James Russell Lowell (1819–1891)

GOD sends his teachers unto every age,

To every clime and every race of men,

With revelations fitted to their growth

And shape of mind, nor gives the realm of Truth

Into the selfish rule of one sole race:

Therefore each form of worship that hath swayed

The life of man, and given it to grasp

The master-key of knowledge, reverence,

Infolds some germs of goodness and of right;

Else never had the eager soul, which loathes

The slothful down of pampered ignorance,

Found in it even a moment’s fitful rest.

There is an instinct in the human heart

Which makes that all the fables it hath coined,

To justify the reign of its belief

And strengthen it by beauty’s right divine,

Veil in their inner cells a mystic gift,

Which, like the hazel twig, in faithful hands,

Points surely to the hidden springs of truth.

For, as in nature naught is made in vain,

But all things have within their hull of use

A wisdom and a meaning which may speak

Of spiritual secrets to the ear

Of spirit; so, in whatsoe’er the heart

Hath fashioned for a solace to itself,

To make its inspiration suit its creed,

And from the niggard hands of falsehood wring

Its needful food of truth, there ever is

A sympathy with Nature, which reveals,

Not less than her own works, pure gleams of light

And earnest parables of inward lore.