"THE LAND OF THE LIVING."
And is this "the land of the living?"
We toil but a wearisome hour,
A brief day of hoping and striving
For fast-fleeting pleasure or power. But the life which is earnest, undying,
The fullness of life and of love,
For which every spirit is sighing,
Dwells only with Jesus above. We are now in the land of the dying,
Around us; are blight and decay,
The blossoms Youth gathered, are lying
With beauty all withered away. The hopes which sprang up, in life's morning,
Were faded and chilled before noon,
Deceit and the world's bitter scorning
Had poisoned life's fountain so soon. The clods on the coffin are ringing,
We look on the pall and the bier,
And grim death forever is flinging
His shadow of pain and of fear. But we haste to the land of the living,
And soon on its beautiful shore,
We shall drink from life's fountain upspringing,
Shall drink, and shall thirst never more. The path may be thorny and toilsome,
The gateway be shrouded in gloom,
But through the bright portals which open,
Is life, in unvarying bloom.