1917 Yearbook
Source URL
Title
1917 Yearbook
Description
The Missioners Reverie
A stranger 'mongst a strange, unhallowed people
Obeying the voice of the Master; sharing His yearning
For Souls, works in the heat of the vineyard.
An exile? perhaps, but love is the chain that binds him.
But as he sits at his door at nightfall reviewing
The deeds of the day, the tiring work of the harvest,
How his work had been better and making resolve for the morrow,
His thoughts unbidden return to the land of his fathers.
Not to bewail his lot, nor in uselessly sighing,
Not to begrudge his life—more lives he would give if he had them;
But seeking—"strange composite of earth and heaven"—
In the pictured halls of mem'ry, rest and refreshment.
Dear to him are they all, but o'er one he lovingly lingers,
Each curve and line retracing—dearer it is than the others,
For 'tis of her who bore him and lavished her love upon him,
And then, at the call of his Maker, bade him Godspeed on his mission.
He is with her again as she quietly reads at the hearthstone
After the evening meal, or, with hands that cannot be idle,
Prepares the work for the morrow, and breathes a petition
For him—and the thought gives strength to his soul for the warfare.
But there is another picture that bears the title of 'mother',
'Tis of his Alma Mater, that shared with the other the duty
Of shaping his mind and heart, by word and example,
For the work his Master had chosen—to be an Apostle.
And he knows that she has not forgotten, though her children be countless;
He knows that her love is for all—the love of a mother,
That daily she prays for him as one of her children,
Rejoices when he is happy and weeps with him in his sorrow.
And musing thus, he breathes a prayer of thanksgiving
And praise to God, by whose infinite wisdom and bounty,
To him has been given, what is denied to thousands of others,
And his heart grows strong, to renew on the morrow the battle.
ALUMNUS, '13
A stranger 'mongst a strange, unhallowed people
Obeying the voice of the Master; sharing His yearning
For Souls, works in the heat of the vineyard.
An exile? perhaps, but love is the chain that binds him.
But as he sits at his door at nightfall reviewing
The deeds of the day, the tiring work of the harvest,
How his work had been better and making resolve for the morrow,
His thoughts unbidden return to the land of his fathers.
Not to bewail his lot, nor in uselessly sighing,
Not to begrudge his life—more lives he would give if he had them;
But seeking—"strange composite of earth and heaven"—
In the pictured halls of mem'ry, rest and refreshment.
Dear to him are they all, but o'er one he lovingly lingers,
Each curve and line retracing—dearer it is than the others,
For 'tis of her who bore him and lavished her love upon him,
And then, at the call of his Maker, bade him Godspeed on his mission.
He is with her again as she quietly reads at the hearthstone
After the evening meal, or, with hands that cannot be idle,
Prepares the work for the morrow, and breathes a petition
For him—and the thought gives strength to his soul for the warfare.
But there is another picture that bears the title of 'mother',
'Tis of his Alma Mater, that shared with the other the duty
Of shaping his mind and heart, by word and example,
For the work his Master had chosen—to be an Apostle.
And he knows that she has not forgotten, though her children be countless;
He knows that her love is for all—the love of a mother,
That daily she prays for him as one of her children,
Rejoices when he is happy and weeps with him in his sorrow.
And musing thus, he breathes a prayer of thanksgiving
And praise to God, by whose infinite wisdom and bounty,
To him has been given, what is denied to thousands of others,
And his heart grows strong, to renew on the morrow the battle.
ALUMNUS, '13
Date
1917
Identifier
http://cdm16810.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p16810coll2/id/2029