XXV.
My soul has fire to mingle with the fire
Of all these souls, within or out of doors
Of Rome's Church or another. I believe
In one priest, and one temple, with its floors
Of shining jasper, gloom'd at morn and eve
By countless knees of earnest auditors;
And crystal walls, too lucid to perceive,—
That none may take the measure of the place
And say, "so far the porphyry; then, the flint—
To this mark, mercy goes, and there, ends grace,"
While still the permeable crystals hint
At some white starry distance, bathed in space!
I feel how nature's ice-crusts keep the dint
Of undersprings of silent Deity;
I hold the articulated gospels, which
Show Christ among us, crucified on tree;
I love all who love truth, if poor or rich
In what they have won of truth possessively!
No altars and no hands defiled with pitch
Shall scare me off, but I will pray and eat
With all these—taking leave to choose my ewers
And say at last, "Your visible Churches cheat
Their inward types; and if a Church assures
Of standing without failure and defeat,
That Church both fails and lies!"
XXVI.
Of wider subject through past years,—behold,
We come back from the Popedom to the Pope,
To ponder what he must be, ere we are bold
