Since Gutenberg made thought cosmopolite And stretched electric threads from mind to mind? Nay, did Faith build this wonder? or did Fear, That makes a fetish and misnames it God (Blockish or metaphysic, matters not), Contrive this coop to shut its tyrant in, Appeased with playthings, that he might not harm? I turned and saw a beldame on her knees; With eyes astray, she told mechanic beads Before some shrine of saintly womanhood, Bribed intercessor with the far-off Judge: Such my first thought, by kindlier soon rebuked, Pleading for whatsoever touches life With upward impulse: be He nowhere else, God is in all that liberates and lifts, In all that humbles, sweetens, and consoles: Blessëd the natures shored on every side With landmarks of hereditary thought! Thrice happy they that wander not lifelong Beyond near succor of the household faith, The guarded fold that shelters, not confines! Their steps find patience in familiar paths, Printed with hope by loved feet gone before Of parent, child, or lover, glorified By simple magic of dividing Time. My lids were moistened as the woman knelt, And--was it will, or some vibration faint Of sacred Nature, deeper than the will?-- My heart occultly felt itself in hers, Through mutual intercession gently leagued. Or was it not mere sympathy of brain? A sweetness intellectually conceived In simpler creeds to me impossible? A juggle of that pity for ourselves In others, which puts on such pretty masks And snares self-love with bait of charity? Something of all it might be, or of none: Yet for a moment I was snatched away And had the evidence of things not seen; For one rapt moment; then it all came back, This age that blots out life with question-marks, This nineteenth century with its knife and glass That make thought physical, and thrust far off The Heaven, so neighborly with man of old, To voids sparse-sown with alienated stars.