A granite rock in the mountain sideGazed on the world and was satisfied.It watched the centuries come and go,It welcomed the sunlight yet loved the snow,It grieved when the forest was forced to fall,Yet joyed when steeples rose white and tallIn the valley below it, and thrilled to hearThe voice of the great town roaring near.
When the mountain stream from its idle playWas caught by the mill-wheel and borne awayAnd trained to labour, the gray rock mused,‘Tree and verdure and stream are usedBy man the master, but I remainFriend of the mountain and star and plain,Unchanged forever by God’s decreeWhile passing centuries bow to me.’
Then all unwarned, with a mighty shockOut of the mountain was wrenched the rock;Bruised and battered, and broken in heartIt was carried away to the common mart.Wrenched, and ruined in peace and pride,‘Oh, God is cruel,’ the granite cried,‘Comrade of mountain, of star the friend,By all deserted—how sad my end.’
A dreaming sculptor in passing byGazed on the granite with thoughtful eye;Then stirred with a purpose supremely grandHe bade his dream in the rock expand.And lo! from the broken and shapeless massThat grieved and doubted, it came to passThat a glorious statue of priceless worthAnd infinite beauty adorned the earth.
Behold the earth swung in among the starsFit home for gods if men were only kind—Do thou thy part to shape it to those ends,By shaping thine own life to perfectness.Seek nothing for thyself or thine own kinThat robs another of one hope or joy,Let no man toil in poverty and painTo give thee unearned luxury and ease.Feed not the hungry servitor with stones,That idle guests may fatten on thy bread.Look for the good in stranger and in foe,Nor save thy praises for the cherished few;And let the weakest sinner find in theeAn impetus to reach receding heights.Behold the earth swung in among the stars—Fit home for gods; wake thou the God withinAnd by the broad example of thy loveCommunicate Omnipotence to men.All men are unawakened gods: be thineThe voice to rouse them from unhappy sleep
Sad man,Sad man,tell me,pray,What did you see to-day?
I saw the unloved and unhappy old, waiting for slow delinquent death to come.Pale little children toiling for the rich, in rooms where sunlight is ashamed to go.The awful alms-house, where the living dead rot slowly in their hideous open graves.And there were shameful things;Soldiers and forts, and industries of death, and devil ships, and loud-winged devil birds,All bent on slaughter and destruction. These and yet more shameful things mine eyes beheld.Old men upon lascivious conquest bent, and young men living with no thought of God;And half clothed women puffing at a weed, aping the vices of the underworld—Engrossed in shallow pleasures and intent on being barren wives.These things I saw.(How God must loathe His earth.)
Glad man,Glad man,tell me,pray,What did you see to-day?
I saw an aged couple, in whose eyesShone that deep light of mingled love and faithWhich makes the earth one room of Paradise,And leaves no sting in death.
I saw fair regiments of children pour,Rank after rank, out of the schoolroom doorBy Progress mobilised. They seemed to say‘Let ignorance make way;We are the heralds of a better day.’
I saw the college and the church that stoodFor all things sane and good.
I saw God’s helpers in the shop and slumBlazing a path for health and hope to come;And men and women of large soul and mindAbsorbed in toil for bettering their kind.
Then, too, I saw life’s sweetest sight and best—Pure mothers with dear babies at the breast,These things I saw.(How God must love His earth.)
Well, you are free;The longed for, lied for, waited for decreeIs yours to-day.I made no protest; and you had your say,And left me with no vestige of repute.Neglect, abuse, and cruelty you chargeWith broken marriage vows. The list is largeBut not to be denied. So I was mute.
Now you shall listen to a few plain factsBefore you go out wholly from my lifeAs some man’s wife.Read carefully this statement of your actsWhich changed the lustre of my honeymoonTo sombre gloom,And wrenched the cover from Pandora’s box.
In those first talks’Twixt bride and groom I showed you my whole heart,Showed you how deep my love was and how true;With all a strong man’s feeling I loved YOU:(God, how I loved you, my one chosen mate.)But I learned this(So poorly did you play your little part):You married marriage, to avoid the fateOf having ‘Miss’Carved on your tombstone. Love you did not know,But you were greedy for the showy thingsThat money brings.Such weak affection as you could bestowWas given the provider, not the lover.
