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And thus, O Prophet-bard of old, Hast thou thy tale of sorrow told The same which earth's unwelcome seers Have felt in all succeeding years.
Sport of the changeful multitude, Nor calmly heard nor understood, Their song has seemed a trick of art, Their warnings but, the actor's part.
With bonds, and scorn, and evil will, The world requites its prophets still.
So was it when the Holy One The garments of the flesh put on Men followed where the Highest led For common gifts of daily bread, And gross of ear, of vision dim, Owned not the Godlike power of Him.
Vain as a dreamer's words to them His wail above Jerusalem, And meaningless the watch He kept Through which His weak disciples slept.
Yet shrink not thou, whoe'er thou art, For God's great purpose set apart, Before whose far-discerning eyes, The Future as the Present lies! Beyond a narrow-bounded age Stretches thy prophet-heritage, Through Heaven's vast spaces angel-trod, And through the eternal years of God Thy audience, worlds!--all things to be The witness of the Truth in thee! 1844.
WHAT THE VOICE SAID MADDENED by Earth's wrong and evil, "Lord!" I cried in sudden ire, "From Thy right hand, clothed with thunder, Shake the bolted fire! "Love is lost, and Faith is dying; With the brute the man is sold; And the dropping blood of labor Hardens into gold.
"Here the dying wail of Famine, There the battle's groan of pain; And, in silence, smooth-faced Mammon Reaping men like grain.
"'Where is God, that we should fear Him ?' Thus the earth-born Titans say 'God! if Thou art living, hear us!' Thus the weak ones pray." "Thou, the patient Heaven upbraiding," Spake a solemn Voice within; "Weary of our Lord's forbearance, Art thou free from sin?
"Fearless brow to Him uplifting, Canst thou for His thunders call, Knowing that to guilt's attraction Evermore they fall?
"Know'st thou not all germs of evil In thy heart await their time?
Not thyself, but God's restraining, Stays their growth of crime.
"Couldst thou boast, O child of weakness! O'er the sons of wrong and strife, Were their strong temptations planted In thy path of life?
"Thou hast seen two streamlets gushing From one fountain, clear and free, But by widely varying channels Searching for the sea.
"Glideth one through greenest valleys, Kissing them with lips still sweet; One, mad roaring down the mountains, Stagnates at their feet.
"Is it choice whereby the Parsee Kneels before his mother's fire?
In his black tent did the Tartar Choose his wandering sire?
"He alone, whose hand is bounding Human power and human will, Looking through each soul's surrounding, Knows its good or ill.
"For thyself, while wrong and sorrow Make to thee their strong appeal, Coward wert thou not to utter What the heart must feel.
"Earnest words must needs be spoken When the warm heart bleeds or burns With its scorn of wrong, or pity For the wronged, by turns.
"But, by all thy nature's weakness, Hidden faults and follies known, Be thou, in rebuking evil, Conscious of thine own.
"Not the less shall stern-eyed Duty To thy lips her trumpet set, But with harsher blasts shall mingle Wailings of regret." Cease not, Voice of holy speaking, Teacher sent of God, be near, Whispering through the day's cool silence, Let my spirit hear! So, when thoughts of evil-doers Waken scorn, or hatred move, Shall a mournful fellow-feeling Temper all with love.
1847.
THE ANGEL OF PATIENCE.
A FREE PARAPHRASE OF THE GERMAN.
To weary hearts, to mourning homes, God's meekest Angel gently comes No power has he to banish pain, Or give us back our lost again; And yet in tenderest love, our dear And Heavenly Father sends him here.
There's quiet in that Angel's glance, There 's rest in his still countenance! He mocks no grief with idle cheer, Nor wounds with words the mourner's ear; But ills and woes he may not cure He kindly trains us to endure.
Angel of Patience! sent to calm Our feverish brows with cooling palm; To lay the storms of hope and fear, And reconcile life's smile and tear; The throbs of wounded pride to still, And make our own our Father's will.
O thou who mournest on thy way, With longings for the close of day; He walks with thee, that Angel kind, And gently whispers, "Be resigned Bear up, bear on, the end shall tell The dear Lord ordereth all things well!" 1847.
