Then one, still farther down,-this mournful troop They say our home is in a better land, By one slight move, so should my sudden sight That this is City of God, both then and now. WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING. The Journey. A THE FUTURE. WANDERER is man from his birth. On the breast of the river of Time; Brimming with wonder and joy He spreads out his arms to the light, Rivets his gaze on the banks of the stream. As what he sees is, so have his thoughts been. Whether he wakes Where the snowy mountainous pass, Echoing the screams of the eagles, Of the new-born clear-flowing stream; Where the river in gleaming rings So is the mind of the man. Vainly does each as he glides Fable and dream Of the lands which the river of Time Had left ere he woke on its breast, Or shall reach when his eyes have been closed. Only the tract where he sails He wots of only the thoughts, Raised by the objects he passes, are his. Who can see the green earth any more The tribes who then roamed on her breast, What girl Now reads in her bosom as clear What bard, At the height of his vision, can deem With a plainness as near, As flashing, as Moses felt, When he lay in the night by his flock Can rise and obey The beck of the Spirit like him? This tract which the river of Time With a thousand cries is its stream. And we on its breast, our minds Are confused as the cries which we hear, Changing and shot as the sights which we see. And we say that repose has fled For ever the course of the river of Time. That cities will crowd to its edge In a blacker incessanter line; That the din will be more on its banks, Denser the trade on its stream, Flatter the plain where it flows, That never will those on its breast Drink of the feeling of quiet again. But what was before us we know not, Haply, the river of Time, As it grows, as the towns on its marge Fling their wavering lights And the width of the waters, the hush As the stars come out, and the night-wind Murmurs and scents of the infinite Sea. MATTHEW ARNOLD. WHERE LIES THE LAND. WHERE lies the land to which the ship would go ? Far, far ahead, is all her seamen know. And where the land she travels from? Away, On sunny noons, upon the deck's smooth face, |