The knowledge hurt. Keen pain like that is dumb;And masks itself in smiles, lest men discover.But I was lonely; and the feeling grewThe more I studied you.Into your shallow heart love could not come,But yet you loved my love; because it gaveThe prowess of a mistress o’er a slave.You showed your powerIn petty tyranny hour after hour,Day after day, year after lengthening years.My tasks, my pleasures, my pursuits were notHeld near or dear,Or made to seem important in your thought.My friends were not your friends; you goaded meBy foolish and ignoble jealousy,Till, through suggestion’s lawsI gave you cause.The beauteous ideal Love had hungIn my soul’s shrine,And worshipped as a something all divine,With wanton hand you flungInto the dust. And then you wondered whyMy love should die.My sins and derelictions cry aloudTo all the world: my head is bowedUnder its merited reproaches. YoursIs lifted to receiveThe sympathy the court’s decree insures.The world loves to believeIn man’s depravity and woman’s worth;But I am one of many men on earthWhose loud resounding fallIs like the crashing of some well-built wallWhich those who seek can traceTo the slow work of insects at its base.. . . . . . .Be not afraid.The alimony will be promptly paid
Let us be friends. My life is sad and lonely,While yours with love is beautiful and bright.Be kind to me: I ask your friendship only.No Star is robbed by lending darkness light.
I give you friendship as I understand it,A sentiment I feel for all mankind.
Oh, give me more; may not one friend command it?
Look in the skies, ’tis there the star you’ll find;It casts its beams on all with equal favour.
I would have more than what all men may claim.
Then your ideas of friendship strongly savourOf sentiments which wear another name.
May not one friend receive more than another?
Not man from woman and still remain a friend.Life holds but three for her, a father, brother,Lover—against the rest she must contend.
Against the universe I would protect you,With my life even, nor hold the price too dear.
But not againstyourself, should fate select youAs Lancelot for foolish Guinevere.
You would not tempt me?
That is undisputed.We put the question back upon the shelf.My point remains unanswered, unrefutedNo man protects a woman from himself.
I am immune: for once I loved with passion,And all the fires within me burned to dust.I think of woman but in friendly fashion:In me she finds a comrade safe to trust.
So said Mount Peelée to the listening ocean:Behold what followed! Let the good be wise.Though human hearts proclaim extinct emotion,Beware how high the tides of friendship rise.
Great dignity ever attends great grief,And silently walks beside it;And I always know when I see such woeThat Invisible Helpers guide it.And I know deep sorrow is like a tide,It cannot ever be flowing;The high-water mark in the night and the dark—Then dawn, and the outward going.
But the people who pull at my heart-strings hardAre the ones whom destiny hurriesThrough commonplace ways to the end of their days,And pesters with paltry worries.The peddlers who trudge with a budget of waresTo the door that is slammed unkindly;The vendor who stands with his shop in his handsWhere the hastening hosts pass blindly;
The woman who holds in her poor flat purseThe price of her rent-room only,While her starved eye feeds on the comfort she needsTo brighten the lot that is lonely;The man in the desert of endless work,Unsoftened by islands of leisure;And the children who toil in the dust and the soil,While their little hearts cry for pleasure;
The people who labour, and scrimp, and save,At the call of some thankless duty,And carefully hide, with a mien of pride,Their ravening hunger for beauty;These ask no pity, and seek no aid,But the thought of them somehow is haunting;And I wish I might fling at their feet everythingThat I know in their hearts they are wanting.
However inexplicable may seemEvent and circumstance upon the earth,Though favours fall on those who none esteem,And insult and indifference greet worth,Though poverty repays a life of toil,And riches spring where idle feet have trod,And storms lay waste the patiently tilled soil—Yet Justice sways the universe of God.
As undisturbed the stately stars remainBeyond the glare of day’s obscuring light,So Justice dwells, though mortal eyes in vainSeek it persistently by reason’s sight.But, when once freed, the illumined soul looks out—Its cry will be, ‘O God, how could I doubt?’
