Poem by Matthew Arnold

Religious Isolation

     TO THE SAME FRIEND.

Children (as such forgive them) have I known,
Ever in their own eager pastime bent
To make the incurious bystander, intent
On his own swarming thoughts, an interest own,--

Too fearful or too fond to play alone.
Do thou, whom light in thine own inmost soul
(Not less thy boast) illuminates, control
Wishes unworthy of a man full-grown.

What though the holy secret, which moulds thee,
Moulds not the solid earth? though never winds
Have whispered it to the complaining sea,

Nature’s great law, and law of all men’s minds?
To its own impulse every creature stirs:
Live by thy light, and earth will live by hers!

1. To George Cruikshank
2. Written in Butler’s Sermons
3. Quiet Work
4. Written in Emerson’s Essays
5. To the Duke of Wellington

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