Poems of Nature, Poems Subjective and Reminiscent and Religious Poems, Complete / Volume II of The Works of John Greenleaf Whittier

     Wake, sisters, wake! the day-star shines;
     Above Ephrata's eastern pines
     The dawn is breaking, cool and calm.
     Wake, sisters, wake to prayer and psalm!

     Praised be the Lord for shade and light,
     For toil by day, for rest by night!
     Praised be His name who deigns to bless
     Our Kedar of the wilderness!

     Our refuge when the spoiler's hand
     Was heavy on our native land;
     And freedom, to her children due,
     The wolf and vulture only knew.

     We praised Him when to prison led,
     We owned Him when the stake blazed red;
     We knew, whatever might befall,
     His love and power were over all.

     He heard our prayers; with outstretched arm
     He led us forth from cruel harm;
     Still, wheresoe'er our steps were bent,
     His cloud and fire before us went!

     The watch of faith and prayer He set,
     We kept it then, we keep it yet.
     At midnight, crow of cock, or noon,
     He cometh sure, He cometh soon.

     He comes to chasten, not destroy,
     To purge the earth from sin's alloy.
     At last, at last shall all confess
     His mercy as His righteousness.

     The dead shall live, the sick be whole,
     The scarlet sin be white as wool;
     No discord mar below, above,
     The music of eternal love!

     Sound, welcome trump, the last alarm!
     Lord God of hosts, make bare thine arm,
     Fulfil this day our long desire,
     Make sweet and clean the world with fire!

     Sweep, flaming besom, sweep from sight
     The lies of time; be swift to smite,
     Sharp sword of God, all idols down,
     Genevan creed and Roman crown.

     Quake, earth, through all thy zones, till all
     The fanes of pride and priesteraft fall;
     And lift thou up in place of them
     Thy gates of pearl, Jerusalem!

     Lo! rising from baptismal flame,
     Transfigured, glorious, yet the same,
     Within the heavenly city's bound
     Our Kloster Kedar shall be found.

     He cometh soon! at dawn or noon
     Or set of sun, He cometh soon.
     Our prayers shall meet Him on His way;
     Wake, sisters, wake! arise and pray!

     1877.

     Who gives and hides the giving hand,
     Nor counts on favor, fame, or praise,
     Shall find his smallest gift outweighs
     The burden of the sea and land.

     Who gives to whom hath naught been given,
     His gift in need, though small indeed
     As is the grass-blade's wind-blown seed,
     Is large as earth and rich as heaven.

     Forget it not, O man, to whom
     A gift shall fall, while yet on earth;
     Yea, even to thy seven-fold birth
     Recall it in the lives to come.

     Who broods above a wrong in thought
     Sins much; but greater sin is his
     Who, fed and clothed with kindnesses,
     Shall count the holy alms as nought.

     Who dares to curse the hands that bless
     Shall know of sin the deadliest cost;
     The patience of the heavens is lost
     Beholding man's unthankfulness.

     For he who breaks all laws may still
     In Sivam's mercy be forgiven;
     But none can save, in earth or heaven,
     The wretch who answers good with ill.

     1877.

     The Benedictine Echard
     Sat by the wayside well,
     Where Marsberg sees the bridal
     Of the Sarre and the Moselle.

     Fair with its sloping vineyards
     And tawny chestnut bloom,
     The happy vale Ausonius sunk
     For holy Treves made room.

     On the shrine Helena builded
     To keep the Christ coat well,
     On minster tower and kloster cross,
     The westering sunshine fell.

     There, where the rock-hewn circles
     O'erlooked the Roman's game,
     The veil of sleep fell on him,
     And his thought a dream became.

     He felt the heart of silence
     Throb with a soundless word,
     And by the inward ear alone
     A spirit's voice he heard.

     And the spoken word seemed written
     On air and wave and sod,
     And the bending walls of sapphire
     Blazed with the thought of God.

     "What lack I, O my children?
     All things are in my band;
     The vast earth and the awful stars
     I hold as grains of sand.

     "Need I your alms? The silver
     And gold are mine alone;
     The gifts ye bring before me
     Were evermore my own.