Two roadways lead from this land to That,and one is the road of Prayer;And one is the road of Old-time Songs,and every note is a stair.
A shabby old man with a music machine on the sordid city street;But suddenly earth seemed Arcady, and life grew young and sweet.For the city street fled, and the world was green, and a little house stood by the sea;And she came singing a martial air (she who was peace itself);She brought back with her the old, strange charm, of mingled pathos and glee—
With her eyes of a child in a woman’s face, and her soul of a saint in an elf.She had been gone for many a year. They tell us it is not far—That silent place where the dear ones go, but it might as well be a star.Yes, it might as well be a distant star as a beautiful Near-by Land,If we hear no voice, and see no face, and feel no touch of a hand.
But now she had come, for I saw her there, and she looked so blithe and young;(Not white and still, as I saw her last) and the rose that she wore was red;And her voice soared up in a bird-like trill, at the end of the song she sung,And she mimicked a soldier’s warlike stride, and tossed back her dear little head.
She had gone for many a year, and never came back before;But I think she dwells in a Near-by Land, since song jarred open the door;Yes, I think it is surely a Near-by Land, that place where our loved ones are,For the song would never have reached her ear had she been on a distant star.
Two roadways lead from this land to That,and one is the road of Prayer,And one is the road of Old-time Songs,and every note is a stair.
Lord of all the Universe,when I think of YOU,Flinging stars out into space,moving suns and tides;Then this little mortal mind gets the larger view,And the carping self of me runs away and hides.
Then I see all shadowed paths leading out to Light;See the false things fade away,leaving but the True;See the wrong things slay themselves,leaving only Right;When this little mortal mind gets the larger view.
Cavillings at this and that,censure,doubt and fear,Fly,as fly before the dawn,insects of the night;Life and Death are understood;everything seems clear,All the wrong things slay themselves,leaving only Right.
The World has walked with fever in its veinsFor many and many a day. Oh, poor, sick world!Not knowing all its dreams of greed and gain,Of selfish conquest and possession, wereDisordered visions of a brain diseased.
Now the World’s malady is at its heightAnd there is foul contagion in its breath.It raves of death and slaughter; and the starsShake with reverberations of its cries,And the sad seas are troubled and disturbed.So must it rave—this sick and suffering world—Until the old secretions in its bloodAre emptied out and purged away by war;And the deep seated cankers of the mindBegin the healing process. Then a calmShall come upon the earth; and that loved wordPEACE, shall be understood from shore to shore.
Shriek on, mad world. The great Physician sitsSerenely conscious of the coming change,Nor seeks to check the fever; it must runUntil its course is finished. He can wait.
In his vast Solar Systems he has seenSo many other worlds as sick as thisHe feels but pity for his ailing charge,Not blame or anger. And he knows the hourWill surely dawn when that sick child shall wakeFree from all frenzied fancies, and shall turnClear-seeing eyes upon the face of God.Then shall begin the new millennium.
Lord of all the Universe,when I think of YOU,Then this little mortal mind gets the larger view;Then I see all shadowed paths leading into Light,Where the wrong things slay themselves,leaving only Right.
Oh, poor, sick world!
Let us halt now for a space in our hurrying;Let us take time to look up and look out;Let us refuse for a spell to be worrying;Let us decline to both question and doubt.If one goes cavilling,Hair splitting, flaw hunting—ready for strife—All the best pleasure is missed in the travellingOnward through life.
Just for to-day we will put away sorrowing—Just for to-day not a tear shall be shed;Nor will we fear anything, or go borrowingPain from the future by profitless dread.Thought shall go frolicking,Pleasuring, treasuring everything bright—Tasting the joy that is found just in rollickingOn through the light.
Just for to-day all the ills that need betteringWe will omit from our notebook of mind;All that is good we will mark by red-lettering;—Those things alone we are seeking to find.Things to be sad over,Pine over, whine over—pass them, I say!Nothing is noted save what we are glad over—This is Praise Day.
The days grow shorter, the nights grow longer;The headstones thicken along the way;And life grows sadder, but love grows stronger,For those who walk with us day by day.
The tear comes quicker, the laugh comes slower;The courage is lesser to do and dare;And the tide of joy in the heart falls lower,And seldom covers the reefs of care.
