Rampolli. George MacDonald
The Past where yet the human spirit
In lofty flames did rise;
Where men the Father did inherit,
His countenance recognize;
And, in simplicity made ripe,
Many grew like their archetype.
The Past wherin, still rich in bloom,
Old stems did burgeon glorious;
And children, for the world to come,
Sought pain and death victorious;
And, though both life and pleasure spake,
Yet many a heart for love did break.
The Past, where to the glow of youth
God yet himself declared;
And early death, in loving truth
The young beheld, and dared—
Anguish and torture patient bore
To prove they loved him as of yore.
With anxious yearning now we see
That Past in darkness drenched;
With this world’s water never we
Shall find our hot thirst quenched:
To our old home we have to go
That blessed time again to know.
What yet doth hinder our return?
Long since repose our precious!
Their grave is of our life the bourn;
We shrink from times ungracious!
By not a hope are we decoyed:
The heart is full; the world is void!
Infinite and mysterious,
Thrills through me a sweet trembling,
As if from far there echoed thus
A sigh, our grief resembling:
The dear ones long as well as I,
And send to me their waiting sigh.
Down to the sweet bride, and away
To the beloved Jesus!
Courage! the evening shades grow gray,
Of all our griefs to ease us!
A dream will dash our chains apart,
And lay us on the Father’s heart.
SPIRITUAL SONGS.
I
Without thee, what were life or being!
Without thee, what had I not grown!
From fear and anguish vainly fleeing,
I in the world had stood alone;
For all I loved could trust no shelter;
The future a dim gulf had lain;
And when my heart in tears did welter,
To whom had I poured out my pain?
Consumed in love and longing lonely
Each day had worn the night’s dull face
With hot tears I had followed only
Afar life’s wildly rushing race.
No rest for me, tumultuous driven!
A hopeless sorrow by the hearth!—
Who, that had not a friend in heaven,
Could to the end hold out on earth?
But if his heart once Jesus bareth,
And I of him right sure can be,
How soon a living glory scareth
The bottomless obscurity!
Manhood in him first man attaineth;
His fate in Him transfigured glows;
On freezing Iceland India gaineth,
And round the loved one blooms and blows.
Life grows a twilight softly stealing;
The world speaks all of love and glee;
For every wound grows herb of healing,
And every heart beats full and free.
I, his ten thousand gifts receiving,
Humble like him, his knees embrace;
Sure that we share his presence living
When two are gathered in one place.
Forth, forth to all highways and hedges!
Compel the wanderers to come in;
Stretch out the hand that good will pledges,
And gladly call them to their kin.
See heaven high over earth up-dawning!
In faith we see it rise and spread:
To all with us one spirit owning—
To them with us ‘tis opened.
An ancient, heavy guilt-illusion
Haunted our hearts, a changeless doom;
Blindly we strayed in night’s confusion;
Gladness and grief alike consume.
Whate’er we did, some law was broken!
Mankind appeared God’s enemy;
And if we thought the heavens had spoken,
They spoke but death and misery.
The heart, of life the fountain swelling—
An evil creature lay therein;
If more light shone into our dwelling,
More unrest only did we win.
Down to the earth an iron fetter
Fast held us, trembling captive crew;
Fear of Law’s sword, grim Death the whetter,
Did swallow up hope’s residue.
Then came a saviour to deliver—
A Son of Man, in love and might!
A holy fire, of life all-giver,
He in our hearts has fanned alight.
Then first heaven opened—and, no fable,
Our own old fatherland we trod!
To hope and trust we straight were able,
And knew ourselves