gottingen I have to thank for 't	S
It may be Gottingen most likely	S
Through the open door I catch obliquely	S
Glimpses of a lecture hall	J
And not a bad assembly neither	E
Ranged decent and symmetrical	J
On benches waiting what's to see there	E
Which holding still by the vesture's hem	F2
I also resolve to see with them	F2
Cautious this time how I suffer to slip	N2
The chance of joining in fellowship	N2
With any that call themselves his friends	P
As these folks do I have a notion	Q
But hist a buzzing and emotion	Q
All settle themselves the while ascends	P
By the creaking rail to the lecture desk	M
Step by step deliberate	S
Because of his cranium's over freight	S
Three parts sublime to one grotesque	M
If I have proved an accurate guesser	E
The hawk nosed high cheekboned Professor	E
I felt at once as if there ran	Q
A shoot of love from my heart to the man	Q
That sallow virgin minded studious	P
Martyr to mild enthusiasm	T2
As he uttered a kind of cough preludious	P
That woke my sympathetic spasm	T2
Beside some spitting that made me sorry	S
And stood surveying his auditory	S
With a wan pure look wellnigh celestial	J
Those blue eyes had survived so much	C3
While under the foot they could not smutch	C3
Lay all the fleshly and the bestial	J
Over he bowed and arranged his notes	P
Till the auditory's clearing of throats	P
Was done with died into a silence	P
And when each glance was upward sent	S
Each bearded mouth composed intent	S
And a pin might be heard drop half a mile hence	P
He pushed back higher his spectacles	P
Let the eyes stream out like lamps from cells	P
And giving his head of hair a hake	M
Of undressed tow for color and quantity	S
One rapid and impatient shake	M
As our own young England adjusts a jaunty tie	S
When about to impart on mature digestion	Q
Some thrilling view of the surplice question	Q
The Professor's grave voice sweet though hoarse	P
Broke into his Christmas Eve discourse	P
	-
XV	S
	-
And he began it by observing	M
How reason dictated that men	Q
Should rectify the natural swerving	M
By a reversion now and then	Q
To the well heads of knowledge few	S
And far away whence rolling grew	S
The life stream wide whereat we drink	M
Commingled as we needs must think	M
With waters alien to the source	P
To do which aimed this eve's discourse	P
Since where could be a fitter time	X2
For tracing backward to its prime	X2
This Christianity this lake	M
This reservoir whereat we slake	M
From one or other bank our thirst	S
So he proposed inquiring first	S
Into the various sources whence	P
This Myth of Christ is derivable	J
Demanding from the evidence	P
Since plainly no such life was livable	J
How these phenomena should class	P
Whether 't were best opine Christ was	P
Or never was at all or whether	E
He was and was not both together	E
It matters little for the name	O2
So the idea be left the same	O2
Only for practical purpose' sake	M
'T was obviously as well to take	M
The popular story understanding	M
How the ineptitude of the time	X2
And the penman's prejudice expanding	M
Fact into fable fit for the clime	X2
Had by slow and sure degrees translated it	S
Into this myth this Individuum	X2
Which when reason had strained and abated it	S
Of foreign matter left for residuum	X2
A Man a right true man however	E
Whose work was worthy a man's endeavor	E
Work that gave warrant almost sufficient	S
To his disciples for rather believing	M
He was just omnipotent and omniscient	S
As it gives to us for as frankly receiving	M
His word their tradition which though it meant	S
Something entirely different	S
From all that those who only heard it	S
In their simplicity thought and averred it	S
Had yet a meaning quite as respectable	J
For among other doctrines delectable	J
Was he not surely the first to insist on	Q
The natural sovereignty of our race	P
Here the lecturer came to a pausing place	P
And while his cough like a droughty piston	Q
Tried to dislodge the husk that grew to him	X2
I seized the occasion of bidding adieu to him	X2
The vesture still within my hand	S
	-
XVI	S
	-
I could interpret its command	S
This time he would not bid me enter	E
The exhausted air bell of the Critic	M
Truth's atmosphere may grow mephitic	M
When Papist struggles with Dissenter	E
Impregnating its pristine clarity	S
One by his daily fare's vulgarity	S
Its gust of broken meat and garlic	M
One by his soul's too much presuming	M
To turn the frankincense's fuming	M
And vapors of the candle starlike	M
