167. An Invocation

TO God, the everlasting, who abides,

One Life within things infinite that die:

To Him whose unity no thought divides:

Whose breath is breathèd through immensity.

Him neither eye hath seen, nor ear hath heard;

Nor reason, seated in the souls of men,

Though pondering oft on the mysterious word,

Hath e’er revealed His Being to mortal ken.

Earth changes, and the starry wheels roll round;

The seasons come and go, moons wax and wane;

The nations rise and fall, and fill the ground,

Storing the sure results of joy and pain:

Slow knowledge widens toward a perfect whole,

From that first man who named the name of heaven,

To him who weighs the planets as they roll,

And knows what laws to every life are given.

Yet He appears not. Round the extreme sphere

Of science still thin ether floats unseen:

Darkness still wraps Him round; and ignorant fear

Remains of what we are, and what have been.

Only we feel Him; and in aching dreams,

Swift intuitions, pangs of keen delight,

The sudden vision of His glory seems

To sear our souls, dividing the dull night:

And we yearn toward Him. Beauty, Goodness, Truth;

These three are one; one life, one thought, one being;

One source of still rejuvenescent youth;

One light for endless and unclouded seeing.

Mere symbols we perceive—the dying beauty,

The partial truth that few can comprehend,

The vacillating faith, the painful duty,

The virtue labouring to a dubious end.

O God, unknown, invisible, secure,

Whose being by dim resemblances we guess,

Who in man’s fear and love abidest sure,

Whose power we feel in darkness and confess!

Without Thee nothing is, and Thou art nought

When on Thy substance we gaze curiously:

By Thee impalpable, named Force and Thought,

The solid world still ceases not to be.

Lead Thou me God, Law, Reason, Duty, Life!

All names for Thee alike are vain and hollow—

Lead me, for I will follow without strife;

Or, if I strive, still must I blindly follow.