Publius as master of the feast perceived Blindly that here a rally of some sort Was needed for the rescue of the cheer Just trembling on the balance to be lost. He was perplexed, but his perplexity Was his resource better than ready wit. For, with a quick dependent instinct, he Turned him to Paul unconsciously confessed Ascendent wheresoever he might be, And Paul, thus silently appealed to, spoke: "Such thought of woman is not from the Lord; The Lord our God made woman one with man. Equal? Nay, equal not. Inferior? Nay, Nor equal nor inferior; as too not Superior; rather, part of him, as he Of her, they twain together one, and whole Neither without the other. He is head, Not lord and master to rule over her, As she not slave, not servant, to be ruled; She, of her will unforced, subject to him Through joyful choice of reverence and of love, And he, with equal mutual reverent love, Honoring her and cherishing as himself." "So is it with you," said Krishna, "as I have seen With wonder, and admired; almost convinced That ye herein are better taught than I. If I perchance in anything have failed Of reverence meet toward womankind, I pray Pardon ye it to me; and hold besides That haply my lord Buddha had himself Judged otherwise herein, with other types To judge from of what womankind may be." "Yea," Paul said, "he but judged from what he saw; Not knowing he, as our Lord Jesus knew, What God from the beginning and before Established as the order of His world, And looked upon it and pronounced it good. But also what your Buddha judged amiss Became a force creating what he saw; For teaching and believing, subtle powers, Are plastic to conform us to themselves. What ye believe of woman, teaching her To know that ye believe it of her, yea, Making her half believe it of herself, This she hereby, even in her own despite, Tends to become; if it unworthy be, Then all the issuing stream of humankind, Fouled at the fountain thus, flows forth corrupt And ever more corrupt--the stream turned back With every generation to its source, And adding to the feculence of that.