Into the cloud her wings she buoys on	Q
Each that thus sets the pure air seething	M
May poison it for healthy breathing	M
But the Critic leaves no air to poison	Q
Pumps out with ruthless ingenuity	S
Atom by atom and leaves you vacuity	S
Thus much of Christ does he reject	S
And what retain His intellect	S
What is it I must reverence duly	S
Poor intellect for worship truly	S
Which tells me simply what was told	S
If mere morality bereft	S
Of the God in Christ be all that's left	S
Elsewhere by voices manifold	S
With this advantage that the stater	E
Made nowise the important stumble	J
Of adding he the sage and humble	J
Was also one with the Creator	E
You urge Christ's followers' simplicity	S
But how does shifting blame evade it	S
Have wisdom's words no more felicity	S
The stumbling block his speech who laid it	S
How comes it that for one found able	J
To sift the truth of it from fable	J
Millions believe it to the letter	E
Christ's goodness then does that fare better	E
Strange goodness which upon the score	E
Of being goodness the mere due	S
Of man to fellow man much more	E
To God should take another view	S
Of its possessor's privilege	B3
And bid him rule his race You pledge	D3
Your fealty to such rule What all	J
From heavenly John and Attic Paul	J
And that brave weather battered Peter	E
Whose stout faith only stood completer	E
For buffets sinning to be pardoned	S
As more his hands hauled nets they hard ened	S
All down to you the man of men	Q
Professing here at Gottingen	Q
Compose Christ's flock They you and I	S
Are sheep of a good man And why	S
The goodness how did he acquire it	S
Was it self gained did God inspire it	S
Choose which then tell me on what ground	S
Should its possessor dare propound	S
His claim to rise o'er us an inch	C3
Were goodness all some man's invention	Q
Who arbitrarily made mention	Q
What we should follow and whence flinch	C3
What qualities might take the style	J
Of right and wrong and had such guessing	M
Met with as general acquiescing	M
As graced the alphabet erewhile	J
When A got leave an Ox to be	S
No Camel quoth the Jews like G	S
For thus inventing thing and title	J
Worship were that man's fit requital	J
But if the common conscience must	S
Be ultimately judge adjust	S
Its apt name to each quality	S
Already known I would decree	S
Worship for such mere demonstration	Q
And simple work of nomenclature	E
Only the day I praised not nature	E
But Harvey for the circulation	Q
I would praise such a Christ with pride	S
And joy that he as none beside	S
Had taught us how to keep the mind	S
God gave him as God gave his kind	S
Freer than they from fleshly taint	S
I would call such a Christ our Saint	S
As I declare our Poet him	X2
Whose insight makes all others dim	X2
A thousand poets pried at life	S
And only one amid the strife	S
Rose to be Shakespeare each shall take	M
His crown I'd say for the world's sake	M
Though some objected Had we seen	Q
The heart and head of each what screen	Q
Was broken there to give them light	S
While in ourselves it shuts the sight	S
We should no more admire perchance	P
That these found truth out at a glance	P
Than marvel how the bat discerns	P
Some pitch dark cavern's fifty turns	P
Led by a finer tact a gift	S
He boasts which other birds must shift	S
Without and grope as best they can	Q
No freely I would praise the man	Q
Nor one whit more if he contended	S
That gift of his from God descended	S
Ah friend what gift of man's does not	S
No nearer something by a jot	S
Rise an infinity of nothings	P
Than one take Euclid for your teacher	E
Distinguish kinds do crownings clothings	P
Make that creator which was creature	E
Multiply gifts upon man's head	S
And what when all 's done shall be said	S
But the more gifted he I ween	Q
That one's made Christ this other Pilate	S
And this might be all that has been	Q
So what is there to frown or smile at	S
What is left for us save in growth	Y2
Of soul to rise up far past both	Y2
From the gift looking to the giver	E
And from the cistern to the river	E
And from the finite to infinity	S
And from man's dust to God's divinity	S
	-
XVII	S
	-
Take all in a word the truth in God's breast	S
Lies trace for trace upon ours impressed	S
Though he is so bright and we so dim	X2
We are made in his image to witness him	X2
And were no eye in us to tell	J
Instructed by no inner sense	P
The light of heaven from the dark of hell	J
That light would want its evidence	P
Though justice good and truth were still	J
