On Refusal of Aid between Nations

Not that the earth is changing, O my God!
Nor that the seasons totter in their walk,--
Not that the virulent ill of act and talk
Seethes ever as a winepress ever trod,--
Not therefore are we certain that the rod
Weighs in thine hand to smite thy world; though now
Beneath thine hand so many nations bow,
So many kings:--not therefore, O my God!--

But because Man is parcelled out in men
To-day; because, for any wrongful blow
No man not stricken asks, "I would be told
Why thou dost thus; "but his heart whispers then,
"He is he, I am I." By this we know
That our earth falls asunder, being old.