 | The poetical works of Edmund Clarence Stedman |  |
THE PROTEST OF FAITH.
TO REV. ---
Dear Friend and Teacher,—not by word alone,
But by the plenteous virtues shining out
Along the zodiac of a good man's life;
Dear gentle friend! from one so loved as you,—
Because so loving, and so finely apt
In tender ministry to a little flock,
With whom you joy and suffer ... and, withal,
So constant to the spirit of our time
That I must hold you of a different sort
From those dry lichens on the altar steps,
Those mutes in surplices, school-trained to sink
The ashes of their own experience
So low, in doctrinal catacombs, that none
Find token they can love and mourn like us,—
From such an one as you, I cannot brook
What from these mummies were a pleasant draught
Of bitter hyssop—pleasant unto me,
Drunk from a chalice worthier men have held
And emptied to the lees.
But by the plenteous virtues shining out
Along the zodiac of a good man's life;
Dear gentle friend! from one so loved as you,—
Because so loving, and so finely apt
In tender ministry to a little flock,
With whom you joy and suffer ... and, withal,
So constant to the spirit of our time
That I must hold you of a different sort
From those dry lichens on the altar steps,
Those mutes in surplices, school-trained to sink
The ashes of their own experience
So low, in doctrinal catacombs, that none
Find token they can love and mourn like us,—
From such an one as you, I cannot brook
What from these mummies were a pleasant draught
Of bitter hyssop—pleasant unto me,
Drunk from a chalice worthier men have held
And emptied to the lees.
I cannot brook
The shake o' the head and earnest, sorrowing glance,
Which often seem to say:—“Be wise in time!
Give up the iron key that locks your heart.
I grant you charity, and patient zeal,
And something of a young, romantic love
For what is good, as children love the fields
And birds and babbling brooks, they know not why.
You have your moral virtues, but you err:
To err is fatal. O, my heart is faint
Lest that sweet prize I win should not be yours!”
The shake o' the head and earnest, sorrowing glance,
Which often seem to say:—“Be wise in time!
Give up the iron key that locks your heart.
45
And something of a young, romantic love
For what is good, as children love the fields
And birds and babbling brooks, they know not why.
You have your moral virtues, but you err:
To err is fatal. O, my heart is faint
Lest that sweet prize I win should not be yours!”
In some such wise I read your half-dropped thoughts;
Yet wondrous compensation falls to all,
And every soul has strongholds of its own,
Invisible, yet answering to its needs.
And even I may have a secret tower
Up storm-cleft Pisgah, whence I see beyond
Jordan, and far across the happy plains,
Where gleams the Holy City, like a queen,
The crown of all our hopes and perfect faith.
I may have gone somewhat within the veil,
Though few repose serenely in the light
Of that divinest splendor, till they shine,
With countenance aglow, like him of old,—
Prophet and priest and warrior, all in one.
But every human path leads on to God;
He holds a myriad finer threads than gold,
And strong as holy wishes, drawing us
With delicate tension upward to Himself.
You see the strand that reaches down to you;
Haply I see mine own, and make essay
To trace its glimmerings—up the shadowy hills
Forever narrowing to that unknown sky.
Yet wondrous compensation falls to all,
And every soul has strongholds of its own,
Invisible, yet answering to its needs.
And even I may have a secret tower
Up storm-cleft Pisgah, whence I see beyond
Jordan, and far across the happy plains,
Where gleams the Holy City, like a queen,
The crown of all our hopes and perfect faith.
I may have gone somewhat within the veil,
Though few repose serenely in the light
Of that divinest splendor, till they shine,
With countenance aglow, like him of old,—
Prophet and priest and warrior, all in one.
But every human path leads on to God;
He holds a myriad finer threads than gold,
And strong as holy wishes, drawing us
With delicate tension upward to Himself.
You see the strand that reaches down to you;
Haply I see mine own, and make essay
To trace its glimmerings—up the shadowy hills
Forever narrowing to that unknown sky.
There grows a hedge about you pulpit-folk:
You reason ex cathedra. Little gain
Have we to clash in tourney on the least
Of points, wherewith you trammel down the Faith,
It being, at outset, understood right well
By lay knights-errant, that their Reverend foes,
Fore-pledged to hold their own, will sound their trumps,
Though spearless and unhorsed! Why take the field,
When, at the best, both sides go bowing off
With mutual courtesy, and fair white flags
Afloat at camp, and every fight is drawn?
As soon encounter statues, balanced well
Upon their granite, fashioned not to move,
And drawing all mankind to hold in awe
Their grim persistence.
You reason ex cathedra. Little gain
Have we to clash in tourney on the least
46
It being, at outset, understood right well
By lay knights-errant, that their Reverend foes,
Fore-pledged to hold their own, will sound their trumps,
Though spearless and unhorsed! Why take the field,
When, at the best, both sides go bowing off
With mutual courtesy, and fair white flags
Afloat at camp, and every fight is drawn?
As soon encounter statues, balanced well
Upon their granite, fashioned not to move,
And drawing all mankind to hold in awe
Their grim persistence.