Divine if by some demon's will	J
Hatred and wrong had been proclaimed	S
Law through the worlds and right misnamed	S
No mere exposition of morality	S
Made or in part or in totality	S
Should win you to give it worship therefore	E
And if no better proof you will care for	E
Whom do you count the worst man upon earth	S2
Be sure he knows in his conscience more	E
Of what right is than arrives at birth	S2
In the best man's acts that we bow before	E
This last knows better true but my fact is	P
'T is one thing to know and another to practice	P
And thence I conclude that the real God function	Q
Is to furnish a motive and injunction	Q
For practising what we know already	S
And such an injunction and such a motive	S
As the God in Christ do you waive and heady	S
High minded hang your tablet votive	S
Outside the fane on a finger post	S
Morality to the uttermost	S
Supreme in Christ as we all confess	P
Why need we prove would avail no jot	S
To make him God if God he were not	S
What is the point where himself lays stress	P
Does the precept run Believe in good	S
In justice truth now understood	S
For the first time or Believe in me	S
Who lived and died yet essentially	S
Am Lord of Life Whoever can take	M
The same to his heart and for mere love's sake	M
Conceive of the love that man obtains	P
A new truth no conviction gains	P
Of an old one only made intense	P
By a fresh appeal to his faded sense	P
	-
XVIII	S
	-
Can it be that he stays inside	S
Is the vesture left me to commune with	E3
Could my soul find aught to sing in tune with	E3
Even at this lecture if she tried	S
Oh let me at lowest sympathize	P
With the lurking drop of blood that lies	P
In the desiccated brain's white roots	P
Without throb for Christ's attributes	P
As the lecturer makes his special boast	S
If love's dead there it has left a ghost	S
Admire we how from heart to brain	Q
Though to say so strike the doctors dumb	X2
One instinct rises and falls again	Q
Restoring the equilibrium	X2
And how when the Critic had done his best	S
And the pearl of price at reason's test	S
Lay dust and ashes levigable	S
On the Professor's lecture table	S
When we looked for the inference and monition	Q
That our faith reduced to such condition	Q
Be swept forthwith to its natural dust hole	S
He bids us when we least expect it	S
Take back our faith if it be not just whole	S
Yet a pearl indeed as his tests affect it	S
Which fact pays damage done rewardingly	S
So prize we our dust and ashes accordingly	S
Go home and venerate the myth	F3
I thus have experimented with	E3
This man continue to adore him	X2
Rather than all who went before him	X2
And all who ever followed after	E
Surely for this I may praise you my brother	E
Will you take the praise in tears or laughter	E
That's one point gained can I compass another	E
Unlearned love was safe from spurning	M
Can't we respect your loveless learning	M
Let us at least give learning honor	E
What laurels had we showered upon her	E
Girding her loins up to perturb	G3
Our theory of the Middle Verb	G3
Or Turk like brandishing a scimitar	E
O'er anapaests in comic trimeter	E
Or curing the halt and maimed Iketides	P
While we lounged on at our indebted ease	P
Instead of which a tricksy demon	Q
Sets her at Titus or Philemon	Q
When ignorance wags his ears of leather	E
And hates God's word 't is altogether	E
Nor leaves he his congenial thistles	P
To go and browse on Paul's Epistles	P
And you the audience who might ravage	A3
The world wide enviably savage	B3
Nor heed the cry of the retriever	E
More than Herr Heine before his fever	E
I do not tell a lie so arrant	S
As say my passion's wings are furled up	N2
And without plainest heavenly warrant	S
I were ready and glad to give the world up	N2
But still when you rub brow meticulous	P
And ponder the profit of turning holy	S
If not for God's for your own sake solely	S
God forbid I should find you ridiculous	P
Deduce from this lecture all that eases you	S
Nay call yourselves if the calling pleases you	S
Christians abhor the deist's pravity	S
Go on you shall no more move my gravity	S
Than when I see boys ride a cockhorse	P
I find it in my heart to embarrass them	X2
By hinting that their stick's a mock horse	P
And they really carry what they say carries them	X2
	-
XIX	P
	-
So sat I talking with my mind	S
I did not long to leave the door	E
And find a new church as before	E
But rather was quiet and inclined	S
To prolong and enjoy the gentle resting	M
