Are the clouds that wander by
But the offspring of mine eye,
Born with every glance I cast,
Perishing when that is past ?
But the offspring of mine eye,
Born with every glance I cast,
Perishing when that is past ?
Warner - World's Best Literature - v28 - Songs, Hymns, Lyrics
—
I see your gentle ghosts arise ;
You look at me with mournful eyes,
And then the night grows vague and vast:
You have gone back to Paradise.
Why did you fleet away, dear days?
You were so welcome when you came!
The morning skies were all aflame;
The birds sang matins in your praise:
All else of life you put to shame.
Did I not honor you aright, -
I, who but lived to see you shine,
Who felt your very pain divine,
Thanked God and warmed me in your light,
Or quaffed your tears as they were wine ?
What wooed you to those stranger skies, —
What love more fond, what dreams more fair,
What music whispered in the air ?
What soft delight of smiles and sighs
Enchanted you from otherwhere ?
You left no pledges when you went:
The years since then are bleak and cold;
No bursting buds the Junes unfold.
While you were here my all I spent;
Now I am poor and sad and old.
LOUISE CHANDLER MOULTON.
A REVERY OF BOYHOOD
(THIRTEENTH CENTURY)
T
HERE we children used to play,
Through the meadows and
away,
Looking 'mid the grassy maze
For the violets; those days
Long ago
Saw them grow:
Now one sees the cattle graze.
XXVIII-1052
## p. 16818 (#518) ##########################################
16818
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
I remember as we fared
Through the blossoms, we compared
Which the prettiest might be:
We were little things, you see.
On the ground
Wreaths we bound;
So it goes, our youth and we.
Over stick and stone we went
Till the sunny day was spent;
Hunting strawberries, each skirts
From the beeches to the firs,
Till - Hello,
Children! Go
Home, they cry — the foresters.
HEINRICH VON MORUNGEN.
Translation of Edward T. McLaughlin.
TWILIGHT
I
SAW her walking in the rain,
And sweetly drew she nigh;
And then she crossed the hills again
To bid the day good-by.
«Good-by! good-by!
The world is dim as sorrow;
But close beside the morning sky
I'll say a glad Good-morrow! »
O dweller in the darling wood,
When near to death I lie,
Come from your leafy solitude,
And bid my soul good-by.
Good-by! good-by!
The world is dim as sorrow;
But close beside the morning sky
O say a glad Good-morrow!
ETHELWYN WETHERALD.
## p. 16819 (#519) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16819
THE HIGHWAY
TE
He highway lies all bare and brown,
A naked line across the down
Worn by a hundred hurrying feet.
The tide of life along it flows,
And busy commerce comes and goes.
Where once the grass grew green and sweet
The world's fierce pulses beat.
Well for the highway that it lies
The passageway of great emprise!
Yet from its dust what voices cry,-
Voices of soft green growing things
Trampled and torn from earth which clings
Too closely, unperceiving why
Its darling bairns must die.
*
***
My heart's a highway, trodden down
By many a traveler of renown,-
Grave Thought and burden-bearing Deeds.
And strong Achievement's envoy fares,
With laughing Joys and crowding Cares,
Along the road that worldward leads —
Once rank with foolish weeds.
Glad is my heart to hear them pass,
Yet sometimes breathes a low "Alas!
The tender springing things that grew-
The nursling hopes their feet destroyed,
Sweet ignorant dreams that youth enjoyed
That blossomed there the long year through-
Would I could have them too!
LOUISE BETTS EDWARDS.
## p. 16820 (#520) ##########################################
16820
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
OLD
B
Y THE wayside, on a mossy stone,
Sat a hoary pilgrim sadly musing:
Oft I marked him sitting there alone,
All the landscape like a page perusing;
Poor, unknown,
By the wayside, on a mossy stone.
Buckled knee and shoe, and broad-rimmed hat,
Coat as ancient as the form 'twas folding,
Silver buttons, queue, and crimped cravat,
Oaken staff his feeble hand upholding: -
There he sat!
Buckled knee and shoe, and broad-rimmed hat.
Seemed it pitiful he should sit there,
No one sympathizing, no one heeding,
None to love him for his thin gray hair,
And the furrows all so mutely pleading
Age and care:
Seemed it pitiful he should sit there.
It was summer, and we went to school,
Dapper country lads and little maidens,
Taught the motto of the “dunce's stool”.
Its grave import still my fancy ladens:
«Here's a fool! »
It was summer, and we went to school.
Still, in sooth, our tasks we seldom tried, -
Sportive pastime only worth our learning;
But we listened when the old man sighed,
And that lesson to our hearts went burning,
And we cried !
Still, in sooth, our tasks we seldom tried.
When a stranger seemed to mark our play,
(Some of us were joyous, some sad-hearted,)
I remember well — too well — that day!
Oftentimes the tears unbidden started,
Would not stay!
When the stranger seemed to mark our play.
When we cautiously adventured nigh,
We could see his lips with anguish quiver;
## p. 16821 (#521) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
1682 1
Yet no word he uttered, but his eye
Seemed in mournful converse with the river
Murmuring by,
When we cautiously adventured nigh.
One sweet spirit broke the silent spell:
Ah! to me her name was always heaven!
She besought him all his grief to tell –
(I was then thirteen, and she eleven)
Isabel!
One sweet spirit broke the silent spell.
Softly asked she with a voice divine:
“Why so lonely hast thou wandered hither?
Hast no home? — then come with me to mine;
There's our cottage, let me lead thee thither.
Why repine ? ”
Softly asked she with a voice divine.
»
"Angel,” said he sadly, I am old;
Earthly hope no longer hath a morrow:
Yet why I sit here thou shalt be told. ”
Then his eye betrayed a pearl of sorrow:
Down it rolled ; -
“Angel,” said he sadly, “I am old!
“I have tottered here to look once more
On the pleasant scene where I delighted
In the careless, happy days of yore,
Ere the garden of my heart was blighted
To the core !
I have tottered here to look once more!
"All the picture now to me how dear!
E'en this gray old rock where I am seated
Seems a jewel worth my journey here;
Ah, that such a scene should be completed
With a tear!
All the picture now to me how dear!
«Old stone school-house! - it is still the same!
There's the very step so oft I mounted;
There's the window creaking in its frame,
And the notches that I cut and counted
For the game:
Old stone school-house! it is still the same!
## p. 16822 (#522) ##########################################
16822
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
«In the cottage yonder I was born —
Long my happy home, that humble dwelling:
There the fields of clover, wheat, and corn,
There the spring with limpid nectar swelling :
Ah, forlorn!
In the cottage yonder I was born.
(C
“Those two gateway sycamores you see —
They were planted just so far asunder
That long well-pole from the path to free,
And the wagon to pass safely under -
Ninety-three!
Those two gateway sycamores you see.
« There's the orchard where we used to climb,
When my mates and I were boys together;
Thinking nothing of the flight of time,
Fearing naught but work and rainy weather:
Past its prime!
There's the orchard where we used to climb.
« There the rude three-cornered chestnut rails,
Round the pasture where the flocks were grazing,
Where so sly I used to watch for quails
In the crops of buckwheat we were raising;
Traps and trails. -
There the rude three-cornered chestnut rails.
«How in summer have I traced that stream,
There through mead and woodland sweetly gliding,
Luring simple trout with many a scheme,
From the nooks where I have found them hiding:
All a dream!
How in summer have I traced that stream.
« There's the mill that ground our yellow grain;
Pond, and river still serenely flowing;
Cot, there nestling in the shaded lane,
Where the lily of my heart was blowing –
Mary Jane!
There's the mill that ground our yellow grain.
« There's the gate on which I used to swing,
Brook, and bridge, and barn, and old red gable;
But alas! the morn shall no more bring
That dear group around my father's table:
## p. 16823 (#523) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16823
Taken wing!
There's the gate on which I used to swing.
“I am fleeing! — all I loved are fled;
Yon green meadow was our place for playing;
That old tree can tell of sweet things said,
When around it Jane and I were straying:
She is dead!
I am fleeing ! - all I loved have fled!
« Yon white spire,- a pencil on the sky,
Tracing silently life's changeful story,
So familiar to my dim old eye,
Points me to seven who are now in glory
There on high!
Yon white spire,- a pencil on the sky.
«Oft the aisle of that old church we trod,
Guided thither by an angel mother;
Now she sleeps beneath its sacred sod,
Sire and sisters, and my little brother:
Gone to God!
Oft the aisle of that old church we trod.
« There I heard of Wisdom's pleasant ways;
Bless the holy lesson! — but ah, never
Shall I hear again those songs of praise,
Those sweet voices silent now forever!
Peaceful days!
There I heard of Wisdom's pleasant ways.
“There my Mary blest me with her hand,
When our souls drank in the nuptial blessing,–
Ere she hastened to the spirit land,
Yonder turf her gentle bosom pressing:
Broken band!
There my Mary blest me with her hand.
“I have come to see that grave once more,
And the sacred place where we delighted,
Where we worshiped in the days of yore,
Ere the garden of my heart was blighted
To the core !
I have come to see that grave once more.
