Now, this is the race as we find it, Where love, in the creed, spells hate; And where bird and beast meet a foe in the priest And in rulers of fashion and State. But up to the Kingdom of Thinkers Has risen the cry of our kin; And the weapons of thought are burnished and brought To clash with the bludgeons of sin. Far Christ, of a million churches, Come near to the earth again; Be more than a Name; be a living Flame; ‘Make Good’ in the hearts of men. Shine full on the path of Science, And show it the heights above, Where vast truths lie for the searching eye That shall follow the torch of love. TIME’S DEFEAT Time has made conquest of so many things That once were mine. Swift-footed, eager youth That ran to meet the years; bold brigand health, That broke all laws of reason unafraid, And laughed at talk of punishment. Close ties of blood and friendship, joy of life, Which reads its music in the major key And will not listen to a minor strain— These things and many more are spoils of time. Yet as a conqueror who only storms The outposts of a town, and finds the fort Too strong to be assailed, so time retreats And knows his impotence. He cannot take My three great jewels from the crown of life: Love, sympathy, and faith; and year on year He sees them grow in lustre and in worth, And glowers by me, plucking at his beard, And dragging, as he goes, a useless scythe. Once in the dark he plotted with his friend Grim Death, to steal my treasures. Death replied: ‘They are immortal, and beyond thy reach, I could but set them in another sphere, To shine with greater lustre.’ Time and Death Passed on together, knowing their defeat; And I am singing by the road of life. THE HYMN OF THE REPUBLIC I have listened to the sighing of the burdened and the bound, I have heard it change to crying, with a menace in the sound; I have seen the money-getters pass unheeding on the way, As they went to forge new fetters for the people day by day. Then the voice of Labour thundered forth its purpose and its need, And I marvelled, and I wondered, at the cold dull ear of greed; For as chimes, in some great steeple, tell the passing of the hour, So the voices of the people tell the death of purchased power. All the gathered dust of ages, God is brushing from His book; He is opening up its pages, and He bids His children look; And in shock and conflagration, and in pestilence and strife, He is speaking to the nations, of the brevity of life. Mother Earth herself is shaken by our sorrows and our crimes; And she bids her sons awaken to the portent of the times; With her travail pains upon her, she is hurling from their place All the minions of dishonour, to admit the Coming Race.