Theism :: :: University of Virginia Library

Wild men yield themselves to the guidance of instinct,
And gratify impulse as they have might and means.
Then instinct fights against instinct and force against force,

Until self-restraint is imposed by necessity and by shame:
And from suffering rises wisdom, which puts forth novel precepts,
And separates the instincts into baser, nobler, and noblest,
And honours the higher, and sets limits for the lower.
Then profligates are punished, and patriot warriors are praised,
And the sage and the artizan have their several meed of esteem.

False prophets haply arise then, to teach ascetic follies,
As though man, by ceasing to be man, could come nearer to God,
And earn the favour of the Highest by sacrificing nature.
But the stoutest souls of mankind and the loftiest minds everywhere
Scorn to be crippled and mutilated as victims for God's altar;
And know that what is meaner, or is meanest, or is highest,
Has each its place in the world, rightful and needful.

But afterward come philosophers, who study the world of matter,
Who are wise about the body and its influence on the mind,
Who are skilled in science and in knowledge multifarious,
And from honest love of truth long to explode delusion.
When they find the nations beguiled by a hundred superstitions,
They pity men's ignorance; and to cure our follies, they say:
“Listen not to priests, who forbid the pious to marry,
Who make merit of fasting, who bid you to renounce vanities,
Who talk against riches, and against enjoyment of ear and eye;
As though the senses were impure, and affection blamable,
The indulgence of taste a weakness, and ease ignominious.
Wherever enjoyment is lawful, enjoy ye with a good conscience.
Of one instinct only take heed and beware ye,—for it is dangerous,—
The instinct of religion, which seeks after God.
Cripple it, crush it, tear it out by the roots;
For from it have come wars and controversies and exclusions
And heartburnings endless; but Truth it will never reach.”

Instinct is but a dumb pointer; this know we very well:
It cannot guide reasonings, nor frame thought into sentences,
Nor interpret its own movements, nor verify its suggestions:
The work of establishing Truth falls alway to the Intellect.
But take away the instincts, and man has no desire,
No passion, no emotion, no approvals and no will.

No material can remain to be carved into moral science,
Sharp tool as the mind may be, if moral instinct be destroyed.
And the instinct of religion is the noblest of them all,
The bravest, the most enduring, the most fruitful in mighty deeds,
The source of earliest grandeur, unitress of scattered tribes;
Even in the crudeness of its infancy, when unpurified by Science,
Yet teeming with civilization, with statesmanship, with letters,
Mistress of all high art, and parent of glorious martyrs.
And if from it have come wars and bigotries and cruelties,
Through infantine hot-headedness and unripeness of the mind,
We take your aid, O sceptics! to purge it from all such evils,
And kindly honour we pay to you for your battles against superstition:
Yet the very evils ye deplore, prove religion's mighty energy
And the grasp deeply seated which she has within human hearts.
Nor may we esteem your philosophy, when you uphold the lower instincts,
And praise tasteful enjoyment, and all the pleasures of sense,
And the sweetness of human love, and the ease of wealth and luxury;
Yet are fain to blot out and quench the highest instinct of man,
Life to his purest morals, feeder of his noblest hopes,
Fountain of his deepest joy, and centre of his richest love.