Plod in thy cave, gray anchorite; Be wiser than thy peers; Augment the range of human power, And trust to coming years. They may call thee wizard, and monk accursed, And load thee with dispraise; Thou wert born five hundred years too soon For the comfort of thy days; But not too soon for human kind. Time hath reward in store; And the demons of our sires become The saints that we adore. The blind can see, the slave is lord, So round and round we run; And ever the Wrong is proved to be wrong And ever is Justice done. Keep, Galileo, to thy thought, And nerve thy soul to bear; They may gloat o'er the senseless words they wring From the pangs of thy despair; They may veil their eyes, but they cannot hide The sun's meridian glow; The heel of a priest may tread thee down And a tyrant work thee woe; But never a truth has been destroyed; They may curse it and call it crime; Pervert and betray, or slander and slay Its teachers for a time. But the sunshine aye shall light the sky, As round and round we run; And the Truth shall ever come uppermost, And Justice shall be done. And live there now such men as these-- With thoughts like the great of old? Many have died in their misery, And left their thought untold; And many live, and are ranked as mad, And are placed in the cold world's ban, For sending their bright, far-seeing souls Three centuries in the van. They toil in penury and grief, Unknown, if not maligned; Forlorn, forlorn, bearing the scorn Of the meanest of mankind! But yet the world goes round and round, And the genial seasons run; And ever the Truth comes uppermost, And ever is Justice done. --Charles Mackay. We cannot kindle when we will The fire which in the heart resides. The spirit bloweth and is still; In mystery our soul abides: But tasks in hours of insight willed Can be through hours of gloom fulfilled. With aching hands and bleeding feet We dig and heap, lay stone on stone; We bear the burden and the heat Of the long day, and wish 'twere done. Not till the hours of light return, All we have built do we discern. --Matthew Arnold. WHAT MAKES A HERO?