But all true things in the world seem truer;And the better things of earth seem best;And friends are dearer, as friends are fewer,And love is all, as our sun dips west.
Then let us clasp hands as we walk together,And let us speak softly in love’s sweet tone;For no man knows on the morrow whetherWe two pass on—or but one alone.
Oh! that is a beautiful land I wis,The land of the Gone-Away Souls.Yes, a lovelier region by far than this(Though this is a world most fair),The goodliest goal of all good goals,Else why do our friends stay there?I walk in a world that is sweet with friends,And earth I have ever held dear;Yes, love with duty and beauty blends,To render the earth plane bright.But faster and faster, year on yearMy comrades hurry from sight.
They hurry away to the Over-There,And few of them say Farewell.Yes, they go away with a secret airAs if on a secret quest.And they come not back to the earth to tellWhy that land seems the best.
Messages come from the mystic sphere,But few know the code of that land;Yes, many the message, but few who hearIn the din of the world below,Or hearing the message, can understandThose truths which we long to know.
But it must be the goal of all good goals,And I think of it more and more,Yes I think of that land of the Gone-Away-SoulsAnd its growing host of friendsWho will hail my bark when it touches shoreWhere the last brief journey ends.
All day, all day in a calm like deathThe harp hung waiting the sea wind’s breath.
When the western sky flushed red with shameAt the sun’s bold kiss, the sea wind came.
Said the harp to the breeze, Oh, breathe as softAs the ring-dove cooes from its nest aloft.
I am full of a song that mothers croonWhen their wee ones tire of their play at noon.
Though a harp may feel ’tis a silent thingTill the breeze arises and bids it sing.
Said the wind to the harp, Nay, sing for meThe wail of the dead that are lost at sea.
I caught their cry as I came along,And I hurried to find you and teach you the song.
Oh, the heart is the harp, and love is the breeze,And the song is ever what love may please.
[In Edgar Allan Poe’s story, ‘The Pit and the Pendulum,’ the victim is bound hand and foot, face upturned to a huge, knife-edged pendulum which swings back and forth across his body, the blade dropping closer to his heart at each swing.]
Bound hand and foot in the pit I lie,And the wall about me is strong and high;Stronger and higher it grows each day,With maximum labour and minimum pay;And there is no ladder whereon to climbTo a fairer world and a brighter time.There is no ladder, there is no rope,But the devil of greed has given a hope.He swings before me the pendulum—Vice;I know its purpose and know its price,And the world’s good people all know it, too,And much they chatter and little they do.I have sent up my cry to the hosts of menOver and over and over again:But should I cry once to the devil, ah, heWould hurry to answer and set me free.For Virtue to Virtue must ever call thrice,But once brings an answer when Virtue calls Vice.
Bound hand and foot in the pit I lieWhile the pendulum swings and the days go by.
For ‘Mabel Brown’ I never cared(My rightful name by birth),But when the name of Smith I shared,I seemed to own the earth,(I wrote it without ‘y’ or ‘e’—Plain ‘Mrs. Jack Smith’ suited me.)
My happiest hour, as I look backOn times of great content,Was when folks called me ‘Mrs. Jack,’Though ‘Mrs. Smith’ was meant.It was the pleasure of my lifeTo hear them say: ‘That’s Jack Smith’s wife.’
One day I joined a club. They saidThat I must speak or write.So I did both. I wrote and readA speech one fateful night.It made a hit, but proved, alack,A death blow to poor ‘Mrs. Jack.’
As ‘Mrs. Mabel Smith’ I’m knownThroughout my town and State;My heart feels widowed and alone;The case is intricate.Though darling Jack is mine, the same,I am divorced somehow in name.
Just ‘Mabel Smith’ I can endure;It leaves the world in doubt;But ‘Mrs.’ makes the marriage sure,Yet leaves the husband out.It sounds like Reno, or the tomb,And always fills me full of gloom.
They say the honours are all mine;Well, I would trade the packFor one sweet year in which to shineAgain as ‘Mrs. Jack.’That gave to life a core, a pith,Not found by ‘Mrs. Mabel Smith.’
