O Star above all stars! whose blessed light
Illumes the darkness of our moral night,
Still guide our wandering feet till He whose birth
Thou didst announce shall come again to earth,
And wise and simple, king and subject meet
To hear their doom before the judgment-seat,--
Till nature's groans with human groans shall cease,
And Earth itself, once more with Heaven at peace,
Shall put her robes of deathless beauty on,
Time be no more, and the millennium dawn!
GOD MADE ME POOR.
God made me poor--am I to blame?
And shall I bow my head
As though it were some dreadful shame
I had inherited?
Shall I among the rich and great
Like trembling culprit stand,
Or like obedient servant wait
To do their least command?
And when they pass me by in scorn--
As they have often done,--
Shall I regret that I was born
An humble farmer's son?
No! should it ever cause a sigh
This were indeed a shame;
For all unworthy then were I
To bear my father's name.
I'll pay to all the homage due
Whatever rank they hold;
But to my manhood ever true,
_I will not bow to gold,_
THE STRANGER GUEST.
Came a stranger, sad and weary,
To my humble cot one day,
And he asked me for a shelter,--
Long and rough had been the way
He had traveled
On that sultry summer day.
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