     "Heed I the noise of viols,
     Your pomp of masque and show?
     Have I not dawns and sunsets
     Have I not winds that blow?

     "Do I smell your gums of incense?
     Is my ear with chantings fed?
     Taste I your wine of worship,
     Or eat your holy bread?

     "Of rank and name and honors
     Am I vain as ye are vain?
     What can Eternal Fulness
     From your lip-service gain?

     "Ye make me not your debtor
     Who serve yourselves alone;
     Ye boast to me of homage
     Whose gain is all your own.

     "For you I gave the prophets,
     For you the Psalmist's lay
     For you the law's stone tables,
     And holy book and day.

     "Ye change to weary burdens
     The helps that should uplift;
     Ye lose in form the spirit,
     The Giver in the gift.

     "Who called ye to self-torment,
     To fast and penance vain?
     Dream ye Eternal Goodness
     Has joy in mortal pain?

     "For the death in life of Nitria,
     For your Chartreuse ever dumb,
     What better is the neighbor,
     Or happier the home?

     "Who counts his brother's welfare
     As sacred as his own,
     And loves, forgives, and pities,
     He serveth me alone.

     "I note each gracious purpose,
     Each kindly word and deed;
     Are ye not all my children?
     Shall not the Father heed?

     "No prayer for light and guidance
     Is lost upon mine ear
     The child's cry in the darkness
     Shall not the Father hear?

     "I loathe your wrangling councils,
     I tread upon your creeds;
     Who made ye mine avengers,
     Or told ye of my needs;

     "I bless men and ye curse them,
     I love them and ye hate;
     Ye bite and tear each other,
     I suffer long and wait.

     "Ye bow to ghastly symbols,
     To cross and scourge and thorn;
     Ye seek his Syrian manger
     Who in the heart is born.

     "For the dead Christ, not the living,
     Ye watch His empty grave,
     Whose life alone within you
     Has power to bless and save.

     "O blind ones, outward groping,
     The idle quest forego;
     Who listens to His inward voice
     Alone of Him shall know.

     "His love all love exceeding
     The heart must needs recall,
     Its self-surrendering freedom,
     Its loss that gaineth all.

     "Climb not the holy mountains,
     Their eagles know not me;
     Seek not the Blessed Islands,
     I dwell not in the sea.

     "Gone is the mount of Meru,
     The triple gods are gone,
     And, deaf to all the lama's prayers,
     The Buddha slumbers on.

     "No more from rocky Horeb
     The smitten waters gush;
     Fallen is Bethel's ladder,
     Quenched is the burning bush.

     "The jewels of the Urim
     And Thurnmim all are dim;
     The fire has left the altar,
     The sign the teraphim.

     "No more in ark or hill grove
     The Holiest abides;
     Not in the scroll's dead letter
     The eternal secret hides.

     "The eye shall fail that searches
     For me the hollow sky;
     The far is even as the near,
     The low is as the high.

     "What if the earth is hiding
     Her old faiths, long outworn?
     What is it to the changeless truth
     That yours shall fail in turn?

     "What if the o'erturned altar
     Lays bare the ancient lie?
     What if the dreams and legends
     Of the world's childhood die?

     "Have ye not still my witness
     Within yourselves alway,
     My hand that on the keys of life
     For bliss or bale I lay?

     "Still, in perpetual judgment,
     I hold assize within,
     With sure reward of holiness,
     And dread rebuke of sin.

     "A light, a guide, a warning,
     A presence ever near,
     Through the deep silence of the flesh
     I reach the inward ear.

     "My Gerizim and Ebal
     Are in each human soul,
     The still, small voice of blessing,
     And Sinai's thunder-roll.

     "The stern behest of duty,
     The doom-book open thrown,
     The heaven ye seek, the hell ye fear,
     Are with yourselves alone."

          .    .    .    .    .

     A gold and purple sunset
     Flowed down the broad Moselle;
     On hills of vine and meadow lands
     The peace of twilight fell.

     A slow, cool wind of evening
     Blew over leaf and bloom;
     And, faint and far, the Angelus
     Rang from Saint Matthew's tomb.

