THE NEW EARTH by Mrs. E. M. H. Gates

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 3, 1874

THE NEW EARTH.

By Mrs. E. M. H. Gates

O EARTH, marching onward around thy vast circle To music of wind and to music of wave, With flowers on thy brow, and with gems in thy bosom, The birthplace of mortals, their home and their grave.

We look on thy patience and ponder its meaning, We question the past, but its ages are dumb; The mountains and valleys they call to each other, And floods lift their voice, but no answer doth come.

One after one come the long generations, And one after one they sink down to their place; How silent they lie there within the dark chambers, A shroud folded close on each questioning face.

He sits in the heavens! He keeps his own counsel! He watches the earth, every atom and grain He weighs in his balances, plants in their places The grasses that grow upon mountain and plain.

He watches the Earth! Not a moment forgets he The wonderful ball as it spins on its way. What to him are the ages? They roll on beneath him— A thousand are but as the flight of a day.

In order he sendeth the times and the seasons, Like ashes he scattereth the frost and the snow, He roundeth the dewdrop, he fashions the lily, And maketh the cedars of Lebanon grow.

He knoweth the stories of Sinai and Horeb, On Calvary’s mountain he looks from afar, And deep with the dust of the centuries on them, He knows where the bones of the patriarchs are.

He looks on the Earth, in his anger he smites it, His thunderbolts fall where the violets grow; He whispers, “Be still!” and the rainbows are gleaming, And soft through the valley his breezes do blow.

O Earth! patient mother, what doom doth await thee? Thy secrets are safe, for thy riddles are deep And done with our working and done with our playing, Back into thy bosom we wearily creep.

But deep in our hearts is a hope ever growing, And still looking forward we patiently trust That when the long night of our sleep shall be over, And we lift up our heads from their pillows of dust,

We shall look with delight on the new earth about us, The earth that shall suffer no atom of loss, Though elements melt in the great transformation, And fires of his fury shall burn up the dross.

We shall lift up our eyes to the new sky that bendeth In beauty above us—most glorious sight! The sun will be there, but all sunlight excelling Will be the soft rays of God’s wonderful light.

What a home it will be for the soul to come back to! The soul that to-day, though it tire of the strife, And the face of the foe and the noise of the battle, Must still without stopping fight on for its life.

Then the rest will be pure and the peace will be perfect, And over the earth not a sorrowful sound Will hinder the music and sadden the singer, Nor a poor faded leaf flutter down to the ground.

What happy hand-claspings, what words of forgiveness Will be as Eternity bears us along! What sweet explanations, old secrets revealing, Will make us forget all the pain and the wrong!

The mists will no longer hang low on the landscape, No evening will come with its curtains of gray, Then through the great doors that are standing wide open, We may follow our thoughts as they wander away.

O Earth! patient mother! What doom doth await thee? Thou, thou who didst bear up the cross of the Son, Now trembling with earthquake, now smiling in sunshine, When, when will thy labor and travail be done?

Sublime in thy silence thou makest no answer, Forgive our bold questions, thy children are we, So used to thy face we are longing hereafter Thy glory to share, thy redemption to see.

—MRS. E. M. H. GATES, in Examiner and Chronicle.