In the world's broad field of battle, Be not like dumb, driven cattle! Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant! Heart within, and God o'erhead! Lives of great men all remind us We can make our lives sublime, And, departing, leave behind us Footprints on the sands of time; Footprints, that perhaps another, Let us, then, be up and doing, Learn to labor and to wait. HENRY W. LONGFELLOW. EXTREME UNCTION. Go! leave me, Priest; my soul would be Far sadder eyes than thine will see This crumbling clay yield up its breath; These shrivelled hands have deeper stains Than holy oil can cleanse away,— Hands that have plucked the world's coarse gains As erst they plucked the flowers of May. Call, if thou canst, to those gray eyes Some faith from youth's traditions wrung; Once laid its consecrating hands; Paused, waiting my supreme commands. But look! whose shadows block the door? God bends from out the deep and says, Wast thou not called in many ways? Are not my earth and heaven at strife? I gave thee of my seed to sow, Bringest thou me my hundred-fold?" Can I look up with face aglow, And answer, "Father, here is gold?" I have been innocent; God knows Christ still was wandering o'er the earth He shared my cup and broke my bread; Upon the hour when I was born, God said, "Another man shall be," And the great Maker did not scorn Out of himself to fashion me; He sunned me with his ripening looks, And Heaven's rich instincts in me grew, As effortless as woodland nooks Send violets up and paint them blue. Yes, I who now, with angry tears, Am exiled back to brutish clod, Have borne unquenched for four-score years And to what end? How yield I back Men think it is an awful sight To see a soul just set adrift A helpless infant newly born, Mine held them once; I flung away But clutch the keys of darkness yet; Into God's harvest; I, that might With them have chosen, here below Grope shuddering at the gates of night. O glorious Youth, that once was mine! Ye enter at this ruined shrine Whence worship ne'er shall rise again; The bat and owl inhabit here, The snake nests in the altar-stone, The sacred vessels moulder near, The image of the God is gone. JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. ANNABEL LEE. IT was many and many a year ago, That a maiden there lived, whom you may know And this maiden she lived with no other thought Than to love, and be loved by me. I was a child and she was a child, In this kingdom by the sea; But we loved with a love that was more than love, I and my Annabel Lee With a love that the wingéd seraphs of heaven And this was the reason that, long ago, In this kingdom by the sea, A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling My beautiful Annabel Lee; |