     Then up rose Master Echard,
     And marvelled: "Can it be
     That here, in dream and vision,
     The Lord hath talked with me?"

     He went his way; behind him
     The shrines of saintly dead,
     The holy coat and nail of cross,
     He left unvisited.

     He sought the vale of Eltzbach
     His burdened soul to free,
     Where the foot-hills of the Eifel
     Are glassed in Laachersee.

     And, in his Order's kloster,
     He sat, in night-long parle,
     With Tauler of the Friends of God,
     And Nicolas of Basle.

     And lo! the twain made answer
     "Yea, brother, even thus
     The Voice above all voices
     Hath spoken unto us.

     "The world will have its idols,
     And flesh and sense their sign
     But the blinded eyes shall open,
     And the gross ear be fine.

     "What if the vision tarry?
     God's time is always best;
     The true Light shall be witnessed,
     The Christ within confessed.

     "In mercy or in judgment
     He shall turn and overturn,
     Till the heart shall be His temple
     Where all of Him shall learn."

     With warning hand I mark Time's rapid flight
     From life's glad morning to its solemn night;
     Yet, through the dear God's love, I also show
     There's Light above me by the Shade below.

     1879.

     Stranger and traveller,
     Drink freely and bestow
     A kindly thought on her
     Who bade this fountain flow,
     Yet hath no other claim
     Than as the minister
     Of blessing in God's name.
     Drink, and in His peace go

     1879

     In the minister's morning sermon
     He had told of the primal fall,
     And how thenceforth the wrath of God
     Rested on each and all.

     And how of His will and pleasure,
     All souls, save a chosen few,
     Were doomed to the quenchless burning,
     And held in the way thereto.

     Yet never by faith's unreason
     A saintlier soul was tried,
     And never the harsh old lesson
     A tenderer heart belied.

     And, after the painful service
     On that pleasant Sabbath day,
     He walked with his little daughter
     Through the apple-bloom of May.

     Sweet in the fresh green meadows
     Sparrow and blackbird sung;
     Above him their tinted petals
     The blossoming orchards hung.

     Around on the wonderful glory
     The minister looked and smiled;
     "How good is the Lord who gives us
     These gifts from His hand, my child.

     "Behold in the bloom of apples
     And the violets in the sward
     A hint of the old, lost beauty
     Of the Garden of the Lord!"

     Then up spake the little maiden,
     Treading on snow and pink
     "O father! these pretty blossoms
     Are very wicked, I think.

     "Had there been no Garden of Eden
     There never had been a fall;
     And if never a tree had blossomed
     God would have loved us all."

     "Hush, child!" the father answered,
     "By His decree man fell;
     His ways are in clouds and darkness,
     But He doeth all things well.

     "And whether by His ordaining
     To us cometh good or ill,
     Joy or pain, or light or shadow,
     We must fear and love Him still."

     "Oh, I fear Him!" said the daughter,
     "And I try to love Him, too;
     But I wish He was good and gentle,
     Kind and loving as you."

     The minister groaned in spirit
     As the tremulous lips of pain
     And wide, wet eyes uplifted
     Questioned his own in vain.

     Bowing his head he pondered
     The words of the little one;
     Had he erred in his life-long teaching?
     Had he wrong to his Master done?

     To what grim and dreadful idol
     Had he lent the holiest name?
     Did his own heart, loving and human,
     The God of his worship shame?

     And lo! from the bloom and greenness,
     From the tender skies above,
     And the face of his little daughter,
     He read a lesson of love.

     No more as the cloudy terror
     Of Sinai's mount of law,
     But as Christ in the Syrian lilies
     The vision of God he saw.

     And, as when, in the clefts of Horeb,
     Of old was His presence known,
     The dread Ineffable Glory
     Was Infinite Goodness alone.

     Thereafter his hearers noted
     In his prayers a tenderer strain,
     And never the gospel of hatred
     Burned on his lips again.

     And the scoffing tongue was prayerful,
     And the blinded eyes found sight,
     And hearts, as flint aforetime,
     Grew soft in his warmth and light.

     1880.

