The yea-nay of Free-will and Fate, Whereof both cannot be, yet are; The praise a poet wins too late Who starves from earth into a star;
The lies that serve great parties well, While truths but give their Christs a cross The loves that send warm souls to hell, While cold-blood neuters live on loss;
Th' indifferent smile that nature's grace On Jesus, Judas, pours alike; Th' indifferent frown on nature's face When luminous lightnings blindly strike;
The sailor praying on his knees Along with him that's cursing God— Whose wives and babes may starve or freeze, Yet Nature will not stir a clod.
If winds of question blow from out The large sea-caverns of thy notes, They do but clear each cloud of doubt That round a high-path'd purpose floats.
As: why one blind by nature's act Still feels no law in mercy bend, No pitfall from his feet retract, No storm cry out, Take shelter, friend!
Or, Can the truth be best for them That have not stomachs for its strength? Or, Will the sap in Culture's stem E'er reach life's furthest fibre-length?
How to know all, save knowingness; To grasp, yet loosen, feeling's rein; To sink no manhood in success; To look with pleasure upon pain;
How, teased by small mixt social claims, To lose no large simplicity; How through all clear-seen crimes and shames To move with manly purity;
How, justly, yet with loving eyes, Pure art from cleverness to part; To know the Clever good and wise, Yet haunt the lonesome heights of Art.