Out of a summer’s opulence,
Over the Eden barrier whence
Thou art excluded. Knock in vain!’
He is made welcome to so rate earth, and never to know
‘What royalties in store
Lay one step past the entrance door.’
So he tries the world, tries all its ways, its intellect, and art; and at last, when everything else fails, he tries love. Surely love will not offend; and he looks upward to The Form at his side for approval. But its face is as the face of the headsman, who shoulders the axe to make an end. Love? Asking for love, when He so loved the world as to give His only beloved Son to die for love. Then lost and bewildered, and weary to death, the youth cowers deprecatingly, and prays that at least he may not know all is lost; that he may go on, and on, still hoping ‘one eve to reach the better land.’” And the minister’s eyes were full of tears, and his voice was full of despair, and there was a moment’s intense silence. Harry broke it. “Surely, sir,” he said, “the poet did not leave the youth in such hopeless distress?”
“He knew his God better,” was the answer. “I will tell you in the youth’s own words what happened:
‘Then did The Form expand, expand—