TO A CHILD by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Pacific Press Publishing Company · OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA · Jan 20, 1904

TO A CHILD.

By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

LIKE the new moon thy life appears, A little strip of silver light, And widening outward into night The shadowy disk of future years; And yet upon its outward rim, A luminous circle, faint and dim, And scarcely visible to us here, Rounds and completes the perfect sphere; A prophecy and intimation, A pale and feeble adumbration, Of the great world of light that lies Behind all human destinies.

Ah! if thy fate, with anguish fraught, Should be to wet the dusty soil With the hot tears and sweat of toil,— To struggle with imperious thought, Until the overburdened brain, Weary with labor, faint with pain, Like a jarred pendulum retain Only its motion, not its power,— Remember, in that perilous hour, When most afflicted and oppressed, From labor there shall come forth rest.

And if a more auspicious fate On thy advancing steps await, Still let it ever be thy pride To linger by the laborer's side; With words of sympathy or song To cheer the dreary march along Of the great army of the poor, O'er desert sand, o'er dangerous moor. Nor to thyself the task shall be Without reward; for thou shalt learn The wisdom early to discern True beauty in utility.

—Longfellow.