From further tracking and trying and testing	M
This tolerance is a genial mood	S
Said I and a little pause ensued	S
One trims the bark 'twixt shoal and shelf	S
And sees each side the good effects of it	S
A value for religion's self	S
A carelessness about the sects of it	S
Let me enjoy my own conviction	Q
Not watch my neighbor's faith with fretfulness	P
Still spying there some dereliction	Q
Of truth perversity forgetfulness	P
Better a mild indifferentism	X2
Teaching that both our faiths though	M
His shine through a dull spirit's prism	X2
Originally had one color	E
Better pursue a pilgrimage	B3
Through ancient and through modern times	P
To many peoples various climes	P
Where I may see saint savage sage	H3
Fuse their respective creeds in one	Q
Before the general Father's throne	Q
	-
XX	P
	-
'T was the horrible storm began afresh	C3
The black night caught me in his mesh	C3
Whirled me up and flung me prone	Q
I was left on the college step alone	Q
I looked and far there ever fleeting	M
Far far away the receding gesture	E
And looming of the lessening vesture	E
Swept forward from my stupid hand	S
While I watched my foolish heart expand	S
In the lazy glow of benevolence	P
O'er the various modes of man's belief	S
I sprang up with fear's vehemence	P
Needs must there be one way our chief	S
Best way of worship let me strive	S
To find it and when found contrive	S
My fellows also take their share	E
This constitutes my earthly care	E
God's is above it and distinct	S
For I a man with men am linked	S
And not a brute with brutes no gain	Q
That I experience must remain	Q
Unshared but should my best endeavor	E
To share it fail subsisteth ever	E
God's care above and I exult	S
That God by God's own ways occult	S
May doth I will believe bring back	M
All wanderers to a single track	M
Meantime I can but testify	S
God's care for me no more can I	S
It is but for myself I know	M
The world rolls witnessing around me	X2
Only to leave me as it found me	X2
Men cry there but my ear is slow	M
Their races flourish or decay	M
What boots it while yon lucid way	M
Loaded with stars divides the vault	S
But soon my soul repairs its fault	S
When sharpening sense's hebetude	S
She turns on my own life So viewed	S
No mere mote's breadth but teems immense	P
With witnessings of providence	P
And woe to me if when I look	M
Upon that record the sole book	M
Unsealed to me I take no heed	S
Of any warning that I read	S
Have I been sure this Christmas Eve	S
God's own hand did the rainbow weave	S
Whereby the truth from heaven slid	S
Into my soul I cannot bid	S
The world admit he stooped to heal	S
My soul as if in a thunder peal	S
Where one heard noise and one saw flame	X2
I only knew he named my name	X2
But what is the world to me for sorrow	M
Or joy in its censure when to morrow	M
It drops the remark with just turned head	S
Then on again That man is dead	S
Yes but for me my name called drawn	Q
As a conscript's lot from the lap's black yawn	Q
He has dipt into on a battle dawn	Q
Bid out of life by a nod a glance	P
Stumbling mute mazed at nature's chance	P
With a rapid finger circled round	S
Fixed to the first poor inch of ground	S
To fight from where his foot was found	S
Whose ear but a minute since lay free	X2
To the wide camp's buzz and gossipry	X2
Summoned a solitary man	Q
To end his life where his life began	Q
From the safe glad rear to the dreadful van	Q
Soul of mine hadst thou caught and held	S
By the hem of the vesture	X2
	-
XXI	P
	-
And I caught	S
At the flying robe and unrepelled	S
Was lapped again in its folds full fraught	S
With warmth and wonder and delight	S
God's mercy being infinite	S
For scarce had the words escaped my tongue	M
When at a passionate bound I sprung	M
Out of the wondering world of rain	Q
Into the little chapel again	Q
	-
XXII	P
	-
How else was I found there bolt upright	S
On my bench as if I had never left it	S
Never flung out on the common at night	S
Nor met the storm and wedge like cleft it	S
Seen the raree show of Peter's successor	X2
Or the laboratory of the Professor	X2
For the Vision that was true I wist	S
True as that heaven and earth exist	S
There sat my friend the yellow and tall	S
With his neck and its wen in the selfsame place	P
Yet my nearest neighbor's cheek showed gall	S
She had slid away a contemptuous space	P
And the old fat woman late so placable	S
Eyed me with symptoms hardly mistakable	S
Of her milk of kindness turning rancid	S
In short a spectator might have fancied	S
