University of Virginia Library


31

THE APOSTLES

They pass from sight, those men of power,
The planted seed of God's dear field.
In martyrdom's consummate flower
A world-renewing crop they yield.
From lowly trade, from hours sublime
In which they knew the Master's love,
From prison bonds and heathen crime,
Resistless in their calm they move.
The heart which ran its own wild way,
With knowledge of recorded good;
Which tarried for the poet's lay,
And loved, though wrong, the hero's mood,
From all the songs of Greece and Rome,
The joys and woes of human souls,
Turns to the truths that overcome,
The sacred reason which controls.
Twelve lowly men, of little lore,
With human fault and human faith,
Still from their crownéd service pour
The light that triumphs over death.
Oh! glory of man's true desert!
The wilderness is glad of them,
And Nature, healed of every hurt,
Bears up the New Jerusalem.