Page:Songs, Legends, and Ballads.djvu/16

4  From soul to soul the shortest line
 * At best will bended be:

The ship that holds the straightest course
 * Still sails the convex sea.

N the old days, while yet the Church was young, And men believed that praise of God was sung In curbing self as well as singing psalms, There lived a monk, Macarius by name, A holy man, to whom the faithful came With hungry hearts to hear the wondrous Word. In sight of gushing springs and sheltering palms, He dwelt within the desert: from the marsh He drank the brackish water, and his food Was dates and roots,—and all his rule was harsh, For pampered flesh in those days warred with good.