And there two Brahmans press their funeral-pile,
And sink to dust amid the whirling flames.
Each from his lisping infancy had heard
That Brahmans were a high and holy caste,
Too high and holy for the common touch,
And each had learned the Vedas' sacred lore.
But here they parted. One was cold and proud,
Drawing away from all the humbler castes
As made to toil, and only fit to serve.
The other found within those sacred books
That all were brothers, made of common clay,
And filled with life from one eternal source,
While Brahmans only elder brothers were,
With greater light to be his brother's guide,
With greater strength to give his brother aid;
That he alone a real Brahman was
Who had a Brahman's spirit, not his blood.
With patient toil from youth to hoary age
He taught the ignorant and helped the weak.
And now they come where all external pomp
And rank and caste and creed are nothing worth.
But when that proud and haughty Brahman saw
Poor Sudras and Chandalas clothed in white,
He swept away with proud and haughty scorn,
Swept on and down where heartless selfishness
Alone can find congenial company.
The other, full of joy, his brothers met,
And in sweet harmony they journeyed on
Where higher joys await the pure in heart.
And there he saw all ranks and grades and castes,
Chandala, Sudra, warrior, Brahman, prince,
The wise and ignorant, the strong and weak,
In all the stages of our mortal round
From lisping; infancy to palsied age,
By all the ways to human frailty known,
Enter that vale of shadows, deep and still,
Leaving behind their pomp and power and wealth,
Leaving their rags and wretchedness and want,
And cast-off bodies, dust to dust returned,
By flames consumed or moldering to decay,
While here the real character appeared,
All shows, hypocrisies and shams cast off,
So that a life of gentleness and love
Shines through the face and molds the outer form
To living beauty, blooming not to fade,
While every act of cruelty and crime
Seems like a gangrened ever-widening wound,
Wasting the very substance of the soul,
Marring its beauty, eating out its strength.
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