Elias: An Epic of the Ages. Whitney Orson Ferguson

      Gone the great Sun—set but to rise again,

      More glorious from a night of martyrdom;

      Set here to rise on realms and times untold;

      All worlds, God's lofty vineyards[8], visiting. 730

      Linger the spirit Moon and speaking Stars[9],

      Crowning with light the Woman Wonderful[10].

      Fair as the morn, though tearful as the eve;

      Risen as from the rocky sepulchre,

      Where slept betimes the body of her Lord;

      Clothed, crowned, and shod, with glory's symboling[11];

      Ere winging to the vast invisible,

      Returning to the restful wilderness,

      She bides to hope, to labor, and endure,

      All depths, all heights, with Him inheriting. 740

      Henceforth with her another Comforter,

      Vicegerent[12] of the vanished Majesty,

      Of heavenly Three, the unembodied One[13],

      Proceeding from the presence of the Sire,

      To manifest the meaning of the Son;

      Giver of gifts from Him, the glory-crowned,

      Fountain of memory and of prophecy.

      After and ere,[14] Messiah's Minister,

      Creative hand, omnific arm of God;

      Holder with Christ of resurrection's key, 750

      The quickener of the living and the dead.

      Lamp of the worlds, life of the universe,

      Eternal spring of energy divine—

      Life, Light, and Love, magnetic mystery,

      Whereby all things upheld and heavenward drawn.

      Prophet still pleading[15] in the wilderness,

      The promise of a perfect yet to come;

      Proclaimer of the heavenly commonweal,

      Kingdom upon and yet not of the earth,

      Whose portal none can enter, none can see, 760

      Save born anew—born of a dual birth,

      By mystic fatherhood and motherhood

      Begotten sons and daughters unto God,

      Whose Spirit, omnipresent, immanent,

      Unwearied, strives by countless ministries,

      By might of word, by miracle of deed,

      Mankind to win, wooing while hope remains.

      Henceforth with her that holy gift and guide,

      Truth's high revealer and interpreter;

      Henceforth with her the Father and the Son, 770

      Absent, yet present by the Comforter;

      Of great lights twain, the lesser, ruling night,

      Moon to that Sun, whose realm the rounded Day.

      Resplendent night, while flame those fluent stars[16],

      That still a spotless brow bediadem;

      Circling forever round their central Light,

      And, Him withdrawn, repeating from afar,

      And gladdening with His rays a gloom-hung world.

      As set that Sun, sinking in seas of blood,

      Sinking to soar above a mightier morrow, 780

      Follow the lingering stars, save haply one[17],

      Through mystic night of ages sparkling lone,

      And speaking in high splendor things to come.

      Most lustrous of the living lamps of God,

      'Mid human lights, divinely luminant.

      Rarest of twelve, remaining oracle,

      Reserved unto a wondrous destiny;

      Pilot of peoples, nations, tribes and tongues,

      Leading the lost[18] ones from captivity.

      Beloved of Love—life's King, death's Conqueror, 790

      Tarrying by will of Him through troubled time,

      Lighting the way unto eternity.

      And thou, e'en thou, O Woman Wonderful!

      Safe for a season from the She-Wolf's maw,

      Far borne, east, west, on power's imperial wings,

      Nourished 'neath Caesar's shield, till Caesar's sword

      Hath turned upon and made thee desolate.

      Thou too must pass—not perish—in thy time.

      Betrayed to foes without, by false within,

      E'en as thy Lord thou sufferest martyrdom. 800

      But what avails to baffle Him or bind?

      Vain, dragon, vain thy deluge of deceit,

      Thy flood of lies, thou false one from of old!

      Vain, wrath of devils and of men combined,

      Bent to defile the sacred Bride of Christ.

      Triumphs the Man-Child[19], heaven now summons home;

      Triumphs the Woman in the wilderness,

      'Scaping the jaws, the hungering gates of hell,

      That 'gainst the mortal part alone prevail;

      Body, not spirit, crushed and all o'ercome. 810

      Throned upon higher worlds, she reigneth still;

      And here shall rise unto the regnant place,

      When rolls the stone upon the image doomed,

      When God hath fanned with fire His threshing floor.

      Till then proud Japheth sways[20], while Jacob mourns,

      Fainting 'neath yokes and fardels, prostrate, prone,

      With Judah undermost, the last of all

      The trampled tribes to taste of liberty.

      Haply ordained a lesser power to wield,

      Antaeus-like[21], from touching of the ground; 820

      Bent, curst, yet clutching, and by might of gold

      Conquering his dust-adoring conqueror[22].

      For God, through all, remembers Abraham,

      Ordained of old His lineal house to be.

      Came not the Christ their covenant to fulfill?

      Who but an Israel might offer Him?

      Whose hand than Judah's might Jehovah slay?

      "His blood be on our head"—Ay, rests it there!

      Weightier than worlds by that high death redeemed.

      World-wandering Saul! Was this thy symboling: 830

      The Jew struck blind that Gentile hosts might see[23]?

      Predestined Israel, martyred, immolate[24],

      That nations, blood-besprent, might look and live;

      A burden-bearer for the universe,

      Outcast and homeless for humanity,

      Descending like his Lord all else below,

      And yet with Him to rise all else above,

      Extremes