THE WIFE OF MANOAH TO HER HUSBAND.
Against the sunset's glowing wall The city towers rise black and tall, Where Zorah, on its rocky height, Stands like an armed man in the light.
Down Eshtaol's vales of ripened grain Falls like a cloud the night amain, And up the hillsides climbing slow The barley reapers homeward go.
Look, dearest! how our fair child's head The sunset light hath hallowed, Where at this olive's foot he lies, Uplooking to the tranquil skies.
Oh, while beneath the fervent heat Thy sickle swept the bearded wheat, I've watched, with mingled joy and dread, Our child upon his grassy bed.
Joy, which the mother feels alone Whose morning hope like mine had flown, When to her bosom, over-blessed, A dearer life than hers is pressed.
Dread, for the future dark and still, Which shapes our dear one to its will; Forever in his large calm eyes, I read a tale of sacrifice.
The same foreboding awe I felt When at the altar's side we knelt, And he, who as a pilgrim came, Rose, winged and glorious, through the flame.
I slept not, though the wild bees made A dreamlike murmuring in the shade, And on me the warm-fingered hours Pressed with the drowsy smell of flowers.
Before me, in a vision, rose The hosts of Israel's scornful foes,-- Rank over rank, helm, shield, and spear, Glittered in noon's hot atmosphere.
I heard their boast, and bitter word, Their mockery of the Hebrew's Lord, I saw their hands His ark assail, Their feet profane His holy veil.
No angel down the blue space spoke, No thunder from the still sky broke; But in their midst, in power and awe, Like God's waked wrath, our child I saw! A child no more!--harsh-browed and strong, He towered a giant in the throng, And down his shoulders, broad and bare, Swept the black terror of his hair.
He raised his arm--he smote amain; As round the reaper falls the grain, So the dark host around him fell, So sank the foes of Israel! Again I looked.

In sunlight shone The towers and domes of Askelon; Priest, warrior, slave, a mighty crowd Within her idol temple bowed.
Yet one knelt not; stark, gaunt, and blind, His arms the massive pillars twined,-- An eyeless captive, strong with hate, He stood there like an evil Fate.
The red shrines smoked,--the trumpets pealed He stooped,--the giant columns reeled; Reeled tower and fane, sank arch and wall, And the thick dust-cloud closed o'er all! Above the shriek, the crash, the groan Of the fallen pride of Askelon, I heard, sheer down the echoing sky, A voice as of an angel cry,-- The voice of him, who at our side Sat through the golden eventide; Of him who, on thy altar's blaze, Rose fire-winged, with his song of praise.
"Rejoice o'er Israel's broken chain, Gray mother of the mighty slain! Rejoice!" it cried, "he vanquisheth! The strong in life is strong in death! "To him shall Zorah's daughters raise Through coming years their hymns of praise, And gray old men at evening tell Of all he wrought for Israel.
"And they who sing and they who hear Alike shall hold thy memory dear, And pour their blessings on thy head, O mother of the mighty dead!" It ceased; and though a sound I heard As if great wings the still air stirred, I only saw the barley sheaves And hills half hid by olive leaves.
I bowed my face, in awe and fear, On the dear child who slumbered near; "With me, as with my only son, O God," I said, "Thy will be done!" 1847.
MY SOUL AND I Stand still, my soul, in the silent dark I would question thee, Alone in the shadow drear and stark With God and me! What, my soul, was thy errand here?
Was it mirth or ease, Or heaping up dust from year to year?
"Nay, none of these!" Speak, soul, aright in His holy sight Whose eye looks still And steadily on thee through the night "To do His will!" What hast thou done, O soul of mine, That thou tremblest so?
Hast thou wrought His task, and kept the line He bade thee go?
Aha! thou tremblest!--well I see Thou 'rt craven grown.
Is it so hard with God and me To stand alone?
Summon thy sunshine bravery back, O wretched sprite! Let me hear thy voice through this deep and black Abysmal night.
What hast thou wrought for Right and Truth, For God and Man, From the golden hours of bright-eyed youth To life's mid span?
What, silent all! art sad of cheer?
Art fearful now?
When God seemed far and men were near, How brave wert thou! Ah, soul of mine, thy tones I hear, But weak and low, Like far sad murmurs on my ear They come and go.
