Page:The poetical works of Matthew Arnold, 1897.djvu/314

276 "Was it," the Lord then said, "with scorn ye saw

The old law observed by scribes and Pharisees?

I say unto you, see ye keep that law

More faithfully than these!

"Too hasty heads for ordering worlds, alas!

Think not that I to annul the law have willed:

No jot, no tittle, from the law shall pass

Till all have been fulfilled."

So Christ said eighteen hundred years ago.

And what, then, shall be said to those to-day,

Who cry aloud to lay the old world low

To clear the new world's way?

"Religious fervors! ardor misapplied!

Hence, hence!" they cry, "ye do but keep man blind!

But keep him self-immersed, pre-occupied,

And lame the active mind."

Ah! from the old world let some one answer give:

"Scorn ye this world, their tears, their inward cares?

I say unto you, see that your souls live

A deeper life than theirs!

"Say ye, 'The spirit of man has found new roads,

And we must leave the old faiths, and walk therein'?

Leave, then, the cross as ye have left carved gods,

But guard the fire within!

"Bright, else, and fast the stream of life may roll,

And no man may the other's hurt behold;

Yet each will have one anguish,—his own soul

Which perishes of cold."

Here let that voice make end; then let a strain

From a far lonelier distance, like the wind

Be heard, floating through heaven, and fill again

These men's profoundest mind:—