Explore "Presumption" by Ella Wheeler Wilcox on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Whenever I am prone to doubt or wonder- / I check myself, and say, "That mighty One / Who made the solar system cannot blunder- / And for the best all things are being done. " / Who set the stars on their eternal courses / Has fashioned this strange earth by some sure plan. / Bow low, bow low to those majestic forces, / Nor dare to doubt their wisdom, puny man.
You cannot put one little star in motion, / You cannot shape one single forest leaf, / Nor fling a mountain up, nor sink an ocean, / Presumptuous pigmy, large with unbelief. / You cannot bring one dawn of regal splendour, / Nor bid the day to shadowy twilight fall, / Nor send the pale moon forth with radiance tender- / And dare you doubt the One who has done all?
"So much is wrong, there is such pain-such sinning. " / Yet look again-behold how much is right! / And He who formed the world from its beginning / Knows how to guide it upward to the light. / Your task, O man, is not to carp and cavil / At God's achievements, but with purpose strong / To cling to good, and turn away from evil. / That is the way to help the world along.