University of Virginia Library

First sin, and then the Judgment. It is so.
Father and God! how came this man to sin?
How may I medicine his agony?
What shall I do to help the Impenitent?
Shall I condemn, or shall I speak of peace?
What peace for sin? what peace to the depraved?
What peace before the threatenings of thy wrath?

Are these Thy martyrs? God! Even at the stake,
Before the strangling smoke can ease his pains,
Or underneath the pile of crushing stones,
The Saint upraises his exultant hymn;
Upon the battle-field, too proud to flee,
Or in the last ditch of a long defeat,
Or on the scaffold drench'd with noblest blood,
The hero and the patriot smiling falls,
Passing to Thee with triumph on his brows,
Knowing the future harvest of his loss;
The good physician, the yet tenderer nurse,
Struck down beside the dying or the saved;—
All who for Truth or for the common weal
Have given or risk'd their lives, all these we know:
The glorious army of the Sacrificed,
Thy saints, Thy chosen, who shall reign with Thee,
Their glory as eternal as their worth.
The sufferer who has borne disease or grief—
A daily task from Thee—without complaint;
The beggar Thou translatest up to heaven,
For he was rich in patience; and the poor,
Who knew not, had not, and yet sinn'd not, good
In spite of ignorance: we know them too:
The kingdom of heaven is of such as these.
Surely they are not martyrs, all of whom
Pass crowned conquerors through the gates of love.
The sinning are Thy martyrs, Father! Thou
Seëst them too. Since not a sparrow falls
Unnoticed or unorder'd of Thy Will.

Thou dost not order sin. For is not sin
Itself disorder? Yet disease is Thine.
And vice is but disease of mind or will:
Poorness or imbecility of soul.
If Thou dost order it, it must be good:
And imbecility may be forgiven,
And poorness led to wealth, nor always left
Outside the porch of Thy benevolence.
Why then—the saint and sinner are alike
In Thy esteem: the righteous and the knave:
The rain of Thy compassion falls on both.
The cripple climbeth to the angel's place;
Thou liftest up the loathsome to Thy side,
Not reckoning as wrong what wrought Thy will.
And truly, if these wretches enter heaven,
Good deeds and faith have but an equal claim,
Our righteousness is but as filthy rags,
And saintly Dives sups with Lazarus.

Shall we then envy Wrong and doubt of Right?
Is Evil then all pleasant? and is Good
Only a travail, painful, and in vain?
Not so! not so! Although Thy heaven were not,
Evil and Good are their own sure reward.
Sin yet remaineth sin; and vice is vice,—
The parent of unhappiness and shame,
Weakness, and fear, and heathenish despair—
When not debased to very brutishness.
Right is even here the lord of higher joy
Than ever the voluptuary knew.
Take every pleasure sense and will exchange,
Even in the heyday of their hottest blood,
And one pure thought of duty fairly done—
Whatever be the cost to life or hope—
Outweighs it all. Is holiness so poor,
Or man's best heritage so little worth,
The prodigal is envied for his husks?
We thank Thee, God! we know that Thou art just.

And yet the piteous question cometh back:
How came this man to sin? Born, bred in it:
His parents evil livers like himself:
Lustful and lawless, vilely unrestrain'd,
All better impulses were so o'ergrown
And overshadow'd like good herbs by weeds
And poisonous trees, until the garden-ground
Became a wilderness weed-choked and cursed:
Cursed for his parents' sins as they for theirs;
Cursed for that Evil came into the world,—
Evil of weakness, of disease, of death,
Of all that hinders strength of healthy growth,—
Evil—the worm that dieth not. Alas!
So was he cursed: though God is merciful.

I travel round unto my grief again:
The sorrow of sorrows,—for that there is ill,—
Our ill, though all be very good with Thee,—
Ill—love is yet too weak to remedy,
Ill—which our hope dares hardly look upon,
Ill—that even faith can but behold through tears.

All-loving One! Thy Lazarus is dead:
Bound with the grave-cloths, laid within the tomb.
Forgive the impatience praying for Thy Word—
“Not dead, but sleeping: Lazarus! come forth.”