The Tree of Truth
Theregrows a mighty centuried tree,Its roots athwart the world,Its branches wide as earth’s wide girthBy thousand dews impearled.Its top is hoary, its wide boughsReach out to heaven above,Its roots are knowledge, and its sapThe yearning heart of love.Men hack its branches, curb its roots,To trim it to their ken,Or hide its green in poisonous vinesFrom evil’s grimmest fen.But evermore while ages wane,And centuries rise and die,Through dark, through light, through good and ill,Its saps the years defy.For deeper in the heart of things,And older far than time,Its roots are fixed in those sure deepsFrom which the centuries climb.Ages ago its girth was great;Its boughs o’er earth’s wide lands;All peoples gathered ’neath its gladesWhere now old ruin stands.But form and custom staled its greenAnd curbed it into boundsOf pruning hooks and greedy wallsThat hemmed its sacred rounds.And vast and wide where once to allIts radiant leaves were free,Far peoples paid, with earth’s red gold,Its sacred home to see.And summer by summer, yea, year by year,Still lower shrank its head,Till shallow deceit and life’s despairDeclared its heart was dead.Then men cried, “We will hew it down,And build from out its woodA temple rare wherein to teachUs memory of its good.“And ’neath its shelter we will keep,To hold the ages’ youth,Those holy dreams our fathers drewFrom out the tree of truth.”They hacked and hewed, they sawed and planed,They lopped its branches wide,Till shorn and bare the old tree stoodTo every wind and tide.And round its scathed and ruined trunk,Whence life had fled aloof,They built a temple carved and archedFrom floor to groinèd roof.And reared a shrine where art was allThe end of human pain,Till a sprout shot forth from the old tree’s trunkAnd burst its walls amain;A sturdy, wayward, wilding growth,That mocked their maimèd dreamOf life and truth in legend carvedOn groinèd arch and beam.Men stood amazed. The teachers cried,“Behold the curse of earth!Its life must die or all our wordsAre but as nothing worth.”“Nay, nay,” cried others, “but let it stand,Perchance a miracle.”Then straight about its burgeoning boughsOld bloody battles fell.Wild clamor and clash of fiery arms,The old against the new.Mad hosts arrayed with banner and blade,Where war’s wild trumpets blew.But as they strove by gates of blood,With glad unconscious youth,Higher and wider skyward climbedThe newer tree of truth.And blithe within its boughs their nestsThe birds of heaven made,While at its foot mid earth’s old ruins,The happy children played.And form and cant were swept away,While under its dream sublime,Men drank anew ’neath heaven’s archFrom nature for a time.Yea, still it spreads its antres vast,Through peace and clash of arms,And blossoms brave and blithe and free,O’er all earth’s shrunk alarms.And still men battle to destroyThe living for the deadOld ruined trunk of that which towersIts glories overhead:And strive for art’s distorted ways,While from earth’s heart of youth,Higher and wider heavenward spreadsThe ancient tree of truth.
Theregrows a mighty centuried tree,Its roots athwart the world,Its branches wide as earth’s wide girthBy thousand dews impearled.Its top is hoary, its wide boughsReach out to heaven above,Its roots are knowledge, and its sapThe yearning heart of love.Men hack its branches, curb its roots,To trim it to their ken,Or hide its green in poisonous vinesFrom evil’s grimmest fen.But evermore while ages wane,And centuries rise and die,Through dark, through light, through good and ill,Its saps the years defy.For deeper in the heart of things,And older far than time,Its roots are fixed in those sure deepsFrom which the centuries climb.Ages ago its girth was great;Its boughs o’er earth’s wide lands;All peoples gathered ’neath its gladesWhere now old ruin stands.But form and custom staled its greenAnd curbed it into boundsOf pruning hooks and greedy wallsThat hemmed its sacred rounds.And vast and wide where once to allIts radiant leaves were free,Far peoples paid, with earth’s red gold,Its sacred home to see.And summer by summer, yea, year by year,Still lower shrank its head,Till shallow deceit and life’s despairDeclared its heart was dead.Then men cried, “We will hew it down,And build from out its woodA temple rare wherein to teachUs memory of its good.