{
 "id": "henry-van-dyke-jr/the-unseen-altar",
 "title": "The Unseen Altar",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Henry van Dyke Jr.",
 "poet_slug": "henry-van-dyke-jr",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "The Poems of Henry Van Dyke: Now First Collected and Revised, with Many Hitherto Unpublished",
 "book_slug": "poems-now-first-collected",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 6,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1911,
  "venue": "The Poems of Henry Van Dyke: Now First Collected and Revised, with Many Hitherto Unpublished (1911)",
  "note": "Taken from the 1911 first collected edition. That is the printing this text comes from and the first to give the poem a title, not necessarily the poem's first appearance: the volume's own title page describes it as now first collected and revised, and eleven of these twelve poems had already been printed untitled in Out-of-Doors in the Holy Land (1908).",
  "uncertain": true,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsnowfirstcol00vanduoft"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/henry-van-dyke-jr_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
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   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/16134",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10679",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3525",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9372",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/29314",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/43094",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsofhenryvand00vandrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/buildersotherpoe00vandrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/toilingoffelixan00vandiala",
   "https://archive.org/details/musicotherpoems0000henr_c7v6",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsnowfirstcol00vanduoft",
   "https://archive.org/details/songsoutofdoors0000vand",
   "https://archive.org/details/thyseaisgreatour00vandiala",
   "https://archive.org/details/chosenpoems0000vand"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 24,
  "n_stanzas": 12,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 66,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Man the maker of cities is also a builder of altars:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Among his habitations he setteth tables for his god.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "He bringeth the beauty of the rocks to enrich them:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Marble and alabaster, porphyry, jasper and jade.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "He cometh with costly gifts to offer an oblation:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He would buy favour with the fairest of his flock.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Around the many altars I hear strange music arising:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Loud lamentations and shouting and singing and sighs.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I perceive also the pain and terror of their sacrifices:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I see the white marble wet with tears and with blood.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Then I said, These are the altars of ignorance:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Yet they are built by thy children, O God, who know thee not.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Surely thou wilt have pity upon them and lead them:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hast thou not prepared for them a table of peace?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Then the Lord mercifully sent his angel forth to lead me:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He led me through the temples, the holy place that is hidden.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Lo, there are multitudes kneeling in the silence of the spirit:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They are kneeling at the unseen altar of the lowly heart.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Here is plentiful forgiveness for the souls that are forgiving:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the joy of life is given unto all who long to give.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Here a Father’s hand upholdeth all who bear each other’s burdens:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the benediction falleth upon all who pray in love.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Surely this is the altar where the penitent find pardon:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the priest who hath blessed it forever is the Holy One of God.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}