As the crinoid star-fish to the sea-base
By his stem fixed draws bare subsistence in
His straitened sphere, as in the sunless ooze
He turns on his long jointed pedicle,
So are half-bruted men, barbarian-brained,
Endued with scarce more power to see and hear
The visions and the rumours of the world,
So poorly apt to think and feel and know,
As each turns on his dark time-pivot in
A universal ignorance, as it were
Far back in the beginning of the world;
Disjointed and dismembered in the mind,
And in the spirit so confused and foul,
With no sign of truth's authenticity,
As nature in their origin had jarred
The primal tone of man.