“Haply, ere the verdure there shall fade,
I, all withering with years, shall perish;
## p. 16824 (#524) ##########################################
16824
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
With my Mary may I there be laid,
Join forever — all the wish I cherish -
Her dear shade!
Haply, ere the verdure there shall fade.
"Angel,” said he sadly, "I am old!
Earthly hope no longer hath a morrow;
Now why I sit here thou hast been told. ” –
In his eye another pearl of sorrow
Down it rolled!
“Angel,” said he sadly, "I am old!
By the wayside, on a mossy stone,
Sat the hoary pilgrim, sadly musing:
Still I marked him sitting there alone,
All the landscape like a page perusing;
Poor, unknown,
By the wayside, on a mossy stone.
RALPH HOYT.
THE PRIME OF LIFE
Jº
Ust as I thought I was growing old,
Ready to sit in my easy-chair,
To watch the world with a heart grown cold,
And smile at a folly I would not share,
Rose came by with a smile for me,-
And I am thinking that forty year
Isn't the age that it seems to be,
When two pretty brown eyes are near.
Bless me, of life it is just the prime ! -
A fact that I hope she will understand ;-
And forty year is a perfect rhyme
To dark-brown eyes and a pretty hand.
These gray hairs are by chance, you see,–
Boys are sometimes gray, I am told.
Rose came by with a smile for me,
Just as I thought I was getting old.
WALTER LEARNED.
## p. 16825 (#525) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16825
THE OLD
T"
WHEY are waiting on the shore
For the bark to take them home:
They will toil and grieve no more;
The hour for release hath come.
All their long life lies behind,
Like a dimly blending dream;
There is nothing left to bind
To the realms that only seem.
They are waiting for the boat;
There is nothing left to do:
What was near them grows remote,
Happy silence falls like dew;
Now the shadowy bark is come,
And the weary may go home.
By still water they would rest,
In the shadow of the tree;
After battle, sleep is best,
After noise, tranquillity,
RODEN NOËL.
THE GREAT BREATH
I"
Ts edges foamed with amethyst and rose,
Withers once more the old blue flower of day;
There where the ether like a diamond glows,
Its petals fade away.
A shadowy tumult stirs the dusky air;
Sparkle the delicate dews, the distant snows;
The great deep thrills, for through it everywhere
The breath of Beauty blows.
I saw how all the trembling ages past,
Molded to her by deep and deeper breath,
Neared to the hour when Beauty breathes her last
And knows herself in death.
G. W. RUSSELL.
## p. 16826 (#526) ##########################################
16826
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
THE REFUSAL OF CHARON *
"W"
Hy look the distant mountains
So gloomy and so drear?
Are rain-clouds passing o'er them,
Or is the tempest near ? » —
«No shadow of the tempest
Is there, nor wind, nor rain,-
'Tis Charon that is passing by,
With all his gloomy train.
“The young men march before him
In all their strength and pride;
The tender little infants,
They totter by his side;
The old men walk behind him,
And earnestly they pray-
Both old and young imploring him
To grant some brief delay. ” —
“O Charon! halt, we pray thee,
By yonder little town,
Or near that sparkling fountain,
Where the waters wimple down!
The old will drink and be refreshed,
The young the disk will fing,
And the tender little children
Pluck flowers beside the spring. ”.
“I will not stay my journey,
Nor halt by any town,
Near any sparkling fountain,
Where the waters wimple down:
The mothers coming to the well
Would know the babes they bore;
The wives would clasp their husbands,
Nor could I part them more. ”
Romaic.
* Modern Greek poetry assigns to Charon, not only the duty of ferrying his
cargo across the Styx, but the function formerly assumed by Hermes, of con-
ducting the souls of the dead to the underworld.
## p. 16827 (#527) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16827
THE WILD RIDE
I
HEAR in my heart, I hear in its ominous pulses,
All day the commotion of sinewy, mane-tossing horses,
All night from their cells the importunate tramping and neighing.
Cowards and laggards fall back; but alert to the saddle, [legion,
Straight, grim, and abreast, vault our weather-worn, galloping
With stirrup-cup each to the one gracious woman that loves him.
The road is through dolor and dread, over crags and morasses;
There are shapes by the way, there are things to entice us:
What odds? We are knights, and our souls are but bent on the
riding.
Thought's self is a vanishing wing, and joy is a cobweb,
And friendship a flower in the dust, and her pitiful beauty!
We hurry with never a word in the track of our fathers.
I hear in my heart, I hear in its ominous pulses,
All day the commotion of sinewy, mane-tossing horses,
All night from their cells the importunate tramping and neighing.
We spur to a land of no name, outracing the storm-wind;
We leap to the infinite dark, like the sparks from the anvil.
Thou leadest, O God! All's well with thy Troopers that follow!
LOUISE IMOGEN GUINEY.
THE FRONTIER
O
SOLDIER, treading through the long day's heat,
With tattered banner and with drooping crest, —
Now as the sun sinks down thy purpled West,
Thou who hast come so far with aching feet,
Thou who must march and never canst retreat,
Art thou not weary of the bootless quest ?
Look'st thou not forward to a time of rest?
Sweet will it be — beyond all telling sweet-
After long marches with red danger fraught,
The wakeful bivouac, the assault and flight-
After thy scars of glory; sore distraught -
To camp afar, beyond defeat and fight,
Wrapped in the blanket of a dreamless night,
Out past the pickets and the tents of thought!
LLOYD MIFFLIN.
## p. 16828 (#528) ##########################################
16828
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
FREEDOM OF THE MIND
H"
IGH walls and huge the body may confine,
And iron grates obstruct the prisoner's gaze,
And massive bolts may baffle his design,
And vigilant keepers watch his devious ways;
Yet scorns the immortal mind this base control!
No chains can bind it, and no cell inclose:
Swifter than light it flies from Pole to Pole,
And in a flash from earth to heaven goes!
It leaps from mount to mount — from vale to vale
It wanders, plucking honeyed fruits and flowers;
It visits home, to hear the fireside tale,
Or in sweet converse pass the joyous hours;
'Tis up before the sun, roaming afar,
And in its watches wearies every star!
WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON.
THE CLOISTER
T:
HOUGHT never knew material bound or place,
Nor footsteps may the roving fancy trace:
Peace cannot learn beneath a roof to house,
Nor cloister hold us safe within our vows.
The cloistered heart may brave the common air,
And the world's children breathe the holiest prayer:
Build for us, Lord, and in thy temple reign!
Watch with us, Lord, our watchman wakes in vain!
LYDIA MARIA Child.
MY MINDE TO ME A KINGDOM IS
M
Y MINDE to me a kingdom is;
Such perfect joy wherein I finde
As farre exceeds all earthly blisse
That God or nature hath assignde;
Though much I want that most would have,
Yet still my minde forbids to crave.
Content I live; this is my stay, —
I seek no more than may suffice.
## p. 16829 (#529) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16829
I presse to beare no haughtie sway;
Look! what I lack my mind supplies.
Loe, thus I triumph like a king,
Content with that my minde doth bring.
I see how plentie surfets oft,
And hastie clyinbers soon do fall;
I see that such as sit aloft
Mishap doth threaten most of all.
These get with toile, and keepe with feare;
Such cares my mind could never beare.
Some have too much, yet still they crave;
I little have, yet seek no more :
They are but poore, though much they have,
And I am rich with little store:
They poor, I rich; they beg, I give;
They lacke, I lend; they pine, I live.
.
I wish but what I have at will;
I wander not to seeke for more;
I like the plaine, I clime no hill;
In greatest storms I sitte on shore,
And laugh at them that toile in vaine
To get what must be lost againe.
The court ne cart I like ne loath,-
Extreames are counted worst of all;
The golden meane betwixt them both
Doth surest sit, and feares no fall:
This is my choyce; for why? -I finde
No wealth is like a quiet minde.
My wealth is health and perfect ease;
My conscience clere my chiefe defence;
I neither seeke by bribes to please,
Nor by desert to breed offence.
Thus do I live: thus will I die:
Would all did so as well as I!
SIR EDWARD DYER.
## p. 16830 (#530) ##########################################
168 30
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
THOUGHT
Thor
HOUGHT is deeper than all speech,
Feeling deeper than all thought:
Souls to souls can never teach
What unto themselves was taught.
We are spirits clad in veils;
Man by man was never seen:
All our deep communing fails
To remove the shadowy screen.
Heart to heart was never known;
Mind with mind did never meet:
We are columns left alone
Of a temple once complete.
Like the stars that gem the sky,
Far apart though seeming near,
In our light we scattered lie;
All is thus but starlight here.
What is social company
But a babbling summer stream ?
What our wise philosophy
But the glancing of a dream ?
Only when the sun of love
Melts the scattered stars of thought,
Only when we live above
What the dim-eyed world hath taught,
Only when our souls are fed
By the fount which gave them birth,
And by inspiration led
Which they never drew from earth,
We, like parted drops of rain,
Swelling till they meet and run,
Shall be all absorbed again,
Melting, flowing into one.
CHRISTOPHER PEARSE CRANCH.
## p. 16831 (#531) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16831
QUESTIONINGS
H*
ATH this world without me wrought
Other substance than my thought ?