“And ’neath its shelter we will keep,To hold the ages’ youth,Those holy dreams our fathers drewFrom out the tree of truth.”They hacked and hewed, they sawed and planed,They lopped its branches wide,Till shorn and bare the old tree stoodTo every wind and tide.And round its scathed and ruined trunk,Whence life had fled aloof,They built a temple carved and archedFrom floor to groinèd roof.And reared a shrine where art was allThe end of human pain,Till a sprout shot forth from the old tree’s trunkAnd burst its walls amain;A sturdy, wayward, wilding growth,That mocked their maimèd dreamOf life and truth in legend carvedOn groinèd arch and beam.Men stood amazed. The teachers cried,“Behold the curse of earth!Its life must die or all our wordsAre but as nothing worth.”“Nay, nay,” cried others, “but let it stand,Perchance a miracle.”Then straight about its burgeoning boughsOld bloody battles fell.Wild clamor and clash of fiery arms,The old against the new.Mad hosts arrayed with banner and blade,Where war’s wild trumpets blew.But as they strove by gates of blood,With glad unconscious youth,Higher and wider skyward climbedThe newer tree of truth.And blithe within its boughs their nestsThe birds of heaven made,While at its foot mid earth’s old ruins,The happy children played.And form and cant were swept away,While under its dream sublime,Men drank anew ’neath heaven’s archFrom nature for a time.Yea, still it spreads its antres vast,Through peace and clash of arms,And blossoms brave and blithe and free,O’er all earth’s shrunk alarms.And still men battle to destroyThe living for the deadOld ruined trunk of that which towersIts glories overhead:And strive for art’s distorted ways,While from earth’s heart of youth,Higher and wider heavenward spreadsThe ancient tree of truth.
Theregrows a mighty centuried tree,Its roots athwart the world,Its branches wide as earth’s wide girthBy thousand dews impearled.
Its top is hoary, its wide boughsReach out to heaven above,Its roots are knowledge, and its sapThe yearning heart of love.
Men hack its branches, curb its roots,To trim it to their ken,Or hide its green in poisonous vinesFrom evil’s grimmest fen.
But evermore while ages wane,And centuries rise and die,Through dark, through light, through good and ill,Its saps the years defy.
For deeper in the heart of things,And older far than time,Its roots are fixed in those sure deepsFrom which the centuries climb.
Ages ago its girth was great;Its boughs o’er earth’s wide lands;All peoples gathered ’neath its gladesWhere now old ruin stands.
But form and custom staled its greenAnd curbed it into boundsOf pruning hooks and greedy wallsThat hemmed its sacred rounds.
And vast and wide where once to allIts radiant leaves were free,Far peoples paid, with earth’s red gold,Its sacred home to see.
And summer by summer, yea, year by year,Still lower shrank its head,Till shallow deceit and life’s despairDeclared its heart was dead.
Then men cried, “We will hew it down,And build from out its woodA temple rare wherein to teachUs memory of its good.
“And ’neath its shelter we will keep,To hold the ages’ youth,Those holy dreams our fathers drewFrom out the tree of truth.”
They hacked and hewed, they sawed and planed,They lopped its branches wide,Till shorn and bare the old tree stoodTo every wind and tide.
And round its scathed and ruined trunk,Whence life had fled aloof,They built a temple carved and archedFrom floor to groinèd roof.
And reared a shrine where art was allThe end of human pain,Till a sprout shot forth from the old tree’s trunkAnd burst its walls amain;
A sturdy, wayward, wilding growth,That mocked their maimèd dreamOf life and truth in legend carvedOn groinèd arch and beam.
Men stood amazed. The teachers cried,“Behold the curse of earth!Its life must die or all our wordsAre but as nothing worth.”
“Nay, nay,” cried others, “but let it stand,Perchance a miracle.”Then straight about its burgeoning boughsOld bloody battles fell.
Wild clamor and clash of fiery arms,The old against the new.Mad hosts arrayed with banner and blade,Where war’s wild trumpets blew.
But as they strove by gates of blood,With glad unconscious youth,Higher and wider skyward climbedThe newer tree of truth.
And blithe within its boughs their nestsThe birds of heaven made,While at its foot mid earth’s old ruins,The happy children played.
And form and cant were swept away,While under its dream sublime,Men drank anew ’neath heaven’s archFrom nature for a time.
Yea, still it spreads its antres vast,Through peace and clash of arms,And blossoms brave and blithe and free,O’er all earth’s shrunk alarms.
And still men battle to destroyThe living for the deadOld ruined trunk of that which towersIts glories overhead:
And strive for art’s distorted ways,While from earth’s heart of youth,Higher and wider heavenward spreadsThe ancient tree of truth.