Poems

Candid and curious, how they seek All truth to know and scan; And ere the budding mind can speak, Begin to study man. Confiding sweetness colors all they say, And angels listen when they try to pray.

Oh lovely Voices of the Sky, That hymned the Saviour's birth, Are ye not singing still on high, Ye that sang "Peace on earth?" To us yet speak the strains, Wherewith, in days gone by, Ye blessed the Syrian swains, Oh Voices of the Sky! Oh clear and shining Light, whose beams That hour Heaven's glory shed Around the palms, and o'er the streams, And on the shepherd's head; Be near, through life and death, As in that holiest night Of Hope and Joy and Faith, Oh clear and shining Light! Oh Star, which led to him whose love Brought down man's ransom free; Where art thou?—Midst the hosts above May we still gaze on thee? In Heaven thou art not set, Thy rays earth might not dim; Send them to guide us yet, Oh Star which led to him! It is the Devil's masterpiece, to make us think well of ourselves ANONYMOUS.

Where shall happiness be found, In the sky or in the ground,— In the bag with money filled, Or the farm with toil tilled? Nay! for happiness supreme, God must be the solemn theme,— Love and Love's eternal Law, Ruling man with gentle awe. Peace and Hope and Truth combine, In the ancient law sublime, Making Joy and Life unite, In the Happiness of Light.

Doth the flower find the sun, Whence alone its life must come? Doth the tree-sap upward flow, Turning from earth's power below? Doth the leaflet glance above, To return God's smile of love? Doth for sunshine pine the fruit, It absorbs not from the root? Doth the forest skyward march, Like some grand cathedral arch? Doth the bee fly toward the light, Shunning darkness as its blight? Doth the ant, to higher land, Tug his mite of delved sand? Doth the bird, on rising wing, To the blue celestial sing? Doth the fount stream toward the sky, Where its watery source must lie? Doth the flame, from household hearth, Seek anew its pristine birth? Thus, oh thought, shouldst thou aspire, Toward supernal, sacred fire!

Towards thy Star, Forever turning, Let Thy light, Within me burning, Make the East Of conscious yearning; As my heart, For lovelight yearning, Feels within, The impulse burning, From the night Of error turning.

[Set to music by Irving I. Harwood, and for sale at Metaphysical College, at O.

About the globe, in never-ending round, Circles the Sun. Men talk of night and dark; He sees them not; wherever he comes 't is day.

Hast thou, from heights the Spirit hath attained,      Beheld the world beneath thee, as a dream,      Dissolve in nothingness,—the while its mean Desires, and meaner joys, no longer chained Thee to thyself, but, lost these limits, gained      Thy universal Being? Hast thou seen      All earth-forged barriers removed, till e'en God merged in thee, and thou in Him remained? Oh! weary, world-bound mind, which hath conceived      God high above thee, throned, personified,—      Thou shalt with sin and suffering be tried, Till of thy small beliefs thou art relieved, And faith through understanding hath perceived      The Mind Immortal, real and unified.

Colored gold and red and amber, See the ripe leaves fall! Nourishing the vines that clamber O'er their brilliant pall. Not because the frost hath clutched them, Drop they to the earth; But that deeper life hath touched them, With a second birth.

Sway to and fro in the twilight gray,— This is the ferry for Shadowtown. It always sails at the end of day, Just as the darkness is closing down.