When he protested, not too solemnly, That for a world's achieving maintenance The crust of overdone divinity Lacked aliment, they called it recreance; And when he chose through his own glass to scan Sick Europe, and reduced, unyieldingly, The monk within the cassock to the man Within the monl, they called it heresy. And when he made so periously bold As to be scattered forth in black and white, Good fathers looked askance at him and rolled Their inward eyes in anguish and afright; There were some of them did shake at what was told, And they shook best who knew that he was right. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...SONNET WRITTEN IN DISGUST OF VULGAR SUPERSTITION by JOHN KEATS CLEVER TOM CLINCH GOING TO BE HANGED by JONATHAN SWIFT THE MOURNING MOTHER by ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING PATIENCE AND HOPE by EDWARD GEORGE EARLE LYTTON BULWER-LYTTON A POTION by RICHARD EUGENE BURTON |