VI.
Is all but a dream, O my mother, as, plain in your sight,
These march on their star-lit way?
Or see you, through casements celestial, on Heaven's bright floor,
Some earnest of Heaven's new day,
When all things on earth, or in heaven, or in hell's blackest night,
Bow down to give praise evermore—
When they sing the new song of release from earth's sorrow and thrall
To Him who, though born in a manger, is King over all?
VII.
Still dream, and with life as it passes still mingle your dream,
Nor fear for the ages unknown!
All fear shall your Babe laugh to scorn, however heavy its weight,
Since man is not faring alone!
'Emmanuel'—'God with us all'—this is solace, we deem,
Sufficient to front any fate;
Though sharp be the Cross He must bear, when the conflict is o'er,
The kingship of earth and of heaven is His evermore.
XII.
A Prayer for the New Year
A Prayer for the New Year
O God, whose days are without end and Whose years cannot
be numbered!
We, the seeming creatures of a day, reach onward through
the passing years
To claim Thy kinship in Eternity.
We thank Thee for the solemn pause wherein we put the dead
past behind us,
And face the new unknown with courage new.
Lift up over Thy bewildered world the sunshine of Thy presence
That we this year may see the world, Thy handiwork,
Emerge victorious, purposeful from Chaos,
Grant us to see, clear of cloud and battle-smoke,
The Eternal City, real before our eyes,
Stable on earth, the world of all our dreams,
Home of men reconciled, redeemed from hate.
Grant us to see Creation, after travail pangs,
With Love again made young, young Hope within her arms,
Her sorrows healed, her tears to pearls transformed.
Then we, strangers and sojourners of Time, shall gird ourselves
For the march which ends not but in rest with Thee.
O hang the lamp of hope above our onward path;
Give clearer light to understand the things which hitherto were dark;
Give strength to work the work for which our hands were hitherto
too feeble;
Enlarge our hearts to love all that is worthy love, though
hitherto unloved;
Whatever seed Thou scatterest along these unknown days ahead,
Help us to reap therefrom harvests of blessing for ourselves
and others
Which Thou wilt garner safe beyond the flux of years.
PRINTED IN
THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
BY
MOREHOUSE PUBLISHING CO.
MILWAUKEE, WIS.