Through that long strife her constant hope was stayed
On God alone, nor looked for other aid.

She met the hosts of sorrow with a lock

That altered not beneath the frown they wore ;
And soon the lowering brood were tamed, and took
Meekly her gentle rule, and frowned no more.
Her soft hand put aside the assaults of wrath,
And calmly broke in twain

The fiery shafts of pain,

And rent the nets of passion from her path.
By that victorious hand despair was slain.
With love she vanquished hate, and overcame
Evil with good in her great Master's name.

Her glory is not of this shadowy state,

Glory that with the fleeting season dies; But when she entered at the sapphire gate, What joy was radiant in celestial eyes!

How heaven's bright depths with sounding welcomes rung,
And flowers of heaven by shining hands were flung!
And He who, long before,

Pain, scorn, and sorrow bore,

The mighty Sufferer, with aspect sweet,
Smiled on the timid stranger from his seat;

He who, returning glorious from the grave,

Dragged Death, disarmed, in chains, a crouching slave.

See, as I linger here, the sun grows low;

Cool airs are murmuring that the night is near.

O gentle sleeper, from thy grave I go

Consoled though sad, in hope and yet in fear.
Brief is the time, I know,

The warfare scarce begun,

Yet all may win the triumphs thou hast won:
Still flows the fount whose waters strengthened thee.
The victors' names are yet too few to fill
Heaven's mighty roll; the glorious armoury,
That ministered to thee, is open still.

BRYANT.

SORROW.

He that lacks time to mourn lacks time to mend
Eternity mourns that. 'Tis an ill cure

For life's worst ills, to have no time to feel them.
Where sorrow's held intrusive, and turned out,
There wisdom will not enter, nor true power,

Nor aught that dignifies humanity.

TREASURE-TROVE.

THROUGH the forest idly,
As my steps I bent,

With a free and happy heart,

Singing as I went.

Cow'ring in the shade, I

Did a floweret spy,

Bright as any star in heaven,

Sweet as any eye.

Down to pluck it stooping,
Thus to me it said-
Wherefore pluck me only
To wither and to fade?
Up with its roots I dug it,
I bore it as it grew;

And in my garden-plot at home

I planted it anew.

All in a still and shady place

Beside my home so dear;

HENRY TAYLOR.

And now it thanks me for my pains,

And blossoms all the year.

From the German of GOETHE.

TO AUTUMN.

SEASON of mists and mellow fruitfulness!
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;

Conspiring with him how to load and bless

With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run; To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,

And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;

To swell the gourd and plump the hazel-shells

With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells.
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes, whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,

Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,

Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers ; And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep Steady thy laden head across a brook ;

Or by a cider-press, with patient look,

Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours. Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they? Think not of them, thou hast thy music too, While barred clouds bloom the soft dying day,

And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue; Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn Among the river sallows, borne aloft

Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies ; And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn; Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft The redbreast whistles from a garden croft, And gathering swallows twitter from the skies.

THE GRASSHOPPER AND CRICKET.

THE poetry of earth is never dead :

KEATS.

When all the birds are faint with the hot sun,
And hide in cooling trees, a voice will run
From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead :
That is the grasshopper's-he takes the lead
In summer luxury,—he has never done

With his delights, for when tired out with fun,
He rests at ease beneath some pleasant weed.
The poetry of earth is ceasing never :

On a lone winter evening, when the frost

Has wrought a silence, from the stove there shrills The Cricket's song, in warmth increasing ever, And seems to one' in drowsiness half lost, The Grasshopper's among some grassy hills.

ODE WRITTEN IN THE YEAR 1746.

How sleep the brave who sink to rest,
By all their country's wishes blest?
When spring, with dewy fingers cold,
Returns to deck their hallowed mould,
She there shall dress a sweeter sod
Than Fancy's feet have ever trod.
By fairy hands their knell is rung;
By forms unseen their dirge is sung;
There Honour comes, a pilgrim grey,
To bless the turf that wraps their clay;
And Freedom shall awhile repair,

To dwell a weeping hermit there.

THE LABOURER.

You cannot pay with money

The million sons of toil

The sailor on the ocean,

The peasant on the soil,
The labourer in the quarry,
The hewer of the coal;
Your money pays the hand,

But it cannot pay the soul.

You gaze on the cathedral

Whose turrets meet the sky;
Remember the foundations

That in earth and darkness lie:
For, were not those foundations
So darkly resting there,
Yon towers up could never soar

So proudly in the air.

KEATS.

COLLINS.

The workshop must be crowded
That the palace may be bright;
If the ploughman did not plough,

Then the poet could not write.
Then let every toil be hallow'd

That man performs for man,
And have its share of honour
As part of one great plan.
See, light darts down from heaven,
And enters where it may ;
The eyes of all earth's people

Are cheered with one bright day.
And let the mind's true sunshine
Be spread o'er earth as free,

And fill the souls of men

As the waters fill the sea.

The man who turns the soil

Need not have an earthly mind;

The digger 'mid the coal

Need not be in spirit blind :
The mind can shed a light

On each worthy labour done,
As lowliest things are bright
In the radiance of the sun.
What cheers the musing student,
The poet, the divine,-

The thought that for his followers
A brighter day will shine.
Let every human labourer
Enjoy the vision bright-

Let the thought that comes from heaven,

Be spread like heaven's own light!

Ye men who hold the pen,

Rise like a band inspired,

And, poets, let your lyrics

With hope for man be fired ;

Till the earth becomes a temple,

And every human heart

Shall join in one great service,

Each happy in his part.--From the German.