I idle stand that I may find employ,
Such as my Master when He comes will give;
I cannot find in mine own work my joy,
But wait, although in waiting I must live;
My body shall not turn which way it will,
But stand till I the appointed road can find,
And journeying so his messages fulfil,
And do at every step the work designed.
...
-
-
The night that has no star lit up by God,
The day that round men shines who still are blind,
The earth their grave-turned feet for ages trod,
And sea swept over by His mighty wind,
All these have passed away, the melting dream
That flitted o’er the sleeper’s half-shut eye,
When touched by morning’s golden-darting beam;
And he beholds... -
The road is left that once was trod
By man and heavy-laden beast;
And new ways opened, iron-shod,
That bind the land from west to east.I asked of Him who all things knows
Why none who lived now passed that way:
Where rose the dust the grass now grows?
A still, low voice was heard to say,—“Thou knowest not why I change the...
-
’t is to yourself I speak; you cannot know
Him whom I call in speaking such a one,
For you beneath the earth lie buried low,
Which he, alone, as living walks upon.
You may at times have heard him speak to you,
And often wished perchance that you were he;
And I must ever wish that it were true,
For then you could hold fellowship with me:... -
I see them,—crowd on crowd they walk the earth,
Dry leafless trees no autumn wind laid bare;
And in their nakedness find cause for mirth,
And all unclad would winter’s rudeness dare;
No sap doth through their clattering branches flow,
Whence springing leaves and blossoms bright appear:
Their hearts the living God have ceased to know
Who... -
The light that fills thy house at morn,
Thou canst not for thyself retain;
But all who with thee here are born,
It bids to share an equal gain.The wind that blows thy ship along,
Her swelling sails cannot confine;
Alike to all the gales belong,
Nor canst thou claim a breath as thine.The earth, the green out-spreading earth,...
-
It is not life upon thy gifts to live,
But to grow fixed with deeper roots in Thee;
And when the sun and showers their bounties give,
To send out thick-leaved limbs; a fruitful tree
Whose green head meets the eye for many a mile,
Whose spreading boughs a friendly shelter rear,
And full-faced fruits their blushing welcome smile
As to its... -
Father! thy wonders do not singly stand,
Nor far removed where feet have seldom strayed;
Around us ever lies the enchanted land,
In marvels rich to thine own sons displayed.
In finding thee are all things round us found;
In losing thee are all things lost beside;
Ears have we, but in vain strange voices sound;
And to our eyes the vision... -
The Latter rain,—it falls in anxious haste
Upon the sun-dried fields and branches bare,
Loosening with searching drops the rigid waste
As if it would each root’s lost strength repair;
But not a blade grows green as in the spring;
No swelling twig puts forth its thickening leaves;
The robins only mid the harvests sing,
Pecking the grain... -
The Bubbling brook doth leap when I come by,
Because my feet find measure with its call;
The birds know when the friend they love is nigh,
For I am known to them, both great and small.
The flower that on the lonely hillside grows
Expects me there when spring its bloom has given;
And many a tree and bush my wanderings knows,
And e’en the...