Classic Poem

18.

" Bend not thy cruel brow on me,
Priest! " Adwick answer'd mournfully;
" I know thy power, and pity thee.
The feet that on long-suffering trod
Cannot crush out my trust in God;
Nor canst thou waste, or use in vain,
His fund of dreadful mercy, pain.
Me thou can'st rack, my blood canst spill;
But there's a power thou canst not kill,
The will and power To Think and Know.
Sure is its march, however slow;
And it shall put to shame and flight
That darkness which to thee is light:
Torturing, and blackening, like a sky
Darken'd with arrows — Infamy,
Though she hath done your bidding well,
Shall find the truth invincible.
Nor will my disembodied soul
Live in the shape of toad or owl,
(Shapes, not despis'd by Power Divine,
Nor less august, perchance, than thine,)
But — with the spirit of that form
Which there invites the wasting worm —
Delight to number, as they fly,
The age-long hours of Deity;
Until, at last, Hate's altars fall,
And Loving-kindness conquer all. "