"His youth was innocent; his riper age Meekly he gave his being up, and went To share the holy rest that waits a life well spent. "That life was happy: every day he gave "And I am glad that he has lived thus long, And glad that he has gone to his reward; Nor can I deem that nature did him wrong, Softly to disengage the vital cord; For, when his hand grew palsied, and his eye Dark with the mists of age, it was his time to die." From “Thanatopsis.” SO LIVE, that when thy summons comes to join To that mysterious realm where each shall take Bryant. Thou go not like the quarry-slave at night, Blessed are They that Mourn. OH, deem not they are blest alone Whose lives a peaceful tenor keep! The light of smiles shall fill again Are promises of happier years. Bryant. There is a day of sunny rest For every dark and troubled night; And grief may bide an evening guest, But joy shall come with early light. And thou who, o'er thy friend's low bier, Nor let the good man's trust depart, For God hath marked each sorrowing day And heaven's long age of bliss shall pay William Cullen Bryant. Here and There. HERE is the sorrow, the sighing, Here is the fading, the wasting, Here are the locks growing hoary, The glass with the vanishing sands; There are the crown and the glory, The house that is made not with hands. Here is the longing, the vision, The hopes that so swiftly remove; There is the blessed fruition, The feast, and the fulness of love. Here are the heart-strings a-tremble, Alice Car To J. S. I YIELD thee unto higher spheres, I know thou hast escaped the blight And yet thy little sunny life Was beautiful as it was brief: It was not vexed by pain or strife, The sunshine from our house is gone, And from our hearts their peace and joy: We feel so terribly alone Without thee, dearest boy! Thou mad'st us feel how very fair God's earth could be, and taught us love And in life's tapestry of care A golden figure wove. Brave as we will our hearts to bear, Grief will not wholly be denied; The ineffectual dykes we rear We lie all prostrate,—cannot feel We blindly wail, for we are maimed He lifts us up, all bleeding, lamed, He asks, "And would you wish him back, Drag downward to Life's narrow track "No! no!" the spirit makes reply: "Not back to earthly chance and pain." He was so meshed within our love Yet let us suffer: he is freed, And on our tears a bridge of light Is built by God, his steps to lead To joys beyond our sight. Villiam W. Story. The Two Mysteries. [In the middle of the room, in its white coffin, lay the dead child, a nephew of he poet. Near it, in a great chair, sat Walt Whitman, surrounded by little ones, and holding a beautiful little girl in his lap. The child looked curiously at the spectacle of death, and then inquiringly into the old man's face. Know what it is, do you, my dear?" said he. "We don't either."] "You don't We know not what it is, dear, this sleep so deep and still; We know not what it means, dear, this desolate heart-pain,- We know not to what other sphere the loved who leave us go; But this we know: our loved and dead, if they should come this day, Should come and ask us, "What is life?" not one of us could say. Life is a mystery as deep as ever death can be; Yet, O, how sweet it is to us, this life we live and see! Then might they say,- these vanished ones,— -and blessed is the thought! "So death is sweet to us, beloved, though we may tell you naught: - this mystery of death,— We may not tell it to the quick The child who enters life comes not with knowledge or intent, Mary Mapes Dodge. Auld Lang Syne. Ir singeth low in every heart, They throng the silence of the breast, The kind, the brave, the true, the sweet, "Tis hard to take the burden up, Thanks be to God that such have been, More home-like seems the vast unknown, Wherever they may fare; They cannot be where God is not, Whate'er betides, Thy love abides, Our God, for evermore. J. W. Chadwick. |