Unmoved by all the claims our times avow...

Unmoved by all the claims our times avow,

The ancient Sphinx still keeps the porch of shade;

And comes Despair, whom not her calm may cow,

And coldly on that adamantine brow

Scrawls undeterred his bitter pasquinade.

But Faith ( who from the scrawl indignant turns )

With blood warm oozing from her wounded trust,

Inscribes even on her shards of broken urns

The sign o’ the cross — the spirit above the dust!

Yea, ape and angel, strife and old debate —

The harps of heaven and dreary gongs of hell;

Science the feud can only aggravate —

No umpire she betwixt the chimes and knell:

The running battle of the star and clod

Shall run forever — if there be no God.

Degrees we know, unknown in days before;

The light is greater, hence the shadow more;

And tantalized and apprehensive Man

Appealing — Wherefore ripen us to pain?

Seems there the spokesman of dumb Nature's train.

But through such strange illusions have they passed

Who in life's pilgrimage have baffled striven —

Even death may prove unreal at the last,

And stoics be astounded into heaven.

Then keep thy heart, though yet but ill-resigned —

Clarel, thy heart, the issues there but mind;

That like the crocus budding through the snow —

That like a swimmer rising from the deep —

That like a burning secret which doth go

Even from the bosom that would hoard and keep;

Emerge thou mayst from the last whelming sea,

And prove that death but routs life into victory.