That I had nodded betrayed by slumber	X2
Yet kept my seat a warning ghastly	S
Through the heads of the sermon nine in number	X2
And woke up now at the tenth and lastly	S
But again could such disgrace have happened	S
Each friend at my elbow had surely nudged it	S
And as for the sermon where did my nap end	S
Unless I heard it could I have judged it	S
Could I report as I do at the close	P
First the preacher speaks through his nose	P
Second his gesture is too emphatic	M
Thirdly to waive what's pedagogic	M
The subject matter itself lacks logic	M
Fourthly the English is ungrammatic	M
Great news the preacher is found no Pascal	S
Whom if I pleased I might to the task call	S
Of making square to a finite eye	S
The circle of infinity	S
And find so all but just succeeding	M
Great news the sermon proves no reading	M
Where bee like in the flowers I bury me	S
Like Taylor's the immortal Jeremy	S
And now that I know the very worst of him	X2
What was it I thought to obtain at first of him	X2
Ha Is God mocked as he asks	P
Shall I take on me to change his tasks	P
And dare dispatched to a river head	S
For a simple draught of the element	S
Neglect the thing for which he sent	S
And return with another thing instead	S
Saying Because the water found	S
Welling up from underground	S
Is mingled with the taints of earth	S2
While thou I know dost laugh at dearth	S2
And couldst at wink or word convulse	P
The world with the leap of a river pulse	P
Therefore I turned from the oozings muddy	S
And bring thee a chalice I found instead	S
See the brave veins in the breccia ruddy	S
One would suppose that the marble bled	S
What matters the water A hope I have nursed	S
The waterless cup will quench my thirst	S
Better have knelt at the poorest stream	X2
That trickles in pain from the straitest rift	S
For the less or the more is all God's gift	S
Who blocks up or breaks wide the granite seam	X2
And here is there water or not to drink	M
I then in ignorance and weakness	P
Taking God's help have attained to think	M
My heart does best to receive in meekness	P
That mode of worship as most to his mind	S
Where earthly aids being cast behind	S
His All in All appears serene	Q
With the thinnest human veil between	Q
Letting the mystic lamps the seven	Q
The many motions of his spirit	S
Pass as they list to earth from heaven	Q
For the preacher's merit or demerit	S
It were to be wished the flaws were fewer	X2
In the earthen vessel holding treasure	X2
Which lies as safe in a golden ewer	X2
But the main thing is does it hold good meas ure	X2
Heaven soon sets right all other matters	P
Ask else these ruins of humanity	S
This flesh worn out to rags and tatters	P
This soul at struggle with insanity	S
Who thence take comfort can I doubt	S
Which an empire gained were a loss without	S
May it be mine And let us hope	N2
That no worse blessing befall the Pope	N2
Turned sick at last of to day's buffoonery	X2
Of posturings and petticoatings	P
Beside his Bourbon bully's gloatings	P
In the bloody orgies of drunk poltroonery	X2
Nor may the Professor forego its peace	P
At Gottingen presently when in the dusk	M
Of his life if his cough as I fear should in crease	P
Prophesied of by that horrible husk	M
When thicker and thicker the darkness fills	P
The world through his misty spectacles	P
And he gropes for something more substantial	S
Than a fable myth or personification	Q
May Christ do for him what no mere man shall	S
And stand confessed as the God of salvation	Q
Meantime in the still recurring fear	X2
Lest myself at unawares be found	S
While attacking the choice of my neighbors round	S
With none of my own made I choose here	X2
The giving out of the hymn reclaims me	S
I have done and if any blames me	S
Thinking that merely to touch in brevity	S
The topics I dwell on were unlawful	S
Or worse that I trench with undue levity	S
On the bounds of the holy and the awful	S
I praise the heart and pity the head of him	X2
And refer myself to THEE instead of him	X2
Who head and heart alike discernest	S
Looking below light speech we utter	X2
When frothy spume and frequent sputter	X2
Prove that the soul's depths boil in earnest	S
May truth shine out stand ever before us	P
I put up pencil and join chorus	P
To Hepzibah Tune without further apology	S
The last five verses of the third section	Q
Of the seventeenth hymn of Whitefield's Collection	Q
To conclude with the doxology	S

Robert Browning

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