The well-built house with walls of brick, or stone,
May tremble some if struck by the cyclone;
The most established saint may trials feel,
As flint may turn the edge of finest steel.
Satanic hosts may rush in like a flood,
Allied with foes of our own flesh and blood,
The elements of earth and hell combine,
Yet tho' he trembles, stands in strength divine;
He rests secure on the unyielding rock.
The top may sway, but base feels not the shock;
His heart is fixed, nor earth nor hell can move;
They wrench not loose, but his allegiance prove.
Christ wept with Mary at her brother's grave;
Laid down His life a rebel world to save;
Tried, like ourselves, and like us too, infirm,
Yet knew no sin in either root or germ;
Let us be like Him while we sojourn here,
Then...

To all to whom this little book may come,
Health for yourselves and those you hold most dear!
Content abroad, and happiness at home,
And, one grand Secret in your private ear:,
Nations have passed away and left no traces,
And History gives the naked cause of it,
One single, simple reason in all cases;
They fell because their peoples were not fit.

Now, though your Body be mis-shapen, blind,
Lame, feverish, lacking substance, power or skill,
Certain it is that men can school the Mind
To school the sickliest Body, to her will,
As many have done, whose glory blazes still
Like mighty flames in meanest lanterns lit:
Wherefore, we pray the crippled, weak and ill,
Be fit, be fit! In mind at first be fit!

And, though your Spirit seem uncouth or small,
...

Something compels me, somewhere.    Yet I see
No clear command in Life's long mystery.

Oft have I flung myself beside my horse,
To drink the water from the roadside mire,
And felt the liquid through my being course,
Stilling the anguish of my thirst's desire.

A simple want; so easily allayed;
After the burning march; water and shade.

Also I lay against the loved one's heart
Finding fulfilment in that resting-place,
Feeling my longing, quenched, was but a part
Of nature's ceaseless striving for the race.

But now, I know not what they would with me;
Matter or Force or God, if Gods there be.

I wait; I question; Nature heeds me not.
She does but urge in answer to my prayer,
"Arise and do!"    Alas, she adds not what;
"Arise and g...

Go, little book, and be the looking-glass
Of her dear soul,
The mirror of her moments as they pass,
Keeping the whole;
Wherein she still may look on yesterday
To-day to cheer,
And towards To-morrow pass upon her way
Without a fear.
For yesterday hath never won a crown,
However fair,
But that To-day a better for its own
Might win and wear;
And yesterday hath never joyed a joy,
However sweet,
That this To-day or that To-morrow too
May not repeat.
Think too, To-day is trustee for to-morrow,
And present pain
That's bravely borne shall ease the future sorrow
Nor cry in vain
'Spare us To-day, To-morrow bring the rod,'
For then again
To-morrow from To-morrow still shall borrow,
A little ease to gain:
But bear to-day whate'er To...

We thank Thee, Lord,
For mercies manifold in these dark days;--
For Heart of Grace that would not suffer wrong;
For all the stirrings in the dead dry bones;
For bold self-steeling to the times' dread needs;
For every sacrifice of self to Thee;
For ease and wealth and life so freely given;
For Thy deep sounding of the hearts of men;
For Thy great opening of the hearts of men;
For Thy close-knitting of the hearts of men;
For all who sprang to answer the great call;
For their high courage and self-sacrifice;
For their endurance under deadly stress;
For all the unknown heroes who have died
To keep the land inviolate and free;
For all who come back from the Gates of Death;
For all who pass to larger life with Thee,
And find in Thee the wider liberty;
For ...

What will I say when face to face with God
My naked soul shall come, seared with the stain
That men call sin? Why, God will understand;
He knew my pitiful story long before
My frail dust quickened with the breath of life;
He knew the mystery of that day of days
When, thrilled with virgin wonder, I should come
Bearing the lily of my stainless love
To plant upon the desert of desire.
I do not fear His judgment; He knows all.

I do not fear His judgment lest it be
That I shall look no more upon his face
Who taught my heart to love; and, surely, One
Who wrought a perfect note from these poor strings
Will not condemn to discord when the strain
Has reached the fullness of its harmony.

I do not fear His judgment, but I weep
For him who slew the lily w...

Token of friendship true and tried,
From one whose fiery heart of youth
With mine has beaten, side by side,
For Liberty and Truth;
With honest pride the gift I take,
And prize it for the giver's sake.
But not alone because it tells
Of generous hand and heart sincere;
Around that gift of friendship dwells
A memory doubly dear;
Earth's noblest aim, man's holiest thought,
With that memorial frail inwrought!
Pure thoughts and sweet like flowers unfold,
And precious memories round it cling,
Even as the Prophet's rod of old
In beauty blossoming:
And buds of feeling, pure and good,
Spring from its cold unconscious wood.
Relic of Freedom's shrine! a brand
Plucked from its burning! let it be
Dear as a jewel from the hand
Of a lost friend to me!...

I hate the fellow who sits around
    And knocks the livelong day--
Who tells of the work he might have done;
    If things had come his way.
But I love the fellow who pushes ahead
    And smiles at his work or play--
You can wager when things do come around,
    They will come his way--and stay.

There once was a pious young priest,
Who lived almost wholly on yeast;
    "For," he said, "it is plain
    We must all rise again,
And I want to get started, at least."

