ON THE SACRO MONTE

Gods fade; but God abides, and in man's heart
Speaks with the clear unconquerable cry

Of energies and hopes that cannot die.
We feel this sentient self the counterpart
Of some self vaster than the star-girt sky.

Yea, though our utterance falter; though no art By more than sign or symbol may impart This faith of faiths that lifts our courage high: Yet are there human duties, human needs,

Love, charity, self-sacrifice, pure deeds, Tender affections, helpful service, war Waged against tyranny, fraud, suffering, crime: These, ever strengthening with the strength of time,

Exalt man higher than fabled angels are.

AUGUSTA WEBSTER

Born 1840

IF

If I should die this night, (as well might be,
So pain has on my weakness worked its will),
And they should come at morn and look on me

Lying more white than I am wont, and still

In the strong silence of unchanging sleep,
And feel upon my brow the deepening chill,
And know we gathered to His time-long keep,
The quiet watcher over all men's rest,
And weep as those around a death-bed weep-

There would no anguish throb my vacant breast,
No tear-drop trickle down my stony cheek,
No smile of long farewell say "Calm is best."

I should not answer aught that they should speak,
Nor look my meaning out of earnest eyes,

Nor press the reverent hands that mine should seek;

But, lying there in such an awful guise,

Like some strange presence from a world unknown

Unmoved by any human sympathies,

Seem strange to them, and dreadfully alone,

Vacant to love of theirs or agony,

Having no pulse in union with their own.

Gazing henceforth upon infinity

With a calm consciousness devoid of change, Watching the current of the years pass by,

And watching the long cycles onward range,

With stronger vision of their perfect whole,
As one whom time and space from them estrange.

And they might mourn and say "The parted soul
"Is gone out of our love; we spend in vain
"A tenderness that cannot reach its goal."

Yet I might still perchance with them remain
In spirit, being free from laws of mould,
Still comprehending human joy and pain.

Ah me! but if I knew them as of old,

Clasping them in vain arms, they unaware, And mourned to find my kisses leave them cold, And sought still some part of their life to share Still standing by them, hoping they might see, And seemed to them but as the viewless air!

For so once came it in a dream to me,

And in my heart it seemed a pang too deep,
A shadow having human life to be.

For it at least would be long perfect sleep
Unknowing Being and all Past to lie,
Void of the growing Future, in God's keep:

But such a knowledge would be misery

Too great to be believed. Yet if the dead In a diviner mood might still be nigh,

Their former life unto their death so wed

That they could watch their loved with heavenly eye, That were a thing to joy in, not to dread.

TO ONE OF MANY

What! wilt thou throw thy stone of malice now,
Thou dare to scoff at him with scorn or blame?
He is a thousand times more great than thou:
Thou, with thy narrower mind and lower aim,
Wilt thou chide him and not be checked by shame?

He hath done evil-God forbid my sight
Should falter where I gaze with loving eye,

That I should fail to know the wrong from right.
He hath done evil-let not any tie

Of birth or love draw moral sense awry.

And though my trust in him is yet full strong
I may not hold him guiltless, in the dream
That wrong forgiven is no longer wrong,
And, looking on his error, fondly deem
That he in that he erreth doth but seem.

I do not soothe me with a vain belief;
He hath done evil, therefore is my thought

Of him made sadness with no common grief.

But thou, what good or truth has in thee wrought That thou shouldst hold thee more than him in aught?

He will redeem his nature, he is great

In inward purpose past thy power to scan,

And he will bear his meed of evil fate

And lift him from his fall a nobler man,
Hating his error as a great one can.

And what art thou to look on him and say

"Ah! he has fallen whom they praised, but know

My foot is sure"? Upon thy level way

Are there the perils of the hills of snow?

Yea, he has fallen, but wherefore art thou low?