AY not, the struggle nought availeth,
The labor and the wounds are vain,
The enemy faints not, nor faileth,

And as things have been they remain.

If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars ;
It may be, in yon smoke concealed,
Your comrades chase e'en now the fliers,
And, but for you, possess the field.

For while the tired waves, vainly breaking,
Seem here no painful inch to gain,

Far back, through creeks and inlets making,
Comes silent, flooding in, the main.

And not by eastern windows only,

When daylight comes, comes in the light; In front, the sun climbs slow, - how slowly! But westward, look, the land is bright.

ARTHUR H. CLOUGH, 1849

THE SEED GROWING SECRETLY

DE

EAR, secret greenness! nurst below
Tempests and winds and winter nights!
Vex not, that but One sees thee grow;
That One made all these lesser lights.

What needs a conscience calm and bright
Within itself, an outward test?
Who breaks his glass, to take more light,
Makes way for storms into his rest.

Then bless thy secret growth, nor catch

At noise, but thrive unseen and dumb; Keep clean, bear fruit, earn life, and watch Till the white-winged reapers come!

HENRY VAUGHAN

THE MYSTERY OF LIFE.

SPINNING.

LIKE a blind spinner in the sun,

I tread my days;

I know that all the threads will run

Appointed ways;

I know each day will bring its task,
And, being blind, no more I ask.

I do not know the use or name
Of that I spin;

I only know that some one came,
And laid within

My hand the thread, and said, "Since you Are blind, but one thing you can do."

Sometimes the threads so rough and fast
And tangled fly,

I know wild storms are sweeping past,
And fear that I

Shall fall; but dare not try to find
A safer place, since I am blind.

I know not why, but I am sure
That tint and place,
In some great fabric to endure
Past time and race

My threads will have; so from the first,
Though blind, I never felt accurst.

I think, perhaps, this trust has sprung
From one short word

Said over me when I was young,-
So young, I heard

It, knowing not that God's name signed
My brow, and sealed me His, though blind.

But whether this be seal or sign
Within, without,

It matters not. The bond divine
I never doubt.

I know He set me here, and still,
And glad, and blind, I wait His will;

But listen, listen, day by day,
To hear their tread
Who bear the finished web away,
And cut the thread,
And bring God's message in the sun,
"Thou poor blind spinner, work is done.'

"THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY."

HAT we, when face to face we see

WHAT
The Father of our souls, shall be,

John tells us, doth not yet appear :
Ah! did he tell what we are here!

H. H.

A mind for thoughts to pass into,
A heart for loves to travel through,
Five senses to detect things near,
Is this the whole that we are here?

- instincts rules;

Rules baffle instincts,
Wise men are bad, - and good are fools;
Facts evil-wis va appear,
We cannot go, why are we here?
O may we, for assurance sake,
Some arbitrary judgment take,
And wilfully pronounce it clear,
For this or that 'tis we are here?

Or is it right, and will it do,

To pace the sad confusion through,
And say:
"It doth not yet appear,
What we shall be, what we are here"?

Ah, yet, when all is thought and said,
The heart still overrules the head;
Still what we hope we must believe,
And what is given us receive;

Must still believe, for still we hope,
That in a world of larger scope.
What here is faithfully begun
Will be completed, not undone.

My child, we still must think, when we
That ampler life together see,
Some true result will yet appear
Of what we are, together, here.

ARTHUR HUGH CLOUGH