OUR thoughts are boundless though our frames are frail,
Our souls immortal, though our limbs decay;
Though darkened in this poor life by a veil
Of suffering, dying matter, we shall play
In truth's eternal sunbeams; on the way
To Heaven's high capitol our car shall roll;
The temple of the power whom all obey,
That is the mark we tend to, for the soul
Can take no lower flight, and seek no meaner goal.
I feel it—though the flesh is weak, I feel
The spirit has its energies untamed
By all its fatal wanderings; time may heal
The wounds which it has suffered; folly claimed
Too large a portion of its youth; ashamed
Of those low pleasures, it would leap and fly,
And soar on wings of lightning, like the famed
Elijah, when the chariot rushing by
Bore him with steeds of fire triumphant to the sky.
We are as barks afloat upon the sea
Helmless and oarless, when the light has fled,
The spirit, whose strong influence can free
The drowsy soul, that slumbers in the dead,
Cold night of mortal darkness; from the bed
Of sloth he rouses at her sacred call,
And kindling in the blaze around him shed,
Rends with strong effort sin's debasing thrall,
And gives to God, his strength, his heart, his mind, his all.
Our home is not on earth; although we sleep,
And sink in seeming death awhile, yet then
The awakening voice speaks loudly, and we leap
To life, and energy, and light, again;
We cannot slumber always in the den
Of sense and selfishness; the day will break,
Ere we for ever leave the haunts of men;
Even at the parting hour the soul will wake,
Nor like a senseless brute its unknown journey take.
How awful is that hour, when conscience stings
The hoary wretch, who on his death-bed hears,
Deep in his soul, the thundering voice that rings,
In one dark, damning moment, crimes of years,
And screaming like a vulture in his ears,
Tells one by one his thoughts and deeds of shame;
How wild the fury of his soul careers!
His swart eye flashes with intensest flame,
And like the torture's rack the wrestling of his frame.
Our souls have wings; their flight is like the rush
Of whirlwinds, and they upward point their way,
Like him who bears the thunder, when the flush
Of his keen eye feeds on the dazzling ray:
He claps his pinions in the blaze of day,
And gaining on the loftiest arch his throne,
Darts his quick vision on his fated prey,
And, gathering all his vigour, he is gone,
And in an instant grasps his victim as his own.
We soar as proudly, and as quickly fall,
This moment in the empyrean, then we sink,
And wrapping in the joys of sense our all,
The stream that flows from Heaven we cannot drink,
But we will lie along the flowery brink
Of pleasure's tempting current, till the wave
Is bitter and its banks bare, then we think
Of what we might have been, and, idly brave,
We take a short weak flight, and drop into the grave.
WHEN other friends are round thee,
And other hearts are thine;
When other bays have crowned thee,
More fresh and green than mine.
Then think how sad and lonely
This wretched heart will be;
Which, while it beats-beats only,
Beloved one! for thee.
Yet do not think I doubt thee;
I know thy truth remains,
I would not live without thee
For all the world contains.
Thou art the star that guides me
Along life's troubled sea,
And whatever fate betides me,
This heart still turns to thee.
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