For one suggests the chosen mate,And all the joy love brings;And one suggests a delegateTo federated things.I’m built upon the old-time plan—I like to supplement a man.
If on each point of glory’s starMy name shone like a pearl,I’d feel a pleasure greater farIn being ‘Jack Smith’s girl.’It is ridiculous, I know,But then, you see, I’m fashioned so.
Amidst applauding cheers I won a prize.A cynic watched me, with ironic eyes;An open foe, in open hatred, sneered;I cared for neither. Then my friend appeared.Eager, I listened for his glad ‘Well done.’But sudden shadow seemed to shroud my sun.He praised me: yet each slow, unwilling wordForced from its sheath base Envy’s hidden sword,Two-edged, it wounded me; but, worst of all,It thrust my friend down from his pedestal,And showed him as he was—so small, so small.
A sudden softness in the wind;A glint of song, a-wing;A fragrant sound that trails behind,And joy in everything.
A sudden flush upon the cheek,The teardrop quick to start;A hope too delicate to speak,And heaven within the heart.
A riotous dawn and the sea’s great wonder;The red, red heart of a rose uncurled;And beauty tearing her veil asunder,In sight of a swooning world.
A call of the soul, and the senses blended;The Springtime lost in the glow of the sun,And two lives rushing, as God intended,To meet and mingle as one.
The world is out in gala dress;And yet it is not gay.Its splendour hides a lonelinessFor something gone away.
(Laughter and music on the air;A shower of rice and bloom.Smiles for the fond departing pair—And then the empty room.)
Two trees swayed in the winter wind; and dreamedThe snowflakes falling about them were beesSinging among the leaves. And they were glad,Knowing the dream would soon come true.
Beside the hearth an aged couple rocked,And dozed; and dreamed the friends long passed from sightWere with them once again. They woke and smiled,Knowing the dream would soon come true.
There was once a little comet who lived near the Milky Way!She loved to wander out at night and jump about and play.The mother of the comet was a very good old star—She used to scold her reckless child for venturing out too far;She told her of the ogre, Sun, who loved on stars to sup,And who asked no better pastimes than gobbling comets up.
But instead of growing cautious and of showing proper fear,The foolish little comet edged up near, and near, and near.She switched her saucy tail along right where the Sun could see,And flirted with old Mars and was bold as bold could be.She laughed to scorn the quiet stars, who never frisked about;She said there was no fun in life unless you ventured out.
She liked to make the planets stare, and wished no better mirthThan just to see the telescopes aimed at her from the Earth.She wondered how so many stars could mope through nights and days,And let the sickly faced old moon get all the love and praise.And as she talked and tossed her head and switched her shining trail,The staid old mother star grew sad, her cheek grew wan and pale.
For she had lived there in the skies a million years or more,And she had heard gay comets talk in just this way before.And by and by there came an end to this gay comet’s fun—She went a tiny bit too far—and vanished in the Sun!No more she swings her shining trail before the whole world’s sight,But quiet stars she laughed to scorn are twinkling every night.
WHEN LOVE FOR HIS MAKER AWOKE IN MAN, THE DANCE BEGAN
The wave of the ocean, the leaf of the wood,In the rhythm of motion proclaim life is good.The stars are all swinging to metres and rhyme,The planets are singing while suns mark the time.The moonbeams and rivers float off in a trance,The Universe quivers—on, on with the dance!
Our partners we pick from the best of the throngIn the ballroom of Life and go lilting along;We follow our fancy, and choose as we will,For waltz or for tango or merry quadrille;But ever one partner is waiting us allAt the end of the programme, to finish the ball.
Unasked, and unwelcome, he comes without leaveAnd calls when he chooses, ‘My dance, I believe?’And none may refuse him, and none may say no;When he beckons the dancer, the dancer must go.You may hate him, and shun him; and yet in life’s ballFor the one who lives well ’tis the best dance of all.
Since early this morning the world has seemed surgingWith unworded rhythm, and rhyme without thought.It may be the Muses take this way of urgingThe patience and pains by which poems are wrought.It may be some singer who passed into glory,With songs all unfinished, is lingering nearAnd trying to tell me the rest of the story,Which I am too dull of perception to hear.
