Read it through once

“I answer, Have ye not to argue out {540} The very primal thesis, plainest law, --Man is not God but hath God’s end to serve, A master to obey, a course to take, Somewhat to cast off, somewhat to become? Grant this, then man must pass from old to new, {545} From vain to real, from mistake to fact, From what once seemed good, to what now proves best. How could man have progression otherwise? Before the point was mooted ‘What is God?’ No savage man inquired ‘What is myself?’ {550} Much less replied, ‘First, last, and best of things.’ Man takes that title now if he believes Might can exist with neither will nor love, In God’s case--what he names now Nature’s Law-- While in himself he recognizes love {555} No less than might and will: and rightly takes. Since if man prove the sole existent thing Where these combine, whatever their degree, However weak the might or will or love, So they be found there, put in evidence,-- {560} He is as surely higher in the scale Than any might with neither love nor will, As life, apparent in the poorest midge (When the faint dust-speck flits, ye guess its wing), Is marvellous beyond dead Atlas’ self-- {565} Given to the nobler midge for resting-place! Thus, man proves best and highest--God, in fine, And thus the victory leads but to defeat, The gain to loss, best rise to the worst fall, His life becomes impossible, which is death. {570}