I may be laid amid the dead

As low as thou art now:

Yet wilt thou rise in rugged strength,
And crown this barren height at length."

Each had a hope: the childish heart
Looked to a summer's joy;

The manly thought — strong and mature
Looks to futurity.

Each trusts to nature's genial power,
He wants a forest; she, a flower.

53

In beauty and in mystery ever new;
One harmony divine through great and

small.

E'en our plain neighbor, as he sips his tea,
I doubt not through his window feels the sky
Of evening bring a sweet and tender plea
That links him even to dreamers such as I.

So through the symbol alphabet that glows

Through all creation, higher still and higher The spirit builds its faith, and ever grows Beyond the rude forms of its first desire.

O boundless Beauty and Beneficence!

O deathless Soul that breathest in the weeds, And in a starlit sky! E'en through the rents Of accident thou serv'st all human needs, Nor stoopest idly to our petty cares;

Nor knowest great or small, since, folded in By Universal Love, all being shares The life that ever shall be or hath been. CHRISTOPHER PEARSE CRANCH.

SONG OF FAITH.

WILLIAM CROSWELL was born at Hudson, N. Y., Nov. 7, 1804, and died in Boston, where he had been the founder, and for seven years the rector, of the Church of the Advent.

THE lilied fields behold;
What king in his array
Of purple pall and cloth of gold
Shines gorgeously as they?
Their pomp, however gay,

Is brief, alas! as bright;
It lives but for a summer's day,
And withers in a night.

If God so clothe the soil,
And glorify the dust,
Why should the slave of daily toil
His providence distrust?

Will be, whose love has nursed

The sparrow's brood, do less
For those who seek his kingdom first,
And with it righteousness?

The birds fly forth at will;

They neither plough nor sow:

Yet theirs the sheaves that crown the hill, Or glad the vale below.

While through the realms of air

He guides their trackless way, Will man, in faithlessness, despair? Is he worth less than they?

WILLIAM CROSWELL

ON WATCHING THE FLight of A SKYLARK.

UPWARD and upward still! — in pearly light
The clouds are steeped; the vernal spirit sighs
With bliss in every wind, and crystal skies
Woo thee, O bird, to thy celestial height;
Bird piercing heaven with music! thy free
flight

Hath meaning for all bosoms; most of all
For those wherein the rapture and the might
Of poesy lie deep, and strive, and burn,
For their high place: O heirs of genius, learn
From the sky's bird your way!- No joy may

fill Your hearts, no gift of holy strength be won To bless your songs, ye children of the sun, Save by the unswerving flight, - upward and upward still!

FELICIA HEMANS.

Gathered its kindly crumbs; And with a chirp of thanks ye take What Heaven has sent.

But ye are safe!

55

My little doves have left a nest

Upon an Indian tree,

Whose leaves fantastic take their rest
Or motion from the sea:
Forever there the sea-winds go
With sunlit paces, to and fro.

The tropic flowers looked up to it,
The tropic stars looked down:
And there my little doves did sit
With feathers softly brown,
And glittering eyes that showed their right
To general Nature's deep delight.

And God them taught at every close
Of water far, and wind

And lifted leaf, to interpose

Their chanting voices kind;
Interpreting that love must be
The meaning of the earth and sea.

My little doves were borne away
From that glad nest of theirs;
Across an ocean foaming aye,

And tempest-clouded airs.
My little doves! who lately knew
The sky and wave by warmth and blue!

ROBIN REDBREAST.

GEORGE WASHINGTON DOANE, for twenty-seven years Bishop of New Jersey, was born at Trenton, May 27, 1799, and was educated at Union College He published a volume of poems and several works on theology. He died April 27, 1859

SWEET Robin, I have heard them say
That thou wert there upon the day
That Christ was crowned in cruel scorn,
And bore away one bleeding thorn;
That so the blush upon thy breast
In shameful sorrow was imprest,
And thence thy genial sympathy
With our redeemed humanity.

Sweet Robin, would that I might be
Bathed in my Saviour's blood, like thee;
Bear in my breast, whate'er the loss,
The bleeding blazon of the cross;
Live ever, with thy loving mind,
In fellowship with human kind;
And take my pattern still from thee,
In gentleness and constancy.

57

When wearied, on the meadow-grass I sank; So narrow was the rill from which I drank, An infant might have stepped from bank to bank;

And the tall rushes near,
Lapping together, hid its waters clear.

Yet to the ocean joyously it went,
And, rippling in the fulness of content,
Watered the pretty flowers that o'er it leant;
For all the banks were spread
With delicate flowers that on its bounty fed.

The stately maize, a fair and goodly sight, With serried spear-points bristling sharp and bright,

Shook out his yellow tresses, for delight,
To all their tawny length,

Like Samson, glorying in his lusty strength.

And every little bird upon the tree,
Ruffling his plumage bright, for ecstasy,
Sang in the wild insanity of glee;

And seemed, in the same lays,
Calling his mate and uttering songs of praise.

The golden grasshopper did chirp and sing;
The plain bee, busy with her housekeeping,
Kept humming cheerfully upon the wing,
As if she understood
That, with contentment, labor was a good.
I saw each creature, in his own best place,
To the Creator lift a smiling face,
Praising continually his wondrous grace;
As if the best of all

Life's countless blessings was to live at all !

So with a book of sermons, plain and true, Hid in my heart, where I might turn them through,

I went home softly, through the falling dew, Still listening, rapt and calm,

To Nature giving out her evening psalm.