"For he, like Socrates, denies the gods!"

Teacher of truth, be this thy gracious charter,

To live imprisoned, or to die a martyr.

This Jesus, and this Galileo knew,

Stern lessons! taught by Christian and by Jew.

And thou, geologist, take timely heed,

Nor let a quarry quarrel with a creed.

Truth may lie, fossil, in some cave, no doubt;
But 'twere a mad success to win her out;

For ere thou lead, or she come safely forth,
Astræa must return once more to earth.

Rapt to some peak, or trailing on the ground, For each how various faith's horizon bound;

Yet, far as soul sincere is virtue's test,

What truly each perceives, for each is best.

Let knowledge upward win from view to view,

But drag not-strain not with Procrustian screw.

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Duty, you say, must rise in truth's defence."

But duty, oft, is temper's mere pretence.

And ne'er is soul so surely sway'd to evil,

As when, in guise of conscience, tempts the devil. —And if a heart be found, which rarely flies. To the fond need of human sympathies,

'Tis there Intolerance loves to fix her place *, Proud, as old Stylite, of her narrow base, And wider worship views with aspect sour,

And crooks and more contracts from hour to hour.

There too, where social loves refuse to shoot,

Did ancient persecution strike his root,

And nourished by the sigh, the tear, the groan,
In Upas-desolation frowned alone,

Or raged, like tiger, who of human blood

Hath proved the scent, and fiercely craves his food.

But "certainties, you hold, should doubt exclude"'Twixt sect and sect, yet where the certitude? For very truth their dogmas all profess,

And who may dare decide 'twixt guess and guess?
Various our means, one same our right to scan;
The judgment is for God, and not for man;
And if that judgment of the all-seeing throne,
No thought may dare, yet tolerance is our own.

B.-But judge we must.

A.—Then let no blinding pride

Of dogmatism, but mild heart decide.

Where his own wisdom bounds his mercy's store,

The veriest sage in charity is poor.

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Perchance, who doomed us thus to disagree,
Planned this arena for our charity;

For beauteous end, bade virtue, weakness, join,
And turns our freedom's self to discipline.

By many a step we mount heaven's awful stair,
And love fits here, as knowledge waits us there.

If e'er some slight misgiving thou should'st know Of present creed-for thought will ebb and flow-Straight, from thyself, the passing lesson take, And spare another's for thine own mind's sake. Faith, vowed unchangeable, may win thee sorrow, When light to-day appears less light tomorrow.

But if thine own peculiar faith be fixed, Yet earth is fully wide for creeds commixed. Or, grant, that all must fuse to one consent, Love more hath won than ever argument.

Nor need thine argument be rasping file;
Pour forth the milk of reason, not its bile.

Nay, if by foe ungentle scorn be shown,

Bear his intolerance and chain down thine own.

B.-But, strongly feeling, strongly we express.

A.-Yet permanence how little waits on stress! Half-Christian Plato! long thy mild controul Clung to the musings of the thoughtful soul; Whilst harsher lore-the cynic's bitter flow, And all the dogmas of the Portico,

Dictators once-ruled but their little year,—

A story now-a moral—or a sneer.

B." But principles we hate, and not the man."

A. 'Tis dangerous thus to balance on a span;