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THE CRUMBLING LIE

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Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · May 1, 1901

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 27, No. 18.

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“THE CRUMBLING LIE.”

By F. T. Elkin

Writ on a ruined palace in Cashmere.
“The end is nothing, and the end is near.”
What promptings of vain-glorious unbelief, What crushing mightiness of mortal grief, E’er wrought damnation in a work so brief?
Where is the hand that graved that dreary lie? Where is the heart once insincerely high? Dust!—as the dust the desert wind blows by.
O son of man — son of man’s baser part— The end is naught where naught is in the heart; Thy hand hath traced thy judgment—dust thou art.
The fault was thy poor self—the common crime; Self was the god and glory of thy prime, That failed and feebled with the weight of time.
Too close to earth! Things kindred to thy clay Called to the flesh, and found an easy prey, Then stole thy birthright—stole thy soul away.
For the day dawned, and evening drew her pall; Seasons recurred, and genius slipped the stall, And yet ye knew no purpose in it all.
Earth’s thousand types thy fallacy denied; Life died to life to keep thy need supplied; And yet of hand and heart, lo, thou hast lied.
Still a lone truth thru thine unreason ran: “The end is near!” Yea, verily, O man, The end was with thee when thy life began.
Fixed from the first, when life took shape and span, This steadfast truth reveals creation’s plan: Time’s great memorial to God is man.
Love gave thee life, and sang thy cradle song; Love whispered when the way was rough or wrong; Love mourned the failure, mourned thee sore and long.
O, how shall Love forgive the fool whose life With sacrilege and blasphemy is rife, Who spurs the world to fear and doubt and strife? Mark 3:29.
With seeing eyes and ears attuned to hear, Then had this message quickened all Cashmere: “The end is Love, and love is ever near.”
Alamosa, Colo.                     F. T. ELKIN.