Finality

A HEAVY and desolate sense of life Is all the Past makes mine—and still A cold contempt of Fortune’s strife, Despite the dread Of want of bread, ’Numbs, clogs like ice, my weary will. How little is there on the earth That I at length can venerate? I see at most one world-wide dearth Of wisdom free, True piety, Of noble love, of honest hate. With little hope of higher good For Man, for me, of earthly bliss, Yet I withstand as I’ve withstood, The evil plan Man teaches man Of valuing all things amiss. There’s nothing under the godlike sun Worth loving to be bought or sold!— The only wealth by labour won Besides the food Supplying blood, Is human excellence—not gold! All other things designed or done Their only real value miss, But in so far as this—each one And all sustain, Adorn, explain, Secure and enter into this. Beauty itself were nothing—no, But for Love’s golden heart and eye; Nay Truth were dead but for the glow Around its shrine Of minds divine, Of martyr minds that may not die. Why pile we stone on stone to raise Jail, fane, or public hall—why plan Fortress or tower for future days, Yet leave unbuilt To wrong or guilt That nobler pile—the Mind of Man? With finer wool the land to dower, Behold how strongly we are moved— Even while a Nation’s thinking power Unvalued, yet Unnamed, we let All bestial grow, being unimprov’d! Can then the seed in God’s right hand Of Happiness, when shed below, Find fitting nurture in a land Of wilding soil And selfish toil? I tell ye Time shall answer, No! I tell ye that all public good, All individual worth and peace, All youthful nobleness of mood, Like rose-leaves thin Must wither in The sordid breath of days like these. O for a prophet’s tongue to teach The truths I cannot else reveal, O for a conqueror’s power to reach The holy aim That doth inflame And nerve me with a martyr’s zeal! ’Tis vain—the sacred wish is vain! Men but renew the strifes of old: But value with a greed insane All devilish skill, All splendid ill That fetters Truth with chains of gold!