Lives it by my sense alone,
Or by essence of its own ?
Will its life, with mine begun,
Cease to be when that is done,
Or another consciousness
With the selfsame forms impress?
Doth yon fire-ball poised in air
Hang by my permission there?
Are the clouds that wander by
But the offspring of mine eye,
Born with every glance I cast,
Perishing when that is past ?
And those thousand thousand eyes,
Scattered through the twinkling skies —
Do they draw their life from mine,
Or of their own beauty shine ?
Now I close my eyes, my ears,
And creation disappears;
Yet if I but speak the word,
All creation is restored.
Or— more wonderful — within,
N creations do begin;
Hues more bright and forms more rare
Than reality doth wear
Flash across my inward sense,
Born of mind's omnipotence.
Soul, that all informest, say!
Shall these glories pass away?
Will those planets cease to blaze
When these eyes no longer gaze ?
And the life of things be o'er,
When these pulses beat no more?
Thought! that in me works and lives, -
Life to all things living gives -
Art thou not thyself, perchance,
But the universe in trance ?
A reflection inly flung
By that world thou fanciedst sprung
-
## p. 16832 (#532) ##########################################
16832
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
From thyself, - thyself a dream, -
Of the world's thinking, thou the theme?
Be it thus, or be thy birth
From a source above the earth,-.
Be thou matter, be thou mind,
In thee alone myself I find,
And through thee alone, for me,
Hath this world reality.
Therefore in thee will I live;
To thee all myself will give:
Losing still, that I may find
This bounded self in boundless mind.
FREDERIC HENRY HEDGE.
ANCIENT GUEBER HYMN
W*
HERE goest thou, keen soul of heat,
So bright, so light, so fleet;
Whose wing was never downward bent,
Aye pluming for ascent?
Where goest thou, when, breaking loose
From all mechanic use,
From beacon-head and altar-stone
And hearth of mortal flown,
Thou spreadest through the air apace,
Dissolving in wide space ?
Continually the waters fall;
Springs, torrents, rivers, — all,
Drawn downward to the gathering deep,
Remain within its keep.
But thou to the empyrean sea,
Bright upward stream, dost flee,
Where stars and sun are lost to sight,
Drowned in exceeding light!
Continually, in strength and pride,
The great ships cut the tide;
The waters fall, and these descend
Unto their journey's end.
But who, upborne on wing of thine,
Shall reach thy goal divine ?
## p. 16833 (#533) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16833
Thither, O rapt and holy Fire,
Thither, bid me aspire,
That when my spirit's flame burns free,
It shall ascend with thee.
FLAMMANTIS MENIA MUNDI *
STOOD alone in purple space, and saw
The burning walls of the world, like wings of flame
Circling the sphere: there was no break nor flaw
In those vast airy battlements whence came
The spirits who had done with time and fame
And all the playthings of earth's little hour;
I saw them each, I knew them for the same,
Mothers and brothers and the sons of power.
Yet were they changed: the flaming walls had burned
Their perishable selves, and there remained
Only the pure white vision of the soul,
The mortal part consumed, and swift returned
Ashes to ashes; while unscathed, unstained,
The immortal passed beyond the earth's control.
ANNIE FIELDS.
THE CRANES OF IBYCUS
T*
WHERE was a man who watched the river flow
Past the huge town, one gray November day.
Round him in narrow high-piled streets at play
The boys made merry as they saw him go,
Murmuring half-loud, with eyes upon the stream,
The immortal screed he held within his hand.
For he was walking in an April land
With Faust and Helen. Shadowy as a dream
Was the prose-world, the river and the town.
Wild joy possessed him: through enchanted skies
He saw the cranes of Ibycus swoop down.
He closed the page, he lifted up his eyes:
Lo- a black line of birds in wavering thread
Bore him the greetings of the deathless dead!
EMMA LAZARUS.
(
*«Flaming walls of the world”: Lucretius.
XXVIII-1053
## p. 16834 (#534) ##########################################
16834
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
THE SOUL'S DEFIANCE
I
(
SAID to Sorrow's awful storm
That beat against my breast,
Rage on,- thou mayst destroy this form,
And lay it low at rest;
But still the spirit that now brooks
Thy tempest, raging high,
Undaunted on its fury looks
With steadfast eye. ”
I said to Penury's meagre train,
“Come on,- your threats I brave:
My last poor life-drop you may drain,
And crush me to the grave;
Yet still the spirit that endures
Shall mock your force the while,
And meet each cold, cold grasp of yours
With bitter smile. ”
I said to cold Neglect and Scorn,
“Pass on,- I heed you not:
Ye may pursue me till my form
And being are forgot;
Yet still the spirit, which you see
Undaunted by your wiles,
Draws from its own nobility
Its high-born smiles. ”
I said to Friendship's menaced blow,
“Strike deep,- my heart shall bear:
Thou canst but add one bitter woe
To those already there;
Yet still the spirit that sustains
This last severe distress
Shall smile upon its keenest pains,
And scorn redress,
I said to Death's uplifted dart,
«Aim sure, -oh, why delay ?
Thou wilt not find a fearful heart,
A weak, reluctant prey;
For still the spirit, firm and free,
Unruffled by dismay,
Wrapt in its own eternity,
Shall pass away. ”
LAVINIA STODDARD.
## p. 16835 (#535) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16835
ANY SOUL TO ANY BODY
S°
O we must part, my body, you and I,
Who've spent so many pleasant years together!
'Tis sorry work to lose your company
Who clove to me so close, whate'er the weather,
From winter unto winter, wet or dry;
But you have reached the limit of your tether,
And I must journey on my way alone,
And leave you quietly beneath a stone.
They say that you are altogether bad
(Forgive me, 'tis not my experience),
And think me very wicked to be sad
At leaving you, a clod, a prison, whence
To get quite free I should be very glad.
Perhaps I may be so, some few days hence;
But now, methinks, 'twere graceless not to spend
A tear or two on my departing friend.
Now our iong partnership is near completed,
And I look back upon its history,
I greatly fear 1 have not always treated
You with the honesty you showed to me.
And I must own that you have oft defeated
Unworthy schemes by your sincerity,
And by a blush or stammering tongue have tried
To make me think again before I lied.
'Tis true you're not so handsome as you were,
But that's not your fault and is partly mine, -
You might have lasted longer with more care,
And still looked something like your first design;
And even now, with all your wear and tear,
'Tis pitiful to think I must resign
You to the friendless grave, the patient prey
Of all the hungry legions of decay.
But you must stay, dear body, and I go.
And I was once so very proud of you!
You made my mother's eyes to overflow
When first she saw you, wonderful and new.
And now, with all your faults, 'twere hard to find
A slave more willing or a friend more true:
Ay - even they who say the worst about you
Can scarcely tell what I shall do without you.
COSMO MONKHOUSE.
## p. 16836 (#536) ##########################################
16836
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
BODY AND SOUL
H*
ERE at life's silent, shadowy gate,
O Soul, my Soul, I lie and wait;
Faint in the darkness, blind and dumb,
O Soul, my promised comrade, come!
The morn breaks gladly in the east;
Hush! hark! the signs of solemn feast:
The softened footstep on the stair;
The happy smile, the chant, the prayer;
The dainty robes, the christening-bowl -
'Tis well with Body and with Soul.
Why lingerest thou at dawn of life?
Seest not a world with pleasure rife?
Hear'st not the song and whir of bird ?
The joyous leaves to music stirred ?
Thou too shalt sing and float in light;
My Soul, thou shalt be happy — quite.
But yet so young, and such unrest ?
Thou must be glad, my glorious guest.
Here is the revel, here is mirth,
Here strains enchanting sway the earth;
Measures of joy in fullness spent:
My Soul, thou canst but be content.
Is this a tear upon my hand ?
A tear? I do not understand.
Ripples of laughter, and a moan?
Why sit we thus, apart, alone ?
Lift up thine eyes, O Soul, and sing!
He comes, our lover and our king!
Feel how each pulse in rapture thrills!
Look, at our feet the red wine spills!
And he – he comes with step divine,
A spirit meet, O Soul, for thine.
Body and Soul's supremest bliss -
What, dost thou ask for more than this?
Stay, here are houses, lands, and gold;
Here, honor's hand; here, gains untold :
Drink thou the full cup to the lees;
Drink, Soul, and make thy bed in ease.
Thou art my prisoner; thou my slave:
And thou shalt sip wherein I lave.
## p. 16837 (#537) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16837
Nay? nay? Then there are broader fields,
Whose luring path a treasure yields:
Thou shalt the universe explore,
Its heights of knowledge, depths of lore;
Shalt journey far o'er land and sea:
And I, my Soul, will follow thee;
Will follow — follow — but I lag:
My heart grows faint, my footsteps flag.
-
And there are higher, holier things ?
Is this a taunt thy spirit Alings?
What is it, Soul, that thou wouldst say ?
Thou erst had time to fast and pray.
Give me one word, one loving sign,
For this spent life of yours and mine!
I held thee fast by sordid ties?
I trailed thy garments, veiled thine eyes?
Go on, I come: but once did wait,
O Soul, for thee, at morning's gate.
Canst thou not pause to give me breath ?
