Page:Poems of Nature and Life.djvu/232

 224 INTRODUCTION

" PRAYER.

" Father of All, within thy hand How blest submissively to stand ! Here or hereafter, let all be Even as thou wilt ! 'Tis not for me To meddle with one wheel or key In thy vast world's machinery. Be lastly this my only prayer : Grant me I know not what nor care ! The fate thou wilt is what I would — I dare not change it if I could. Henceforth be all life's longings still, And let my wishes be Thy Will."

And again, in 1879 : —

" Imagination and Reason join in the faith that the greatest powers cannot fail to be the best. They therefore dare ask for nothing, save that all may be what it is des- tined to be ; so that even to wish seems almost an impiety, and Right so foredoomed to reign that one man has a right to command the universe, if that go wrong and he be in harmony with Right."

I cannot imagine how any thoughtful mind could fail to perceive the substantial identity of message in these diverse forms of utterance, their essential coincidence of content, their equal intensity, veracity, elevation of spirit and tone. Yet Randall was as little conversant with the writings of Carlyle and Emerson as they were with his. His reading, wide as it was, never extended far in their direction; I never heard him speak of Emerson, except as a gentleman of exceptionally fine personality, nor of Carlyle at all, though he quotes him once above. I believe the identical message sprang out of equally original and deeply ethical natures, which reacted vigorously and with equal force

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