Then, as that high cathedral psalm o’erflows The dusky, vaulted aisles, and slowly grows A burst of harmony the hearer knows, Her voice assailed by rage, and I Took its purport wonderingly.

“Ah, pause for dread, before you charge in haste The ways of fate; for how can those be traced That in the life Omnipotent lie based? Or earth-grown atom’s bounded soul Grasp the universal whole?

p. 72“The more he chafes, the worse his fetter galls The luckless captive closed in dungeon walls, And fighting chains and stones, he fighting falls. Nor will that wasteful immolation Touch his lofty victor’s station.

p. 72

“Woe be to him perverse, who, weak and blind, In pride refusing to behold, shall find The ponderous roll of circumstance will grind His steps; and if he turn not, must Bruise and crush him into dust.

“We are the Lord’s, not ours, His angels sing; So you, mine own, bow meekly to your King, And striving hard and long His grace will bring:  His voice shall through the battle cry, When the strife is raging high.”

She fluttering paused: awhile her surging zeal All utterance overwhelmed to mute appeal: I felt as men who fallen in battle feel, p. 73When far their chief’s sword, like a gem, Points to glory not for them.

p. 73

“When naked heaven is azure to your eyes, And light shines everywhere, you can be wise; But, when its storms in common course arise, To you the wind but sobs and grieves Wailing with the streaming leaves.

“Rust eats the steel, and moths corrupt the cloth, And peevish doubts destroy the soul that’s loth To strive for duty, merged in shameful sloth, And lolls a weary wretch forlorn, While men reap the mellow corn.

“It is not man’s to dream in sweet repose; He toils and murmurs, as he wondering goes, Poor changeful glitter on the stream that flows In lapses huge and solemn roar, Ever on without a shore.

p. 74“The plantlet grown in darkness puts forth spray; Through loaded gloom yearns feebly toward some ray Of bounty golden from the outer day That shines eternally sublime On the dancing motes of time.”

p. 74

The music stopped, and passed into a smile Of tenderness, which she impressed to guile Her pain 

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