Classic Poem

The way of compassion is also the way of sorrow .

Ascetic L IFE

T HE end of self-denial
 Is not to rack the flesh,
Of needless pain in heart and brain
 Adding yet burdens fresh.

It is to school the spirit
 Till this reveals to sense
How patience meek through all must seek,
 And yet through all dispense;

Must look for love the perfect,
 For truth the perfect end;
Not for the prize before the eyes
 But that unseen contend.

Yet must we strive, provided
 To fail on earth of each;
Must nurse no doubt but still hold out
 To reach what's out of reach,

The lesser purpose round us
 Shall gain the lesser meed,
And take its fill; the greater, still
 Go empty and in need.

The world unfolds her treasures;
 It sighs but does not stay;
O'er secret parts of human hearts
 It yearns, but moves away.

Perchance its goal awaits it:
 We dream but do not see;
If we but knew, our pains were few—
 Ah, light our task would be!

Task, do I say? What spirit
 Would pause on things of earth,
Did bright and clear that star appear
 Whence all our stars draw birth?

To act as if with knowledge
 Is here meanwhile our lot,
And to forego but not to know—
 Asking, but answer'd not.

One thing is certain only—
 That which we burn to find
Earth cannot give; for this to live
 Dares not the man of mind.

And so by self-denial
 His great shall school his less,
'Twixt soul and star to lift no bar—
 Because the end may bless.

O well for those who labour
 Their daily bread to eat,
And God at last bless those who fast,
 Desiring ghostly meat!
The Path of the Cross is the Path of the Mystical Rose, though Rose and Cross are joined. That which they form together ceases to be a path of sorrow .