So one in savage lands: He enters all alone; No weapon in his hands. The secret spears unthrown,
The creepers lose their guile, Seeing his face, distrest They know not why. A smile, A sign or two, a jest,
And all on bended knees Withhold the savage stroke. With beating heart he sees The lessening steamer-smoke.
He draws a power to be From powers sacrificed; And in his eyes we see The teaching of the Christ,
And all the great beside, The oracles of time From Delphic clefts have cried Or crasht in thundering rhyme.
A book his finger parts; He moves thro’ adverse cries; Master of many arts And careless of the skies.
What are thy mighty deeds, O Past, thy gains, O Time? A dust of ruin’d creeds, A scroll or two of rhyme?
A temple earthquake-dasht? A false record of things? A picture lightning-flasht Of cruel eyes of kings?
No, these: a wiser rule; A science of ampler span; A heart more pitiful; More mind; a nobler man.
Thee most we honour, thee, Great Science. Hold thy way. The end thou canst not see, But in the end the day.
Seek without seeking ends, And shatter without ruth; On thee our fate depends; Be faithful, keep the truth.
We think it false to dream Beyond the likely fact; We grant thee, Truth, supreme, Whatever thou exact.
I pray thee, Truth, control My destiny distraught, And move my sightless soul In thy high ways of thought.
Hold thou my hand. I go Wherever thou wilt guide, Tho’ bleak the bitter snow And black the mountain side.
Or if thou bid’st descend, I fear not for myself, Tho’ raging thunders rend And lightnings lash, the gulf.
My deeds I will endow, My spirit render clean, O Truth, with thee; and thou Wilt make the desert green;
And haply show withal The wells that will not sink, Sweet pastures for the soul, And in the desert drink.
Confounded by these briars, Thy stars will compass me And be the beacon fires To light mine eyes to thee.
But in my state infirm That Spirit comes and cries To me in wrath, ‘O worm, They see not who have eyes,
How thou that hast not? Know, My children drink the sun, Taking them wings to go Where others walk or run:
Yet scarcely one life-taught Can ever rightly heed The issue of a thought Or do a fruitful deed.’
I call no curse on fate, I call no curse on thee, O barren bitter state Of exile, such to me.