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Judas
- FOR what wilt thou sell thy Lord?
- ‘For certain pieces of silver, since wealth buys the world’s good word.’
- But the world’s word, how canst thou hear it, while thy brothers cry scorn on thy name?
- And who shall thy bargain content thee, when thy brothers shall clothe thee with shame?
- For what shall thy brother be sold?
- ‘For the rosy garland of pleasure, and the coveted crown of gold.’
- But thy soul will turn them to thorns, and to heaviness binding thy head,
- While women are dying of shame, and children are crying for bread.
- For what wilt thou sell thy soul?
- ‘For the world.’ And what shall it profit, when thou shalt have gained the whole?
- What profit the things thou hast, if the thing thou art be so mean?
- Wilt thou fill, with the husks of having, the void of the might‐have‐been?
- ‘But, when my soul shall be gone,
- No more shall I fail to profit by all the deeds I have done!
- And wealth and the world and pleasure shall sing sweet songs in my ear
- When the stupid soul is silenced, which never would let me hear.
- ‘And if a void there should be
- I shall not feel it or know it; it will be nothing to me!’
- It will be nothing to thee, and thou shalt be nothing to men
- But a ghost whose treasure is lost, and who shall not find it again.
- ‘But I shall have pleasure and praise!’
- Praise shall not pleasure thee then, nor pleasure laugh in thy days:
- For as colour is not, without light, so happiness is not, without
- Thy Brother, the Lord whom thou soldest—and the soul that thou hast cast out!
