In vain remorse and fear and hate Beat with bruised bands against a fate Whose walls of iron only move And open to the touch of love. He only feels his burdens fall Who, taught by suffering, pities all. _Pray for us_! He prayeth best who leaves unguessed The mystery of another's breast. Why cheeks grow pale, why eyes o'erflow, Or heads are white, thou need'st not know. Enough to note by many a sign That every heart hath needs like thine. _Pray for us_! 1870 THE BREWING OF SOMA. "These libations mixed with milk have been prepared for Indra: offer Soma to the drinker of Soma." --Vashista, translated by MAX MULLER. The fagots blazed, the caldron's smoke Up through the green wood curled; "Bring honey from the hollow oak, Bring milky sap," the brewers spoke, In the childhood of the world. And brewed they well or brewed they ill, The priests thrust in their rods, First tasted, and then drank their fill, And shouted, with one voice and will, "Behold the drink of gods!" They drank, and to! in heart and brain A new, glad life began; The gray of hair grew young again, The sick man laughed away his pain, The cripple leaped and ran. "Drink, mortals, what the gods have sent, Forget your long annoy." So sang the priests. From tent to tent The Soma's sacred madness went, A storm of drunken joy. Then knew each rapt inebriate A winged and glorious birth, Soared upward, with strange joy elate, Beat, with dazed head, Varuna's gate, And, sobered, sank to earth. The land with Soma's praises rang; On Gihon's banks of shade Its hymns the dusky maidens sang; In joy of life or mortal pang All men to Soma prayed. The morning twilight of the race Sends down these matin psalms; And still with wondering eyes we trace The simple prayers to Soma's grace, That Vedic verse embalms. As in that child-world's early year, Each after age has striven By music, incense, vigils drear, And trance, to bring the skies more near, Or lift men up to heaven! Some fever of the blood and brain, Some self-exalting spell, The scourger's keen delight of pain, The Dervish dance, the Orphic strain, The wild-haired Bacchant's yell,-- The desert's hair-grown hermit sunk The saner brute below; The naked Santon, hashish-drunk, The cloister madness of the monk, The fakir's torture-show! And yet the past comes round again, And new doth old fulfil; In sensual transports wild as vain We brew in many a Christian fane The heathen Soma still! Dear Lord and Father of mankind, Forgive our foolish ways! Reclothe us in our rightful mind, In purer lives Thy service find, In deeper reverence, praise. In simple trust like theirs who heard Beside the Syrian sea The gracious calling of the Lord, Let us, like them, without a word, Rise up and follow Thee. O Sabbath rest by Galilee! O calm of hills above, Where Jesus knelt to share with Thee The silence of eternity Interpreted by love!