But whether in the uncoloured light of truth

Arthur Hugh Clough

1819 to 1861

Poem Image

But whether in the uncoloured light of truth,
This inward strong assurance be, indeed,
More than the self-willed arbitrary creed,
Manhood’s inheritor to the dream of youth;
Whether to shut out fact because forsooth
To live were insupportable unfreed,
Be not or be the service of untruth:
Whether this vital confidence be more
Than his, who upon death’s immediate brink,
Knowing, perforce determines to ignore;
Or than the bird’s, that when the hunter’s near,
Burying her eyesight, can forget her fear;
Who about this shall tell us what to think?