University of Virginia Library

CONSOLATION.

O friends, we are drawing nearer home
As day by day goes by;
Nearer the fields of fadeless bloom,
The joys that never die.
Ye doubting souls, from doubt be free,—
Ye mourners, mourn no more,
For every wave of death's dark sea
Breaks on that blissful shore.
God's ways are high above our ways,—
So shall we learn at length,
And tune our lives to sing his praise
With all our mind, might, strength.
About our devious paths of ill
He sets his stern decrees,
And works the wonder of his will
Through pains and promises.
Strange are the mysteries He employs,
Yet we his love will trust,
Though it should blight our dearest joys,
And bruise us into dust.