A FOREST HYMN

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT (1794-1878) was one of the foremost American poets. For many years he was editor of the New York Evening Post. His poems show his love of nature and his deep religious feeling.

The groves were God's first temples. Ere man learned
To hew the shaft, and lay the architrave,
And spread the roof above them, ere he framed
The lofty vault, to gather and roll back

The sound of anthems; in the darkling wood,
Amid the cool and silence, he knelt down,
And offered to the Mightiest solemn thanks
And supplication. For his simple heart
Might not resist the sacred influences

Which, from the stilly twilight of the place,

And from the gray old trunks that high in heaven
Mingled their mossy boughs, and from the sound
Of the invisible breath that swayed at once.
All their green tops, stole over him, and bowed
His spirit with the thought of boundless power
And inaccessible majesty. Ah, why

Should we, in the world's riper years, neglect
God's ancient sanctuaries, and adore

Only among the crowd, and under roofs

That our frail hands have raised? Let me, at least,

5

10

15

20

Here in the shadow of this aged wood,
Offer one hymn-thrice happy, if it find
Acceptance in His ear.

Father, thy hand

Hath reared these venerable columns, thou

5 Didst weave this verdant roof. Thou didst look down Upon the naked earth, and, forthwith, rose

All these fair ranks of trees. They, in thy sun,
Budded, and shook their green leaves in thy breeze,
And shot toward heaven. The century-living crow,
10 Whose birth was in their tops, grew old and died
Among their branches, till, at last, they stood,
As now they stand, massy, and tall, and dark,
Fit shrine for humble worshiper to hold
Communion with his Maker. These dim vaults,
15 These winding aisles, of human pomp or pride
Report not. No fantastic carvings show

The boast of our vain race to change the form
Of thy fair works. But thou art here- thou fill'st
The solitude. Thou art in the soft winds

20 That run along the summit of these trees
In music; thou art in the cooler breath
That from the inmost darkness of the place

Comes, scarcely felt; the barky trunks, the ground,
The fresh moist ground, are all instinct with thee.
25 Here is continual worship; -nature, here,
In the tranquillity that thou dost love,

Enjoys thy presence. Noiselessly, around,
From perch to perch, the solitary bird

Passes; and yon clear spring, that, midst its herbs,
Wells softly forth and wandering steeps the roots
Of half the mighty forest, tells no tale

Of all the good it does. Thou hast not left
Thyself without a witness, in these shades,
Of thy perfections. Grandeur, strength, and grace
Are here to speak of thee. This mighty oak —
By whose immovable stem I stand and seem
Almost annihilated-not a prince,

In all that proud old world beyond the deep,
E'er wore his crown as loftily as he
Wears the green coronal of leaves with which
Thy hand has graced him. Nestled at his root
Is beauty, such as blooms not in the glare
Of the broad, sun. That delicate forest flower
With scented breath, and look so like a smile,
Seems, as it issues from the shapeless mold,
An emanation of the indwelling Life,

A visible token of the upholding Love,
That are the soul of this wide universe.

There have been holy men who hid themselves
Deep in the woody wilderness, and gave

Their lives to thought and prayer, till they outlived
The generation born with them, nor seemed

Less aged than the hoary trees and rocks
Around them; - and there have been holy men

Who deemed it were not well to pass life thus.
But let me often to these solitudes

5 Retire, and in thy presence reassure
Here its enemies,

My feeble virtue. Here its

The passions, at thy plainer footsteps shrink
And tremble and are still. Oh, God! when thou
Dost scare the world with tempests, set on fire
10 The heavens with falling thunderbolts, or fill
With all the waters of the firmament

The swift dark whirlwind that uproots the woods
And drowns the villages; when, at thy call,
Uprises the great deep and throws himself
15 Upon the continent, and overwhelms

Its cities who forgets not, at the sight
Of these tremendous tokens of thy power,
His pride, and lays his strifes and follies by?
Oh, from these sterner aspects of thy face
20 Spare me and mine, nor let us need the wrath
Of the mad unchained elements to teach
Who rules them. Be it ours to meditate,
In these calm shades, thy milder majesty,
And to the beautiful order of thy works
25 Learn to conform the order of our lives.

architrave (är ́ki-träv): literally "the chief beam"; that which rests immediately on the column or support.—without a witness; see Acts xiv. 17.

WAR AND HUMAN BROTHERHOOD

WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING

WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING (1780-1842) was an American preacher and writer, famous for his eloquence, his courage, and his high ideals.

I have written once and again on war, a hackneyed subject, as it is called, yet one would think too terrible ever to become a commonplace. Is this insanity never 5 to cease? False notions of national honor, as false and unholy as those of the duelist, do most toward fanning this fire. Great nations, like great boys, place their honor in resisting insult and in fighting well. One would think the time had gone by in which nations needed to rush to 10 arms to prove that they were not cowards. If there is one truth which history has taught, it is that communities in all stages of society, from the most barbarous to the most civilized, have sufficient courage. No people can charge upon its conscience that it has not shed blood 15 enough in proof of its valor. Almost any man, under the usual stimulants of the camp, can stand fire. Is it not time that the point of honor should undergo some change, that some glimpses, at least, of the true glory of a nation should be caught by rulers and people?

"It is the honor of a man to pass over a transgression," and so it is of states. To be wronged is no disgrace. To bear wrong generously, till every means of conciliation is

20