Page:Complete Poetical Works of John Greenleaf Whittier (1895).djvu/460

428  Now stauding apart with God and me
 * Thou art weakness all,

Gazing vainly after the things to be
 * Through Death’s dread wall.

But never for this, never for this
 * Was thy being lent;

For the craven’s fear is but selfishness,
 * Like his merriment.

Folly and Fear are sisters twain:
 * One closing her eyes,

The other peopling the dark inane
 * With spectral lies.

Know well, my soul, God’s hand controls
 * Whate’er thou fearest;

Round Him in calmest music rolls
 * Whate’er thou hearest.

What to thee is shadow, to Him is day,
 * And the end He knoweth,

And not on a blind and aimless way
 * The spirit goeth.

Man sees no future,—a phantom show
 * Is alone before him;

Past Time is dead, and the grasses grow,
 * And flowers bloom o’er him.

Nothing before, nothing behind;
 * The steps of Faith

Fall on the seeming void, and find
 * The rock beneath.

The Present, the Present is all thou hast
 * For thy sure possessing;

Like the patriarch’s angel hold it fast
 * Till it gives its blessing.

Why fear the night? why shrink from Death,
 * That phantom wan?

There is nothing in heaven or earth beneath
 * Save God and man.

Peopling the shadows we turn from Him
 * And from one another;

All is spectral and vague and dim
 * Save God and our brother!

Like warp and woof all destinies
 * Are woven fast,

Linked in sympathy like the keys
 * Of an organ vast.

Pluck one thread, and the web ye mar;
 * Break but one

Of a thousand keys, and the paining jar
 * Through all will run.

O restless spirit! wherefore strain
 * Beyond thy sphere?

Heaven and hell, with their joy and pain,
 * Are now and here.

Back to thyself is measured well
 * All thou hast given;

Thy neighbor’s wrong is thy present hell,
 * His bliss, thy heaven.

And in life, in death, in dark and light,
 * All are in God’s care:

Sound the black abyss, pierce the deep of night,
 * And He is there!

All which is real now remaineth,
 * And fadeth never:

The hand which upholds it now sustaineth
 * The soul forever.

Leaning on Him, make with reverent meekness
 * His own thy will,

And with strength from Him shall thy utter weakness
 * Life’s task fulfil;

And that cloud itself, which now before thee
 * Lies dark in view,

Shall with beams of light from the inner glory
 * Be stricken through.

And like meadow mist through autumn’s dawn
 * Uprolling thin,

Its thickest folds when about thee drawn
 * Let sunlight in.

Then of what is to be, and of what is done,
 * Why queriest thou?

The past and the time to be are one,
 * And both are now!