Bill Boram

FOREWORD In this strong and curiously beautiful poem, quotBill Boram, quot with its rush of tidal waters and its welter of elemental human passions, Mr. Norwood, it seems to my mind, has sought to epitomize the evolution of the spiritual universe, much as the writers of Holy Writ epitomize the evolution of the physical universe in that glorious choric outburst which we call the first chapter of the Book of Genesis. What matters it if the stage of the latter conflict, in place of embracing as does the former, the round world, the overhanging stars, all visible creation, is confined to the adventure in development of a single human soul Dare we, indeed, employ the term quotcon finedquot to that which no man yet has ever found con- finable or is there aught to do with quotgreatquot or quotsmallquot in the realm of that which can neither be seen nor handled quotThat was not first which is spiritual but that which is natural and afterwards that which is spiritualquot ... all things, no matter how gross their seeming, tend at the last to results.quot The quotspiritual poet has warranty for his philosophy not in Scripture alone but in the conclusions of the choicest and the vii most chosen of the race. For not only is it asked by the prophets what that is which man shall give quotin exchangequot for the soul, but it is demanded of man how and in what manner he shall weigh or measure that which when put into the balances with the quotwhole worldquot shows the world, by comparison, to be as light as a moulted feather. The physical universe with all its modifications from star-dust to organic life, we assume, had its birth amid convulsions of titanic forces poetically termed quotChaos and oldNight, quot and that at a period of time so re mote the contemplation of it staggers the intellect. That universe would now seem to be perfected, in cer tain details decadent though with regard to both sup positions the wisest of our scientists consent to hold but a tentative opinion. The spiritual universe so far at least as it apper tains to this planet, we believe to have had its incep tion at that stupendous moment when physical man first achieved an quotinward eye, quot became conscious not alone of th earth as an environmental fact but of himself as a thinking and an aspiring entity, an en tity curious and critical in regard to himself as also to the source and origin of himself ., . God, This spiritual beginning, we argue, took place at a period comparatively modern this side a million years while its perfectability presupposes the throes of an infinity. Is it too much, then, logically to reason that just as the physical universe rose amid a struggle of colossal material forces, so the spiritual universe, in viii the dawn of whose day we now dwell, is coming into being amid quotgroanings that cannot be utteredquot Our vision of the conflict in which humanity is immersed is myopic, we suffer a false perspective, we see men as trees walking and call their intentions and actions by uncouth and unphilosophic names. Thus that which we term quotsin, quot it is possible, may be but physical instinct raised to the plane where, by right, spiritual understanding should prevail. The two great instincts of the animal kingdom, it will be allowed, are the instincts of stomach hunger and of generative hunger...