Prisons loomed up like giant spectres there, and dens of Vice glared out with bloodshot eyes and gave forth sounds of mockery within;
And up toward the pure, unfading stars, the church-spire pointed with unchanging faith,
And from their holy altars incense rose of prayer and song and hallowed all around,
A city with its virtue and its vice.
Through the dim lighted or the darkened streets, unheard, unseen, amid the jostling crowds, sped with white wings the
Heavenly messenger;
She passed the entrances of lighted halls, whence flowed soft tones of music, and the sound of circling dances and the laugh and jest,
Winged with the fragrance of ten thousand flowers;
She passed the jaws of dens where
Riots ruled and Crime unloosed made horrible the night with gory victims and unearthly groans, and Vice triumphant gloated o'er her spoils;
She passed the prisons where in lonely cells crouched hopeless wretches in their vague despair;
She passed the churches with their lofty spires pointing toward the gateway beautiful;
And stayed not 'till within a little room whose one small window looked serenely down upon a busy, hurrying street below, she paused, at last her destination reached.
Upon a table burned a lamp and near, lost in the volume that he held,
A youth sat with a thoughtful, earnest brow,
A moment by his side the angel stood, and then he raised his head and laying down the little volume on the table near, rose (seeing not the Heavenly messenger) and passing to the window stood and gazed long on the busy, hurrying scene below,
His face was sorely troubled and perplexed,
And up toward the pure, unfading stars, the church-spire pointed with unchanging faith,
And from their holy altars incense rose of prayer and song and hallowed all around,
A city with its virtue and its vice.
Through the dim lighted or the darkened streets, unheard, unseen, amid the jostling crowds, sped with white wings the
Heavenly messenger;
She passed the entrances of lighted halls, whence flowed soft tones of music, and the sound of circling dances and the laugh and jest,
Winged with the fragrance of ten thousand flowers;
She passed the jaws of dens where
Riots ruled and Crime unloosed made horrible the night with gory victims and unearthly groans, and Vice triumphant gloated o'er her spoils;
She passed the prisons where in lonely cells crouched hopeless wretches in their vague despair;
She passed the churches with their lofty spires pointing toward the gateway beautiful;
And stayed not 'till within a little room whose one small window looked serenely down upon a busy, hurrying street below, she paused, at last her destination reached.
Upon a table burned a lamp and near, lost in the volume that he held,
A youth sat with a thoughtful, earnest brow,
A moment by his side the angel stood, and then he raised his head and laying down the little volume on the table near, rose (seeing not the Heavenly messenger) and passing to the window stood and gazed long on the busy, hurrying scene below,
His face was sorely troubled and perplexed,
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