I have wrestled stoutly with the Wrong, And borne the Right From beneath the footfall of the throng To life and light.
"Wherever Freedom shivered a chain, God speed, quoth I; To Error amidst her shouting train I gave the lie." Ah, soul of mine! ah, soul of mine! Thy deeds are well: Were they wrought for Truth's sake or for thine?
My soul, pray tell.
"Of all the work my hand hath wrought Beneath the sky, Save a place in kindly human thought, No gain have I." Go to, go to! for thy very self Thy deeds were done Thou for fame, the miser for pelf, Your end is one! And where art thou going, soul of mine?
Canst see the end?
And whither this troubled life of thine Evermore doth tend?
What daunts thee now?
what shakes thee so?
My sad soul say.
"I see a cloud like a curtain low Hang o'er my way.
"Whither I go I cannot tell That cloud hangs black, High as the heaven and deep as hell Across my track.
"I see its shadow coldly enwrap The souls before.
Sadly they enter it, step by step, To return no more.
"They shrink, they shudder, dear God! they kneel To Thee in prayer.
They shut their eyes on the cloud, but feel That it still is there.
"In vain they turn from the dread Before To the Known and Gone; For while gazing behind them evermore Their feet glide on.
"Yet, at times, I see upon sweet pale faces A light begin To tremble, as if from holy places And shrines within.
"And at times methinks their cold lips move With hymn and prayer, As if somewhat of awe, but more of love And hope were there.
"I call on the souls who have left the light To reveal their lot; I bend mine ear to that wall of night, And they answer not.
"But I hear around me sighs of pain And the cry of fear, And a sound like the slow sad dropping of rain, Each drop a tear! "Ah, the cloud is dark, and day by day I am moving thither I must pass beneath it on my way-- God pity me!--whither ?" Ah, soul of mine! so brave and wise In the life-storm loud, Fronting so calmly all human eyes In the sunlit crowd! Now standing apart with God and me Thou art weakness all, Gazing vainly after the things to be Through Death's dread wall.
But never for this, never for this Was thy being lent; For the craven's fear is but selfishness, Like his merriment.
Folly and Fear are sisters twain One closing her eyes.
The other peopling the dark inane With spectral lies.
Know well, my soul, God's hand controls Whate'er thou fearest; Round Him in calmest music rolls Whate'er thou Nearest.
What to thee is shadow, to Him is day, And the end He knoweth, And not on a blind and aimless way The spirit goeth.
Man sees no future,--a phantom show Is alone before him; Past Time is dead, and the grasses grow, And flowers bloom o'er him.
Nothing before, nothing behind; The steps of Faith Fall on the seeming void, and find The rock beneath.
The Present, the Present is all thou hast For thy sure possessing; Like the patriarch's angel hold it fast Till it gives its blessing.
Why fear the night?
why shrink from Death; That phantom wan?
There is nothing in heaven or earth beneath Save God and man.
Peopling the shadows we turn from Him And from one another; All is spectral and vague and dim Save God and our brother! Like warp and woof all destinies Are woven fast, Linked in sympathy like the keys Of an organ vast.
Pluck one thread, and the web ye mar; Break but one Of a thousand keys, and the paining jar Through all will run.
O restless spirit! wherefore strain Beyond thy sphere?
Heaven and hell, with their joy and pain, Are now and here.
Back to thyself is measured well All thou hast given; Thy neighbor's wrong is thy present hell, His bliss, thy heaven.
And in life, in death, in dark and light, All are in God's care Sound the black abyss, pierce the deep of night, And He is there! All which is real now remaineth, And fadeth never The hand which upholds it now sustaineth The soul forever.
Leaning on Him, make with reverent meekness His own thy will, And with strength from Him shall thy utter weakness Life's task fulfil; And that cloud itself, which now before thee Lies dark in view, Shall with beams of light from the inner glory Be stricken through.
And like meadow mist through autumn's dawn Uprolling thin, Its thickest folds when about thee drawn Let sunlight in.
Then of what is to be, and of what is done, Why queriest thou?
The past and the time to be are one, And both are now! 1847.
WORSHIP.
"Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this.

To visit the fatherless and widows in, their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world."-- JAMES I.27.
The Pagan's myths through marble lips are spoken, And ghosts of old Beliefs still flit and moan Round fane and altar overthrown and broken, O'er tree-grown barrow and gray ring of stone.
Blind Faith had martyrs in those old high places, The Syrian hill grove and the Druid's wood, With mother's offering, to the Fiend's embraces, Bone of their bone, and blood of their own blood.
Red altars, kindling through that night of error, Smoked with warm blood beneath the cruel eye Of lawless Power and sanguinary Terror, Throned on the circle of a pitiless sky; Beneath whose baleful shadow, overcasting All heaven above, and blighting earth below, The scourge grew red, the lip grew pale with fasting, And man's oblation was his fear and woe! Then through great temples swelled the dismal moaning Of dirge-like music and sepulchral prayer; Pale wizard priests, o'er occult symbols droning, Swung their white censers in the burdened air As if the pomp of rituals, and the savor Of gums and spices could the Unseen One please; As if His ear could bend, with childish favor, To the poor flattery of the organ keys! Feet red from war-fields trod the church aisles holy, With trembling reverence: and the oppressor there, Kneeling before his priest, abased and lowly, Crushed human hearts beneath his knee of prayer.
Not such the service the benignant Father Requireth at His earthly children's hands Not the poor offering of vain rites, but rather The simple duty man from man demands.
For Earth He asks it: the full joy of heaven Knoweth no change of waning or increase; The great heart of the Infinite beats even, Untroubled flows the river of His peace.
He asks no taper lights, on high surrounding The priestly altar and the saintly grave, No dolorous chant nor organ music sounding, Nor incense clouding tip the twilight nave.
For he whom Jesus loved hath truly spoken The holier worship which he deigns to bless Restores the lost, and binds the spirit broken, And feeds the widow and the fatherless! Types of our human weakness and our sorrow! Who lives unhaunted by his loved ones dead?
Who, with vain longing, seeketh not to borrow From stranger eyes the home lights which have fled?
O brother man! fold to thy heart thy brother; Where pity dwells, the peace of God is there; To worship rightly is to love each other, Each smile a hymn, each kindly deed a prayer.
Follow with reverent steps the great example Of Him whose holy work was "doing good;" So shall the wide earth seem our Father's temple, Each loving life a psalm of gratitude.
Then shall all shackles fall; the stormy clangor Of wild war music o'er the earth shall cease; Love shall tread out the baleful fire of anger, And in its ashes plant the tree of peace! 1848.
THE HOLY LAND Paraphrased from the lines in Lamartine's _Adieu to Marseilles_, beginning "Je n'ai pas navigue sur l'ocean de sable." I have not felt, o'er seas of sand, The rocking of the desert bark; Nor laved at Hebron's fount my hand, By Hebron's palm-trees cool and dark; Nor pitched my tent at even-fall, On dust where Job of old has lain, Nor dreamed beneath its canvas wall, The dream of Jacob o'er again.
One vast world-page remains unread; How shine the stars in Chaldea's sky, How sounds the reverent pilgrim's tread, How beats the heart with God so nigh How round gray arch and column lone The spirit of the old time broods, And sighs in all the winds that moan Along the sandy solitudes! In thy tall cedars, Lebanon, I have not heard the nations' cries, Nor seen thy eagles stooping down Where buried Tyre in ruin lies.
The Christian's prayer I have not said In Tadmor's temples of decay, Nor startled, with my dreary tread, The waste where Memnon's empire lay.
Nor have I, from thy hallowed tide, O Jordan! heard the low lament, Like that sad wail along thy side Which Israel's mournful prophet sent! Nor thrilled within that grotto lone Where, deep in night, the Bard of Kings Felt hands of fire direct his own, And sweep for God the conscious strings.
I have not climbed to Olivet, Nor laid me where my Saviour lay, And left His trace of tears as yet By angel eyes unwept away; Nor watched, at midnight's solemn time, The garden where His prayer and groan, Wrung by His sorrow and our crime, Rose to One listening ear alone.
