John Greenleaf Whittier (1807–1892). The Poetical Works in Four Volumes. 1892.
Narrative and Legendary PoemsThe Hermit of the Thebaid
O
From inmost founts of life ye start,—
The spirit’s pulse, the vital breath
Of soul and heart!
Alone, in crowds, at home, abroad,
Unheard of man, ye enter in
The ear of God.
Nor weary rote, nor formal chains;
The simple heart, that freely asks
In love, obtains.
The mercy-seat and cherubim,
And all the holy mysteries,
He bears with him.
Which, wordless, shapes itself in needs,
And wearies Heaven for naught above
Our common needs.
That trust of His undoubting child
Whereby all seeming good and ill
Are reconciled.
Of favor, is content to fall
Within the providence which shines
And rains on all.
At noontime o’er the sacred word.
Was it an angel or a fiend
Whose voice he heard?
A human utterance, sweet and mild;
And, looking up, the hermit saw
A little child.
O’erawed and troubled by the sight
Of hot, red sands, and brazen skies,
And anchorite.
Of cool, green palms, nor grass, nor well,
Nor corn, nor vines.” The hermit said:
“With God I dwell.
I live not by the outward sense;
My Nile his love, my sheltering palm
His providence.”
Here only?—where the desert’s rim
Is green with corn, at morn and eve,
We pray to Him.
His little field; beneath the leaves
My sisters sit and spin, the while
My mother weaves.
And all the bean-field hangs in pod,
My mother smiles, and says that all
Are gifts from God.
She calls the stranger at the door,
She says God fills the hands that deal
Food to the poor.”
Glistened the flow of human tears;
“Dear Lord!” he said, “Thy angel speaks,
Thy servant hears.”
And thought of home and life with men;
And all his pilgrim feet forsook
Returned again.
The eyes that smiled through lavish locks,
Home’s cradle-hymn and harvest-song,
And bleat of flocks.
There is no place where God is not;
That love will make, where’er it be,
A holy spot.”
And, leaning on his staff of thorn,
Went with the young child hand in hand,
Like night with morn.
And heard the palm-tree’s rustling fan,
The Nile-bird’s cry, the low of kine,
And voice of man.
He followed, as the small hand led
To where a woman, gentle-eyed,
Her distaff fed.
She thanked the stranger with her eyes;
The hermit gazed in doubt and joy
And dumb surprise.
A tender memory thrilled his frame;
New-born, the world-lost anchorite
A man became.
Behold me!—had we not one mother?”
She gazed into the stranger’s face:
“Thou art my brother!”
And patient trust is more than mine;
And wiser than the gray recluse
This child of thine.
That toil is praise, and love is prayer,
I come, life’s cares and pains content
With thee to share.”
The hermit’s better life began;
Its holiest saint the Thebaid lost,
And found a man!