Perchance this shadow, Soul, is death.
I stumble, fall — it is the grave:
I am the prisoner, I the slave;
And thou, strange guest, for aye art free:
Forgive me, Soul, - I could but be
The earth that soiled, the fleshly clod,
The weight that bound thee to the sod.
Dust unto dust! I hear the knell;
And yet, O Soul, I love thee well!
EMMA HUNTINGTON NASON.
GREETING
O
LIFE that maketh all things new,-
The blooming earth, the thoughts of men!
Our pilgrim feet, wet with thy dew,
In gladness hither turn again.
From hand to hand the greeting flows,
From eye to eye the signals run,
From heart to heart the bright hope glows;
The seekers of the Light are one.
## p. 16838 (#538) ##########################################
16838
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
One in the freedom of the truth,
One in the joy of paths untrod,
One in the soul's perennial youth,
One in the larger thought of God;
The freer step, the fuller breath,
The wide horizon's grander view,
The sense of life that knows no death,-
The life that maketh all things new.
Samuel LONGFELLOW.
IN LITTLES
A
LITTLE House of Life,
With many noises rife,
Noises of joy and crime;
A little gate of birth,
Through which I slipped to earth
And found myself in Time.
And there, not far before,
Another little door,
One day to swing so free!
None pauses there to knock,
No other hand tries lock,-
It knows, and waits for me.
From out what Silent Land
I came, on Earth to stand
And learn life's little art,
Is not in me to say:
I know I did not stray, -
Was sent; to come, my part.
And down what Silent Shore
Beyond yon little door
I
pass,
I cannot tell:
I know I shall not stray,
Nor ever lose the way, —
Am sent; and all is well.
WILLIAM CHANNING GANNETT.
## p. 16839 (#539) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16839
TO-MORROWS AND TO-MORROWS
To-
-
10-MORROWS and to-morrows stretch a gray
Unbroken line of shore; but as the sea
Will fret and gnaw the land, and stealthily
Devour it grain by grain, so day by day
Time's restless waters lap the sands away,
Until the shrinking isle of life, where we
Had pitched our tent, wholly engulfed shall be,
And swept far out into eternity,
Some morn, some noon, some night - we may not say
Just how, or when, or where! And then — what then?
O cry unanswered still by mortal ken!
This only may we know,- how far and wide
That precious dust be carried by the tide,
No mote is lost, but every grain of sand
Close-gathered in our Father's loving hand,
And made to build again — somehow, somewhere -
Another Isle of Life, divinely fair!
GERTRUDE BLOEDE (“Stuart Sterne").
SHALL I LOOK BACK ?
F
ROM some dim height of being, undescried,
Shall I look back and trace the weary way
By which my feet are journeying to-day, -
The toilsome path that climbs the mountain-side,
Or leads into the valley sun-denied,
Where, through the darkness, hapless wanderers stray,
Unblessed, uncheered, ungladdened by a ray
Of certitude their errant steps to guide ?
Shall I look back, and see the great things small;
The toilsome path, God's training for my feet,
The pains that never had been worth my tears ?
Will some great light of rapture, bathing all,
Make bygone woe seem joy; past bitter, sweet?
Shall I look back and wonder at my fears?
LOUISE CHANDLER MOULTON.
## p. 16840 (#540) ##########################################
16840
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
LIFE
ONE Universe is stirred
B' By Les strong pulse, stars climb the darkening blue;
It throbs in each fresh sunset's changing hue,
And thrills through low sweet song of every bird;
By It, the plunging blood reds all men's veins;
Joy feels that Heart against his rapturous own,
And on It, Sorrow breathes her sharpest groan;
It bounds through gladnesses and deepest pains.
Passionless beating through all Time and Space,
Relentless, calm, majestic in Its march,
Alike, though Nature shake heaven's endless arch,
Or man's heart break because of some dead face!
'Tis felt in sunshine greening the soft sod,
In children's smiling as in mother's tears;
And, for strange comfort, through the aching years,
Men's hungry souls have named that great Heart, God!
MARGARET DELAND.
WHAT LIFE IS
I
“What is life but what a man is thinking of all day ? »
- EMERSON.
F LIFE were only what a man
Thinks daily of,— his little care,
His petty ill, his trivial plan;
His sordid scheme to hoard and spare;
His meagre ministry, his all
Unequal strength to breast the stream;
His large regret - repentance small;
His poor unrealized dream,-
'Twere scarcely worth a passing nod:
Meet it should end where it began.
But 'tis not so. Life is what God
Is daily thinking of for man.
JULIE M. LIPPMANN.
## p. 16841 (#541) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16841
GOD
O
THOU eternal One! whose presence bright
All space doth occupy, all motion guide,
Unchanged through time's all-devastating Aight!
Thou only God — there is no God beside !
Being above all beings! Mighty One,
Whom none can comprehend and none explore!
Who fill'st existence with thyself alone,-
Embracing all, supporting, ruling o'er, -
Being whom we call God, and know no more!
Thou from primeval nothingness didst call
First chaos, then existence. Lord! in thee
Eternity had its foundation; all
Sprung forth from thee; of light, joy, harmony,
Sole Origin - all life, all beauty thine.
Thy word created all, and doth create;
Thy splendor fills all space with rays divine.
Thou art, and wert, and shalt be! Glorious! great!
Light-giving, life-sustaining Potentate!
A million torches lighted by thy hand
Wander unwearied through the blue abyss;
They own thy power, accomplish thy command,
All gay with life, all eloquent with bliss.
What shall we call them ? Piles of crystal light —
A glorious company of golden streams
Lamps of celestial ether burning bright -
Suns lighting systems with their joyous beams?
But thou to these art as the noon to night.
Thou art! -- directing, guiding all — thou art!
Direct my understanding then to thee;
Control my spirit, guide my wandering heart:
Though but an atom 'midst immensity,
Still I am something, fashioned by thy hand!
I hold a middle rank 'twixt heaven and earth –
On the last verge of mortal being stand,
Close to the realms where angels have their birth,
Just on the boundaries of the spirit-land!
The chain of being is complete in me;-
In me is matter's last gradation lost,
## p. 16842 (#542) ##########################################
16842
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
And the next step is spirit — Deity!
I can command the lightning, and am dust!
A monarch and a slave - a worm, a god!
Whence came I here, and how, so marvelously
Constructed and conceived ? Unknown! This clod
Lives surely through some higher energy;
For from itself alone it could ‘not be!
Creator, yes! Thy wisdom and thy word
Created me! Thou source of life and good!
Thou spirit of my spirit, and my Lord!
Thy light, thy love, in their bright plenitude,
Filled me with an immortal soul, to spring
Over the abyss of death; and bade it wear
The garments of eternal day, and wing
Its heavenly fight beyond this little sphere,
Even to its source — to thee - its Author there.
GABRIEL ROMANOVICH DERZHAVIN (Russian).
Translation of Sir John Bowring.
«CAN FIND OUT GOD ? »
I
CANNOT find thee! Still on restless pinion
My spirit beats the void where thou dost dwell;
I wander lost through all thy vast dominion,
And shrink beneath thy Light ineffable.
I cannot find thee! Even when, most adoring,
Before thy shrine I bend in lowliest prayer,
Beyond these bounds of thought, my thought upsoaring,
From furthest quest comes back: thou art not there.
Yet high above the limits of my seeing,
And folded far within the inmost heart,
And deep below the deeps of conscious being,
Thy splendor shineth: there, O God! thou art.
I cannot lose thee! Still in thee abiding,
The end is clear, how wide soe'er I roam;
The law that holds the worlds my steps is guiding,
And I must rest at last in thee, my home.
ELIZA SCUDDER.
## p. 16843 (#543) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16843
THE INDWELLING GOD
«Oh that I knew where I might find Him. ”
Gº
O NOT, my soul, in search of Him:
Thou wilt not find Him there,
Or in the depths of shadow dim,
Or heights of upper air.
For not in far-off realms of space
The Spirit hath its throne;
In every heart it findeth place
And waiteth to be known.
Thought answereth alone to thought,
And soul with soul hath kin;
The outward God he findeth not,
Who finds not God within.
And if the vision come to thee
Revealed by inward sign,
Earth will be full of Deity
And with his glory shine!
Thou shalt not want for company,
Nor pitch thy tent alone;
The indwelling God will go with thee,
And show thee of his own.
Oh gift of gifts, oh grace of grace,
That God should condescend
To make thy heart his dwelling-place,
And be thy daily Friend!
Then go not thou in search of him,
But to thyself repair;
Wait thou within the silence dim,
And thou shalt find him there.
FREDERICK LUCIAN HOSMER.
THE COMFORTER
M"
Y HEART is searching for thee,
And lost in longing for thy voice!
Voice that lies deeper than the per-
manent sea,
## p. 16844 (#544) ##########################################
16844
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
Deeper than thought,
Deeper than my own life.
Behold the child,
With yellow locks and aspect wild,
Gazing on naught;
With hands hung listless
And heart at strife,
Waiting, a young lost Israelite,
For angels' food!
We are all children lost, of one great race,
Sighing for light,
Whom thou alone canst bless:
Give us manna, the promised good!
Show us thy face!
