But there are some questions which give pause to the most boastful patriot. Where is the distinctive American Art which interprets in a broad, fresh way the genius of the land, and where is the public that would recognize it and delight in it if it should appear? Where is the great American Church able splendidly to organize the forces of spiritual freedom as Rome organized the principles of ecclesiastical authority? How is the vision of her prophets fulfilled?
And thou, America,
For the scheme’s culmination, its thought and its reality,
For these (not for thyself) thou hast arrived.
Thou, too, surroundest all,
Embracing, carrying, welcoming all, thou too by pathways broad and new,
To the ideal tendest.
The measured faiths of other lands, the grandeurs of the past
Are not for thee, but grandeurs of thine own,
Deific faiths and amplitudes, absorbing, comprehending all.