I hear not, I see not; but feel the sweet swingingAnd swaying of metre, in sunlight and shade,The still arch of Space with such music is ringingAs never an audible orchestra made.The moments glide by me, and each one is dancing;Aquiver with life is each leaf on the tree,And out on the ocean is movement entrancing,As billow with billow goes racing with glee.
With never a thought that is worthy the saying,And never a theme to be put into song,Since early this morning my mind has been straying,A vagabond thing, with a vagabond throng,With gay, idle moments, and waves of the ocean,With winds and with sunbeams, and tree-tops and birds,It has lilted along in the joy of mere motion,To songs without music and verse without words.
My Flower Room is such a little place,Scarce twenty feet by nine; yet in that spaceI have met God; yea, many a radiant hourHave talked with Him, the All-Embracing-Cause,About His laws.And He has shown me, in each vine and flowerSuch miracles of powerThat day by day this Flower Room of mineHas come to be a shrine.
Fed by the self-same soil and atmospherePale, tender shoots appearRising to greet the light in that sweet room.One speeds to crimson bloom;One slowly creeps to unassuming grace;One climbs, one trails;One drinks the light and moisture;One exhales.
Up through the earth together, stem by stemTwo plants push swiftly in a floral race;Till one sends forth a blossom like a gem;And one gives only fragranceIn a seedSo small it scarce is felt within the hand.Lie hidden such delightsOf scents and sights,When by the elements of Nature freed,As Paradise must have at its command.
From shapeless roots and ugly bulbous thingsWhat gorgeous beauty springs!Such infinite variety appearsA hundred artists in a hundred yearsCould never copy from the floral worldThe marvels that in leaf and bud lie curled.Nor could the most colossal mind of manCreate one little seed of plant or vineWithout assistance from the First Great Plan;Without the aid divine.
Who but a GodCould draw from light and moisture, heat and cold,And fashion in earth’s mould,A multitude of blooms to deck one sod?Who but a God!Not one man knowsJust why the bloom and fragrance of the roseOr how its tints were blent;Or why the white Camelia without scentUp through the same soil grows;Or how the daisy and the violetAnd blades of grass first on wild meadows met.Not one, not one man knows;The wisest but SUPPOSE.
This Flower Room of mineHas come to be a shrine;And I go henceEach day with larger faith and reverence.
My faith is rooted in no written creed;And there are those who call me heretic;Yet year on year, though I be well or sickOr opulent, or in the slough of need,If, light of foot, fair Life trips by me pleasuring,Or, by the rule of pain, old Time stands measuringThe dull, drab moments—still ascends my cry:‘God reigns on high!He doeth all things well!’
Not much I prize, or one, or any brandOf theologic lore; nor think too wellOf generally accepted heaven and hell.But faith and knowledge build at Love’s commandA beauteous heaven; a heaven of thought all clarifiedOf hate and fear and doubt; a heaven of rarefiedAnd perfect trust; and from the heaven I cry:‘God reigns on high!Whatever is, is best.’
My faith refuses to accept the ‘fall’!It sees man ever as a child of God,Growing in wisdom as new realms are trod,Until the Christ in him is One with All.From this full consciousness my faith is borrowingLight to illuminate Life’s darkest sorrowing,Whatever woes assail me still I cry:‘God reigns on high!He doeth all things well.’
My faith finds prayer the language of the heart,Which gives us converse with the host unseen;And those who linger in the vales betweenThe Here and Yonder, in these prayers take part.My dead come near, and say: ‘Death means not perishing;Cherish us in your thoughts, for by that cherishingShall severed links be welded by and by.’‘God reigns on high!Whatever is, is best.’
It is easy to stand in the pulpit, or in the closet to kneel,And say: ‘God do this; God do that!—Make the world better; relieve the sorrows of man; for the sake of Thy Son,Oh, forgive all sin!’ Then, having planned out God’s work, to feelOur duty is done.It is easy to be religious this way—Easy to pray.