I have not kissed the rock-hewn grot Where in His mother's arms He lay, Nor knelt upon the sacred spot Where last His footsteps pressed the clay; Nor looked on that sad mountain head, Nor smote my sinful breast, where wide His arms to fold the world He spread, And bowed His head to bless--and died! 1848.
THE REWARD Who, looking backward from his manhood's prime, Sees not the spectre of his misspent time?
And, through the shade Of funeral cypress planted thick behind, Hears no reproachful whisper on the wind From his loved dead?
Who bears no trace of passion's evil force?
Who shuns thy sting, O terrible Remorse?
Who does not cast On the thronged pages of his memory's book, At times, a sad and half-reluctant look, Regretful of the past?
Alas! the evil which we fain would shun We do, and leave the wished-for good undone Our strength to-day Is but to-morrow's weakness, prone to fall; Poor, blind, unprofitable servants all Are we alway.
Yet who, thus looking backward o'er his years, Feels not his eyelids wet with grateful tears, If he hath been Permitted, weak and sinful as he was, To cheer and aid, in some ennobling cause, His fellow-men?
If he hath hidden the outcast, or let in A ray of sunshine to the cell of sin; If he hath lent Strength to the weak, and, in an hour of need, Over the suffering, mindless of his creed Or home, hath bent; He has not lived in vain, and while he gives The praise to Him, in whom he moves and lives, With thankful heart; He gazes backward, and with hope before, Knowing that from his works he nevermore Can henceforth part.
1848.
THE WISH OF TO-DAY.
I ask not now for gold to gild With mocking shine a weary frame; The yearning of the mind is stilled, I ask not now for Fame.
A rose-cloud, dimly seen above, Melting in heaven's blue depths away; Oh, sweet, fond dream of human Love For thee I may not pray.
But, bowed in lowliness of mind, I make my humble wishes known; I only ask a will resigned, O Father, to Thine own! To-day, beneath Thy chastening eye I crave alone for peace and rest, Submissive in Thy hand to lie, And feel that it is best.
A marvel seems the Universe, A miracle our Life and Death; A mystery which I cannot pierce, Around, above, beneath.
In vain I task my aching brain, In vain the sage's thought I scan, I only feel how weak and vain, How poor and blind, is man.
And now my spirit sighs for home, And longs for light whereby to see, And, like a weary child, would come, O Father, unto Thee! Though oft, like letters traced on sand, My weak resolves have passed away, In mercy lend Thy helping hand Unto my prayer to-day! 1848.
ALL'S WELL The clouds, which rise with thunder, slake Our thirsty souls with rain; The blow most dreaded falls to break From off our limbs a chain; And wrongs of man to man but make The love of God more plain.
As through the shadowy lens of even The eye looks farthest into heaven On gleams of star and depths of blue The glaring sunshine never knew! 1850.
INVOCATION Through Thy clear spaces, Lord, of old, Formless and void the dead earth rolled; Deaf to Thy heaven's sweet music, blind To the great lights which o'er it shined; No sound, no ray, no warmth, no breath,-- A dumb despair, a wandering death.
To that dark, weltering horror came Thy spirit, like a subtle flame,-- A breath of life electrical, Awakening and transforming all, Till beat and thrilled in every part The pulses of a living heart.
Then knew their bounds the land and sea; Then smiled the bloom of mead and tree; From flower to moth, from beast to man, The quick creative impulse ran; And earth, with life from thee renewed, Was in thy holy eyesight good.
As lost and void, as dark and cold And formless as that earth of old; A wandering waste of storm and night, Midst spheres of song and realms of light; A blot upon thy holy sky, Untouched, unwarned of thee, am I.
O Thou who movest on the deep Of spirits, wake my own from sleep Its darkness melt, its coldness warm, The lost restore, the ill transform, That flower and fruit henceforth may be Its grateful offering, worthy Thee.
1851.
QUESTIONS OF LIFE And the angel that was sent unto me, whose name was Uriel, gave me an answer and said, "Thy heart hath gone too far in this world, and thinkest thou to comprehend the way of the Most High ?" Then said I, "Yea, my Lord." Then said he unto me, "Go thy way, weigh me the weight of the fire or measure me the blast of the wind, or call me again the day that is past."-- 2 ESDRAS, chap.