"A cloud (see the poem) MAY be evolved; but not an artist;
and I find, in looking over my poem, that it has made itself
into a passionate reaffirmation of the artist's autonomy, threatened alike
from the direction of the scientific fanatic and the pantheistic devotee."
With all of Lanier's development -- whether in science and scholarship,
or in music and literature -- he retained a vital faith
in the Christian religion. He reacted against the Calvinism of his youth
to almost as great a degree as did some of the New England poets.
He at times felt keenly the narrowness and bigotry of the church --
the warring of the sects over the unessential points.* In his thinking
he found no place for the rigid and severe creed which dominated his youth.
He gave up the forms, not the spirit, of worship. He lived the abundant life,
and all of the roads which he traveled led to God. His faith was as broad
as "the liberal marshes of Glynn". In the spirit of St. Francis he said: --
I am one with all the kinsmen things
That e'er my Father fathered.
--
* See especially the poem "Remonstrance".
--
Notwithstanding his vivid realization of the evil of dogma and of sect,
he maintained throughout his life a reverent faith; he could distinguish,
as Browning said Shelley could not, between churchdom and Christianity.
Not only in the "Crystal" and "A Ballad of Trees and the Master",
and in the spirit of nearly all of his poems, is this evident;
but throughout his lectures, essays, and letters he never missed
an opportunity to relate knowledge to faith.
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