Page:Complete Poetical Works of John Greenleaf Whittier (1895).djvu/488

456   Through wish, resolve, and act, our will Is moved by undreamed forces still; And no man measures in advance His strength with untried circumstance.

As streams take hue from shade and sun, As runs the life the song must run; But, glad or sad, to His good end God grant the varying notes may tend!

gives and hides the giving hand,
 * Nor counts on favor, fame, or praise,
 * Shall find his smallest gift outweighs

The burden of the sea and land.

Who gives to whom hath naught been given,
 * His gift in need, though small indeed
 * As is the grass-blade’s wind-blown seed,

Is large as earth and rich as heaven.

Forget it not, O man, to whom
 * A gift shall fall, while yet on earth;
 * Yea, even to thy seven-fold birth

Recall it in the lives to come.

Who broods above a wrong in thought
 * Sins much; but greater sin is his
 * Who, fed and clothed with kindnesses,

Shall count the holy alms as naught.