FAITH'S ANSWER. 167 Be innocence my magic word. Lord, here am I! Young lips may teach the wise, Christ said; Yet teach me, Father! heed their sighs, And make me strong; that staff and stay, "Speak; for I hear!" make "pure in heart,” Thy face to see. Thy truth impart In hut and hall, in church and mart. I ask no heaven till earth be thine, Her sins wiped out, her captives free, Her voice a music unto thee, For crown, new work give thou to me! EARTH'S ANGELS. ANONYMOUS. WHY come not spirits from the realms of glory, To visit earth as in the days of old, The times of sacred writ and ancient story? Is heaven more distant? or has earth grown cold? Oft have I gazed, when sunset clouds, receding, And oft, when midnight stars in distant chillness Were calmly burning, listened late and long; But nature's pulse beat on in solemn stillness, Bearing no echo of the seraphs' song. To Bethlehem's air was their last anthem given, When other stars before the One grew dim? Was their last presence known in Peter's prison, Or where exulting martyrs raised their hymn? And are they all within the veil departed? There gleams no wing along the empyrean now; And many a tear from human eyes has started, Since angel touch has calmed a mortal's brow. EARTH'S 169 No earth has angels, though their forms are moulded But of such clay as fashions all below; Though harps are wanting, and bright pinions folded, We know them by the love-light on their brow. I have seen angels by the sick one's pillow,Theirs was the soft tone and the soundless tread; Where smitten hearts were drooping like the wil low, They stood "between the weeping and the dead." And if my sight, by earthly dimness hindered, There have been angels in the gloomy prison, In crowded halls,-by the lone widow's hearth; And where they passed, the fallen have uprisen, The giddy paused, the mourner's hope had birth. I have seen one, whose eloquence commanding Roused the rich echoes of the human breast, The blandishments of wealth and ease withstand ing That hope might reach the suffering and oppressed. And by his side there moved a form of beauty, Strewing sweet flowers along his path of life, And looking up with meek and love-lent duty; I called her angel, but he called her wife. O, many a spirit walks the world unheeded, That, when its veil of sadness is laid down, Shall soar aloft with pinions unimpeded, And wear its glory like a starry crown! "IT PROFITETH THEE NOTHING." DISCIPLES' HYMN-BOOK. "My child, cleanse thou thy heart; this daily life "Leave here thy deeds,-go seek the inner shrine; There watch, and wait, and pray, and tend thy soul, "IT PROFITETH THEE NOTHING." 171 Till comes the grace which gives no outward sign, Till heaven and earth are bound to its control!" Father, well know I, I have utmost need To tend that hidden fire both night and day; But who will warm my cold, my hungry feed, While I retire to weep, and watch, and pray? Father, before the inmost, stillest shrine Father, it may be that my light is small; Than leave these ones to faint upon their way. "My child, I fear me much thou dost postpone God's great eternity to thy low time; But he doth deal with every heart alone, And will not judge thy error like thy crime." |