Part 5 (2/2)
His kingdom? It was what? Not all a dream? Forbid That fault, that failure, Heaven, for such were death indeed.
His promises of peace, goodwill on earth to men, Which needed a fulfilment, lest faith fail? How then Since no fulfilment came, since He had left them lone In face of the world's wolves, for bread had given a stone?
How reconcile His word with that which was their life, Man's hatred and G.o.d's silence in a world of strife?
Was there no path, no way? Nay, none on this sad Earth Save with their Lord to suffer and account it mirth.
And so awhile they grieved. Then rose a subtlety-- Lord G.o.d, Thou knowest not wholly how men crave to lie In face of a hard truth too grievous to their pride-- To these poor fisher folk, thus of their Lord denied, Came a new blinding vision. They had seen Thy Son How often after death, no ghost, no carrion, But a plain man alive, who moved among them slow, And showed His feet and hands, the thorn prints on His brow, The spear wound in His side. He had come to comfort them, Confirm them in the faith, by His love's stratagem.
How if this thing were real: If this, that proved Him G.o.d, Proved also themselves spirits, not mere flesh and blood One with the beasts that perish, but immortal souls, Even as we angels are who fill Heaven's muster rolls And so shall live for aye? ”Here,” argued they, ”it stands ”The kingdom of His Heaven, a house not made with hands, ”Wherein we too new-born, but in no earthly case, ”Shall enter after death.” On this fair fragile base Their sorrow built its nest. It gave a hope to men And pandered to their pride. And lo the world's disdain Was changed to acclamation. Kings and emperors kneeled Before the Crucified, a living G.o.d revealed, Who made them heirs with Him of His own glory. Mark The enn.o.bling phrase and t.i.tle. No base Noah's ark Man's fount of honour now, but G.o.d's eternal choice Made of His human race, predestined to His joys From the first dawn of time,--the very Universe Resolved to a mere potsherd, shattered to rehea.r.s.e The splendour of Man's advent, the one act and end To which Creation moved, and where even we must tend, The spirit hosts of Heaven--Stark mad insolence!
Rank blasphemy proclaimed in Rome's halls and Byzance, Through all the Imperial lands, as though, forsooth, Thou, Lord, Couldst, even if Thou wouldst, raise this fantastic horde Of bodies to Thy glory, shapes dispersed and gone As lightly as Time's wracks swept to oblivion!
Yet all believed this creed. s.p.a.ce, straightway grown too strait, Shrank from these Christened kings, who held Earth reprobate Save for their own high calling. Heaven had become their throne, A fief for their new pride, in which they reigned alone, In virtue of their faith, above Time's humbler show, And Earth became their footstool. All were masters now Of the brute beasts despised who had no souls to save, And lords too of the heathen doomed beyond the grave.
G.o.d's kingdom had begun. It compa.s.sed all the lands And trafficked wealth and power. It issued its commands, And in default it slew in Thy high holy name, Thine the all merciful! Alas for the world's shame!
Alas for the world's reason, for Thy Son's sane creed Of doing only good each day to its own need, Of being as the least of these in wise humility!
Behold our Christian Saints, too proud to live or die As all flesh dies and lives, their emperors and kings Clothed in the robes of life as with an eagle's wings, Their Popes dispensing power, their priests absolving sin.
Nay. They have made a h.e.l.l their d.a.m.ned shall dwell within, With me for their gaolmaster in a world to come Of which they hold the keys! G.o.d's curse on Christendom!
THE LORD G.o.d
Hush, traitor, thou blasphemest. If things once were so, 'Twas in a darkened age, the night of long ago.
None now believe in h.e.l.l.
SATAN
Or Heaven. Forgive it, Lord, I spoke it in my haste. See, I withdraw the word.
Thy Christendom is wise, reformed. None buy nor sell Seats now at Thy right hand, (_aside_) grown quite unsaleable.
None now believe nor tremble--Yet is their sin as sore.
