earth.

Better thy unbroke seal, if it would teach
The ponderous worm of destiny, called man;
How great things may be hidden from his reach,
And mighty things be silent, that his span
Is but a hand-breadth to the great unknown,
A thistle-down, before the breezes blown,
That silent and unseen God turns the mighty mill,
And on the brow of giant force he writes his words, "Be still."

The possibles of time, are all thine own.
Thou hast not reared thy monuments of stone
To overtop the pyramids, yet wrought
In shapely mounds, thy sculpturehood, and caught
From flying Time, the lustre of his wing,
Which gives the semblance of perpetual Spring
To thy vast lap of luxuries; in thee
(Since man first pinioned thee to history)
Is found the acme of a world's desire.
Thy unknown crucial test, has passed the fire
Of many fading centuries; let none inquire
The secrets of thy conquest: be thou shut up with God,
The master molding of his hand--the jewel of his rod!

Yet in the book of Nature there is writ,
Without exception, all her energies,
As line by line, her page becomes enlit;
Yielding to man some new and glad surprise,
As Agassiz, together works with her,
To make the earth, her own interpreter;
And such a giant, must not hope to hide
The unfading Sanscrit, written on its side.

Thy brow wast glistered with the frost of years,
Ere man's first rapture, at the sight of thee;
Yet, were thy banks unswelled, by falling tears
Till he tore back thy splendid tapestry--
The bison and the deer unfrighted came
To lave upon thy borders, all were tame,
In their untoilsome frolics; and the beasts and birds
Made rolic at thy feet, in songs not marred with words.
But sorrow comes with knowledge; 'tis the tree,
That bears the samest fruit in every zone--
The tale of Eden is no mystery,
The tree will verify wherever grown.
And yet, in God's own providence 'tis best,
That Eden be repeated East and West;
If knowledge in the first, brought sorrowhood to earth,
The power to laugh and cry, were purchased at one birth.

They stand upon thy borders: Mighty Stream!
We will not pry thy silent lips apart,
To ask thee when, and how, the Prophet's dream
Reached its fulfillment; treasured in thy heart,
Let it remain as many other things
Are left; our language lessens their effect,
And makes them small in words,--the very springs
Of our e