The mighty sea will roll its barriers in front,
And with my chariots and my warlike men
I’ll bring them back, or mete them out their graves.”
Then Pharaoh’s officers arose
And gathered up the armies of the king,
And made his chariots ready for pursuit.
With proud escutcheons blazoned to the sun,
In his chariot of ivory, pearl and gold,
Pharaoh rolled out of Egypt; and with him
Rode his mighty men, their banners floating
On the breeze, their spears and armor glittering
In the morning light; and Israel saw,
With fainting hearts, their old oppressors on their
Track: then women wept in hopeless terror;
Children hid their faces in their mothers’ robes,
And strong men bowed their heads in agony and dread;
And then a bitter, angry murmur rose—
“Were there no graves in Egypt, that thou hast
Brought us here to die?”
Then Moses lifted up his face, aglow
With earnest faith in God, and bade their fainting hearts
Be strong and they should his salvation see.
“Stand still,” said Moses to the fearful throng
Whose hearts were fainting in the wild, “Stand still.”
Ah, that was Moses’ word, but higher and greater
Came God’s watchword for the hour, and not for that
Alone, but all the coming hours of time.
“Speak ye unto the people and bid them
Forward go; stretch thy hand across the waters
And smite them with thy rod.” And Moses smote
The restless sea; the waves stood up in heaps,
Then lay as calm and still as lips that just
Had tasted death. The secret-loving sea
Laid bare her coral caves and iris-tinted
Floor; that wall of flood which lined the people’s
Way was God’s own wondrous masonry;
The signal pillar sent to guide them through the wild
Moved its dark shadow till it fronted Egypt’s
Camp, but hung in fiery splendor, a light
To Israel’s path. Madly rushed the hosts
Of Pharaoh upon the people’s track, when
The solemn truth broke on them—that God
For Israel fought. With cheeks in terror
Blenching, and eyes astart with fear, “let
Us flee,” they cried, “from Israel, for their God
Doth fight against us; he is battling on their side.”
They had trusted in their chariots, but now
That hope was vain; God had loosened every
Axle and unfastened every wheel, and each
Face did gather blackness and each heart stood still
With fear, as the livid lightnings glittered
And the thunder roared and muttered on the air,
And they saw the dreadful ruin that shuddered
O’er their heads, for the waves began to tremble
And the wall of flood to bend. Then arose
A cry of terror, baffled hate and hopeless dread,
A gurgling sound of horror, as the waves
Came madly dashing, wildly crashing, seeking
Out their place again, and the flower and pride
Of Egypt sank as lead within the sea
Till the waves threw back their corpses cold and stark
Upon the shore, and the song of Israel’s
Triumph was the requiem of their foes.
Oh the grandeur of that triumph; up the cliffs
And down the valleys, o’er the dark and restless
Sea, rose the people’s shout of triumph, going
Up in praise to God, and the very air
Seemed joyous, for the choral song of millions
Throbbed upon its viewless wings.
Then another song of triumph rose in accents
Soft and clear; ’twas the voice of Moses’ sister
Rising in the tide of song. The warm blood
Of her childhood seemed dancing in her veins;
The roses of her girlhood were flushing
On her cheek, and her eyes flashed out the splendor
Of long departed days, for time itself seemed
Pausing, and she lived the past again; again
The Nile flowed by her; she was watching by the stream,
A little ark of rushes where her baby brother lay;
The tender tide of rapture swept o’er her soul again
She had felt when Pharaoh’s daughter had claimed
Him as her own, and her mother wept for joy
Above her rescued son. Then again she saw
Him choosing “ ’twixt Israel’s pain and sorrow
And Egypt’s pomp and pride.” But now he stood
Their leader triumphant on that shore, and loud
She struck the cymbals as she led the Hebrew women
In music, dance and song, as they shouted out
Triumphs in sweet and glad refrains.
Miriam’s Song
A wail in the palace, a wail in the hut,
The midnight is shivering with dread,
And Egypt wakes up with a shriek and a sob
To mourn for her first-born and dead.In the morning glad voices greeted the light,
As the Nile with its splendor was flushed;
At midnight silence had melted their tones,
And their music forever is hushed.In the morning the princes of palace and court
To the heir of the kingdom bowed down;
’Tis midnight, pallid and stark in his shroud
He dreams not of kingdom or crown.As a monument blasted and blighted by God,
Through the ages proud Pharaoh shall stand,
All seamed with the vengeance and scarred with the wrath
That leaped from God’s terrible hand.
VII
They journeyed on from Zuphim’s sea until
They reached the sacred mount and heard the solemn
Decalogue. The mount was robed in blackness—
Heavy and deep the shadows lay; the thunder
Crashed and roared upon the air; the lightning
Leaped from crag to crag; God’s fearful splendor
Flowed around, and Sinai quaked and shuddered
To its base, and there did God proclaim
Unto their listening ears, the great, the grand,
The central and the primal truth of all
The universe—the unity of God. Only one God—
This truth received into the world’s great life,
Not as an idle dream nor speculative thing,
But as a living, vitalizing thought,
Should bind us closer to our God and link us
With our fellow man, the brothers and co-heirs
With Christ, the elder brother of our race.
Before this truth let every blade of war
Grow dull, and slavery, cowering at the light,
Skulk from the homes of men; instead
Of war bring peace and freedom, love and joy,
And light for man, instead of bondage, whips
And chains. Only one God! the strongest hands
Should help the weak who bend before the blasts
Of life, because if God is only one
Then we are the children of his mighty hand,
And when we best serve man, we also serve
Our God. Let haughty rulers learn that men
Of humblest birth and lowliest lot have
Rights as sacred and divine as theirs, and they
Who fence in leagues of earth by bonds and claims
And title deeds, forgetting land and water,
Air and light are God’s own gifts and heritage
For
