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.
MEDIÆVAL
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 thy own keeping.
Only Thyself hath afflicted thee!
