To None of Them Shall I Myself Bind

In their passionate zeal and zest

They declare their creed's the best,

Drawn from books that they’ve read

About men now long since dead.

Is all that their books claim true?

Might they contain some falsehood, too?

None of these men did I myself see,

And so, for me, there’s no guarantee

That all about them that is said

In the books these folks have read

Is really fully and entirely true,

As they so confidently argue.

There’s just no way I can really know

That those men were as these books show,

They being figures from a most distant age,

Who long ago departed this earthly stage

(Some might even have been fiction pure,

If they ever existed one can’t be sure).

This being the case, for myself I’ll say:

I won’t let blind belief to be my way.

If there’s any good that I might see

In their creeds that resonates with me,

That I can most heartily appreciate,

But my life I won’t let them dictate.  

I can take the good there I might find,

But to none of them shall I myself bind.