Chapter 2
Grow old along with me!
The best is yet to be, The last of life, for which the first was made; Our times are in His hand Who saith, "A whole I planned, Youth shows but half; trust G.o.d: see all, nor be afraid!"
Poor vaunt of life indeed, Were man but formed to feed On joy, to solely seek and find and feast; Such feasting ended, then As sure an end to men: Irks care the crop-full bird? Frets doubt the maw-crammed beast?
Then welcome each rebuff That turns earth's smoothness rough, Each sting that bids nor sit nor stand, but go!
Be our joys three parts pain!
Strive, and hold cheap the strain; Learn, nor account the pang; dare, never grudge the throe!
For thence--a paradox Which comforts while it mocks-- Shall life succeed in that it seems to fail: What I aspired to be, And was not, comforts me: A brute I might have been, but would not sink i' the scale.
Not on the vulgar ma.s.s Called "work" must sentence pa.s.s, Things done, that took the eye and had the price; O'er which, from level stand, The low world laid its hand, Found straightway to its mind, could value in a trice:
But all, the world's coa.r.s.e thumb And finger failed to plumb, So pa.s.sed in making up the main account; All instincts immature, All purposes unsure, That weighed not as his work, yet swelled the man's amount:
Thoughts hardly to be packed Into a narrow act, Fancies that broke through language and escaped; All I could never be, All, men ignored in me, This I was worth to G.o.d, whose wheel the pitcher shaped.
Fool! All that is, at all, Lasts ever, past recall; Earth changes, but thy soul and G.o.d stand sure: What entered into thee _That_ was, is, and shall be: Time's wheel runs back or stops; Potter and clay endure.
--From "Rabbi Ben Ezra."
TRUTH AND FALSEHOOD
Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide, In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good or evil side; Some great cause, G.o.d's new Messiah, offering each the bloom or blight, Parts the goats upon the left hand, and the sheep upon the right, And the choice goes by forever 'twixt that darkness and that light.
Careless seems the great Avenger; history's pages but record One death-grapple in the darkness 'twixt old systems and the Word; Truth forever on the scaffold, Wrong forever on the throne-- Yet that scaffold sways the future, and, behind the dim unknown, Standeth G.o.d within the shadow, keeping watch, above his own.
Then to side with Truth is n.o.ble when we share her wretched crust, Ere her cause bring fame and profit, and 'tis prosperous to be just; Then it is the brave man chooses, while the coward stands aside, Doubting in his abject spirit, till his Lord is crucified, And the mult.i.tude make virtue of the faith they had denied.
Count me o'er earth's chosen heroes--they were souls that stood alone
By the light of burning heretics Christ's bleeding feet I track, Toiling up new Calvaries ever with the cross that turns not back, And these mounts of anguish number how each generation learned One new word of that grand _Credo_ which in prophet-hearts hath burned Since the first man stood G.o.d-conquered with his face to heaven upturned.
For Humanity sweeps onward: where to-day the martyr stands, On the morrow crouches Judas with the silver in his hands; Far in front the cross stands ready and the crackling f.a.gots burn, While the hooting mob of yesterday in silent awe return To glean up the scattered ashes into History's golden urn.
'Tis as easy to be heroes as to sit the idle slaves Of a legendary virtue carved upon our fathers' graves; Wors.h.i.+pers of light ancestral make the present light a crime;-- Was the Mayflower launched by cowards, steered by men behind their time?
Turn those tracks toward Past or Future that make Plymouth Rock sublime?
They have rights who dare maintain them; we are traitors to our sires, Smothering in their holy ashes Freedom's new-lit altar-fires; Shall we make their creed our jailer? shall we in our haste to slay, From the tombs of the old prophets steal the funeral lamps away To light up the martyr-f.a.gots round the prophets of to-day?
New occasions teach new duties; Time makes ancient good uncouth; They must upward still, and onward, who would keep abreast of Truth; Lo, before us gleam her camp-fires! we ourselves must Pilgrims be, Launch our Mayflower, and steer boldly through the desperate winter sea, Nor attempt the Future's portal with the Past's blood-rusted key.
--James Russell Lowell.
COLUMBUS
Behind him lay the gray Azores, Behind the Gates of Hercules; Before him not the ghost of sh.o.r.es, Before him only sh.o.r.eless seas.
The good mate said: "Now, we must pray, For lo! the very stars are _gone_, Speak, Admiral, what shall I say?"
"Why say, 'Sail on! sail on! and on!'"
"My men grow mutinous day by day; My men grow ghastly wan and weak."
The stout mate thought of home; a spray Of salt wave washed his swarthy cheek.
"What shall I say, brave Admiral, say, If we sight naught but seas at dawn?"
"Why, you shall say at break of day, 'Sail on! sail on! sail on! and on!'"
They sailed and sailed, as winds might blow, Until at last the blanched mate said: "Why, now not even G.o.d would know Should I and all my men fall dead.
These very winds forget their way, For G.o.d from these dread seas is gone.
Now speak, brave Admiral, speak and say--"
He said, "Sail on! sail on! and on!"
They sailed. They sailed. Then spoke the mate: "This mad sea shows its teeth to-night.
He curls his lip, he lies in wait, With lifted teeth, as if to bite!
Brave Admiral, say but one good word.
What shall we do when hope is gone?"
The words leapt as a leaping sword, "Sail on! sail on! sail on! and on!"
Then, pale and worn, he kept his deck, And peered through darkness. Ah, that night Of all dark nights! And then a speck-- A light! A light! A light!
It grew, a starlit flag unfurled!
It grew to be Time's burst of dawn: He gained a world; he gave that world Its grandest lesson: "On, and on!"
--Joaquin Miller.
THE CHOSEN FEW
The Son of G.o.d goes forth to war, A kingly crown to gain; His blood-red banner streams afar; Who follows in his train.
Who best can drink His cup of woe, And triumph over pain, Who patient bears His cross below-- He follows in His train.
A glorious band, the chosen few, On whom the Spirit came; Twelve valiant saints, their hope they knew, And mocked the cross and flame.
They climbed the dizzy steep to heaven Through peril, toil and pain; O G.o.d! to us may grace be given To follow in their train!
--Reginald Heber.
HOW DID YOU DIE?
Did you tackle that trouble that came your way With a resolute heart and cheerful, Or hide your face from the light of day With a craven soul and fearful?
O, a trouble is a ton, or a trouble is an ounce, Or a trouble is what you make it, And it isn't the fact that you're hurt that counts, But only--how did you take it?
You are beaten to earth? Well, well, what's that?
Come up with a smiling face.
It's nothing against you to fall down flat, But to lie there--that's disgrace.