_He saves the sheep, the goats he doth not save._ <br />So rang Tertullian's sentence, on the side <br />Of that unpitying Phrygian Sect which cried: <br />'Him can no fount of fresh forgiveness lave, <br /> <br />Who sins, once washed by the baptismal wave.'-- <br />So spake the fierce Tertullian. But she sighed, <br />The infant Church! of love she felt the tide <br />Stream on her from her Lord's yet recent grave. <br /> <br />And then she smiled; and in the Catacombs, <br />With eye suffused but heart inspired true, <br />On those walls subterranean, where she hid <br /> <br />Her head in ignominy, death, and tombs, <br />She her good Shepherd's hasty image drew-- <br />And on his shoulders, not a lamb, a kid.<br /><br />Matthew Arnold<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-good-shepherd-with-the-kid/
