River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1874-02-03
Inc Prayer of Agasslz.
BY JOHN @. WHITTIER.

On the isle of Penikese,
Hinged about by sapphire seas,
Famed by breezes salt and cool,
Stood the Master with his school,
Over sails that not IN vain
Weed the west winds steady strain,
Line of coast that low aud tar
stretched its undulating ba..
Wings aslant along tho rim
OF the waves they stopped to skim,
Rock and isle and giistening bay,
Fell the beautiful white day.
Said the Master to the youth
"We have come IN search of truth,
Trying with uncertain key
Door by door Of mystery
We are reaching, through His laws,
TO the garment-hcm Of Cause,
Him the endless, unbegun,
The Unnameabe, the One,
Light Of all our light the Source.
Lie Of lite, and Force OF force.
As with fingers OF the blind
We are groplpg here TO find
What the hyeroglyphlcs mean
VI the Unseen in the seen.
What the Thought which undorlies
Natures masking aud disguise,
What It is that hides beneath
Blight and bloom ana birth and death,
by past efforts unayaihng.
Doubt and error, loss and falling,
Of our weakness made aware,
On the threshold Of our task
Let us light and guidance ask,
Let us pause in silent prayer -
Then the Master in bis place
Bowed his head little space,
And the leaves by soft airs stirred,
Lapse of wave ana cry of bird
Lett the solemn hush unbroken
VI that wordless prayer unspoken,
While its wish, on earth unsaid.
Rose to heaven interpreted,
As, on LIES best hours, we hear
BY the spirits finer ear
His low voice within us, thus
The All-Father heareth us;
And mis- holy ear we pain
With our noisy words and vain.
Not for Him our violence
Storming at the gates of sense,
His the primal language, His
The eternal silence !
Even the careless heart was moved,
hAh tiN pbHbtib{a ShNt
With gesture reverent,
To the Master well-beloved.
As thin mists are gloriliod
By the light they cannot hide,
All who gazed upon him saw,
Through its vale of tender awe,
How STAGE was still upht,
BY the old sweet look of it,
Hopeful, trusttul. full of cheer,
And the love that casts out fear.
Who the secret may declare
OF that brief, unuttered prayer
Did the shade before him come
OF tn inevitable doom,
OF the end of earth so near,
Aud Eternity's new year
In the lap Of sheltering seas
Rests the isle of peuikese
But the lord OF the domain
Comes not to his own again:
Where the eyes that follow fall,
On vaster sea his sell
Drifts beyond our beck and hail!
Other lips within its bound
Shall the laws of life expound;
Other eyes from rock and shell
Read the worlds riddles well
But when breezes light aud bland
Blow from summers blOssomed land,
When the air is glad with wings
And the blItbe sODg-sparrow sings,
Many an eye with his still face
Shall the living ones displace,
Many an ear the word shall seek
He alone could fifty speak,
Aud one name for evermore
Shall be uttered DER and DER
BY the waves that HRS the shore,
by the curlew's whistle sent
Down the cool, sea scented air;
In all voices known to her
Nature own her worshipper,
Halt in triumph, half lament.
Ihither Love shall fearful turn,
Friendship pause uncovered there,
And the wlsest reverend learn
From the Masters silent prayer.