Lord, hear me to the end. Thou dravest me out of yore An exile from Thy sight, with mission to undo And tempt Man to his death. I had fallen from Heaven's blue By reason of my pride. Thou wouldst have service done Unreasoning, on the knees, as flowers bend to the Sun, Which withers them at noon, nor ask of his white fires Why they consume and slay. I had fallen by my desires Which were too large for one not G.o.d, because I would Have shewn Thee the truth bare, in no similitude As a slave flattering speaks and half despises him He fawns on, but in love, which stands erect of limb Claiming an equal part, which reasons, questions, dares, And calls all by its name, the wheat wheat, the tares tares, The friend friend, the foe foe. Thou wast displeased at this, And deemed I envied Man his portion in Thy bliss, The Man that Thou hadst made and in Thy royal faith Held worthy of all trust, Thy lord of life and death, One to be proved and tried, as gold is tried by fire, And fare the purer forth. Of me Thou didst require The sad task of his tempting. I, forsooth, must sue And prompt to evil deeds, make the false thought seem true, The true thought false, that he, thus proved, thus tried, might turn And hurl me a dog's word, as Jesus did, in scorn ”Get thee behind Me, Satan!” To this penance chained I bowed me in despair, as Thou, Lord, hadst ordained, Cast out from Thee and cursed. It was a rueful task For one who had known _Thee_ to wear the felon's mask And tempt this piteous child to his base sins of greed, His l.u.s.ts ign.o.ble, crimes how prompt in act and deed, To urge him to rebellion against G.o.d and good Who needed none to urge. His savage simian blood Flamed at a word, a sign. He lied, he thieved, he slew, By instinct of his birth. No virtue but he knew Its countervice and foil, without my wit to aid.
No fair thought but he chose the foul thought in its stead.
Ah sad primaeval race! Thou saidst it was not Man This thing armed with the stone which through thy forests ran, Intent to snare and slay. Not Man the senseless knave Who struck fire from his flint to burn Thy gorses brave, Thy heaths for his lean kine, who, being the one unclean, Defiled thy flower-sweet Earth with ordure heaps obscene To plant his rice, his rye. Not Man, saidst Thou, because He knew not of Thy way nor had he learned Thy laws, And was stark savage still. Not Man? Behold to-day Thy tamed Man as he lives, Thy Son of j.a.phet, nay Thy new true-Christened King, the follower of Thy Christ, Who sweareth by Thy name and his own mailed fist That Thou art Lord of all and he the Lord of Thee, Heaven's instrument ordained to teach integrity.
Thinkest Thou the _man_ is changed, the _ape_ that in him is Because his limbs are clothed which went in shamelessness?
Are his l.u.s.ts bridled more because his parts are hid?
Nay, Lord, he doeth to-day as those forefathers did, Only in greater guile. I will tell Thee his full worth, This Man's, the latest born, Thy creature from his birth Who lords it now, a king, this white Man's who hath pressed All Earth to his sole bondage and supreme behest, This Man of all Mankind. Behold him in Thy place, Administering the World, vicegerent of Thy grace And agent named of Thee, the symbol and the sign Of Thy high will on Earth and purposing divine, Clothed in his robes of power. Whence was he? What is he That he a.s.serteth thus his hand's supremacy?
His lineage what? Nay, Lord, he cometh of that mad stem Harder in act than Ham's, more subtle than of Shem, The red j.a.phetic stock of the bare plains which rolled A base born horde on Rome erewhile in l.u.s.t of gold, Tide following tide, the Goth, Gaul, Vandal, Lombard, Hun, Spewed forth from the white North to new dominion In the fair southern lands, with famine at their heel And rapine in their van, armed to the lips with steel.
These made their spoil of all, the pomp of the world's power, Its wealth, its beauty stored, all Rome's imperial dower, Her long renown, her skill, her art, her cultured fame, And with the rest her faiths bearing the Christian name.
From this wild bitter root of violent l.u.s.t and greed New Christendom upsprang, a pagan blood-stained creed, Pagan in spite of Christ, for the old G.o.ds cast down Still ruled it in men's hearts and lured them to renown, Ay in Thy name, Lord G.o.d, by glamour of the sword, And for Thy dead Son's sake, as in the days abhorred.
Like bulls they strove, they slew, like wolves they seized the prey, The hungriest strongest first, and who should say them nay.
After the Goth the Gaul, after the Gaul the Dane, Kings in descent from Thor, peace sued to them in vain.
Thou knowest, Lord G.o.d, their story. It is writ in blood, The blood of beast and man, by their brute hands subdued, Down to the latest born, the hungriest of the pack, The master wolf of all men call the Sa.s.senach, The Anglo-Norman dog, who goeth by land and sea As his forefathers went in chartered piracy, Death, fire in his right hand.
THE LORD G.o.d
Satan, once more beware.
Thy tongue hath a wide license, yet it runneth far.
This Anglo-Saxon man hath a fair name with some.
He standeth in brave repute, a priest of Christendom, First in civility, so say the Angel host Who speak of him with awe as one that merits most.
SATAN
The Angels fear him, Lord.
THE LORD G.o.d
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