It is harder to stand on the highway, or walk in the crowded mart;And say: ‘I am He. I am He.‘Mine the world-burden; mine the sorrows of men; mine the Christ-work‘To forgive my brother’s sin,’ and then to live the Christ-part and never to shirk.It is hard for you and meTo be religious this way,Day after day.
But God is no longer in heaven; we drove Him out with our prayers,Drove Him out with our sermons and creeds, and our endless plaints and despairs.He came down over the borders, and Christ, too, came along;They are looking the whole world over to see just what is wrong.God has grown weary of hearing His praises sung on earth;And Jesus is weary of hearing the story about His birth;And the way to win Their favour, that is surer than any other,Is to join in a song of Brotherhood and praises of one another.
No; God is no longer in heaven; He has come down on earth to seeThat nothing is wrong with the world He made;the wrong is in you and me.He meant the earth for a garden-spot, where mill and factory stand;Childhood, he meant for growing-time—but look at the toiling band!Woman was meant for mother and mate—now look at the slaves of lust.And the good folks shake their heads and say, ‘We must pray to God and trust.’God has a billion books of our prayers unopened upon his shelves,For the things we are begging Him to do, He wants us to do ourselves.
Jehovah, Jesus, and each soul in spaceAre one and undividable. UntilWe see God shining in each neighbour’s faceAnd find Him in ourselves and hail Him there,What use is prayer?Let us be still.How can we love the whole and not each part?How worship God, and harbour in the heartHate of God’s members—for all men are that.Too long our souls have sat,Like poor blind beggars at the door of God.He never made a beggar—we are kings!
Let us rise up, for it is time we trodThe mountain-tops; time that we did the thingsWe have so long asked God to do.He waits for youTo look deep in your brother’s eyes and seeThe God within;To hear you say ‘Lo, thou art He; Lo, thou art He.’This is the only way to end all sin,The difficult, one way.
A prayer without a deed is an arrow without a bow-string;A deed without a prayer is a bow-string without an arrow.The heart of a man should be like a quiver full of arrows,And the hand of a man should be like a strong bow strung for action.The heart of a man should keep his arrows ever ascending,And the hand and the mind of a man should keep at a work unending.
Now what were the words of Jesus,And what would He pause and say,If we were to meet in home or streetThe Lord of the world to-day?Oh, I think He would pause and say,‘Go on with your chosen labour;Speak only good of your neighbour;Widen your farms, and lay down your arms,Or dig up the soil with each sabre.’
Now what were the answer of JesusIf we should ask for a creedTo carry us straight through the wonderful gateWhen soul from body is freed?Oh, I think He would give us this creed:‘Praise God, whatever betide you;Cast joy on the lives beside you;Better the earth, by growing in worth,With love as the law to guide you.’
Now what were the answer of JesusIf we should ask Him to tellOf the last great goal of the homing soul,Where each of us hopes to dwell.Oh, I think it is this He would tell:‘The soul is the builder—then wake it;The mind is the kingdom—then take it;And thought upon thought let Eden be wrought,For heaven will be what you make it.’
Let a valiant Faith cross swords with Death,And Death is certain to fall;For the dead arise with joy in their eyes—They were not dead at all.If this were only a world of chance,Then faith, with its strong white sparkCould burn through the sod and fashion a God,And set Him to shine in the dark.
So in troublesome days, and in shadowy ways,In the dire and difficult time,We must cling, we must cling to our Faith, and bringOur courage to heights sublime.It is not a matter of hugging a creedThat will lift us up to the light,But in keeping our trust that Love is just,And that whatever is, is right.
When the hopes of this world into chaos are hurled,And the devil seems running the earth,When the bad folks stay and the good pass away,And greed fares better than worth,Oh, that is the hour to trust in the PowerThat will straighten the tangle out;For death and sorrow are little things,But a terrible thing is doubt.
For he who climbs to say his prayerMeets half way the descending Grace.Elsa Barker, inBritish Review.
For he who climbs to say his prayerMeets half way the descending Grace.
Elsa Barker, inBritish Review.
This is the secret of all prayersThat in God’s sight have worth,They must be uttered from the stairsThat wind away from earth;And he who mounts to speak the word,He shall be heard. He shall be heard.