Else how should joy survive
The ebbing tide,
And hear the burden of the desert sea ?
Where art thou, Guide ?
Ah!
I see your gentle ghosts arise ;
You look at me with mournful eyes,
And then the night grows vague and vast:
You have gone back to Paradise.
Why did you fleet away, dear days?
You were so welcome when you came!
The morning skies were all aflame;
The birds sang matins in your praise:
All else of life you put to shame.
Did I not honor you aright, -
I, who but lived to see you shine,
Who felt your very pain divine,
Thanked God and warmed me in your light,
Or quaffed your tears as they were wine ?
What wooed you to those stranger skies, —
What love more fond, what dreams more fair,
What music whispered in the air ?
What soft delight of smiles and sighs
Enchanted you from otherwhere ?
You left no pledges when you went:
The years since then are bleak and cold;
No bursting buds the Junes unfold.
While you were here my all I spent;
Now I am poor and sad and old.
LOUISE CHANDLER MOULTON.
A REVERY OF BOYHOOD
(THIRTEENTH CENTURY)
T
HERE we children used to play,
Through the meadows and
away,
Looking 'mid the grassy maze
For the violets; those days
Long ago
Saw them grow:
Now one sees the cattle graze.
XXVIII-1052
## p. 16818 (#518) ##########################################
16818
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
I remember as we fared
Through the blossoms, we compared
Which the prettiest might be:
We were little things, you see.
On the ground
Wreaths we bound;
So it goes, our youth and we.
Over stick and stone we went
Till the sunny day was spent;
Hunting strawberries, each skirts
From the beeches to the firs,
Till - Hello,
Children! Go
Home, they cry — the foresters.
HEINRICH VON MORUNGEN.
Translation of Edward T. McLaughlin.
TWILIGHT
I
SAW her walking in the rain,
And sweetly drew she nigh;
And then she crossed the hills again
To bid the day good-by.
«Good-by! good-by!
The world is dim as sorrow;
But close beside the morning sky
I'll say a glad Good-morrow! »
O dweller in the darling wood,
When near to death I lie,
Come from your leafy solitude,
And bid my soul good-by.
Good-by! good-by!
The world is dim as sorrow;
But close beside the morning sky
O say a glad Good-morrow!
ETHELWYN WETHERALD.
## p. 16819 (#519) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16819
THE HIGHWAY
TE
He highway lies all bare and brown,
A naked line across the down
Worn by a hundred hurrying feet.
The tide of life along it flows,
And busy commerce comes and goes.
Where once the grass grew green and sweet
The world's fierce pulses beat.
Well for the highway that it lies
The passageway of great emprise!
Yet from its dust what voices cry,-
Voices of soft green growing things
Trampled and torn from earth which clings
Too closely, unperceiving why
Its darling bairns must die.
*
***
My heart's a highway, trodden down
By many a traveler of renown,-
Grave Thought and burden-bearing Deeds.
And strong Achievement's envoy fares,
With laughing Joys and crowding Cares,
Along the road that worldward leads —
Once rank with foolish weeds.
Glad is my heart to hear them pass,
Yet sometimes breathes a low "Alas!
The tender springing things that grew-
The nursling hopes their feet destroyed,
Sweet ignorant dreams that youth enjoyed
That blossomed there the long year through-
Would I could have them too!
LOUISE BETTS EDWARDS.
## p. 16820 (#520) ##########################################
16820
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
OLD
B
Y THE wayside, on a mossy stone,
Sat a hoary pilgrim sadly musing:
Oft I marked him sitting there alone,
All the landscape like a page perusing;
Poor, unknown,
By the wayside, on a mossy stone.
Buckled knee and shoe, and broad-rimmed hat,
Coat as ancient as the form 'twas folding,
Silver buttons, queue, and crimped cravat,
Oaken staff his feeble hand upholding: -
There he sat!
Buckled knee and shoe, and broad-rimmed hat.
Seemed it pitiful he should sit there,
No one sympathizing, no one heeding,
None to love him for his thin gray hair,
And the furrows all so mutely pleading
Age and care:
Seemed it pitiful he should sit there.
It was summer, and we went to school,
Dapper country lads and little maidens,
Taught the motto of the “dunce's stool”.
Its grave import still my fancy ladens:
«Here's a fool! »
It was summer, and we went to school.
Still, in sooth, our tasks we seldom tried, -
Sportive pastime only worth our learning;
But we listened when the old man sighed,
And that lesson to our hearts went burning,
And we cried !
Still, in sooth, our tasks we seldom tried.
When a stranger seemed to mark our play,
(Some of us were joyous, some sad-hearted,)
I remember well — too well — that day!
Oftentimes the tears unbidden started,
Would not stay!
When the stranger seemed to mark our play.
When we cautiously adventured nigh,
We could see his lips with anguish quiver;
## p. 16821 (#521) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
1682 1
Yet no word he uttered, but his eye
Seemed in mournful converse with the river
Murmuring by,
When we cautiously adventured nigh.
One sweet spirit broke the silent spell:
Ah! to me her name was always heaven!
She besought him all his grief to tell –
(I was then thirteen, and she eleven)
Isabel!
One sweet spirit broke the silent spell.
Softly asked she with a voice divine:
“Why so lonely hast thou wandered hither?
Hast no home? — then come with me to mine;
There's our cottage, let me lead thee thither.
Why repine ? ”
Softly asked she with a voice divine.
»
"Angel,” said he sadly, I am old;
Earthly hope no longer hath a morrow:
Yet why I sit here thou shalt be told. ”
Then his eye betrayed a pearl of sorrow:
Down it rolled ; -
“Angel,” said he sadly, “I am old!
“I have tottered here to look once more
On the pleasant scene where I delighted
In the careless, happy days of yore,
Ere the garden of my heart was blighted
To the core !
I have tottered here to look once more!
"All the picture now to me how dear!
E'en this gray old rock where I am seated
Seems a jewel worth my journey here;
Ah, that such a scene should be completed
With a tear!
All the picture now to me how dear!
«Old stone school-house! - it is still the same!
There's the very step so oft I mounted;
There's the window creaking in its frame,
And the notches that I cut and counted
For the game:
Old stone school-house! it is still the same!
## p. 16822 (#522) ##########################################
16822
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
«In the cottage yonder I was born —
Long my happy home, that humble dwelling:
There the fields of clover, wheat, and corn,
There the spring with limpid nectar swelling :
Ah, forlorn!
In the cottage yonder I was born.
(C
“Those two gateway sycamores you see —
They were planted just so far asunder
That long well-pole from the path to free,
And the wagon to pass safely under -
Ninety-three!
Those two gateway sycamores you see.
« There's the orchard where we used to climb,
When my mates and I were boys together;
Thinking nothing of the flight of time,
Fearing naught but work and rainy weather:
Past its prime!
There's the orchard where we used to climb.
« There the rude three-cornered chestnut rails,
Round the pasture where the flocks were grazing,
Where so sly I used to watch for quails
In the crops of buckwheat we were raising;
Traps and trails. -
There the rude three-cornered chestnut rails.
«How in summer have I traced that stream,
There through mead and woodland sweetly gliding,
Luring simple trout with many a scheme,
From the nooks where I have found them hiding:
All a dream!
How in summer have I traced that stream.
« There's the mill that ground our yellow grain;
Pond, and river still serenely flowing;
Cot, there nestling in the shaded lane,
Where the lily of my heart was blowing –
Mary Jane!
There's the mill that ground our yellow grain.
« There's the gate on which I used to swing,
Brook, and bridge, and barn, and old red gable;
But alas! the morn shall no more bring
That dear group around my father's table:
## p. 16823 (#523) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16823
Taken wing!
There's the gate on which I used to swing.
“I am fleeing! — all I loved are fled;
Yon green meadow was our place for playing;
That old tree can tell of sweet things said,
When around it Jane and I were straying:
She is dead!
I am fleeing ! - all I loved have fled!
« Yon white spire,- a pencil on the sky,
Tracing silently life's changeful story,
So familiar to my dim old eye,
Points me to seven who are now in glory
There on high!
Yon white spire,- a pencil on the sky.
«Oft the aisle of that old church we trod,
Guided thither by an angel mother;
Now she sleeps beneath its sacred sod,
Sire and sisters, and my little brother:
Gone to God!
Oft the aisle of that old church we trod.
« There I heard of Wisdom's pleasant ways;
Bless the holy lesson! — but ah, never
Shall I hear again those songs of praise,
Those sweet voices silent now forever!
Peaceful days!
There I heard of Wisdom's pleasant ways.
“There my Mary blest me with her hand,
When our souls drank in the nuptial blessing,–
Ere she hastened to the spirit land,
Yonder turf her gentle bosom pressing:
Broken band!
There my Mary blest me with her hand.
“I have come to see that grave once more,
And the sacred place where we delighted,
Where we worshiped in the days of yore,
Ere the garden of my heart was blighted
To the core !
I have come to see that grave once more.
“Haply, ere the verdure there shall fade,
I, all withering with years, shall perish;
## p. 16824 (#524) ##########################################
16824
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
With my Mary may I there be laid,
Join forever — all the wish I cherish -
Her dear shade!
