 | 'Twixt Kiss and Lip or Under the Sword. By the author of "Women Must Weep," [i.e. F. W. O. Ward] Third edition |  |
THE NEW REFORMATION.
Hark, the oracle has spoken,
But what promise it may bring,
Mumbling out its message broken,
That is quite another thing;
Misty words, that have no meaning,
Limp as strumpets without stays,
Doubtful sense and sentence, leaning
Half a dozen different ways;
Murky views of musty German,
Blinking blindly like a bat
Into day, though none determine
What the devil he is at.
But what promise it may bring,
Mumbling out its message broken,
That is quite another thing;
Misty words, that have no meaning,
Limp as strumpets without stays,
Doubtful sense and sentence, leaning
Half a dozen different ways;
Murky views of musty German,
Blinking blindly like a bat
Into day, though none determine
What the devil he is at.
Rénan, Reuss, and Strauss who spells mere
Pretty myths in Bible fact,
Boiled with watery Robert Elsmere,
Till the suffering kettle crackt;
Baur and Martineau and Spencer,
Huxley and his croaking frogs,
Mixed and muddled into denser
Dust, from fusty catalogues;
Learnéd nonsense, like Lux Mundi,
Or Nox Mundi—which is it?
With a dash of Mrs. Grundy,
Just to make the folly fit.
Pretty myths in Bible fact,
Boiled with watery Robert Elsmere,
Till the suffering kettle crackt;
Baur and Martineau and Spencer,
Huxley and his croaking frogs,
Mixed and muddled into denser
Dust, from fusty catalogues;
Learnéd nonsense, like Lux Mundi,
Or Nox Mundi—which is it?
With a dash of Mrs. Grundy,
Just to make the folly fit.
Ah, the oracle is vaguer
Far than oracles of old,
When through moonlight song and saga,
Ran a glorious thread of gold;
Then was method in the fables,
Pledge of an undying youth,
Not from red dissecting tables
Mangled limbs of murdered Truth;
Flashed then lightning with the thunder,
If the ore some rubbish girt,
And from clouds that burst asunder
Stept Divinity, not Dirt.
Far than oracles of old,
When through moonlight song and saga,
Ran a glorious thread of gold;
Then was method in the fables,
Pledge of an undying youth,
782
Mangled limbs of murdered Truth;
Flashed then lightning with the thunder,
If the ore some rubbish girt,
And from clouds that burst asunder
Stept Divinity, not Dirt.
Now our Piety and Learning
Work, as scavengers, in gloom,
Leave the dust, and dogma spurning
Call to worship of their broom;
This is the “New Reformation,”
Destitute of light and love,
With a ragged revelation,
That can scarce be from above;
Lies at last will find their level,
Though false prophets' conjuring rod
Turn our God into the Devil,
And the Devil into God.
Work, as scavengers, in gloom,
Leave the dust, and dogma spurning
Call to worship of their broom;
This is the “New Reformation,”
Destitute of light and love,
With a ragged revelation,
That can scarce be from above;
Lies at last will find their level,
Though false prophets' conjuring rod
Turn our God into the Devil,
And the Devil into God.
| 'Twixt Kiss and Lip or Under the Sword. By the author of "Women Must Weep," [i.e. F. W. O. Ward] Third edition | |