We are left to battle, not forsaken,
    Watched in secret by our awful Sire;
  Left to conquer, lest our spirits weaken,
    And forget to wrestle and aspire,
     Finding all things prompter than desire.

  He hath hid the everlasting presence
    Of his Godhead from the world he made,
  Veiled his incommunicable essence
    In thick darkness of thick clouds arrayed,
    On our bold search flashing through the shade.

  We are gods in veritable seeming
    When we struggle for our vacant thrones,
  But are earthlings beyond God’s redeeming
    While we lean, and creep, and beg in moans,
    And base kneeling cramps our knitted bones.

  Strength is given us, and a field for labor,
    Boundless vigor and a boundless field;
  Not to eat the harvests of our neighbor,
    But our own fate’s reaping-hook to wield—­
    Gathering only what our lands may yield;

  If perchance it may be wheat or darnel,
    Bitter herbs to medicine a wrong,
  Stinging thistles round a haunted charnel,
    Or rich wines to make us glad and strong,—­
    Fitting fruits that to each mood belong.

  While such power and scope to us are given,
    Who shall bind us to the triumph-car
  Of some victor soul, before us driven,
    Earlier hero in the work and war,
    Him to mimic, humbly and afar?

  No! we will not stoop, and fawn and follow;
    There are victories for our hands to win,
  Rocks to rive, and stubborn glebes to mellow,
    Outward trials leagued to foes within;
    Earth and self to purify from sin.

  No! our spirits shall not cringe and grovel,
    Stooping lowly to a low thoughts door,
  As if Heaven were straitened to a hovel,
    All its star-worlds set to rise no more,
    And our genius had no wings to soar.

  Truths bequeathed us are for lures to action;
    Not for grave-stones fane and altar stand,
  Tempting men to wait the resurrection
    Of old prophets from their sunsets grand,—­
    Rather mile-stones towards the Promised Land,

  Gird your mantles and bind on your sandals,
    Each man marching by his own birth-star;
  God will crown us when those glimmering candles
    Swell to suns as forth we track them far,—­
    Suns that bear our throne and victory-bannered car!

* * * * *

THE HUGUENOT FAMILIES IN AMERICA.

The celebrated ‘Edict of Nantes’ was, to speak accurately, a new confirmation of former treaties between the French government and the Protestants, or Huguenots—­in fact, a royal act of indemnity for all past offences.  The verdicts against the ‘Reformed’ were annulled and erased from the rolls of the Superior Courts, and to them unlimited liberty of conscience was recognized as a right.  This important and solemn Edict marked