NOT VERY FAR. SURELY, yon heaven, where angels see God's face, Is not so distant as we deem From this low earth? 'Tis but a little space, The narrow crossing of a slender stream; 'Tis but a veil, which winds might blow aside: Yes, these are all that us of earth divide, From the bright dwelling of the glorified,— The Land of which I dream! These peaks are nearer heaven than earth below, They lift us to the land where all is fair,- These ocean-waves, in their unmeasured sweep, Are brighter, bluer, than they seem; 70 NOT VERY FAR. True image here of the celestial deep, Fed from the fulness of the unfailing stream,— Heaven's glassy sea of everlasting rest, With not a breath to stir its silent breast, The sea that laves the land where all are blest,— The Land of which I dream! And these keen stars, the bridal gems of Night, Of the glad home above, beyond our view,- This life of ours, these lingering years of earth, A little while, and the great second birth Of time shall come, the prophet's ancient theme! Then He, the King, the Judge at length shall come, And for this desert, where we sadly roam, Shall give the kingdom for our endless home, The Land of which I dream! THE EVERLASTING MEMORIAL. Up and away, like the dew of the morning, My name and my place and my tomb, all forgotten, Gladly away from this toil would I hasten, Up to the crown that for me has been won; Unthought of by man in rewards or in praises,Only remembered by what I have done. Up and away, like the odors of sunset, That sweeten the twilight as darkness comes on,— So be my life, a thing felt but not noticed, And I but remembered by what I have done. 72 THE EVERLASTING MEMORIAL. Yes, like the fragrance that wanders in freshness, When the flowers that it came from are closed up and gone, So would I be to this world's weary dwellers, Needs there the praise of the love-written record, The name and the epitaph graved on the stone? The things we have lived for,—let them be our story, We ourselves but remembered by what we have done. I need not be missed, if my life has been bearing I need not be missed, if another succeed me, To reap down those fields which in spring I have sown; He who ploughed and who sowed is not missed by the reaper, He is only remembered by what he has done. THE EVERLASTING MEMORIAL. 73 Not myself, but the truth that in life I have spoken, So let my living be, so be my dying; So let my name lie, unblazoned, unknown; Unpraised and unmissed, I shall still be remembered; Yes, but remembered by what I have done. 7 |