Alfred H. Miles, ed. The Sacred Poets of the Nineteenth Century. 1907.
By Be Just and Fear NotHenry Alford (18101871)
S
And trim their words for pay:
In pleasant sunshine of pretence
Let others bask their day.
Down on thy watch-tower stoop:
Though thou shouldst see thine heart’s delight
Borne from thee by their swoop.
In shelter to abide:
We were not made to sit and dream:
The safe, must first be tried.
Cry not, “The way is plain:”
His path within for those without
Is paved with toil and pain.
Into thy spirit burned,
Is better than the whole, half-heard
And by thine interest turned.
Set not thy bushel down:
The smallest spark may send his beam
O’er hamlet, tower, and town.
Who creeps to age from youth,
Failing to grasp his life’s intent,
Because he fears the truth.
And as thy thought, thy speech:
What thou hast not by suffering bought,
Presume thou not to teach.
The foes are on the sand:
The first world-tempest’s ruthless shock
Scatters their shifting strand:
We now see darkly through,
And justified at last appear
The true, in Him that’s True.