Page:Diary of a Pilgrimage (1891).pdf/231

 the-wisps, hovering over dismal swamps where dead men's bones lie rotting.

We stand with our hand upon the helm of our little bark, and we gather round us in a heap the log-books of the great dead captains that have passed over the sea before us. We note with care their course; and, in our roll of memory, we mark their soundings, and we learn their words of counsel, and their wise maxims, and all the shrewd, deep thoughts that came to them during the long years they sailed upon those same troubled waters that are heaving round us now.

Their experience shall be our compass. Their voices, whispering in our ear, shall be our pilot. By the teaching of their silent lips will we set our sails to the unseen wind.

But the closer we follow the dog's-eared logs, the wilder our poor craft tosses. The wind that filled the sails of those vanished ships blew not as blows the wind that strains our masts this day; and where they rode in safety, we run aground on reefs and banks, and our quivering timbers creak and groan, and we are well-nigh wrecked.

We must close those fading pages. They can teach us to be brave sailors, but they cannot tell us how to sail.

Over the sea of Life each must guide the helm for himself: and none can give us aid or counsel; for no one knows, nor ever has known, the pathway over that trackless ocean. In the Heavens above us shines the sun: and when the night falls, the stars come forth; and by these, looking upward, we must steer, and God be with us on the waters!

For the sea of Life is very deep, and no man knows