“Put out the candle, for the sun has risen ! MY The Return of Youth. Y friend, thou sorrowest for thy golden prime, For thy fair youthful years, too swift of flight; Thou musest with wet eyes upon the time Of cheerful hopes that filled the world with light,— Years when thy heart was bold, thy hand was strong, And quick the thought that moved thy tongue to speak And willing faith was thine, and scorn of wrong Summoned the sudden crimson to thy cheek. Thou lookest forward on the coming days, Slopes downward to the place of common sleep; Dull love of rest, and weariness, and fear. Yet grieve thou not, nor think thy youth is gone, LABOR AND REST. There shall he welcome thee, when thou shalt stand Through the fair earth to lead thy tender feet. Shall clothe thy spirit with new strength, and fill Hast thou not glimpses, in the twilight here, Of mountains where immortal morn prevails? A murmur, wafted from that glorious shore, WILLIAM C. BRYANT. Labor and Rest. WO hands upon the breast, Tw And labor's done; Two pale feet crossed in rest, The race is run; Two eyes with coin-weights shut, And all tears cease; Two lips where grief is mute, And wrath at peace!— So pray we oftentimes, mourning our lot,— God in his mercy answereth not. Two hands to work addressed Aye for his praise; Two feet that never rest, Walking his ways; 389 Two eyes that look above, Still through all tears; Two lips that breathe but love, Nevermore fears, So pray we afterward low on our knees;— Father, hear these! DINAH MARIA MULOCK God. "Whom have I in Heaven but Thee ?" I LOVE (and have some cause to love) the earth; She is my Maker's creature, therefore good; She is my mother, for she gave me birth; She is my tender nurse; she gives me food; I love the air; her dainty sweets refresh My drooping soul, and to new sweets invite me; Her shrill-mouthed choir sustain me with their flesh, And with their polyphonian notes delight me: But what's the air, or all the sweets that she I love the sea; she is my fellow-creature, My careful purveyor: she provides me store; She walls me round; she makes my diet greater; She wafts my treasure from a foreign shore; But, Lord of oceans, when compared with thee, What is the ocean, or her wealth, to me? THE SOUL. To Heaven's high city I direct my journey, But what is Heaven, just God, compared to thee? Without thy presence, earth gives no refection; FRANCIS QUARLES. 391 The Soul. AGAIN, how can she but immortal be, When with the motions of both will and wit, She still aspireth to eternity, And never rests till she attain to it? Water in conduit-pipes can rise no higher Than the well-head from whence it first doth spring; Then since to Eternal God she doth aspire, She cannot but be an eternal thing. "All moving things to other things do move Of the same kind, which shows their nature such ;" And as the moisture which the thirsty earth Long doth she stay, as loth to leave the land Yet Nature so her streams doth lead and carry, Within whose watery bosom first she lay. E'en so the soul, which in this earthly mould At first her mother Earth she holdeth dear, And doth embrace the world and worldly things; Yet under heaven she cannot light on aught For who did ever yet in honor, health, Or pleasure of the sense,contentment find? Who ever ceased to wish, when he had wealth? Or, having wisdom, was not vexed in mind? Then as a bee which among weeds doth fall, Which seem sweet flowers with lustre fresh and gay,— She lights on that and this, and tasteth all, But pleased with none, doth rise and soar away— So, when the soul finds here no true content, And like Noah's dove can no sure footing take, She doth return from whence she first was sent, And flies to Him that first her wings did make. |