If, indeed, I sin
In counting somewhat freely on that Love
From which, through rolling ages, worlds have sprung,
And—last and best of all—the lords of worlds,
Through type on type uplifted from the clay;
If I have been exultant in the thought
That such humanity came so near to God,
He held us as His children, and would find
Imperial progress through the halls of Time
For every soul,—why, then, my crescent faith
Clings round the promise; if it spread beyond,
You think, too far, I say that Peter sprang
Upon the waves of surging Galilee,
While all the eleven hugged the ship in fear:
The waters were as stone unto his feet
Until he doubted, even then the Christ
Put forth a blesséd hand, and drew him on
To closer knowledge!
In counting somewhat freely on that Love
From which, through rolling ages, worlds have sprung,
And—last and best of all—the lords of worlds,
Through type on type uplifted from the clay;
If I have been exultant in the thought
That such humanity came so near to God,
He held us as His children, and would find
Imperial progress through the halls of Time
For every soul,—why, then, my crescent faith
Clings round the promise; if it spread beyond,
You think, too far, I say that Peter sprang
Upon the waves of surging Galilee,
While all the eleven hugged the ship in fear:
The waters were as stone unto his feet
Until he doubted, even then the Christ
Put forth a blesséd hand, and drew him on
To closer knowledge!
So, if it be mine
First of us twain to pass the sable gates,
That guard so well their mysteries, and thou,
With some dear friend, may'st stand beside my grave,
Speak no such words as these:—“Not long ago
His voice rang out as cheerly as mine own;
And we were friends, and, far into the nights,
Would analyze the wisdom of old days
By all the tests of Science in her prime;
Anon would tramp afield, to fruits and flowers,
And the long prototypes of trees and beasts
Graven in sandstone; so, at last, would come,
Through lanes of talk, to that perennial tree,—
The Tree of Life, on which redemption hangs,
But there fell out of tune; we parted there,
He bolstering up a creed too broad for me!
I held him kindly for an ardent soul,
Who lacked not skill to make his argument
Seem fair and specious. But he groped in doubt:
His head and heart were young; he wandered off,
And fell afoul of all those theorists
Who soften down our dear New England faith
With German talk of ‘Nature,’ ‘inner lights
And harmonies’: so, taken with the wind
Of those high-sounding terms, he spoke at large,
And held discussion bravely till he died.
Here sleep his ashes; where his soul may be,
Myself, who loved him, do not care to think.”
First of us twain to pass the sable gates,
47
With some dear friend, may'st stand beside my grave,
Speak no such words as these:—“Not long ago
His voice rang out as cheerly as mine own;
And we were friends, and, far into the nights,
Would analyze the wisdom of old days
By all the tests of Science in her prime;
Anon would tramp afield, to fruits and flowers,
And the long prototypes of trees and beasts
Graven in sandstone; so, at last, would come,
Through lanes of talk, to that perennial tree,—
The Tree of Life, on which redemption hangs,
But there fell out of tune; we parted there,
He bolstering up a creed too broad for me!
I held him kindly for an ardent soul,
Who lacked not skill to make his argument
Seem fair and specious. But he groped in doubt:
His head and heart were young; he wandered off,
And fell afoul of all those theorists
Who soften down our dear New England faith
With German talk of ‘Nature,’ ‘inner lights
And harmonies’: so, taken with the wind
Of those high-sounding terms, he spoke at large,
And held discussion bravely till he died.
Here sleep his ashes; where his soul may be,
Myself, who loved him, do not care to think.”
The ecstasy of Faith has no such fears
As those you nurse for me! The marvellous love,
Which folds the systems in a flood of light,
Makes no crude works to shatter out of joint
Through all the future. O, believe, with me,
For every instinct in these hearts of ours
A full fruition hastens! O, believe
That promise greater than our greatest trust
And loftiest aspiration! Tell thy friend,
Beside my grave: “He did the best he could,
With earnest spirit polishing the lens
By which he took the heavens in his ken,
And through the empyrean sought for God;
He caught, or thought he caught, from time to time,
Bright glimpses of the Infinite, on which
He fed in rapturous and quiet joy,
That helped him keep a host of troubles down.
He went his way,—a different path from mine,
But took his place among the ranks of men
Who toil and suffer. If, in sooth, it be
Religion keeps us up, this man had that.
God grant his yearnings were a living faith!
Heaven lies above us: may we find him there
Beside the waters still, and crowned with palms!”
As those you nurse for me! The marvellous love,
Which folds the systems in a flood of light,
Makes no crude works to shatter out of joint
Through all the future. O, believe, with me,
For every instinct in these hearts of ours
A full fruition hastens! O, believe
48
And loftiest aspiration! Tell thy friend,
Beside my grave: “He did the best he could,
With earnest spirit polishing the lens
By which he took the heavens in his ken,
And through the empyrean sought for God;
He caught, or thought he caught, from time to time,
Bright glimpses of the Infinite, on which
He fed in rapturous and quiet joy,
That helped him keep a host of troubles down.
He went his way,—a different path from mine,
But took his place among the ranks of men
Who toil and suffer. If, in sooth, it be
Religion keeps us up, this man had that.
God grant his yearnings were a living faith!
Heaven lies above us: may we find him there
Beside the waters still, and crowned with palms!”
| The poetical works of Edmund Clarence Stedman | |