That gush of feeling overpast,
"Ah me!" Bernardin sighed at last,
I would thy bitterest foes could see
Thy heart as it is seen of me!
"No church of God hast thou denied;
Thou hast but spurned in scorn aside
A bare and hollow counterfeit,
Profaning the pure name of it!
"With dry dead moss and marish weeds
His fire the western herdsman feeds,
And greener from the ashen plain
The sweet spring grasses rise again.
"Nor thunder-peal nor mighty wind
Disturb the solid sky behind;
And through the cloud the red bolt rends
The calm, still smile of Heaven descends.
"Thus through the world, like bolt and blast,
And scourging fire, thy words have passed.
Clouds break,--the steadfast heavens remain;
Weeds burn,--the ashes feed the grain!
"But whoso strives with wrong may find
Its touch pollute, its darkness blind;
And learn, as latent fraud is shown
In others' faith, to doubt his own.
"With dream and falsehood, simple trust
And pious hope we tread in dust;
Lost the calm faith in goodness,--lost
The baptism of the Pentecost!
"Alas!--the blows for error meant
Too oft on truth itself are spent,
As through the false and vile and base
Looks forth her sad, rebuking face.
"Not ours the Theban's charmed life;
We come not scathless from the strife!
The Python's coil about us clings,
The trampled Hydra bites and stings!
"Meanwhile, the sport of seeming chance,
The plastic shapes of circumstance,
What might have been we fondly guess,
If earlier born, or tempted less.
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