l
Thy word, confessed by wood and stone,--
_Beauty that would be beautiful
Must keep Thy law to find its own._

He that can shake it, will he thrust
His careless hands into the fire?
He that would break it, shall we trust
The sun to rise at his desire?
Constant above our discontent,
The trumpet peals in sterner tone,--
_Might that would be omnipotent
Must keep Thy law to find its own._

Ah, though beneath unpitying spheres
Unreckoned seems our human cry,
In Thy deep law, beyond the years,
Abides the Eternal memory.
Thy law is light, to eyes grown dull
Dreaming of worlds like bubbles blown;
_And Mercy that is merciful
Shall keep Thy law and find its own._

Unchanging God, by that one Light
Through which we grope to Truth and Thee,
Confound not yet our day with night,
Break not the measures of Thy sea.
Hear not, though grief for chaos cry
Or rail at Thine unanswering throne.
_Thy law, Thy law, is liberty,
And in Thy law we find our own._

So, to Uranian music, rose our world.
The boughs put forth, the young leaves groped for light.
The wild flower spread its petals as in prayer.
Then, for terrestrial ears, vast discords rose,
The struggle in the jungle, clashing themes
That strove for mastery; but above them all,
Ever the mightier measure of the suns
Resolved them into broader harmonies,
That fought again for mastery. The night
Buried the mastodon. The warring tribes
Of men were merged in nations. Wider laws
Embraced them. Man no longer fought with man,
Though nation warred with nation. Hatred fell
Before the gaze of love. For in an hour
When, by the law of might, mankind could rise
No higher, into the deepening music stole
A loftier theme, a law that gathered all
The laws of earth into its broadening breast
And moved like one full river to the sea,
The law of Love.
The sun stood dark at noon;
Dark as the moon before this mightier Power,
And a Voice rang across the blood-stained earth:
_I am the Way, the Truth, the Life, the Light._
We heard it, and we did not hear. In dreams
We caught a thousand fragments of the strain,
But never wholly heard it. We moved on
Obeying it a little, till our world
Became so vast, that we could only hear
Stray notes, a golden phrase, a sorrowful cry,
Never the rounded glory