Haply, ere the verdure there shall fade.
"Angel,” said he sadly, "I am old!
Earthly hope no longer hath a morrow;
Now why I sit here thou hast been told. ” –
In his eye another pearl of sorrow
Down it rolled!
“Angel,” said he sadly, "I am old!
By the wayside, on a mossy stone,
Sat the hoary pilgrim, sadly musing:
Still I marked him sitting there alone,
All the landscape like a page perusing;
Poor, unknown,
By the wayside, on a mossy stone.
RALPH HOYT.
THE PRIME OF LIFE
Jº
Ust as I thought I was growing old,
Ready to sit in my easy-chair,
To watch the world with a heart grown cold,
And smile at a folly I would not share,
Rose came by with a smile for me,-
And I am thinking that forty year
Isn't the age that it seems to be,
When two pretty brown eyes are near.
Bless me, of life it is just the prime ! -
A fact that I hope she will understand ;-
And forty year is a perfect rhyme
To dark-brown eyes and a pretty hand.
These gray hairs are by chance, you see,–
Boys are sometimes gray, I am told.
Rose came by with a smile for me,
Just as I thought I was getting old.
WALTER LEARNED.
## p. 16825 (#525) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16825
THE OLD
T"
WHEY are waiting on the shore
For the bark to take them home:
They will toil and grieve no more;
The hour for release hath come.
All their long life lies behind,
Like a dimly blending dream;
There is nothing left to bind
To the realms that only seem.
They are waiting for the boat;
There is nothing left to do:
What was near them grows remote,
Happy silence falls like dew;
Now the shadowy bark is come,
And the weary may go home.
By still water they would rest,
In the shadow of the tree;
After battle, sleep is best,
After noise, tranquillity,
RODEN NOËL.
THE GREAT BREATH
I"
Ts edges foamed with amethyst and rose,
Withers once more the old blue flower of day;
There where the ether like a diamond glows,
Its petals fade away.
A shadowy tumult stirs the dusky air;
Sparkle the delicate dews, the distant snows;
The great deep thrills, for through it everywhere
The breath of Beauty blows.
I saw how all the trembling ages past,
Molded to her by deep and deeper breath,
Neared to the hour when Beauty breathes her last
And knows herself in death.
G. W. RUSSELL.
## p. 16826 (#526) ##########################################
16826
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
THE REFUSAL OF CHARON *
"W"
Hy look the distant mountains
So gloomy and so drear?
Are rain-clouds passing o'er them,
Or is the tempest near ? » —
«No shadow of the tempest
Is there, nor wind, nor rain,-
'Tis Charon that is passing by,
With all his gloomy train.
“The young men march before him
In all their strength and pride;
The tender little infants,
They totter by his side;
The old men walk behind him,
And earnestly they pray-
Both old and young imploring him
To grant some brief delay. ” —
“O Charon! halt, we pray thee,
By yonder little town,
Or near that sparkling fountain,
Where the waters wimple down!
The old will drink and be refreshed,
The young the disk will fing,
And the tender little children
Pluck flowers beside the spring. ”.
“I will not stay my journey,
Nor halt by any town,
Near any sparkling fountain,
Where the waters wimple down:
The mothers coming to the well
Would know the babes they bore;
The wives would clasp their husbands,
Nor could I part them more. ”
Romaic.
* Modern Greek poetry assigns to Charon, not only the duty of ferrying his
cargo across the Styx, but the function formerly assumed by Hermes, of con-
ducting the souls of the dead to the underworld.
## p. 16827 (#527) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16827
THE WILD RIDE
I
HEAR in my heart, I hear in its ominous pulses,
All day the commotion of sinewy, mane-tossing horses,
All night from their cells the importunate tramping and neighing.
Cowards and laggards fall back; but alert to the saddle, [legion,
Straight, grim, and abreast, vault our weather-worn, galloping
With stirrup-cup each to the one gracious woman that loves him.
The road is through dolor and dread, over crags and morasses;
There are shapes by the way, there are things to entice us:
What odds? We are knights, and our souls are but bent on the
riding.
Thought's self is a vanishing wing, and joy is a cobweb,
And friendship a flower in the dust, and her pitiful beauty!
We hurry with never a word in the track of our fathers.
I hear in my heart, I hear in its ominous pulses,
All day the commotion of sinewy, mane-tossing horses,
All night from their cells the importunate tramping and neighing.
We spur to a land of no name, outracing the storm-wind;
We leap to the infinite dark, like the sparks from the anvil.
Thou leadest, O God! All's well with thy Troopers that follow!
LOUISE IMOGEN GUINEY.
THE FRONTIER
O
SOLDIER, treading through the long day's heat,
With tattered banner and with drooping crest, —
Now as the sun sinks down thy purpled West,
Thou who hast come so far with aching feet,
Thou who must march and never canst retreat,
Art thou not weary of the bootless quest ?
Look'st thou not forward to a time of rest?
Sweet will it be — beyond all telling sweet-
After long marches with red danger fraught,
The wakeful bivouac, the assault and flight-
After thy scars of glory; sore distraught -
To camp afar, beyond defeat and fight,
Wrapped in the blanket of a dreamless night,
Out past the pickets and the tents of thought!
LLOYD MIFFLIN.
## p. 16828 (#528) ##########################################
16828
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
FREEDOM OF THE MIND
H"
IGH walls and huge the body may confine,
And iron grates obstruct the prisoner's gaze,
And massive bolts may baffle his design,
And vigilant keepers watch his devious ways;
Yet scorns the immortal mind this base control!
No chains can bind it, and no cell inclose:
Swifter than light it flies from Pole to Pole,
And in a flash from earth to heaven goes!
It leaps from mount to mount — from vale to vale
It wanders, plucking honeyed fruits and flowers;
It visits home, to hear the fireside tale,
Or in sweet converse pass the joyous hours;
'Tis up before the sun, roaming afar,
And in its watches wearies every star!
WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON.
THE CLOISTER
T:
HOUGHT never knew material bound or place,
Nor footsteps may the roving fancy trace:
Peace cannot learn beneath a roof to house,
Nor cloister hold us safe within our vows.
The cloistered heart may brave the common air,
And the world's children breathe the holiest prayer:
Build for us, Lord, and in thy temple reign!
Watch with us, Lord, our watchman wakes in vain!
LYDIA MARIA Child.
MY MINDE TO ME A KINGDOM IS
M
Y MINDE to me a kingdom is;
Such perfect joy wherein I finde
As farre exceeds all earthly blisse
That God or nature hath assignde;
Though much I want that most would have,
Yet still my minde forbids to crave.
Content I live; this is my stay, —
I seek no more than may suffice.
## p. 16829 (#529) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16829
I presse to beare no haughtie sway;
Look! what I lack my mind supplies.
Loe, thus I triumph like a king,
Content with that my minde doth bring.
I see how plentie surfets oft,
And hastie clyinbers soon do fall;
I see that such as sit aloft
Mishap doth threaten most of all.
These get with toile, and keepe with feare;
Such cares my mind could never beare.
Some have too much, yet still they crave;
I little have, yet seek no more :
They are but poore, though much they have,
And I am rich with little store:
They poor, I rich; they beg, I give;
They lacke, I lend; they pine, I live.
.
I wish but what I have at will;
I wander not to seeke for more;
I like the plaine, I clime no hill;
In greatest storms I sitte on shore,
And laugh at them that toile in vaine
To get what must be lost againe.
The court ne cart I like ne loath,-
Extreames are counted worst of all;
The golden meane betwixt them both
Doth surest sit, and feares no fall:
This is my choyce; for why? -I finde
No wealth is like a quiet minde.
My wealth is health and perfect ease;
My conscience clere my chiefe defence;
I neither seeke by bribes to please,
Nor by desert to breed offence.
Thus do I live: thus will I die:
Would all did so as well as I!
SIR EDWARD DYER.
## p. 16830 (#530) ##########################################
168 30
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
THOUGHT
Thor
HOUGHT is deeper than all speech,
Feeling deeper than all thought:
Souls to souls can never teach
What unto themselves was taught.
We are spirits clad in veils;
Man by man was never seen:
All our deep communing fails
To remove the shadowy screen.
Heart to heart was never known;
Mind with mind did never meet:
We are columns left alone
Of a temple once complete.
Like the stars that gem the sky,
Far apart though seeming near,
In our light we scattered lie;
All is thus but starlight here.
What is social company
But a babbling summer stream ?
What our wise philosophy
But the glancing of a dream ?
Only when the sun of love
Melts the scattered stars of thought,
Only when we live above
What the dim-eyed world hath taught,
Only when our souls are fed
By the fount which gave them birth,
And by inspiration led
Which they never drew from earth,
We, like parted drops of rain,
Swelling till they meet and run,
Shall be all absorbed again,
Melting, flowing into one.
CHRISTOPHER PEARSE CRANCH.
## p. 16831 (#531) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16831
QUESTIONINGS
H*
ATH this world without me wrought
Other substance than my thought ?
Lives it by my sense alone,
Or by essence of its own ?
Will its life, with mine begun,
Cease to be when that is done,
Or another consciousness
With the selfsame forms impress?
