serve him like a staff;
One day the cross will break in wings,
The sinner laugh a holy laugh.
The dwarfed Zacchaeus climbed a tree,
His humble stature set him high;
The Lord the little man did see
Who sought the great man passing by.
Up to the tree he came, and stopped:
“To-day,” he said, “with thee I bide.”
A spirit-shaken fruit he dropped,
Ripe for the Master, at his side.
Sure never host with gladder look
A welcome guest home with him bore!
Then rose the Satan of rebuke
And loudly spake beside the door:
“This is no place for holy feet;
Sinners should house and eat alone!
This man sits in the stranger’s seat
And grinds the faces of his own!”
Outspoke the man, in Truth’s own might:
“Lord, half my goods I give the poor;
If one I’ve taken more than right
With four I make atonement sure!”
“Salvation here is entered in;
This man indeed is Abraham’s son!”
Said he who came the lost to win—
And saved the lost whom he had won.
After Thomas Kemp
Who follows Jesus shall not walk
In darksome road with danger rife;
But in his heart the Truth will talk,
And on his way will shine the Life.
So, on the story we must pore
Of him who lives for us, and died,
That we may see him walk before,
And know the Father in the guide.
In words of truth Christ all excels,
Leaves all his holy ones behind;
And he in whom his spirit dwells
Their hidden manna sure shall find.
Gather wouldst thou the perfect grains,
And Jesus fully understand?
Thou must obey him with huge pains,
And to God’s will be as Christ’s hand.
What profits it to reason high
And in hard questions court dispute,
When thou dost lack humility,
Displeasing God at very root!
Profoundest words man ever spake
Not once of blame washed any clear;
A simple life alone could make
Nathanael to his master dear.
The eye with seeing is not filled,
The ear with hearing not at rest;
Desire with having is not stilled;
With human praise no heart is blest.
Vanity, then, of vanities
All things for which men grasp and grope!
The precious things in heavenly eyes
Are love, and truth, and trust, and hope.
Better the clown who God doth love
Than he that high can go
And name each little star above
But sees not God below!
What if all things on earth I knew,
Yea, love were all my creed,
It serveth nothing with the True;
He goes by heart and deed.
If thou dost think thy knowledge good,
Thy intellect not slow,
Bethink thee of the multitude
Of things thou dost not know.
Why look on any from on high
Because thou knowest more?
Thou need’st but look abroad, to spy
Ten thousand thee before.
Wouldst thou in knowledge true advance
And gather learning’s fruit,
In love confess thy ignorance,
And thy Self-love confute.
This is the highest learning,
The hardest and the best—
From self to keep still turning,
And honour all the rest.
If one should break the letter,
Yea, spirit of command,
Think not that thou art better,
Thou may’st not always stand!
We all are weak—but weaker
Hold no one than thou art;
Then, as thou growest meeker,
Higher will go thy heart.
Sense and judgment oft indeed
Spy but little and mislead,
Ground us on a shelf!
Happy he whom Truth doth teach,
Not by forms of passing speech,
But her very self!
Why of hidden things dispute,
Mind unwise, howe’er astute,
Making that thy task
Where the Judge will, at the last,
When disputing all is past,
Not a question ask?
Folly great it is to brood
Over neither bad nor good,
Eyes and ears unheedful!
Ears and eyes, ah, open wide
For what may be heard or spied
Of the one thing needful!
To Gordon, Leaving Khartoum
The silence of traitorous feet!
The silence of close-pent rage!
The roar, and the sudden heart-beat!
And the shot through the true heart going,
The truest heart of the age!
And the Nile serenely flowing!
Carnage and curses and cries!
He utters never a word;
Still as a child he lies;
The wind of the desert is blowing
Across the dead man of the Lord;
And the Nile is softly flowing.
But the song is stilled in heaven
To welcome one more king:
For the truth he hath witnessed and striven,
And let the world go crowing,
And Mammon’s church-bell go ring,
And the Nile blood-red go flowing!
Man who hated the sword
Yet wielded the sword and axe—
Farewell, O arm of the Lord,
The Lord’s own harvest mowing—
With a wind in the smoking flax
Where our foul rivers are flowing!
In war thou didst cherish peace,
Thou slewest for love of life:
Hail, hail thy stormy release
Go home and await thy sowing,
The patient flower of thy strife,
Thy bread on the Nile cast flowing.
Not thy earth to our earth alone,
Thy spirit is left with us!
Thy body is victory’s throne,
And our hearts around it are glowing:
Would that we others died thus
Where the Thames and the Clyde are flowing!
Song of the Saints and Angels
January 26, 1885
Gordon, the self-refusing,
Gordon, the lover of God,
Gordon, the good part choosing,
Welcome along the road!
Thou knowest the man, O Father!
To do thy will he ran;
Men’s praises he did not gather:
There is scarce such another man!
Thy black sheep’s faithful shepherd
Who knew not how to flee,
Is torn by the desert leopard,
And comes wounded home to thee!
Home he is coming the faster
That the way he could not miss:
In thy arms, oh take him, Master,
And heal him with a kiss!
Then give him a thousand cities
To rule till their evils cease,
And their wailing minor ditties
Die in a psalm of peace.
Failure
Farewell, O Arm of the Lord!
Man who hated the sword,
Yet struck and spared not the thing abhorred!
Farewell, O word of the Word!
Man who knew no failure
But the failure of the Lord!
To E. G., Dedicating a Book
A broken tale of endless things,
Take, lady: thou art not of those
Who in what
