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
  Even thus; because, for any wrongful blow,
    No man not stricken asks, `I would be told
Why thou dost strike'; but his heart whispers then,
  `He is he, I am I.' By this we know
    That the earth falls asunder, being old.
 
DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI