His Greatest Seal: Poems by the Rev. Francis Quintin-Arthur
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 The Brain in Retrospect and Its Musings Philosophical Automated by Its Own Common or Central Sense
You wandering powers that occupy the top of man
Brain, possessing ability to whiz through winds
Seeking heights and depths physique cannot reach
Bilocating at will
Trilocating and multilocating
Willing voyage to Timbuktu in a flash
And actually getting there while your mantle is still here
Oh, incredible! Wondrous strange!
Penetrating ravines and gorges
Jungles and even the clouds
With eyes more powerful than binoculars
For binoculars cannot compare with brain’s eye—
Millions of billions of miles can he see
Some of the brain I must control
For he acts against my will
Nightmares I try to reject
Recollecting beautiful dreams
Seat of thought, guiding man to heights
Magnificent!
About four-score-and-ten percent unemployed?
So then do I seek usage of some of the rest
That seeing I may be less blind
And though blind still how glaring the mind’s eye
Even with this ten percent!
Amazing to think
That He who so powerful is
Before whom none is
Neither behind nor would be
But He only
- Who the miniscule ant that inches along
- And has lifeblood in his veins
- Did so artfully make
That He, same, would power lack
Abracadabras to pronounce
A mere serpent to conjure
For the sole purpose of speaking with Eve?
It baffles me to ponder
Why Egyptians would mar
ch headlong
Into the Red Sea.
Yes, there was the path,
But not meant for them.
They knew not how it was made
But for that it must be the work
Of the God of the Israelites,
For they had seen Him work other miracles.
Still they did not claim Him to be their God,
So why would He pave the way
For them to pursue their evil ways
Of suppressing other human beings?
Should their negative intelligence
Not have cautioned them
To stand still before the gates—
The gates of the Red Sea—and think?
Could they not see a trap
Right before their eyes
About to entangle them?
O intelligence! devoid of wisdom!
How disastrously blind!
So shall we be hurled also
Into any of the seas
With our chariots and sneakers and all
If our workings are suppressive
And not geared toward emancipation.
Springing in sooth from the Truth,
In the Sacred Script, black and white
Yet too simple a tale to merit credence
In some mortals’ macroscopic minds
Then consider especially the mystery
Respecting the Triune God
Too baffling for analysis
In man’s microscopic mind
Somnambulating still, temporal man?
Employ surplus of your human temporal brain—
So awesome a powerhouse
Cannot even explain own entire self
Employ then the time fruitfully awhile
Not doubting the good books twain
For greater part of own brain
Is yet to be accounted for
Delve into the realms
Only so far as is wise to go
For the sum of all mortal brain
Cannot elucidate nature divine
Would we hold in doubt creative abilities
Of He who made all that is?
Our brain itself, infinitesimal in comparison,
It cannot even fathom own self.
Even own evaluation in health,
An apothecary we seek as doctor
Who himself on same Author
Depends to be healed.
So, brain, stop wondering and heal thyself!
Medice, cura te ipsum!
You must reconnoiter from time to time.
Seek lengths and depths and widths and heights,
But ensure to return in good time
From those pernicious territories,
For if you come not back to your headquarters
To join forces for this requisite integration
But insist on being isolated
You would remain alienated
And you would be called a mind crazed,
Together with your complement.
You have to be intelligent enough to decipher
That you are meant to unite
For the full functioning of the brain.
I
Knowledge of Prime Mover
Before creation
Unfathomable!
For I AM existed alone
Sufficient unto Himself
But what before Him?
And that which or who precedes?
O Quest, are you going beyond bounds?
Is this not a sure way
Of posing wrong question?
Unnecessary!
So to know who was before
Is knowledge gained?
But to what purpose?
Ethics?
Don’t even bother! Ridiculous!
Empty knowledge
For mind circles to conclusive point
May as well rest anywhere in the circle
Useless journey
For you might as well unwind
To the very beginning of circle
To find Him
And there rely on Him in faith and hope and love.
II
So rest, Quest! rest!
You found Him
Before the search
Consider it a recreation
Of the brain
And admit limitation
Or else
Count yourself a nincompoop
For you enter forbidden realms
And despite warning
You trespass
Rest here, I plead
And let Him give you the Spirit
To know what’s to be gained in your limited area
So, having been a good forester
In the section gifted to you
By His grace
May you enter into His rest
And gain that lofty knowledge
You unlawfully sought to gain
Childlike faith
Simplicity
That’s how I can rise!
Desperately seeking aid of senses
To attain knowledge of God
Before deciding to believe
Absolute knowledge—
Too dangerous to seek on earth
For this attainment would destroy faith
Which is ladder to this knowledge sublime
So, smart brain, why destroy what you need
Should you not rather hold up this faith
Aiding it in its quest
Instead of pushing it too far
To seek this temporarily unattainable knowledge
When you are also not unaware
It’s a total waste of time and effort?
Pride of brain!
Use then your abilities
To advance by degrees
So that mature at last
You may exchange your faith
Saturated in hope and love
For knowledge that entails lasting joy
Your allotted task is here on earth!
No thoughts
All higgledy-piggledy
Full to brim
With uselessness
Non-productive
But Christ lives on
Conquering confusion
Tranquility expelling futile thoughts
To remain
Thus peace reigns again
To be cherished
In being protected
And nourished in His love
So peace returns home
From where it had wandered
And now is there to stay
For we seek constantly
To have full knowledge of You
That we may believe
Mystery above man
But man persists still
Despite warning
He seeks this now
And does not rest
He sits idle for this knowledge
Or may work hard trying to know a mystery
And in his foolish quest
Not devoid of its accompaniment—
Confusion—
He misses that which he can know of You on this earth
But that’s too limited for him
So he disregards as simplistic
And continues seeking to understand a mystery
To attain this knowledge of You
Is to be like You
And what does man do with such attainment
On the face of the earth?
Avaricious brain, cure yourself to think
Or think yourself a cure
For such mystery is only fit for the dead
Who through humility live in heaven
And find no mystery in God
But have knowledge duly and courageously attained
Through faith, hope and love
And should minds of creation—multifarious as thy are—
Conspire, God forbid,
To amalgamate to discern the almighty God,
His thinking and His ways,
Even then no part of Him
The sum of man can comprehend.
So, Brain, rest thyself!
Let you your limits keep
And mind what task
Your Maker assigns you!
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