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Tennyson and other Memorial Poems by H. D. Rawnsley
 

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118

Renan.

OBIIT, PARIS, OCTOBER 2ND, 1892.

Renan is gone, we shall not see him more,
That massive face, those eyes of twinkling grey,
The prince of cynics—he has passed away
Who rich in wisdom made his brothers poor:
He, entering the inevitable door,
Has heard the truth that never can betray
Crying:—“Behold your puppets at a play
Are living souls upon no phantom shore.”
For now at length is variance reconciled
Between the reason and the faith of man,
The double soul that so perplexed his life
Has ceased from irremediable strife,
The Christ he dwarfed fills out to godlike span,
The God he doubted claims again his child.