You shall not be overbold
When you deal with arctic cold,
As late I found my lukewarm blood
Chilled wading in the snow-choked wood.
How should I fight? my foeman fine
Has million arms to one of mine:
East, west, for aid I looked in vain,
East, west, north, south, are his domain.
Miles off, three dangerous miles, is home;
Must borrow his winds who there would come.
Up and away for life! be fleet!--
The frost-king ties my fumbling feet,
Sings in my ears, my hands are stones,
Curdles the blood to the marble bones,
Tugs at the heart-strings, numbs the sense,
And hems in life with narrowing fence.
Well, in this broad bed lie and sleep,--
The punctual stars will vigil keep,--
Embalmed by purifying cold;
The winds shall sing their dead-march old,
...

Just as a fawn, in forest shade,
Trembling to meet th' admiring eye,
I've seen thee try to hide, sweet maid!
Thy charms behind thy modesty.

Thus too I've seen at midnight steal
A fleecy cloud before the wind,
And veil, tho' it could not conceal,
The brilliant light that shone behind.

In controversial foul impureness
The peace that is thy light to thee
Quench not: in faith and inner sureness
Possess thy soul and let it be.

No violence—perverse—persistent—
What cannot be can bring to be;
No zeal what is make more existent,
And strife but blinds the eyes that see.

What though in blood their souls embruing,
The great, the good and wise they curse,
Still sinning, what they know not doing;
Stand still, forbear, nor make it worse.

By curses, by denunciation,
The coming fate they cannot stay;
Nor thou, by fiery indignation,
Though just, accelerate the day.

Here lies the clerk who half his life had spent
Toiling at ledgers in a city grey,
Thinking that so his days would drift away
With no lance broken in life's tournament:
Yet ever 'twixt the books and his bright eyes
The gleaming eagles of the legions came,
And horsemen, charging under phantom skies,
Went thundering past beneath the oriflamme.

And now those waiting dreams are satisfied;
From twilight to the halls of dawn he went;
His lance is broken; but he lies content
With that high hour, in which he lived and died.
And falling thus, he wants no recompense,
Who found his battle in the last resort;
Nor needs he any hearse to bear him hence,
Who goes to join the men of Agincourt.

Like Dives in the deeps of Hell
I cannot break this fearful spell,
Nor quench the fires I've madly nursed,
Nor cool this dreadful raging thirst.
Take back your pledge - ye come too late!
Ye cannot save me from my fate,
Nor bring me back departed joys;
But ye can try to save the boys.

Ye bid me break my fiery chain,
Arise and be a man again,
When every street with snares is spread,
And nets of sin where'er I tread.
No; I must reap as I did sow.
The seeds of sin bring crops of woe;
But with my latest breath I'll crave
That ye will try the boys to save.

These bloodshot eyes were once so bright;
This sin-crushed heart was glad and light;
But by the wine-cup's ruddy glow
I traced a path to shame and woe.
A captive to my galling chain...

I.

Some drink to Friendship, some to Love,
Through whom the world is fair, perdie!
But I to one these others prove,
Who leaps 'mid lions for a glove,
Or dies to set another free
I drink to Loyalty.

II.

No dagger his, no cloak and mask,
Free-faced he stands so all may see;
Let Friendship set him any task,
Or Love reward he does not ask,
The deed is done whate'er it be
So here's to Loyalty.

Our band is few, but true and tried,
Our leader frank and bold;
The British soldier trembles
When Marion's name is told.
Our fortress is the good greenwood,
Our tent the cypress-tree;
We know the forest round us,
As seamen know the sea.
We know its walls of thorny vines,
Its glades of reedy grass,
Its safe and silent islands
Within the dark morass.

Wo to the English soldiery
That little dread us near!
On them shall light at midnight
A strange and sudden fear:
When waking to their tents on fire
They grasp their arms in vain,
And they who stand to face us
Are beat to earth again;
And they who fly in terror deem
A mighty host behind,
And hear the tramp of thousands
Upon the hollow wind.

Then sweet the hour that ...

Weep, Israel! your tardy meed outpour
Of grateful homage on his fallen head,
That never coronal of triumph wore,
Untombed, dishonored, and unchapleted.
If Victory makes the hero, raw Success
The stamp of virtue, unremembered
Be then the desperate strife, the storm and stress
Of the last Warrior Jew. But if the man
Who dies for freedom, loving all things less,
Against world-legions, mustering his poor clan;
The weak, the wronged, the miserable, to send
Their death-cry's protest through the ages' span -
If such an one be worthy, ye shall lend
Eternal thanks to him, eternal praise.
Nobler the conquered than the conqueror's end!

Once I seen a human ruin
In a elevator-well.
And his members was bestrewin'
All the place where he had fell.

And I says, apostrophisin'
That uncommon woeful wreck:
"Your position's so surprisin'
That I tremble for your neck!"

Then that ruin, smilin' sadly
And impressive, up and spoke:
"Well, I wouldn't tremble badly,
For it's been a fortnight broke."

Then, for further comprehension
Of his attitude, he begs
I will focus my attention
On his various arms and legs

How they all are contumacious;
Where they each, respective, lie;
How one trotter proves ungracious,
T' other one an alibi.

These particulars is mentioned
For to show his dismal state,
Which I wasn't first intentioned
To specifical relate.