     Call him not heretic whose works attest
     His faith in goodness by no creed confessed.
     Whatever in love's name is truly done
     To free the bound and lift the fallen one
     Is done to Christ. Whoso in deed and word
     Is not against Him labors for our Lord.
     When He, who, sad and weary, longing sore
     For love's sweet service, sought the sisters' door,
     One saw the heavenly, one the human guest,
     But who shall say which loved the Master best?

     1881.

     Voice of the Holy Spirit, making known
     Man to himself, a witness swift and sure,
     Warning, approving, true and wise and pure,
     Counsel and guidance that misleadeth none!
     By thee the mystery of life is read;
     The picture-writing of the world's gray seers,
     The myths and parables of the primal years,
     Whose letter kills, by thee interpreted
     Take healthful meanings fitted to our needs,
     And in the soul's vernacular express
     The common law of simple righteousness.
     Hatred of cant and doubt of human creeds
     May well be felt: the unpardonable sin
     Is to deny the Word of God within!

     1881.

     Gallery of sacred pictures manifold,
     A minster rich in holy effigies,
     And bearing on entablature and frieze
     The hieroglyphic oracles of old.
     Along its transept aureoled martyrs sit;
     And the low chancel side-lights half acquaint
     The eye with shrines of prophet, bard, and saint,
     Their age-dimmed tablets traced in doubtful writ!
     But only when on form and word obscure
     Falls from above the white supernal light
     We read the mystic characters aright,
     And life informs the silent portraiture,
     Until we pause at last, awe-held, before
     The One ineffable Face, love, wonder, and adore.

     1881

     We live by Faith; but Faith is not the slave
     Of text and legend. Reason's voice and God's,
     Nature's and Duty's, never are at odds.
     What asks our Father of His children, save
     Justice and mercy and humility,
     A reasonable service of good deeds,
     Pure living, tenderness to human needs,
     Reverence and trust, and prayer for light to see
     The Master's footprints in our daily ways?
     No knotted scourge nor sacrificial knife,
     But the calm beauty of an ordered life
     Whose very breathing is unworded praise!—
     A life that stands as all true lives have stood,
     Firm-rooted in the faith that God is Good.

     1881.

     Dream not, O Soul, that easy is the task
     Thus set before thee. If it proves at length,
     As well it may, beyond thy natural strength,
     Faint not, despair not. As a child may ask
     A father, pray the Everlasting Good
     For light and guidance midst the subtle snares
     Of sin thick planted in life's thoroughfares,
     For spiritual strength and moral hardihood;
     Still listening, through the noise of time and sense,
     To the still whisper of the Inward Word;
     Bitter in blame, sweet in approval heard,
     Itself its own confirming evidence
     To health of soul a voice to cheer and please,
     To guilt the wrath of the Eumenides.

     1881.

     But what avail inadequate words to reach
     The innermost of Truth? Who shall essay,
     Blinded and weak, to point and lead the way,
     Or solve the mystery in familiar speech?
     Yet, if it be that something not thy own,
     Some shadow of the Thought to which our schemes,
     Creeds, cult, and ritual are at best but dreams,
     Is even to thy unworthiness made known,
     Thou mayst not hide what yet thou shouldst not dare
     To utter lightly, lest on lips of thine
     The real seem false, the beauty undivine.
     So, weighing duty in the scale of prayer,
     Give what seems given thee. It may prove a seed
     Of goodness dropped in fallow-grounds of need.

     1881.

     The soul itself its awful witness is.
     Say not in evil doing, "No one sees,"
     And so offend the conscious One within,
     Whose ear can hear the silences of sin.

     Ere they find voice, whose eyes unsleeping see
     The secret motions of iniquity.
     Nor in thy folly say, "I am alone."
     For, seated in thy heart, as on a throne,
     The ancient Judge and Witness liveth still,
     To note thy act and thought; and as thy ill
     Or good goes from thee, far beyond thy reach,
     The solemn Doomsman's seal is set on each.

     1878.

