RABBI BEN EZRA

XVII

So, still within this life,
Though lifted o'er its strife,

Let me discern, compare, pronounce at last,

'This rage was right i' the main,

That acquiescence vain :

The Future I may face now I have proved the Past.'

XVIII

For more is not reserved

To man, with soul just nerved
To act to-morrow what he learns to-day:

Here, work enough to watch

The Master work, and catch

Hints of the proper craft, tricks of the tool's true play.

XIX

As it was better, youth

Should strive, through acts uncouth,

Toward making, than repose on aught found made : So, better, age, exempt

From strife, should know, than tempt

Further. Thou waited'st age: wait death nor be afraid!

XX

Enough now, if the Right

And Good and Infinite

RABBI BEN EZRA

Be named here, as thou call'st thy hand thine own, With knowledge absolute,

Subject to no dispute

From fools that crowded youth, nor let thee feel alone.

XXI

Be there, for once and all,
Sever'd great minds from small,
Announced to each his station in the Past!
Was I, the world arraign'd,

Where they, my soul disdain'd,

Right? Let age speak the truth and give us peace at last!

XXII

Now, who shall arbitrate?

Ten men love what I hate,

Shun what I follow, slight what I receive;

Ten, who in ears and eyes

Match me we all surmise,

They this thing, and I that: whom shall

believe?

XXIII

my soul

Not on the vulgar mass

Called work,' must sentence pass,

Things done, that took the eye and had the price; O'er which, from level stand,

The low world laid its hand,

Found straightway to its mind, could value in a trice:

RABBI BEN EZRA

XXIV

But all, the world's coarse thumb
And finger fail'd to plumb,

So pass'd in making up the main account;
All instincts immature,

All purposes unsure,

That weigh'd not as his work, yet swell'd the man's

amount:

XXV

Thoughts hardly to be pack'd

Into a narrow act,

Fancies that broke through language and escaped;
All I could never be,

All, men ignored in me,

This, I was worth to God, whose wheel the pitcher shaped.

XXVI

Ay, note that Potter's wheel,

That metaphor! and feel

Why time spins fast, why passive lies our clay,—
Thou, to whom fools propound,

When the wine makes its round,

Since life fleets, all is change; the Past gone, seize to-day!'

XXVII

Fool! All that is, at all,

Lasts ever, past recall;

RABBI BEN EZRA

Earth changes, but thy soul and God stand sure:
What entered into thee,

That was, is, and shall be:

Time's wheel runs back or stops: Potter and clay

endure.

XXVIII

He fixed thee mid this dance

Of plastic circumstance,

This Present, thou, forsooth, wouldst fain arrest:
Machinery just meant

To give thy soul its bent,

Try thee and turn thee forth, sufficiently impressed.

XXIX

What though the earlier grooves

Which ran the laughing loves

Around thy base, no longer pause and press?
What though, about thy rim,

Scull-things in order grim

Grow out, in graver mood, obey the sterner stress?

XXX

Look not thou down but up!

To uses of a cup,

The festal board, lamp's flash and trumpet's peal,
The new wine's foaming flow,

The Master's lips a-glow!

Thou, heaven's consummate cup, what need'st thou with earth's wheel?

PEACE

XXXI

But I need, now as then,

Thee, God, who mouldest men ;

And since, not even while the whirl was worst,
Did I,—to the wheel of life

With shapes and colours rife,

Bound dizzily,-mistake my end, to slake Thy thirst:

XXXII

So, take and use Thy work:
Amend what flaws may lurk,

What strain o' the stuff, what warpings past the aim!
My times be in Thy hand!

Perfect the cup as plann'd!

Let age approve of youth, and death complete the

same!

ROBERT BROWNING

Peace

MY soul, there is a country

Far beyond the stars,

Where stands a winged sentry

All skilful in the wars:
There above noise and danger,

Sweet Peace sits crown'd with smiles,

And One born in a manger

Commands the beauteous files.

He is thy gracious Friend,
And-O my soul, awake!