Thank Thee I am awake!

Thank Thee that I can trust!
That though a thousand times I feel the thrust
Of faith betrayed, I still have faith in man,
Believe him pure and good since time began--
Thy child forever, though he may forget
The perfect mould in which his soul was set.
Thank Thee that when love dies, fresh love springs up.
New wonders pour from Heaven's cup.
Young to my soul the ancient need returns,
Immortal in my heart the ardor burns;
My altar fires replenished from above--
Thank Thee that I can love!

Thank Thee that I can hear,
Finely and keenly with the inner ear,
Below the rush and clamor of a throng
The mighty music of the under-song.
And when the day has journeyed to its rest,
Lo, as I listen, from the amber west,
Where the great organ lifts its glowing spires,
There sounds the chanting of the unseen choirs.
Thank Thee for sight that shows the hidden flame
Beneath all breathing, throbbing things the same,
Thy Pulse the pattern of the thing to be....
Thank Thee that I can see!

Thank Thee that I can feel!
That though life's blade be terrible as steel,
My soul is stript and naked to the fang,
I crave the stab of beauty and the pang.
_To be alive,
To think, to yearn, to strive,_
To suffer torture when the goal is wrong,
To be sent back and fashioned strong
Rejoicing in the lesson that was taught
By all the good the grim experience wrought;
At last, exulting, to _arrive_....
Thank God I am alive!

_Angela Morgan._

From "The Hour Has Struck."

LOSE THE DAY LOITERING

Anything is hard to begin, whether it be taking a cold bath, writing a
letter, clearing up a misunderstanding, or falling to on the day's work.
Yet "a thing begun is half done." No matter how unpleasant a thing is to
do, begin it and immediately it becomes less unpleasant. Form the
excellent habit of making a start.

Lose the day loitering, 'twill be the same story
To-morrow, and the next more dilatory,
For indecision brings its own delays,
And days are lost lamenting o'er lost days.
Are you in earnest? Seize this very minute!
What you can do, or think you can, begin it!
Only engage, and then the mind grows heated;
Begin it, and the work will be completed.

_Johann Wolfgang von Goethe._

PLAYING THE GAME

We don't like the man who whines that the cards were stacked against him
or that the umpire