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TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW.

Through all the long, drear night of years
The people's cry ascendeth,

And earth is wet with blood and tears,

But our meek suffering endeth!

The few shall not forever sway,

The many toil in sorrow:

The Powers of hell are strong to-day,
But Christ shall rise to-morrow!

Though hearts brood o'er the past, our eyes
With smiling futures glisten:

For lo! our day bursts up the skies

Lean out our souls and listen!

The world rolls Freedom's radiant way,
And ripens with her sorrow:

Keep heart! who bear the cross to-day
Shall wear the crown to-morrow!

O, Youth, flame-earnest, still aspire
With energies immortal!
To many a heaven of desire

Our yearning opes a portal!

And though Age wearies by the way,
And hearts break in the furrow,
We'll sow the golden grain to-day—
The harvest comes to-morrow!

Build up heroic lives, and all

Be like the sheathen saber,

Ready to flash out at God's call—
O! Chivalry of labor!

Triumph and Toil are twins-and aye

Joy suns the cloud of sorrow;

And 't is the martyrdom to-day
Brings victory to-morrow!

GERALD MASSEY.

225

D

The Present.

O not crouch to-day, and worship

The old Past whose life is fled: Hush your voice with tender reverence; Crowned he lies, but cold and dead: For the Present reigns our monarch, With an added weight of hours: Honor her, for she is mighty! Honor her, for she is ours!

See, the shadows of his heroes
Girt around her cloudy throne;
Every day the ranks are strengthened
By great hearts to him unknown;
Noble things the great Past promised;
Holy dreams, both strange and new;

But the Present shall fulfill them,

What he promised, she shall do.

She inherits all his treasures,
She is heir to all his fame;
And the light that lightens round her
Is the luster of his name.
She is wise with all his wisdom,
Living on his grave she stands,
On her brow she bears his laurels,
And his harvest in her hands.

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Bids us cast our lives before her,
Bids us serve the great To-day.

ADELAIDE A. PROCTER.

IS IT COME?

227

Is it Come?

Is it come? they said, on the banks of the Nile,

Who looked for the world's long-promised day,

And saw but the strife of Egypt's toil

With the desert's sand and the granite gray.
From the Pyramid, temple, and treasured dead,
We vainly ask for her wisdom's plan ;
They tell us of the tyrant's dread :—

Yet there was hope when that day began.

The Chaldee came with his starry lore,

And built up Babylon's crown and creed; And bricks were stamped on the Tigris' shore With signs which our sages scarce can read. From Ninus' temple and Nimrod's tower,

The rule of the old East's empire spread Unreasoning faith and unquestioned powerBut still, Is it come? the watcher said.

The light of the Persian's worshiped flame
O'er the ancient bondage its splendor threw ;
And once, on the West a sunrise came,

When Greece to her freedom's trust was true:
With dreams to the utmost ages dear,

With human gods, and with god-like men,

No marvel the far-off day seemed near
To eyes that looked through her laurels then.

The Romans conquered and reveled too,

Till honor, and faith, and power were gone;
And deeper old Europe's darkness grew

As, wave after wave, the Goth came on.
The gown was learning, the sword was law;
The people served in the oxen's stead;
But ever some gleam the watcher saw-
And evermore, Is it come? they said.

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Poet and seer that question caught,

Above the din of life's fears and frets;

It marched with letters, it toiled with thought,
Through schools and creeds which the earth forgets.
And statesmen trifle, and priests deceive,
And traders barter our world away—

Yet hearts to that golden promise cleave,
And still at times, Is it come? they say.

The days of the nations bear no trace
Of all the sunshine so far foretold;
The cannon speaks in the teacher's place—
The age is weary with work and gold;
And high hopes wither, and memories wane;
On hearth and altars the fires are dead;
But that brave faith hath not lived in vain—
And this is all that our watcher said.

FRANCES BROWN.

A Song for the New Year (1867).

HE sea sings the song of the ages;

THE

The mountain stands mutely sublime;

While the blank of Eternity's pages

Is filled by the fingers of Time. But Man robbeth sea of its wonder,

Making syllabled speech of its roar;

He rendeth the mountain asunder,

And rolleth his wheels through its core ;
He delveth deep down for earth's treasure,
And every locked secret unbars;

He scanneth the heavens at pleasure,
And writeth his name on the stars.

But purpose is weaker than passion,
And patience is dearer than blood;
And his face groweth withered and ashen
Ere he findeth and graspeth the good.

A SONG FOR THE NEW YEAR.

He pursueth the phantom of beauty,

Or peddleth his valor for pelf;

Till the iron of merciless duty

Has crashed through the armor of self.
He soweth the life of his brother;

He wasteth the half of his soul;-
The harvest is reaped by another,
And Death dippeth deep for his toll.

So the march of triumphal procession,
That Science is fain to begin,
Is hindered with painful digression
Of ignorance, folly, and sin.
Through mazes of needless confusion
The story of Freedom must bend;
And the grandest and simplest conclusion
Go stumbling along to its end.

Yet a year does not slide o'er the border
Of time, but some progress it shows;
And a lustrum proves prescience and order—
So the drama creeps on to its close.

If the blood that was weaker than water
Too thinly and sluggishly ran,
Lo! the wine of the vintage of slaughter
Giveth strength to the sinews of man;
And the shout of a lusty young nation
Shall greet his gray brothers with glee,
And the swell of its ringing vibration
Sweep over the isles of the sea;
While Liberty looks for a morrow
That promiseth joyous increase,
As waneth her midnight of sorrow
And waxeth her morning of peace!

EDWIN R. JOHNSON.

229

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