Not that the earth is changing, O my God!
Nor that the seasons totter in their walk,—
Not that the virulent ill of act and talk
Seethes ever as a winepress ever trod,—
Not therefore are we certain that the rod
Weighs in thine hand to smite thy world; though now
Beneath thine hand so many nations bow,
So many kings:—not therefore, O my God!—
But because Man is parcelled out in men
Even thus; because, for any wrongful blow,
No man not stricken asks, ‘I would be told
Why thou dost strike;’ but his heart whispers then,
‘He is he, I am I.’ By this we know
That the earth falls asunder, being old.