Analysis of All Roads That Lead To God Are Good

Ella Wheeler Wilcox 1855 (Janesville) – 1919



All roads that lead to God are good.
 What matters it, your faith, or mine?
 Both centre at the goal divine
Of love’s eternal Brotherhood.

The kindly life in house or street –
 The life of prayer and mystic rite –
 The student’s search for truth and light –
These paths at one great Junction meet.

Before the oldest book was writ,
 Full many a prehistoric soul
 Arrived at this unchanging goal,
Through changeless Love, that leads to it.

What matters that one found his Christ
 In rising sun, or burning fire?
 In faith within him did not tire,
His longing for the Truth sufficed.

Before our modern hell was brought
 To edify the modern world,
 Full many a hate-filled soul was hurled
In lakes of fire by its own thought.

A thousand creeds have come and gone,
 But what is that to you or me?
 Creeds are but branches of a tree –
The root of love lives on and on.

Though branch by branch proved withered wood,
 The root is warm with precious wine.
 Then keep your faith, and leave me mine –
All roads that lead to God are good.


Scheme Abba cddc effe ghhg ijji xkkx abbA
Poetic Form Quatrain  (86%)
Metre 11111111 11011111 11010101 1101010 01010111 01110101 01011101 11111101 01010111 11000101 01110101 1111111 11011111 010111010 010111110 11010101 011010111 1100101 110011111 011101111 01011101 11111111 11110101 01111101 11111101 01111101 11110111 11111111
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 1,030
Words 195
Sentences 13
Stanzas 7
Stanza Lengths 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4
Lines Amount 28
Letters per line (avg) 28
Words per line (avg) 7
Letters per stanza (avg) 113
Words per stanza (avg) 28
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 14, 2023

58 sec read
65

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Ella Wheeler Wilcox was an American author and poet. more…

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