The Story
of Saville
Then Saville perceived what is common to all who are linked with disciples of art,
That she stood without the holy of holies, an alien, a stranger, apart,
But she passed the portal and coined a word to comfort the desolate heart.
“Hearken, my dearest! You murmur because you fancy you have not done
Your stent to the utmost, have painted but one great picture,—but one!
You should rather thank God from a grateful heart you were gifted to do so much,
For manifold millions of men go by, nor help the world by a touch;
They loiter like lizards half frozen and maimed over the face of the rock,
And they front their kind with no message more true than a moan or a gibbering mock,—
But you! you are like to God in this, that out of your innermost thought
You have created and called to life a thing with deep potencies fraught,
And the work shall endure, inspiring and grand, when the worker hath fallen to dust,
And my soul hath a loftier stature today for looking on ‘Rupert’s Trust!’”
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