every time-honored guest. 
    And slumber and doze in inglorious rest;
    For no progress they find in the wide sphere of mind,
    And the world’s standing still with all of their kind;
    Contented to dwell deep down in the well,
    Or move like a snail in the crust of his shell,
    Or live like the toad in his narrow abode,
  With their souls closely wedged in a thick wall of stone,
  By the gray weeds of prejudice rankly o’ergrown.

REBECCA S. NICHOLS.

* * * * *

HER CREED.

  She stood before a chosen few,
  With modest air and eyes of blue;
  A gentle creature, in whose face
  Were mingled tenderness and grace.

  “You wish to join our fold,” they said: 
  “Do you believe in all that’s read
  From ritual and written creed,
  Essential to our human need?”

  A troubled look was in her eyes;
  She answered, as in vague surprise. 
  As though the sense to her were dim,
  “I only strive to follow Him.”

  They knew her life; how, oft she stood,
  Sweet in her guileless maidenhood,
  By dying bed, in hovel lone,
  Whose sorrow she had made her own.

  Oft had her voice in prayer been heard,
  Sweet as the voice of singing bird;
  Her hand been open in distress;
  Her joy to brighten and to bless.

  Yet still she answered, when they sought
  To know her inmost earnest thought,
  With look as of the seraphim,
  “I only strive to follow Him.”

  Creeds change as ages come and go;
  We see by faith, but little know: 
  Perchance the sense was not so dim
  To her who “strove to follow Him.”

SARAH KNOWLES BOLTON.

* * * * *

MY CREED.

  I hold that Christian grace abounds
    Where charity is seen; that when
  We climb to heaven, ’t is on the rounds
    Of love to men.

  I hold all else, named piety,
    A selfish scheme, a vain pretence;
  Where centre is not—­can there be
    Circumference?

  This I moreover hold, and dare
    Affirm where’er my rhyme may go,—­
  Whatever things be sweet or fair,
    Love makes them so.

  Whether it be the lullabies
    That charm to rest the nursling bird,
  Or the sweet confidence of sighs
    And blushes, made without a word.

  Whether the dazzling and the flush
    Of softly sumptuous garden bowers,
  Or by some cabin door, a bush
    Of ragged flowers.

  ’Tis not the wide phylactery,
    Nor stubborn fast, nor stated prayers,
  That make us saints:  we judge the tree
    By what it bears.

  And when a man can live apart
    From works, on theologic trust,
  I know the blood about his heart
    Is dry as dust.

ALICE CAREY.