Rudyard Kipling

Natural Theology

              Primitive


I ate  my fill of a whale that died
    And stranded after a month at sea.   .   .   .
There is a pain in my inside.
  Why have the Gods afflicted me?
Ow!   I am purged till I am a wraith!
 Wow!   I am sick till I cannot see!
What is the sense of Religion and Faith :
  Look how the Gods have afflicted me!


                 Pagan

How can the skin of rat or mouse hold
  Anything more than a harmless flea?.   .   .
The burning plague has taken my household.
  Why have my Gods afflicted me?
All my kith and kin are deceased,
  Though they were as good as good could be,
I will out and batter the family priest,
  Because my Gods have afflicted me!


              Medi/Eval

My privy and well drain into each other
  After the custom of Christendie.   .   .   .
Fevers and fluxes are wasting my mother.
  Why has the Lord afflicted me?
The Saints are helpless for all I offer--
  So are the clergy I used to fee.
Henceforward I keep my cash in my coffer,
  Because the Lord has afflicted me.


              Material

I run eight hundred hens to the acre
  They die by dozens mysteriously.   .   .   .
I am more than doubtful concerning my Maker,
  Why has the Lord afflicted me?
What a return for all my endeavour--
  Not to mention the L. S. D!
I am an atheist now and for ever,
  Because this God has afflicted me!


              Progressive

Money spent on an Army or Fleet
  Is homicidal lunacy.   .   .   .
My son has been killed in the Mons retreat,
  Why is the Lord afflicting me?
Why are murder, pillage and arson
  And rape allowed by the Deity?
I will write to the Times, deriding our parson
  Because my God has afflicted me.


                 Chorus

We had a kettle: we let it leak:
  Our not repairing it made it worse.
We haven't had any tea for a week.   .   .
  The bottom is out of the Universe!


                Conclusion

This was none of the good Lord's pleasure,
   For the Spirit He breathed in Man is free;
But what comes after is measure for measure,
   And not a God that afflicteth thee.
As was the sowing so the reaping
  Is now and evermore shall be.
Thou art delivered to thine own keeping.
  Only  Thyself hath afflicted thee!