No More Learning

Too long has the land's soul slumbered
In wearying dreams of gain,
With prosperous falsity cumbered
And dulled with bribes, as a bane.

Yes, cunning is civilized evil,
And crafty the gold-baited snare;
But virtue, in fiery upheaval,
May cast fine device to the air.

Bring us the simple and stalwart
Purpose of earlier days.
Come! Far better than all were't--
Our precepts, our pride, and our lays--

That the people in spirit should tremble
With heed of the God-given Word;
That we cease from our boast, nor dissemble,
But follow where truth's voice is heard.

Come to us, mountain-dweller,
Leader, wherever thou art;
Skilled from thy cradle, a queller
Of serpents, and sound to the heart!

Modest and mighty and tender;
Man of an iron mold;
Honest, fine-grained, our defender;--
American-souled!






THE NAME OF WASHINGTON

[Read before the Sons of the Revolution, New-York, February 22, 1887]


Sons of the youth and the truth of the nation,
Ye that are met to remember the man
Whose valor gave birth to a people's salvation,
Honor him now; set his name in the van.
A nobleness to try for,
A name to live and die for--
The name of Washington.

Calmly his face shall look down through the ages--
Sweet yet severe with a spirit of warning;
Charged with the wisdom of saints and of sages;
Quick with the light of a life-giving morning.
A majesty to try for,
A name to live and die for--
The name of Washington!

Though faction may rack us, or party divide us,
And bitterness break the gold links of our story,
Our father and leader is ever beside us.
Live, and forgive! But forget not the glory
Of him whose height we try for,
A name to live and die for--
The name of Washington!

Still in his eyes shall be mirrored our fleeting
Days, with the image of days long ended;
Still shall those eyes give, immortally, greeting
Unto the souls from his spirit descended.
His grandeur we will try for,
His name we 'll live and die for--
The name of Washington!






GRANT'S DIRGE


I

Ah, who shall sound the hero's funeral march?
And what shall be the music of his dirge?
No single voice may chant the Nation's grief,
No formal strain can give its woe relief.
The pent-up anguish of the loyal wife,
The sobs of those who, nearest in this life,
Still hold him closely in the life beyond;--
These first, with threnody of memories fond.
But look! Forth press a myriad mourners thronging,
With hearts that throb in sorrow's exaltation,
Moved by a strange, impassioned, hopeless longing
To serve him with their love's last ministration.
Make way! Make way, from wave-bound verge to verge
Of all our land, that this great multitude
With lamentation proud albeit subdued,
Deep murmuring like the ocean's mighty surge,
May pass beneath the heavens' triumphal arch!


II

What is the sound we hear?
Never the fall of a tear;
For grief repressed
In every breast
More honors the man we revere.
Rising from East and West,
There echoes afar or near--
From the cool, sad North and the burning South--
A sound long since grown dear,
When brave ranks faced the cannon's mouth
And died for a faith austere:
The tread of marching men,
A steady tramp of feet
That never flinched nor faltered when
The drums of duty beat.
With sable hats whose shade
Falls from the cord of gold
On every time-worn face;
With tattered flags, in black enrolled,
Beneath whose folds they warred of old;
Forward, firmly arrayed,
With a sombre, martial grace;
So the Grand Army moves
Commanded by the dead,
Following him whose name it loves,
Whose voice in life its footsteps led.


III

Those that in the combat perished,--
Hostile shapes and forms of friends,--
Those we hated, those we cherished,
Meet the pageant where it ends.
Flash of steel and tears forgiving
Blend in splendor. Hark, the knell!