midnight
Asia has taught her Aliabs and salaams To the world 's children , -- we have grown to men ! We who have rolled the sphere beneath our feet To find a virgin forest , as we lay The beams of our rude temple , first of all Must frame its doorway high enough for man To pass unstooping ; knowing as we do That He who shaped us last of living forms Has long enough been served by creeping things , Reptiles that left their foot-prints in the sand Of old sea-margins that have turned to stone , And men who learned their ritual ; we demand To know him first , then trust him and then love When we have found him worthy of our love , Tried by our own poor hearts and not before ; He must be truer than the truest friend , He must be tenderer than a woman 's love , A father better than the best of sires ; Kinder than she who bore us , though we sin Oftener than did the brother we are told , We-poor ill-tempered mortals-must forgive , Though seven times sinning threescore times and ten . This is the new world 's gospel : Be ye men ! Try well the legends of the children 's time ; Ye are the chosen people , God has led Your steps across the desert of the deep As now across the desert of the shore ; Mountains are cleft before you as the sea Before the wandering tribe of Israel 's sons ; Still onward rolls the thunderous caravan , Its coming printed on the western sky , A cloud by day , by night a pillared flame ; Your prophets are a hundred unto one Of them of old who cried , `` Thus saith the Lord '' ; They told of cities that should fall in heaps , But yours of mightier cities that shall rise Where yet the lonely fishers spread their nets , Where hides the fox and hoots the midnight owl ; The tree of knowledge in your garden grows Not single , but at every humble door ; Its branches lend you their immortal food , That fills you with the sense of what ye are , No servants of an altar hewed and carved From senseless stone by craft of human hands , Rabbi , or dervish , Brahmin , bishop , bonze , But masters of the charm with which they work To keep your hands from that forbidden tree ! Ye that have tasted that divinest fruit , Look on this world of yours with opened eyes ! Ye are as gods ! Nay , makers of your gods , Each day ye break an image in your shrine And plant a fairer image where it stood Where is the Moloch of your fathers ' creed , Whose fires of torment burned for span-long babes ?