 | 'Twixt Kiss and Lip or Under the Sword. By the author of "Women Must Weep," [i.e. F. W. O. Ward] Third edition |  |
43
THE OLD GOSPEL AND THE NEW.
Huxley, hierarch of Science,
Gospels out of stocks and stones
Puffs, and bids us put reliance
Now in gases and in bones;
Vaunts the victories of knowledge,
Wrung from tortured nerve and brain,
Wisdom's new and ghastly college
Reared aloft of blood and pain;
Points to progress of researches
Deep in hidden haunts of life,
Fruitful method that besmirches
Lore with the dissecting knife.
Gospels out of stocks and stones
Puffs, and bids us put reliance
Now in gases and in bones;
Vaunts the victories of knowledge,
Wrung from tortured nerve and brain,
Wisdom's new and ghastly college
Reared aloft of blood and pain;
Points to progress of researches
Deep in hidden haunts of life,
Fruitful method that besmirches
Lore with the dissecting knife.
Huxley swears there is salvation
Sweet, in quest of surer truth,
Rays of brighter revelation
Frozen in a mammoth's tooth;
Brands the miracle a relict
Stupid of a barbarous age,
Sweeping off the hosts angelic,
Just to get a clearer stage;
Thinks that demons raise suspicion
In the reason guided right,
Scoffs at Scripture superstition
Whence he borrows half his light.
Sweet, in quest of surer truth,
Rays of brighter revelation
Frozen in a mammoth's tooth;
Brands the miracle a relict
Stupid of a barbarous age,
Sweeping off the hosts angelic,
Just to get a clearer stage;
Thinks that demons raise suspicion
In the reason guided right,
Scoffs at Scripture superstition
Whence he borrows half his light.
Huxley cannot bridge the chasm
Vast, that severs man from beast,
Prating of his protoplasm,
Scraps from vivisection's feast;
Brings us comfort unpacific,
For which brutes by myriads bleed,
But to make us scientific—
We prefer the ancient creed;
Heedless of his new relation
Man will take a nobler shape,
Though its proved to demonstration
Adam only was an ape.
Vast, that severs man from beast,
Prating of his protoplasm,
Scraps from vivisection's feast;
Brings us comfort unpacific,
For which brutes by myriads bleed,
But to make us scientific—
We prefer the ancient creed;
Heedless of his new relation
Man will take a nobler shape,
Though its proved to demonstration
Adam only was an ape.
None can shake the faith that fathered
Saints serene to do and dare,—
Faith that souls heroic gathered
Under its imperial care;
Sophists may delight to dabble
Yet in questions dark, nor see
Jewels there, and falsehood babble
On of oracles more free;
Let them find their Haman's halter
Is prepared for Haman's neck—
We will rally round the Altar,
Rock no earthly power can wreck.
Saints serene to do and dare,—
Faith that souls heroic gathered
Under its imperial care;
Sophists may delight to dabble
Yet in questions dark, nor see
Jewels there, and falsehood babble
On of oracles more free;
Let them find their Haman's halter
Is prepared for Haman's neck—
We will rally round the Altar,
Rock no earthly power can wreck.
| 'Twixt Kiss and Lip or Under the Sword. By the author of "Women Must Weep," [i.e. F. W. O. Ward] Third edition | |