Michael Villiers, Idealist :: :: University of Virginia Library

‘Burd Lucy, who have put your hand in mine,
And laid that head of yours upon my breast;
Burd Lucy, who have crowned me on the brows
With a fair crown which once I feared to wear;
We stand together, my beloved, we two,
And front the future with unfearing eyes.
We have not solved the mystery of our world,
But yet have seen the heaving of its breast
With the great love which throbs for aye beneath:
And we trust God and man, and we go on
To live out what we think to be the truth.
We who believe in man, ay, and in men;
We who would work as if upon our work
Hung the supremest issue; and would wait
As if our patience had the key of heaven.
We who have clasped this faith unto our hearts,
God never wastes, but only spends; although
Man's eyes unpurged discern not use from waste.

And, for the day which we believe will be,
We love and work for that; and go in faith
That He who comes will comes, whate'er the time.

‘The world that's gravid with a truth may go
Centuries of centuries ere her travailing;
Or, in the twinkling of an eye, her throes
May come upon her, and the child be born.’