     Before the Ender comes, whose charioteer
     Is swift or slow Disease, lay up each year
     Thy harvests of well-doing, wealth that kings
     Nor thieves can take away. When all the things
     Thou tallest thine, goods, pleasures, honors fall,
     Thou in thy virtue shalt survive them all.

     1881.

     Heed how thou livest. Do no act by day
     Which from the night shall drive thy peace away.
     In months of sun so live that months of rain
     Shall still be happy. Evermore restrain
     Evil and cherish good, so shall there be
     Another and a happier life for thee.

     1881.

     O dearest bloom the seasons know,
     Flowers of the Resurrection blow,
     Our hope and faith restore;
     And through the bitterness of death
     And loss and sorrow, breathe a breath
     Of life forevermore!

     The thought of Love Immortal blends
     With fond remembrances of friends;
     In you, O sacred flowers,
     By human love made doubly sweet,
     The heavenly and the earthly meet,
     The heart of Christ and ours!

     1882.

     "All hail!" the bells of Christmas rang,
     "All hail!" the monks at Christmas sang,
     The merry monks who kept with cheer
     The gladdest day of all their year.

     But still apart, unmoved thereat,
     A pious elder brother sat
     Silent, in his accustomed place,
     With God's sweet peace upon his face.

     "Why sitt'st thou thus?" his brethren cried.
     "It is the blessed Christmas-tide;
     The Christmas lights are all aglow,
     The sacred lilies bud and blow.

     "Above our heads the joy-bells ring,
     Without the happy children sing,
     And all God's creatures hail the morn
     On which the holy Christ was born!

     "Rejoice with us; no more rebuke
     Our gladness with thy quiet look."
     The gray monk answered: "Keep, I pray,
     Even as ye list, the Lord's birthday.

     "Let heathen Yule fires flicker red
     Where thronged refectory feasts are spread;
     With mystery-play and masque and mime
     And wait-songs speed the holy time!

     "The blindest faith may haply save;
     The Lord accepts the things we have;
     And reverence, howsoe'er it strays,
     May find at last the shining ways.

     "They needs must grope who cannot see,
     The blade before the ear must be;
     As ye are feeling I have felt,
     And where ye dwell I too have dwelt.

     "But now, beyond the things of sense,
     Beyond occasions and events,
     I know, through God's exceeding grace,
     Release from form and time and place.

     "I listen, from no mortal tongue,
     To hear the song the angels sung;
     And wait within myself to know
     The Christmas lilies bud and blow.

     "The outward symbols disappear
     From him whose inward sight is clear;
     And small must be the choice of clays
     To him who fills them all with praise!

     "Keep while you need it, brothers mine,
     With honest zeal your Christmas sign,
     But judge not him who every morn
     Feels in his heart the Lord Christ born!"

     1882.

     When on my day of life the night is falling,
     And, in the winds from unsunned spaces blown,
     I hear far voices out of darkness calling
     My feet to paths unknown,

     Thou who hast made my home of life so pleasant,
     Leave not its tenant when its walls decay;
     O Love Divine, O Helper ever present,
     Be Thou my strength and stay!

     Be near me when all else is from me drifting
     Earth, sky, home's pictures, days of shade and shine,
     And kindly faces to my own uplifting
     The love which answers mine.

     I have but Thee, my Father! let Thy spirit
     Be with me then to comfort and uphold;
     No gate of pearl, no branch of palm I merit,
     Nor street of shining gold.

     Suffice it if—my good and ill unreckoned,
     And both forgiven through Thy abounding grace—
     I find myself by hands familiar beckoned
     Unto my fitting place.

     Some humble door among Thy many mansions,
     Some sheltering shade where sin and striving cease,
     And flows forever through heaven's green expansions
     The river of Thy peace.

     There, from the music round about me stealing,
     I fain would learn the new and holy song,
     And find at last, beneath Thy trees of healing,
     The life for which I long.

     1882

     The shadows grow and deepen round me,
     I feel the deffall in the air;
     The muezzin of the darkening thicket,
     I hear the night-thrush call to prayer.

     The evening wind is sad with farewells,
     And loving hands unclasp from mine;
     Alone I go to meet the darkness
     Across an awful boundary-line.

