The blessing fell upon her soul;
    Her angel by her side
  Knew that the hour of peace was come;
    Her soul was purified;
  The shadows fell from roof and arch,
  Dim was the incensed air,—­
    But peace went with her as she left
  The sacred Presence there!

ADELAIDE ANNE PROCTOR.

* * * * *

O, MAY I JOIN THE CHOIR INVISIBLE!

  O, may I join the choir invisible
  Of those immortal dead who live again
  In minds made better by their presence; live
  In pulses stirred to generosity,
  In deeds of daring rectitude, in scorn
  Of miserable aims that end with self,
  In thoughts sublime that pierce the night like stars,
  And with their mild persistence urge men’s minds
  To vaster issues. 
                So to live is heaven: 
  To make undying music in the world,
  Breathing a beauteous order that controls
  With growing sway the growing life of man. 
  So we inherit that sweet purity
  For which we struggled, failed, and agonized
  With widening retrospect that bred despair. 
  Rebellious flesh that would not be subdued,
  A vicious parent shaming still its child,
  Poor anxious penitence, is quick dissolved;
  Its discords quenched by meeting harmonies,
  Die in the large and charitable air. 
  And all our rarer, better, truer self,
  That sobbed religiously in yearning song,
  That watched to ease the burden of the world,
  Laboriously tracing what must be,
  And what may yet be better,—­saw within
  A worthier image for the sanctuary,
  And shaped it forth before the multitude,
  Divinely human, raising worship so
  To higher reverence more mixed with love,
  That better self shall live till human Time
  Shall fold its eyelids, and the human sky
  Be gathered like a scroll within the tomb,
  Unread forever. 
                This is life to come,
  Which martyred men have made more glorious
  For us, who strive to follow. 
                May I reach
  That purest heaven,—­be to other souls
  The cup of strength in some great agony,
  Enkindle generous ardor, feed pure love,
  Beget the smiles that have no cruelty,
  Be the sweet presence of a good diffused,
  And in diffusion ever more intense! 
  So shall I join the choir invisible,
  Whose music is the gladness of the world.

MARIAN EVANS LEWES CROSS (George Eliot).

* * * * *

O YET WE TRUST THAT SOMEHOW GOOD.

    FROM “IN MEMORIAM,” LIII.

  O yet we trust that somehow good
    Will be the final goal of ill,
    To pangs of nature, sins of will,
  Defects of doubt, and taints of blood;

  That nothing walks with aimless feet;
    That not one life shall be destroyed,
    Or cast as rubbish to the void,
  When God hath made the pile complete;