Doth yon fire-ball poised in air
Hang by my permission there?
Are the clouds that wander by
But the offspring of mine eye,
Born with every glance I cast,
Perishing when that is past ?
And those thousand thousand eyes,
Scattered through the twinkling skies —
Do they draw their life from mine,
Or of their own beauty shine ?
Now I close my eyes, my ears,
And creation disappears;
Yet if I but speak the word,
All creation is restored.
Or— more wonderful — within,
N creations do begin;
Hues more bright and forms more rare
Than reality doth wear
Flash across my inward sense,
Born of mind's omnipotence.
Soul, that all informest, say!
Shall these glories pass away?
Will those planets cease to blaze
When these eyes no longer gaze ?
And the life of things be o'er,
When these pulses beat no more?
Thought! that in me works and lives, -
Life to all things living gives -
Art thou not thyself, perchance,
But the universe in trance ?
A reflection inly flung
By that world thou fanciedst sprung
-
## p. 16832 (#532) ##########################################
16832
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
From thyself, - thyself a dream, -
Of the world's thinking, thou the theme?
Be it thus, or be thy birth
From a source above the earth,-.
Be thou matter, be thou mind,
In thee alone myself I find,
And through thee alone, for me,
Hath this world reality.
Therefore in thee will I live;
To thee all myself will give:
Losing still, that I may find
This bounded self in boundless mind.
FREDERIC HENRY HEDGE.
ANCIENT GUEBER HYMN
W*
HERE goest thou, keen soul of heat,
So bright, so light, so fleet;
Whose wing was never downward bent,
Aye pluming for ascent?
Where goest thou, when, breaking loose
From all mechanic use,
From beacon-head and altar-stone
And hearth of mortal flown,
Thou spreadest through the air apace,
Dissolving in wide space ?
Continually the waters fall;
Springs, torrents, rivers, — all,
Drawn downward to the gathering deep,
Remain within its keep.
But thou to the empyrean sea,
Bright upward stream, dost flee,
Where stars and sun are lost to sight,
Drowned in exceeding light!
Continually, in strength and pride,
The great ships cut the tide;
The waters fall, and these descend
Unto their journey's end.
But who, upborne on wing of thine,
Shall reach thy goal divine ?
## p. 16833 (#533) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16833
Thither, O rapt and holy Fire,
Thither, bid me aspire,
That when my spirit's flame burns free,
It shall ascend with thee.
FLAMMANTIS MENIA MUNDI *
STOOD alone in purple space, and saw
The burning walls of the world, like wings of flame
Circling the sphere: there was no break nor flaw
In those vast airy battlements whence came
The spirits who had done with time and fame
And all the playthings of earth's little hour;
I saw them each, I knew them for the same,
Mothers and brothers and the sons of power.
Yet were they changed: the flaming walls had burned
Their perishable selves, and there remained
Only the pure white vision of the soul,
The mortal part consumed, and swift returned
Ashes to ashes; while unscathed, unstained,
The immortal passed beyond the earth's control.
ANNIE FIELDS.
THE CRANES OF IBYCUS
T*
WHERE was a man who watched the river flow
Past the huge town, one gray November day.
Round him in narrow high-piled streets at play
The boys made merry as they saw him go,
Murmuring half-loud, with eyes upon the stream,
The immortal screed he held within his hand.
For he was walking in an April land
With Faust and Helen. Shadowy as a dream
Was the prose-world, the river and the town.
Wild joy possessed him: through enchanted skies
He saw the cranes of Ibycus swoop down.
He closed the page, he lifted up his eyes:
Lo- a black line of birds in wavering thread
Bore him the greetings of the deathless dead!
EMMA LAZARUS.
(
*«Flaming walls of the world”: Lucretius.
XXVIII-1053
## p. 16834 (#534) ##########################################
16834
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
THE SOUL'S DEFIANCE
I
(
SAID to Sorrow's awful storm
That beat against my breast,
Rage on,- thou mayst destroy this form,
And lay it low at rest;
But still the spirit that now brooks
Thy tempest, raging high,
Undaunted on its fury looks
With steadfast eye. ”
I said to Penury's meagre train,
“Come on,- your threats I brave:
My last poor life-drop you may drain,
And crush me to the grave;
Yet still the spirit that endures
Shall mock your force the while,
And meet each cold, cold grasp of yours
With bitter smile. ”
I said to cold Neglect and Scorn,
“Pass on,- I heed you not:
Ye may pursue me till my form
And being are forgot;
Yet still the spirit, which you see
Undaunted by your wiles,
Draws from its own nobility
Its high-born smiles. ”
I said to Friendship's menaced blow,
“Strike deep,- my heart shall bear:
Thou canst but add one bitter woe
To those already there;
Yet still the spirit that sustains
This last severe distress
Shall smile upon its keenest pains,
And scorn redress,
I said to Death's uplifted dart,
«Aim sure, -oh, why delay ?
Thou wilt not find a fearful heart,
A weak, reluctant prey;
For still the spirit, firm and free,
Unruffled by dismay,
Wrapt in its own eternity,
Shall pass away. ”
LAVINIA STODDARD.
## p. 16835 (#535) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16835
ANY SOUL TO ANY BODY
S°
O we must part, my body, you and I,
Who've spent so many pleasant years together!
'Tis sorry work to lose your company
Who clove to me so close, whate'er the weather,
From winter unto winter, wet or dry;
But you have reached the limit of your tether,
And I must journey on my way alone,
And leave you quietly beneath a stone.
They say that you are altogether bad
(Forgive me, 'tis not my experience),
And think me very wicked to be sad
At leaving you, a clod, a prison, whence
To get quite free I should be very glad.
Perhaps I may be so, some few days hence;
But now, methinks, 'twere graceless not to spend
A tear or two on my departing friend.
Now our iong partnership is near completed,
And I look back upon its history,
I greatly fear 1 have not always treated
You with the honesty you showed to me.
And I must own that you have oft defeated
Unworthy schemes by your sincerity,
And by a blush or stammering tongue have tried
To make me think again before I lied.
'Tis true you're not so handsome as you were,
But that's not your fault and is partly mine, -
You might have lasted longer with more care,
And still looked something like your first design;
And even now, with all your wear and tear,
'Tis pitiful to think I must resign
You to the friendless grave, the patient prey
Of all the hungry legions of decay.
But you must stay, dear body, and I go.
And I was once so very proud of you!
You made my mother's eyes to overflow
When first she saw you, wonderful and new.
And now, with all your faults, 'twere hard to find
A slave more willing or a friend more true:
Ay - even they who say the worst about you
Can scarcely tell what I shall do without you.
COSMO MONKHOUSE.
## p. 16836 (#536) ##########################################
16836
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
BODY AND SOUL
H*
ERE at life's silent, shadowy gate,
O Soul, my Soul, I lie and wait;
Faint in the darkness, blind and dumb,
O Soul, my promised comrade, come!
The morn breaks gladly in the east;
Hush! hark! the signs of solemn feast:
The softened footstep on the stair;
The happy smile, the chant, the prayer;
The dainty robes, the christening-bowl -
'Tis well with Body and with Soul.
Why lingerest thou at dawn of life?
Seest not a world with pleasure rife?
Hear'st not the song and whir of bird ?
The joyous leaves to music stirred ?
Thou too shalt sing and float in light;
My Soul, thou shalt be happy — quite.
But yet so young, and such unrest ?
Thou must be glad, my glorious guest.
Here is the revel, here is mirth,
Here strains enchanting sway the earth;
Measures of joy in fullness spent:
My Soul, thou canst but be content.
Is this a tear upon my hand ?
A tear? I do not understand.
Ripples of laughter, and a moan?
Why sit we thus, apart, alone ?
Lift up thine eyes, O Soul, and sing!
He comes, our lover and our king!
Feel how each pulse in rapture thrills!
Look, at our feet the red wine spills!
And he – he comes with step divine,
A spirit meet, O Soul, for thine.
Body and Soul's supremest bliss -
What, dost thou ask for more than this?
Stay, here are houses, lands, and gold;
Here, honor's hand; here, gains untold :
Drink thou the full cup to the lees;
Drink, Soul, and make thy bed in ease.
Thou art my prisoner; thou my slave:
And thou shalt sip wherein I lave.
## p. 16837 (#537) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16837
Nay? nay? Then there are broader fields,
Whose luring path a treasure yields:
Thou shalt the universe explore,
Its heights of knowledge, depths of lore;
Shalt journey far o'er land and sea:
And I, my Soul, will follow thee;
Will follow — follow — but I lag:
My heart grows faint, my footsteps flag.
-
And there are higher, holier things ?
Is this a taunt thy spirit Alings?
What is it, Soul, that thou wouldst say ?
Thou erst had time to fast and pray.
Give me one word, one loving sign,
For this spent life of yours and mine!
I held thee fast by sordid ties?
I trailed thy garments, veiled thine eyes?
Go on, I come: but once did wait,
O Soul, for thee, at morning's gate.
Canst thou not pause to give me breath ?
Perchance this shadow, Soul, is death.
I stumble, fall — it is the grave:
I am the prisoner, I the slave;
And thou, strange guest, for aye art free:
Forgive me, Soul, - I could but be
The earth that soiled, the fleshly clod,
The weight that bound thee to the sod.