And he who will not leave himself,But stays down with his cares,Or with his thoughts of pride and pelf,Though loud and long his prayers,Beyond earth’s dome of arching skiesThey shall not rise. They shall not rise.
Oh, ye who seek for strength and powerSeek first some quiet spot,And fashion through a silent hourYour stairway, thought by thought;Then climb, and pray to God on high:He shall reply. He shall reply.
Up to the gates of gleaming Pearl,There came the spirit of a girl,And to the white-robed Guard she said:‘Dear Angel, am I truly dead?Just yonder, lying on my bed,I heard them say it; and they wept.And after that, methinks I slept.Then when I woke, I saw your face,And suddenly was in this place.It seems a pleasant place to be,Yet earth was fair enough to me.What is there here, to do, or see?Will I see God, dear Angel, say?And is He very far away?’
The Angel said, ‘You are in truthWhat men call dead. That word to youthIs full of terror; but it meansOnly a change of tasks, and scenes.You have been brought to us becauseOf certain ancient karmic lawsSet into motion æons gone.By us you will be guided onFrom plane to plane, and sphere to sphere,Until your tasks are finished here.Then back to earth, the home of man,To work again another span.’
‘But, Angel, when will I see God?’
‘After the final path is trod;After you no more long, or crave,To see, or hear, or own, or haveAught beside—HIM. Then shall His faceReveal itself to you in space.And you shall find yourself made oneWith that Great Sun, behind the sun.Child, go thy way inside the gate,Where many eager loved ones wait.Death is but larger life begun.’
My soul beheld a vision of the Master:Methought He stood with grieved and questioning eyes,Where Freedom drove its chariot to disasterAnd toilers heard, unheeding, toilers’ cries.Where man withheld God’s bounties from his neighbour,And fertile fields were sterilised by greed;Where Labour’s hand was lifted against labour,And suffering serfs to despots turned when freed.
Majestic rose tall steeple after steeple;Imperious bells called worshippers to prayer;But as they passed, the faces of the peopleWere marred by envy, anger and despair.‘Christ the Redeemer of the world has risen,Peace and good will,’ so rang the major strain;But forth from sweat-shops, tenement and prisonWailed minor protests, redolent with pain.
Methought about the Master, all unseeing,Fought desperate hosts of striking clan with clan,Their primal purpose, meant for labour’s freeing,Sunk in vindictive hate of man for man.Pretentious Wealth, in unearned robes of beauty,Flung Want a pittance from her bulging purse,While ill-paid Toil went on dull rounds of duty,Hell in her heart, and on her lips a curse.
Then spoke the Christ (so wondrous was my vision)(Deep, deep, His voice, with sorrow’s cadence fraught):‘This world to-day would be a realm elysianHad my disciples lived the love I taught.Un-Christlike is the Christian creed men fashionWho kneel to worship, and who rise to slay.Profane pretenders of my holy Passion,Ye nail Me newly to the cross each day.’
How will Christ come back again,How will He be seen, and where,Where His chosen way?Will He come in dead of night,Shining in His robes of light,Or at dawn of day?
Will it be at Christmas time,When the bells are all achime,That He is re-born?Or will He return and bringWide and wondrous wakeningOn some Easter morn?
When will this sad world rejoice,Listening to that golden voiceSpeaking unto men?Lives there one who yet shall cryLoud to startled passers-by—‘Christ has come again?’
List the answer—Christ is here!Seek and you shall find him near—Dwelling on the earth.By the world’s awakened thought,This great miracle is wrought,This the second birth.
While you wonder where and nowChrist shall come—behold himnow,Patient, loving, meek.Looking from your neighbour’s eyes,Or in humble toiling guise—Lo! the Christ you seek.
Look for him in human hearts,In the shops, and in the marts,And beside your hearth.Search and speak the watchword Love,And the Christ shall rise and proveHe has come to earth.
Sorrowful ofttimes is HeThat we have not eyes to see,Have not ears to hear,As we call to Him afar,Out beyond some distant star,While He stands so near.
Seek Him, seek Him, where He dwells,Chime the voices of the bellsOn the Christmas air.Christ has come to earth again,He is in the hearts of men,Seek and find him there.