Volume I Part 34 (2/2)

Why, then it's all chance-work! And yet, in her eyes, She holds a fixed something by which I am checked.

VII

Yonder riband of suns.h.i.+ne aslope on the wall, If you eye it a minute 'll have the same look: So kind! and so merciful! G.o.d of us all!

It's the very same lesson we get from the Book.

Then, is Life but a trial? Is that what is meant?

Some must toil, and some perish, for others below: The injustice to each spreads a common content; Ay! I've lost it again, for it can't be quite so.

VIII

She's the victim of fools: that seems nearer the mark.

On earth there are engines and numerous fools.

Why the Lord can permit them, we're still in the dark; He does, and in some sort of way they're His tools.

It's a roundabout way, with respect let me add, If Molly goes crippled that we may be taught: But, perhaps, it's the only way, though it's so bad; In that case we'll bow down our heads,--as we ought.

IX

But the worst of ME is, that when I bow my head, I perceive a thought wriggling away in the dust, And I follow its tracks, quite forgetful, instead Of humble acceptance: for, question I must!

Here's a creature made carefully--carefully made!

Put together with craft, and then stamped on, and why?

The answer seems nowhere: it's discord that's played.

The sky's a blue dis.h.!.+--an implacable sky!

X

Stop a moment. I seize an idea from the pit.

They tell us that discord, though discord, alone, Can be harmony when the notes properly fit: Am I judging all things from a single false tone?

Is the Universe one immense Organ, that rolls From devils to angels? I'm blind with the sight.

It pours such a splendour on heaps of poor souls!

I might try at kneeling with Molly to-night.

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