De Profundis by Reginald Wright Kauffman

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · May 26, 1909

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 36, No. 21.

De Profundis

By Reginald Wright Kauffman

By Reginald Wright Kauffman

OUT of the deep! Out of the deep For them that wake and them that sleep; For them that sleep no more to wake, And them that wake with hearts that break; There, by the blue Sicilian sea, Out of the deep they call to Thee.

O God, so mighty is Thy blow That why they fall they may not know; So vast the Law Thyself hast writ That they may never measure it: Yet, tho Thou send this agony, Out of the deep they call to Thee.

With tongues that lie so still in death, With tortured mouths that scarce draw breath, In ruin dealt for no offense, In poverty and pestilence: When Thy love seems a mockery, Out of the deep they call to Thee.

And we — through all this world of Thine, Who blindly follow Thy design — Still in each terror-mastered soul, Tho strength be shattered, faith is whole; From land to land and sea to sea, Out of the deep we call to Thee.

Somehow, at last, the night shall fade, Sometime the riddle plain be made, Somewhere the broken lives of men Be gathered by Thy hand again: O Maker, not destroyer, we — Out of the deep we call to Thee.

— From The Circle Magazine for March.