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Ingelow, Jean, 1820-1897

"Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume II."


'To show the skies, and tether to the sod!
A daunting gift!' we mourn in our long strife.
And God is more than all our thought of God;
E'en life itself more than our thought of life,
And that is all we know--and it is noon,
Our little day will soon be done--how soon!
O let us to ourselves be dutiful:
We are not satisfied, we have wanted all,
Not alone beauty, but that Beautiful;
A lifted veil, an answering mystical.
Ever men plead, and plain, admire, implore,
'Why gavest Thou so much--and yet--not more?
We are but let to look, and Hope is weighed.'
Yet, say the Indian words of sweet renown,
'The doomed tree withholdeth not her shade
From him that bears the axe to cut her down;'
Is hope cut down, dead, doomed, all is vain:
The third day dawns, she too has risen again
(For Faith is ours by gift, but Hope by right),
And walks among us whispering as of yore:
'Glory and grace are thrown thee with the light;
Search, if not yet thou touch the mystic shore;
Immanent beauty and good are nigh at hand,
For infants laugh and snowdrops bloom in the land.


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