And is it so with them? After long years, Do they remember me in the same way, And is the memory pleasant as to me?
I fear to ask; yet wherefore are my fears? Pleasures, like flowers, may wither and decay, And yet the root perennial may be.
FROM "THE NEW ENGLAND TRAGEDIES."
And as the flowing of the ocean fills
Each creek and branch thereof, and then retires, Leaving behind a sweet and wholesome savor; So doth the virtue and the life of God Flow evermore into the hearts of those Whom He hath made partakers of His nature; And, when it but withdraws itself a little, Leaves a sweet savor after it, that many Can say they are made clean by every word That He hath spoken to them in their silence.
Let us, then, labor for an inward stillness, An inward stillness and an inward healing; That perfect silence where the lips and heart Are still, and we no longer entertain Our own imperfect thoughts and vain opinions, But God alone speaks in us, and we wait In singleness of heart, that we may know His will, and in the silence of our spirits, That we may do His will, and do that only!
Slowly, slowly up the wall
Steals the sunshine, steals the shade; Evening damps begin to fall,
Evening shadows are displayed. Round me, o'er me, everywhere, All the sky is grand with clouds, And athwart the evening air
Wheel the swallows home in crowds. Shafts of sunshine from the west
Paint the dusky windows red; Darker shadows, deeper rest, Underneath and overhead. Darker, darker, and more wan, In my breast the shadows fall; Upward steals the life of man, As the sunshine from the wall. From the wall into the sky,
From the roof along the spire; Ah, the souls of those that die Are but sunbeams lifted higher.
Time has laid his hand
Upon my heart, gently, not smiting it, But as a harper lays his open palm
Upon his harp, to deaden its vibrations.
O Friends! with whom my feet have trod The quiet aisles of prayer,
Glad witness to your zeal for God And love of man I bear.
I trace your lines of argument; Your logic linked and strong I weigh as one who dreads dissent, And fears a doubt as wrong.
But still my human hands are weak To hold your iron creeds: Against the words ye bid me speak My heart within me pleads.
Who fathoms the Eternal Thought? Who talks of scheme and plan? The Lord is God! He needeth not poor device of man.
I walk with bare, hushed feet the ground Ye tread with boldness shod;
I dare not fix with mete and bound
The love and power of God.
Ye praise His justice; even such His pitying love I deem :
Ye seek a king; I fain would touch The robe that hath no seam.
Ye see the curse which overbroods A world of pain and loss; I hear our Lord's beatitudes And prayer upon the cross.
More than your schoolmen teach, within Myself, alas! I know;
Too dark ye cannot paint the sin, Too small the merit show.
I bow my forehead to the dust, I veil mine eyes for shame, And urge, in trembling self-distrust, A prayer without a claim.
I see the wrong that round me lies, I feel the guilt within ;
I hear, with groan and travail-cries, The world confess its sin.
Yet, in the maddening maze of things, And tossed by storm and flood,
To one fixed stake my spirit clings; I know that God is good!
Not mine to look where cherubim And seraphs may not see, But nothing can be good in Him Which evil is in me.
The wrong that pains my soul below I dare not throne above:
I know not of His hate,-I know His goodness and His love.
I dimly guess from blessings known Of greater out of sight,
And, with the chastened Psalmist, own His judgments too are right.
I long for household voices gone, For vanished smiles I long, But God hath led my dear ones on, And He can do no wrong.
I know not what the future hath Of marvel or surprise,
Assured alone that life and death His mercy underlies.
And if my heart and flesh are weak To bear an untried pain, The bruised reed He will not break, But strengthen and sustain.
No offering of my own I have,
Nor works my faith to prove ;
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