Page images
PDF
EPUB

Questionings

re the clouds that wander by ut the offspring of mine eye, orn with every glance I cast, erishing when that is past?

nd those thousand, thousand eyes, cattered through the twinkling skies, Do they draw their life from mine, r 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

New creations do begin;

Hues more bright and forms more rare

Than reality doth wear

Flash across my inward sense,
Born of the 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
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,

2831

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 [1805-1890]

THE GREAT VOICES

A VOICE from the sea to the mountains,
From the mountains again to the sea;
A call from the deep to the fountains:
O spirit! be glad and be free!

A cry from the floods to the fountains,
And the torrents repeat the glad song

As they leap from the breast of the mountains:
O spirit! be free and be strong!

The pine forests thrill with emotion
Of praise as the spirit sweeps by;
With a voice like the murmur of ocean
To the soul of the listener they cry.

Oh, sing, human heart, like the fountains,
With joy reverential and free;
Contented and calm as the mountains,
And deep as the woods and the sea.

Charles Timothy Brooks (1813–1883]

BEAUTY AND DUTY

I SLEPT, and dreamed that life was beauty;
I woke, and found that life was duty.
Was thy dream then a shadowy lie?
Toil on, sad heart, courageously,
And thou shalt find thy dream to be
A noonday light and truth to thee.

Ellen Hooper [18

Inspiration

2833

THE STRAIGHT ROAD

may be the path to highest good, e successfully have it pursued.

ho wouldst follow, be well warned to see y prove not a curvèd road to thee.

ightest path perhaps which may be sought, ough the great highway men call "I ought." Ellen Hooper [18

THE WAY

HEY find the way who linger where

he soul finds fullest life;

he battle brave is carried on

y all who wait, and waiting, dare

eem each day's least that's fitly done victory worthy to be won,

For seek their gain with strife.

Sidney Henry Morse [18

INSPIRATION

LIFE of Ages, richly poured,
Love of God, unspent and free,
Flowing in the Prophet's word
And the People's liberty!

Never was to chosen race

That unstinted tide confined;

Thine is every time and place,

Fountain sweet of heart and mind!

Secret of the morning stars,
Motion of the oldest hours,
Pledge through elemental wars
Of the coming spirit's powers!

Rolling planet, flaming sun,

Stand in nobler man complete;
Prescient laws Thine errands run,
Frame the shrine for Godhead meet.

Homeward led, the wondering eye
Upward yearned in joy or awe,
Found the love that waited nigh,
Guidance of Thy guardian Law.

In the touch of earth it thrilled;
Down from mystic skies it burned;
Right obeyed and passion stilled
Its eternal gladness earned.

Breathing in the thinker's creed,
Pulsing in the hero's blood,
Nerving simplest thought and deed,
Freshening time with truth and good,

Consecrating art and song,

Holy book and pilgrim track,
Hurling floods of tyrant wrong
From the sacred limits back,—

Life of Ages, richly poured,

Love of God, unspent and free,
Flow still in the Prophet's word
And the People's liberty!

Samuel Johnson (1822-1882)

I IN THEE, AND THOU IN ME

I AM but clay in thy hands; but thou art the all-loving artist;
Passive I lie in thy sight, yet in my selfhood I strive

So to embody the life and love thou ever impartest
That in my spheres of the finite I may be truly alive.

Knowing thou needest this form, as I thy divine inspiration,
Knowing thou shapest the clay with a vision and purpose

divine,

So would I answer each touch of thy hand in its loving creation, That in my conscious life thy power and beauty may shine.

Gnosis

2835

e noble intent thou hast in forming thy crea

om sense into life of the soul, and the image of

h thee in thy work to model humanity's features likeness of God, myself from myself I would

human existence, no one above or below me; wisdom and love, as roses are steeped in the

m clay to statue, from statue to flesh, till thou

e

into manhood celestial, and in thine image re

e will I trust, bringing me sooner or later lark screen that divides these shows of the finite

ee.

only, this warm dear life, O loving Creator! invisible future, born of the present, must be. Christopher Pearse Cranch [1813-1892]

GNOSIS

THOUGHT 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.

« PreviousContinue »