     As from the lighted hearths behind me
     I pass with slow, reluctant feet,
     What waits me in the land of strangeness?
     What face shall smile, what voice shall greet?

     What space shall awe, what brightness blind me?
     What thunder-roll of music stun?
     What vast processions sweep before me
     Of shapes unknown beneath the sun?

     I shrink from unaccustomed glory,
     I dread the myriad-voiced strain;
     Give me the unforgotten faces,
     And let my lost ones speak again.

     He will not chide my mortal yearning
     Who is our Brother and our Friend;
     In whose full life, divine and human,
     The heavenly and the earthly blend.

     Mine be the joy of soul-communion,
     The sense of spiritual strength renewed,
     The reverence for the pure and holy,
     The dear delight of doing good.

     No fitting ear is mine to listen
     An endless anthem's rise and fall;
     No curious eye is mine to measure
     The pearl gate and the jasper wall.

     For love must needs be more than knowledge:
     What matter if I never know
     Why Aldebaran's star is ruddy,
     Or warmer Sirius white as snow!

     Forgive my human words, O Father!
     I go Thy larger truth to prove;
     Thy mercy shall transcend my longing
     I seek but love, and Thou art Love!

     I go to find my lost and mourned for
     Safe in Thy sheltering goodness still,
     And all that hope and faith foreshadow
     Made perfect in Thy holy will!

     1883.

     Weary of jangling noises never stilled,
     The skeptic's sneer, the bigot's hate, the din
     Of clashing texts, the webs of creed men spin
     Round simple truth, the children grown who build
     With gilded cards their new Jerusalem,
     Busy, with sacerdotal tailorings
     And tinsel gauds, bedizening holy things,
     I turn, with glad and grateful heart, from them
     To the sweet story of the Florentine
     Immortal in her blameless maidenhood,
     Beautiful as God's angels and as good;
     Feeling that life, even now, may be divine
     With love no wrong can ever change to hate,
     No sin make less than all-compassionate!

     1884.

     A tender child of summers three,
     Seeking her little bed at night,
     Paused on the dark stair timidly.
     "Oh, mother! Take my hand," said she,
     "And then the dark will all be light."

     We older children grope our way
     From dark behind to dark before;
     And only when our hands we lay,
     Dear Lord, in Thine, the night is day,
     And there is darkness nevermore.

     Reach downward to the sunless days
     Wherein our guides are blind as we,
     And faith is small and hope delays;
     Take Thou the hands of prayer we raise,
     And let us feel the light of Thee!

     1884.

     Smoothing soft the nestling head
     Of a maiden fancy-led,
     Thus a grave-eyed woman said:

     "Richest gifts are those we make,
     Dearer than the love we take
     That we give for love's own sake.

     "Well I know the heart's unrest;
     Mine has been the common quest,
     To be loved and therefore blest.

     "Favors undeserved were mine;
     At my feet as on a shrine
     Love has laid its gifts divine.

     "Sweet the offerings seemed, and yet
     With their sweetness came regret,
     And a sense of unpaid debt.

     "Heart of mine unsatisfied,
     Was it vanity or pride
     That a deeper joy denied?

     "Hands that ope but to receive
     Empty close; they only live
     Richly who can richly give.

     "Still," she sighed, with moistening eyes,
     "Love is sweet in any guise;
     But its best is sacrifice!

     "He who, giving, does not crave
     Likest is to Him who gave
     Life itself the loved to save.

     "Love, that self-forgetful gives,
     Sows surprise of ripened sheaves,
     Late or soon its own receives."

     1884.

     The tree of Faith its bare, dry boughs must shed
     That nearer heaven the living ones may climb;
     The false must fail, though from our shores of time
     The old lament be heard, "Great Pan is dead!"
     That wail is Error's, from his high place hurled;
     This sharp recoil is Evil undertrod;
     Our time's unrest, an angel sent of God
     Troubling with life the waters of the world.
     Even as they list the winds of the Spirit blow
     To turn or break our century-rusted vanes;
     Sands shift and waste; the rock alone remains
     Where, led of Heaven, the strong tides come and go,
     And storm-clouds, rent by thunderbolt and wind,
     Leave, free of mist, the permanent stars behind.

