Voices come by day Between life's lightning-flash and thunder-peal, And sooner heaven and earth shall pass away Than what they there reveal. Voices come at night Amid the silence of deluding cares, And pain flows through the darkness and grows bright, And knowledge unawares. Voices fill the strife To which I give the beauty of my days, And testify that sacrifice is life, Availing prayer and praise. Life retained is lost, The tocsin of interminable war; And life relinquished is of life the cost, Which shineth as a star. Tongue can never tell God's revelations in this mighty Word, Nor how the mystery of life they spell, With which all hearts are stirred. I continue mute, In joyful awe before the Infinite, Until at length eternity transmute My darkness into light. I can only speak An earth-born language, that does not reveal The infinitude of duty which I seek To utter and but feel. Duty! heart of joy! Which giveth strength to suffer and endure, Till self-forgetfulness in God's employ Enthrones a life secure. Shepherd of the sheep, To whom God gives the universal charge, I think of Thy devotion and I weep, Thy love appears so large! And I think of all The grief which strengthened Thy exalting hand, Until great tears of Easter gladness fall, To think in Thee I stand, Out of whose great heart So glorious is death's sacrificial knife-- To think I know Thee now somewhat, who art The way, the truth, the life; Who art with Thine own, Where Thou hast been through immemorial years, In every touch of consolation known, In every flood of tears. * * * * * The Way of the Lord. I cast my lot with the surging world, To find out the way of the Lord; A pebble hither and thither hurled, To find out the way of the Lord. I sought where the foot of man was unknown, To find out the way of the Lord; In the desert alone, alone, alone, To find out the way of the Lord. I bowed my heart to the voice of the sea, To find out the way of the Lord; To the sob of unuttered mystery, To find out the way of the Lord. I went down into the depths of my soul, To find out the way of the Lord; Down where the years of eternity roll, To find out the way of the Lord. Ah, me! I had no interpreter To tell me the way of the Lord; For Nature, it was not in her To tell me the way of the Lord. I heard of One who came out from God To show me the way of the Lord; I entered the path which here He trod To show me the way of the Lord. I walked the way of humility To find out the way Of the Lord; It turned to the way of sublimity, To show me the way of the Lord.