Page:A Sheaf Gleaned in French Fields.djvu/87

Must I live feared and lonely from my birth?
Oh! let me sleep the sleep of all the earth.
What have I done, elected thus to stand?
Lo! I have led Thy people to their land.
Let some one else appear upon the scene
'Twixt Thee and them, like me to intervene.
Wild is Thy courser Israel, O my God!
He needs the iron curb and scorpion rod.
These and my book I gladly shall resign—
But Thou art just: Thy will be done, not mine.

'On all my hopes why still descends a blight?
Why is my ignorance dispelled by light,
Since from mount Horeb unto Nebo mount
Six feet of earth, alas! I cannot count
To rest in? What to him who never dies
Avails it to be wisest of the Wise?
My finger guides a nation's wanderings,
And draws down fire upon the heads of kings,
With signs and portents no man ever saw;
The future on its knees shall take my law;
The dead, in old tombs opened at my choice,
Find a mysterious and prophetic voice;
I stamp upon the nations with my feet;
My hand makes armies triumph or retreat;
I lift up generations; at my frown
From their high place, headlong they tumble down;
Mighty and lonely from, alas! my birth—
Now let me sleep the sleep of all the earth.

'Ah me! The secrets even of the skies
Are known to me, such power Thou gav'st mine eyes;
Night at my voice its dark veil rends afar,
My lips have named and counted every star.