To truth, it seems to us, life once was nearer,The world ordered, intelligences clearer,Wisdom and knowledge were not yet divided.They lived far more serenely, many-sided,Those ancients of whom Plato, the Chinese,Relate their incandescent verities.Whenever we entered the temple of Aquinas,The graceful Summa contra Gentiles,A new world greeted us, sweet, mature,A world of truth clarified and pure.There all seemed lucid, Nature charged with Mind,Man moving from God to Him, as He designed.The Law, in one great formulary bound,Forming a whole, a still unbroken round.But we who belong to his posteritySeem condemned to doubt and irony,To journeys in the wilderness, to strife,Obsessions, and longings for a better life.But if our children’s children undergoSuch sufferings as ours, they will bestowPraise upon us as blessed and as wise.We will appear transfigured in their eyes,For out of our lives’ harsh cacophoniesThey will hear only fading harmonies,The legends of an anguish often told,The echoes of contentions long grown cold.And those of us who trust ourselves the least,Who doubt and question most, these, it may be,Will make their mark upon eternity,And youth will turn to them as to a feast.The time may come when a man who confessedHis self-doubts will be ranked among the blessedWho never suffered anguish or knew fear,Whose times were times of glory and good cheer,Who lived like children, simple happy lives.For in us too is part of that Eternal MindWhich through the aeons calls to brothers of its kind:Both you and I will pass, but it survives.<p>Stages</p>As every flower fades and as all youthDeparts, so life at every stage,So every virtue, so our grasp of truth,Blooms in its day and may not last forever.Since life may summon us at every ageBe ready, heart, for parting, new endeavor,Be ready bravely and without remorseTo find new light that old ties cannot give.In all beginnings dwells a magic forceFor guarding us and helping us to live.Serenely let us move to distant placesAnd let no sentiments of home detain us.The Cosmic Spirit seeks not to restrain usBut lifts us stage by stage to wider spaces.If we accept a home of our own making,Familiar habit makes for indolence.We must prepare for parting and leave-takingOr else remain the slaves of permanence.Even the hour of our death may sendUs speeding on to fresh and newer spaces,And life may summon us to newer races.So be it, heart: bid farewell without end.<p>The Glass Bead Game</p>
