JOHN SMITH, PLATONIST—"AN INTERPRETER OF THE SPIRIT" . . 305
CHAPTER XVII
THOMAS TRAHERNE AND THE SPIRITUAL POETS OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 320
CHAPTER XVIII
CONCLUSION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336
INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 351
{x}
Within thy sheltering darkness spin the spheres;
Within the shaded hollow of thy wings.
The life of things,
The changeless pivot of the passing years—
These in thy bosom lie.
Restless we seek thy being; to and fro
Upon our little twisting earth we go:
We cry, "Lo, there!"
When some new avatar thy glory does declare,
When some new prophet of thy friendship sings,
And in his tracks we run
Like an enchanted child, that hastes to catch the sun.
And shall the soul thereby
Unto the All draw nigh?
Shall it avail to plumb the mystic deeps
Of flowery beauty, scale the icy steeps
Of perilous thought, thy hidden Face to find,
Or tread the starry paths to the utmost verge of the sky?
Nay, groping dull and blind
Within the sheltering dimness of thy wings—
Shade that their splendour flings
Athwart Eternity—
We, out of age-long wandering, but come
Back to our Father's heart, where now we are at home.
EVELYN UNDERHILL in Immanence, p. 82.