Dust unto dust! I hear the knell;
And yet, O Soul, I love thee well!
EMMA HUNTINGTON NASON.
GREETING
O
LIFE that maketh all things new,-
The blooming earth, the thoughts of men!
Our pilgrim feet, wet with thy dew,
In gladness hither turn again.
From hand to hand the greeting flows,
From eye to eye the signals run,
From heart to heart the bright hope glows;
The seekers of the Light are one.
## p. 16838 (#538) ##########################################
16838
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
One in the freedom of the truth,
One in the joy of paths untrod,
One in the soul's perennial youth,
One in the larger thought of God;
The freer step, the fuller breath,
The wide horizon's grander view,
The sense of life that knows no death,-
The life that maketh all things new.
Samuel LONGFELLOW.
IN LITTLES
A
LITTLE House of Life,
With many noises rife,
Noises of joy and crime;
A little gate of birth,
Through which I slipped to earth
And found myself in Time.
And there, not far before,
Another little door,
One day to swing so free!
None pauses there to knock,
No other hand tries lock,-
It knows, and waits for me.
From out what Silent Land
I came, on Earth to stand
And learn life's little art,
Is not in me to say:
I know I did not stray, -
Was sent; to come, my part.
And down what Silent Shore
Beyond yon little door
I
pass,
I cannot tell:
I know I shall not stray,
Nor ever lose the way, —
Am sent; and all is well.
WILLIAM CHANNING GANNETT.
## p. 16839 (#539) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16839
TO-MORROWS AND TO-MORROWS
To-
-
10-MORROWS and to-morrows stretch a gray
Unbroken line of shore; but as the sea
Will fret and gnaw the land, and stealthily
Devour it grain by grain, so day by day
Time's restless waters lap the sands away,
Until the shrinking isle of life, where we
Had pitched our tent, wholly engulfed shall be,
And swept far out into eternity,
Some morn, some noon, some night - we may not say
Just how, or when, or where! And then — what then?
O cry unanswered still by mortal ken!
This only may we know,- how far and wide
That precious dust be carried by the tide,
No mote is lost, but every grain of sand
Close-gathered in our Father's loving hand,
And made to build again — somehow, somewhere -
Another Isle of Life, divinely fair!
GERTRUDE BLOEDE (“Stuart Sterne").
SHALL I LOOK BACK ?
F
ROM some dim height of being, undescried,
Shall I look back and trace the weary way
By which my feet are journeying to-day, -
The toilsome path that climbs the mountain-side,
Or leads into the valley sun-denied,
Where, through the darkness, hapless wanderers stray,
Unblessed, uncheered, ungladdened by a ray
Of certitude their errant steps to guide ?
Shall I look back, and see the great things small;
The toilsome path, God's training for my feet,
The pains that never had been worth my tears ?
Will some great light of rapture, bathing all,
Make bygone woe seem joy; past bitter, sweet?
Shall I look back and wonder at my fears?
LOUISE CHANDLER MOULTON.
## p. 16840 (#540) ##########################################
16840
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
LIFE
ONE Universe is stirred
B' By Les strong pulse, stars climb the darkening blue;
It throbs in each fresh sunset's changing hue,
And thrills through low sweet song of every bird;
By It, the plunging blood reds all men's veins;
Joy feels that Heart against his rapturous own,
And on It, Sorrow breathes her sharpest groan;
It bounds through gladnesses and deepest pains.
Passionless beating through all Time and Space,
Relentless, calm, majestic in Its march,
Alike, though Nature shake heaven's endless arch,
Or man's heart break because of some dead face!
'Tis felt in sunshine greening the soft sod,
In children's smiling as in mother's tears;
And, for strange comfort, through the aching years,
Men's hungry souls have named that great Heart, God!
MARGARET DELAND.
WHAT LIFE IS
I
“What is life but what a man is thinking of all day ? »
- EMERSON.
F LIFE were only what a man
Thinks daily of,— his little care,
His petty ill, his trivial plan;
His sordid scheme to hoard and spare;
His meagre ministry, his all
Unequal strength to breast the stream;
His large regret - repentance small;
His poor unrealized dream,-
'Twere scarcely worth a passing nod:
Meet it should end where it began.
But 'tis not so. Life is what God
Is daily thinking of for man.
JULIE M. LIPPMANN.
## p. 16841 (#541) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16841
GOD
O
THOU eternal One! whose presence bright
All space doth occupy, all motion guide,
Unchanged through time's all-devastating Aight!
Thou only God — there is no God beside !
Being above all beings! Mighty One,
Whom none can comprehend and none explore!
Who fill'st existence with thyself alone,-
Embracing all, supporting, ruling o'er, -
Being whom we call God, and know no more!
Thou from primeval nothingness didst call
First chaos, then existence. Lord! in thee
Eternity had its foundation; all
Sprung forth from thee; of light, joy, harmony,
Sole Origin - all life, all beauty thine.
Thy word created all, and doth create;
Thy splendor fills all space with rays divine.
Thou art, and wert, and shalt be! Glorious! great!
Light-giving, life-sustaining Potentate!
A million torches lighted by thy hand
Wander unwearied through the blue abyss;
They own thy power, accomplish thy command,
All gay with life, all eloquent with bliss.
What shall we call them ? Piles of crystal light —
A glorious company of golden streams
Lamps of celestial ether burning bright -
Suns lighting systems with their joyous beams?
But thou to these art as the noon to night.
Thou art! -- directing, guiding all — thou art!
Direct my understanding then to thee;
Control my spirit, guide my wandering heart:
Though but an atom 'midst immensity,
Still I am something, fashioned by thy hand!
I hold a middle rank 'twixt heaven and earth –
On the last verge of mortal being stand,
Close to the realms where angels have their birth,
Just on the boundaries of the spirit-land!
The chain of being is complete in me;-
In me is matter's last gradation lost,
## p. 16842 (#542) ##########################################
16842
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
And the next step is spirit — Deity!
I can command the lightning, and am dust!
A monarch and a slave - a worm, a god!
Whence came I here, and how, so marvelously
Constructed and conceived ? Unknown! This clod
Lives surely through some higher energy;
For from itself alone it could ‘not be!
Creator, yes! Thy wisdom and thy word
Created me! Thou source of life and good!
Thou spirit of my spirit, and my Lord!
Thy light, thy love, in their bright plenitude,
Filled me with an immortal soul, to spring
Over the abyss of death; and bade it wear
The garments of eternal day, and wing
Its heavenly fight beyond this little sphere,
Even to its source — to thee - its Author there.
GABRIEL ROMANOVICH DERZHAVIN (Russian).
Translation of Sir John Bowring.
«CAN FIND OUT GOD ? »
I
CANNOT find thee! Still on restless pinion
My spirit beats the void where thou dost dwell;
I wander lost through all thy vast dominion,
And shrink beneath thy Light ineffable.
I cannot find thee! Even when, most adoring,
Before thy shrine I bend in lowliest prayer,
Beyond these bounds of thought, my thought upsoaring,
From furthest quest comes back: thou art not there.
Yet high above the limits of my seeing,
And folded far within the inmost heart,
And deep below the deeps of conscious being,
Thy splendor shineth: there, O God! thou art.
I cannot lose thee! Still in thee abiding,
The end is clear, how wide soe'er I roam;
The law that holds the worlds my steps is guiding,
And I must rest at last in thee, my home.
ELIZA SCUDDER.
## p. 16843 (#543) ##########################################
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
16843
THE INDWELLING GOD
«Oh that I knew where I might find Him. ”
Gº
O NOT, my soul, in search of Him:
Thou wilt not find Him there,
Or in the depths of shadow dim,
Or heights of upper air.
For not in far-off realms of space
The Spirit hath its throne;
In every heart it findeth place
And waiteth to be known.
Thought answereth alone to thought,
And soul with soul hath kin;
The outward God he findeth not,
Who finds not God within.
And if the vision come to thee
Revealed by inward sign,
Earth will be full of Deity
And with his glory shine!
Thou shalt not want for company,
Nor pitch thy tent alone;
The indwelling God will go with thee,
And show thee of his own.
Oh gift of gifts, oh grace of grace,
That God should condescend
To make thy heart his dwelling-place,
And be thy daily Friend!
Then go not thou in search of him,
But to thyself repair;
Wait thou within the silence dim,
And thou shalt find him there.
FREDERICK LUCIAN HOSMER.
THE COMFORTER
M"
Y HEART is searching for thee,
And lost in longing for thy voice!
Voice that lies deeper than the per-
manent sea,
## p. 16844 (#544) ##########################################
16844
SONGS HYMNS AND LYRICS
Deeper than thought,
Deeper than my own life.
Behold the child,
With yellow locks and aspect wild,
Gazing on naught;
With hands hung listless
And heart at strife,
Waiting, a young lost Israelite,
For angels' food!
We are all children lost, of one great race,
Sighing for light,
Whom thou alone canst bless:
Give us manna, the promised good!
Show us thy face!
Else how should joy survive
The ebbing tide,
And hear the burden of the desert sea ?
Where art thou, Guide ?
Ah!
