Great Nature is an army gay,
Resistless marching on its way;
I hear the bugles clear and sweet,
I hear the tread of million feet.
Across the plain I see it pour;
It tramples down the waving grass;
Within the echoing mountain-...
Richard Watson Gilder
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This bronze doth keep the very form and mould
Of our great martyr’s face. Yes, this is he:
That brow all wisdom, all benignity;
That human, humorous mouth; those cheeks that hold
Like some harsh landscape all the summer’s gold;
That spirit fit for... -
When late I heard the trembling cello play,
In every face I read sad memories
That from dark, secret chambers where they lay
Rose, and looked forth from melancholy eyes.
So every mournful thought found there a tone
To match despondence: sorrow knew its... -
What is a sonnet? ’T is the pearly shell
That murmurs of the far-off murmuring sea;
A precious jewel carved most curiously;
It is a little picture painted well.
What is a sonnet? ’T is the tear that fell
From a great poet’s hidden ecstasy;
A two-... -
THE Night was dark, though sometimes a faint star
A little while a little space made bright.
The night was long and like an iron bar
Lay heavy on the land: till o’er the sea
Slowly, within the East, there grew a light
Which half was starlight, and half... -
Through love to light! Oh wonderful the way
That leads from darkness to the perfect day!
From darkness and from sorrow of the night
To morning that comes singing o’er the sea.
Through love to light! Through light, O God, to thee,
Who art the love of love,... -
He speaks not well who doth his time deplore,
Naming it new and little and obscure,
Ignoble and unfit for lofty deeds.
All times were modern in the time of them,
And this no more than others. Do thy part
Here in the living day, as did the great
Who... -
If jesus Christ is a man,—
And only a man,—I say
That of all mankind I cleave to him,
And to him will I cleave alway.If Jesus Christ is a God,—
And the only God,—I swear
I will follow Him through heaven and hell,
The earth, the... -
Star-dust and vaporous light,—
The mist of worlds unborn,—
A shuddering in the awful night
Of winds that bring the morn.Now comes the dawn: the circling earth;
Creatures that fly and crawl;
And Man, that last, imperial birth;
And... -
I heard the bells of Bethlehem ring—
Their voice was sweeter than the priests’;
I heard the birds of Bethlehem sing
Unbidden in the churchly feasts.They clung and sung on the swinging chain
High in the dim and incensed air;
The priests,...