Classic Poem

Lift up, ye range of everlasting hills,
Ring out, forgotten music of the spheres,
Unfold, ye virgin train, attendant still,
Against the dark seal of the cycled years.

Oh! Cherubim and Seraphim that cry
By day and night around the great white throne, —
Oh! silver-winged Ariel, give back
To dulled and earthly ears the raptured tone.

For we who live, but stand on Nebo's height,
And gaze with humbled eyes, half dim with shame,
From wrecks our hands have left upon the past,
To where the horns of dawn-tipped promise flame.

Jehovah! Thou art God, — we cry to Thee, —
Back from the primal morn our voices rise;
Jehovah-jireh, blot the Eden page,
And look in ours, as in Thy Adam's eyes.

Forgive the doubting acts of foolish hearts,
Forgetful that Thy hand would shield from harm;
Beshrive those who have closed the golden year,
With brunt of war and sounding clash of arms.

We question of the skies, for rumors drop
Like sharpened stones upon the path of youth;
Clear Thou these pebbles of confusing doubt,
Give us to see the sureties of truth.

Burn with Thy word the tangled creeds that fret
The stumbling feet of children at Thy skirt;
Turn back the wisdom of the sage who prates
A blatant dogma to his brothers' hurt.

Give Thou this new-born thing to us for peace;
Beneath the shields of warring nations find,
Touched by Thy finger, scourged and purified,
The brotherhood of every humankind.

Thou art Jehovah of the quick and dead;
The passion-swept, the dreamers in the sod;
Who art the King Almighty, Lord of Hosts,
Be Thou, through faith, our Father and our God!