The poetical works of George MacDonald in two volumes - Volume 1, George MacDonald [universal ebook reader txt] 📗

In what I generate,
But in the living, healing power
Of that which doth create.

If he is God to the incomplete,
Fulfilling lack and need,
Then I may cast before his feet
A half-word or half-deed.

I bring, Lord, to thy altar-stair,
To thee, love-glorious,
My very lack of will and prayer,
And cry-Thou seest me thus!

From some old well of life they flow!
The words my being fill!-
"Of me that man the truth shall know
Who wills the Father's will."


XXVIII.

What is his will?-that I may go
And do it, in the hope
That light will rise and spread and grow,
As deed enlarges scope.

I need not search the sacred book
To find my duty clear;
Scarce in my bosom need I look,
It lies so very near.

Henceforward I must watch the door
Of word and action too;
There's one thing I must do no more,
Another I must do.

Alas, these are such little things!
No glory in their birth!
Doubt from their common aspect springs-
If God will count them worth.

But here I am not left to choose,
My duty is my lot;
And weighty things will glory lose
If small ones are forgot.

I am not worthy high things yet;
I'll humbly do my own;
Good care of sheep may so beget
A fitness for the throne.

Ah fool! why dost thou reason thus?
Ambition's very fool!
Through high and low, each glorious,
Shines God's all-perfect rule.

'Tis God I need, not rank in good:
'Tis Life, not honour's meed;
With him to fill my every mood,
I am content indeed.


XXIX.

Will do: shall know : I feel the force,
The fullness of the word;
His holy boldness held its course,
Claiming divine accord.

What if, as yet, I have never seen
The true face of the Man!
The named notion may have been
A likeness vague and wan;

A thing of such unblended hues
As, on his chamber wall,
The humble peasant gladly views,
And Jesus Christ doth call.

The story I did never scan
With vision calm and strong;
Have never tried to see the Man,
The many words among.

Pictures there are that do not please
With any sweet surprise,
But gain the heart by slow degrees
Until they feast the eyes;

And if I ponder what they call
The gospel of God's grace,
Through mists that slowly melt and fall
May dawn a human face.

What face? Oh, heart-uplifting thought,
That face may dawn on me
Which Moses on the mountain sought,
God would not let him see!


XXX.

All faint at first, as wrapt in veil
Of Sinai's cloudy dark,
But dawning as I read the tale,
I slow discern and mark

A gracious, simple, truthful man,
Who walks the earth erect,
Nor stoops his noble head to one
From fear or false respect;

Who seeks to climb no high estate,
No low consent secure,
With high and low serenely great,
Because his love is pure.

Oh not alone, high o'er our reach,
Our joys and griefs beyond!
To him 'tis joy divine to teach
Where human hearts respond;

And grief divine it was to him
To see the souls that slept:
"How often, O Jerusalem!"
He said, and gazed, and wept.

Love was his very being's root,
And healing was its flower;
Love, human love, its stem and fruit,
Its gladness and its power.

Life of high God, till then unseen!
Undreamt-of glorious show!
Glad, faithful, childlike, love-serene!-
How poor am I! how low!


XXXI.

As in a living well I gaze,
Kneeling upon its brink:
What are the very words he says?
What did the one man think?

I find his heart was all above;
Obedience his one thought;
Reposing in his father's love,
His father's will he sought.

* * * * *

XXXII.

Years have passed o'er my broken plan
To picture out a strife,
Where ancient Death, in horror wan,
Faced young and fearing Life.

More of the tale I tell not so-
But for myself would say:
My heart is quiet with what I know,
With what I hope, is gay.

And where I cannot set my faith,
Unknowing or unwise,
I say "If this be what he saith,
Here hidden treasure lies."

Through years gone by since thus I strove,
Thus shadowed out my strife,
While at my history I wove,
Thou wovest in the life.

Through poverty that had no lack
For friends divinely good;
Through pain that not too long did rack,
Through love that understood;

Through light that taught me what to hold
And what to cast away;
Through thy forgiveness manifold,
And things I cannot say,

Here thou hast brought me-able now
To kiss thy garment's hem,
Entirely to thy will to bow,
And trust thee even for them

Who in the darkness and the mire
Walk with rebellious feet,
Loose trailing, Lo, their soiled attire
For heavenly floor unmeet!

Lord Jesus Christ, I know not how-
With this blue air, blue sea,
This yellow sand, that grassy brow,
All isolating me-

Thy thoughts to mine themselves impart,
My thoughts to thine draw near;
But thou canst fill who mad'st my heart,
Who gav'st me words must hear.

Thou mad'st the hand with which I write,
The eye that watches slow
Through rosy gates that rosy light
Across thy threshold go;

Those waves that bend in golden spray,
As if thy foot they bore:
I think I know thee, Lord, to-day,
Shall know thee evermore.

I know thy father thine and mine:
Thou the great fact hast bared:
Master, the mighty words are thine-
Such I had never dared!

Lord, thou hast much to make me yet-
Thy father's infant still:
Thy mind, Son, in my bosom set,
That I may grow thy will.

My soul with truth clothe all about,
And I shall question free:
The man that feareth, Lord, to doubt,
In that fear doubteth thee.


THE GOSPEL WOMEN.


I.

THE MOTHER MARY .

I.

Mary, to thee the heart was given
For infant hand to hold,
And clasp thus, an eternal heaven,
The great earth in its fold.

He seized the world with tender might
By making thee his own;
Thee, lowly queen, whose heavenly height
Was to thyself unknown.

He came, all helpless, to thy power,
For warmth, and love, and birth;
In thy embraces, every hour,
He grew into the earth.

Thine was the grief, O mother high,
Which all thy sisters share
Who keep the gate betwixt the sky
And this our lower air;

But unshared sorrows, gathering slow,
Will rise within thy heart,
Strange thoughts which like a sword will go
Thorough thy inward part.

For, if a woman bore a son
That was of angel brood,
Who lifted wings ere day was done,
And soared from where she stood,

Wild grief would rave on love's high throne;
She, sitting in the door,
All