"After Reading a Child's Guide to Modern Physics"

The following is an excerpt from a poem by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden, what a cool name those initials are hiding) with the title that coincides with the title of this post.

This passion of our kind
For the process of finding out
Is a fact one can hardly doubt,
But I would rejoice in it more
If I knew more clearly what
We wanted the knowledge for,
Felt certain still that the mind
Is free to know or not.