The Home Circle | AdventAI

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Sep 8, 1881

The Home Circle.

A VOICE.

THERE lives a voice within me, a guest angel of my heart, And its sweet lispings win me, till tears do often start; Up evermore it springeth, like hidden melody, And evermore it singeth this song of songs to me:— This world is full of beauty as other worlds above, And if we did our duty, it might be full of love.

If men were more forgiving, and kind words often spoken, Instead of scorn so grieving, there might be few hearts broken; When truth our uttered language, angels might talk with man, And God-illumined earth should see the golden age again; For this world is full of beauty as other worlds above, And if we did our duty it might be full of love.

While plenty round us smileth, why wake this cry for bread? Why are crushed millions toiling, gaunt, clothed in rags, unfed? The sunny hills and valleys blush ripe with fruit and grain, But the lordling in the palace still robs his fellow-men; Yet this world is full of beauty as other worlds above, And if we did our duty it might be full of love.

O, God! what hosts are trampled amid this thirst for gold! What noble hearts are sapped of love, what spirits lose life's blood! And yet upon this God-blessed earth there's room for every-one, Millions of acres wait the seed, and food rots in the sun; The world is full of beauty, as other worlds above, And if we did our duty, it might be full of love.

The leaf-tongues of the forest, the flower-lips of the sod, The birds that hymn their rapture into the ear of God, And the living wind that bringeth sweet music from the sea, Have each a voice that singeth this song of songs to me:— This world is full of beauty as other worlds above, And if we did our duty, it might be full of love.