     Therefore I trust, although to outward sense
     Both true and false seem shaken; I will hold
     With newer light my reverence for the old,
     And calmly wait the births of Providence.
     No gain is lost; the clear-eyed saints look down
     Untroubled on the wreck of schemes and creeds;
     Love yet remains, its rosary of good deeds
     Counting in task-field and o'erpeopled town;
     Truth has charmed life; the Inward Word survives,
     And, day by day, its revelation brings;
     Faith, hope, and charity, whatsoever things
     Which cannot be shaken, stand. Still holy lives
     Reveal the Christ of whom the letter told,
     And the new gospel verifies the old.

     1885.

     I.
     The mercy, O Eternal One!
     By man unmeasured yet,
     In joy or grief, in shade or sun,
     I never will forget.
     I give the whole, and not a part,
     Of all Thou gayest me;
     My goods, my life, my soul and heart,
     I yield them all to Thee!

     II.
     We fast and plead, we weep and pray,
     From morning until even;
     We feel to find the holy way,
     We knock at the gate of heaven
     And when in silent awe we wait,
     And word and sign forbear,
     The hinges of the golden gate
     Move, soundless, to our prayer!
     Who hears the eternal harmonies
     Can heed no outward word;
     Blind to all else is he who sees
     The vision of the Lord!

     III.
     O soul, be patient, restrain thy tears,
     Have hope, and not despair;
     As a tender mother heareth her child
     God hears the penitent prayer.
     And not forever shall grief be thine;
     On the Heavenly Mother's breast,
     Washed clean and white in the waters of joy
     Shall His seeking child find rest.
     Console thyself with His word of grace,
     And cease thy wail of woe,
     For His mercy never an equal hath,
     And His love no bounds can know.
     Lean close unto Him in faith and hope;
     How many like thee have found
     In Him a shelter and home of peace,
     By His mercy compassed round!
     There, safe from sin and the sorrow it brings,
     They sing their grateful psalms,
     And rest, at noon, by the wells of God,
     In the shade of His holy palms!

     1885.

     Still, as of old, in Beavor's Vale,
     O man of God! our hope and faith
     The Elements and Stars assail,
     And the awed spirit holds its breath,
     Blown over by a wind of death.

     Takes Nature thought for such as we,
     What place her human atom fills,
     The weed-drift of her careless sea,
     The mist on her unheeding hills?
     What reeks she of our helpless wills?

     Strange god of Force, with fear, not love,
     Its trembling worshipper! Can prayer
     Reach the shut ear of Fate, or move
     Unpitying Energy to spare?
     What doth the cosmic Vastness care?

     In vain to this dread Unconcern
     For the All-Father's love we look;
     In vain, in quest of it, we turn
     The storied leaves of Nature's book,
     The prints her rocky tablets took.

     I pray for faith, I long to trust;
     I listen with my heart, and hear
     A Voice without a sound: "Be just,
     Be true, be merciful, revere
     The Word within thee: God is near!

     "A light to sky and earth unknown
     Pales all their lights: a mightier force
     Than theirs the powers of Nature own,
     And, to its goal as at its source,
     His Spirit moves the Universe.

     "Believe and trust. Through stars and suns,
     Through life and death, through soul and sense,
     His wise, paternal purpose runs;
     The darkness of His providence
     Is star-lit with benign intents."

     O joy supreme! I know the Voice,
     Like none beside on earth or sea;
     Yea, more, O soul of mine, rejoice,
     By all that He requires of me,
     I know what God himself must be.

     No picture to my aid I call,
     I shape no image in my prayer;
     I only know in Him is all
     Of life, light, beauty, everywhere,
     Eternal Goodness here and there!

     I know He is, and what He is,
     Whose one great purpose is the good
     Of all. I rest my soul on His
     Immortal Love and Fatherhood;
     And trust Him, as His children should.

     I fear no more. The clouded face
     Of Nature smiles; through all her things
     Of time and space and sense I trace
     The moving of the Spirit's wings,
     And hear the song of hope she sings.

     1886