THE SHADOW AND THE LIGHT.

Ah, me! we doubt the shining skies

Seen through our shadows of offence, And drown with our poor childish cries The cradle-hymn of kindly Providence.

And still we love the evil cause, And of the just effect complain ; We tread upon life's broken laws, And murmur at our self-inflicted pain;

We turn us from the light, and find

Our spectral shapes before us thrown,
As they who leave the sun behind
Walk in the shadows of themselves alone.

And scarce by will or strength of ours
We set our faces to the day;

347

Weak, wavering, blind, the Eternal Powers Alone can turn us from ourselves away.

Our weakness is the strength of sin,
But love must needs be stronger far,
Outreaching all and gathering in
The erring spirit and the wandering star.

A Voice grows with the growing years;
Earth, hushing down her bitter cry,
Looks upward from her graves, and hears,
"The Resurrection and the Life am I."

Oh, Love Divine!-whose constant beam
Shines on the eyes that will not see,
And waits to bless us, while we dream
Thou leavest us because we turn from thee!

All souls that struggle and aspire,

All hearts of prayer by thee are lit; And, dim or clear, thy tongues of fire On dusky tribes and twilight centuries sit.

Nor bounds, nor clime, nor creed thou know'st, Wide as our need thy favors fall; The white wings of the Holy Ghost Stoop, seen or unseen, o'er the heads of all.

Oh, Beauty, old yet ever new! 27

Eternal Voice, and Inward Word,
The Logos of the Greek and Jew,
The old sphere-music which the Samian heard!

Truth which the sage and prophet saw,
Long sought without but found within,
The Law of Love beyond all law,
The Life o'erflooding mortal death and sin!

Shine on us with the light which glowed
Upon the trance-bound shepherd's way,
Who saw the Darkness overflowed
And drowned by tides of everlasting Day.28

Shine, light of God!-make broad thy scope
To all who sin and suffer; more

And better than we dare to hope
With Heaven's compassion make our longings poor!

THE GIFT OF TRITEMIUS.

TRITEMIUS OF HERBIPOLIS, one day,
While kneeling at the altar's foot to pray,
Alone with God, as was his pious choice,
Heard from without a miserable voice,

A sound which seemed of all sad things to tell,
As of a lost soul crying out of hell.

Thereat the Abbot paused; the chain whereby
His thoughts went upward broken by that cry;

THE GIFT OF TRITEMIUS.

And, looking from the casement, saw below
A wretched woman, with gray hair a-flow,
And withered hands held up to him, who cried
For alms as one who might not be denied.

849

She cried, "For the dear love of Him who gave
His life for ours, my child from bondage save,—
My beautiful, brave first-born, chained with slaves
In the Moor's galley, where the sun-smit waves
Lap the white walls of Tunis!"-"What I can
I give," Tritemius said: "my prayers."-
"_" O man
Of God!" she cried, for grief had made her bold,
"Mock me not thus; I ask not prayers, but gold.
Words will not serve me, alms alone suffice;
Even while I speak perchance my first-born dies.”

"Woman!" Tritemius answered, "from our door
None go unfed; hence are we always poor:
A single soldo is our only store.

Thou hast our prayers;-what can we give theo more?"

"Give me," she said, "the silver candlesticks
On either side of the great crucifix.

God well may spare them on his errands sped,
Or he can give you golden ones instead.”

Then spake Tritemius, " Even as thy word,
Woman, so be it! (Our most gracious Lord,
Who loveth mercy more than sacrifice,
Pardon me if a human soul I prize
Above the gifts upon his altar piled!)
Take what thou askest, and redeem thy child.”

But his hand trembled as the holy alms
He placed within the beggar's eager palms;
And as she vanished down the linden shade,
He bowed his head and for forgiveness prayed.

So the day passed, and when the twilight came
He woke to find the chapel all a-flame,
And, dumb with grateful wonder, to behold
Upon the altar candlesticks of gold!

THE EVE OF ELECTION.

FROM gold to gray
Our mild sweet day

Of Indian Summer fades too soon;
But tenderly

Above the sea

Hangs, white and calm, the Hunter's moon.

In its pale fire,
The village spire

Shows like the zodiac's spectral lance;
The painted walls
Whereon it falls
Transfigured stand in marble trance!

O'er fallen leaves

The west wind grieves,

Yet comes a seed-time round again;
And morn shall see

The State sown free

With baleful tares or healthful grain.

Along the street

The shadows meet

Of Destiny, whose hands conceal
The moulds of fate

That shape the State,

And make or mar the common weal.

THE EVE OF ELECTION.

Around I see

The powers that be;

I stand by Empire's primal springs;
And princes meet

In every street,

And hear the tread of uncrowned kings!

Hark! through the crowd The laugh runs loud, Beneath the sad, rebuking moon. God save the land

A careless hand

May shake or swerve ere morrow's noon.

No jest is this;
One cast amiss

May blast the hope of Freedom's year
Oh, take me where

Are hearts of prayer,

And foreheads bowed in reverent fear!

Not lightly fall
Beyond recall

The written scrolls a breath can float;
The crowning fact,

The kingliest act

Of Freedom, is the freeman's vote!

The diver in the deep sea dies;
The regal right

We boast to-night

Is ours through costlier sacrifice:

The blood of Vane,

His prison pain

Who traced the path the Pilgrim trod,

851