The writings of John Greenleaf Whittier, Volume 1.
John Greenleaf Whittier, Ed.

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[111] So the Laird of Ury said,
     Turning slow his horse's head
Towards the Tolbooth prison,
     Where, through iron gates, he heard
Poor disciples of the Word
     Preach of Christ arisen!

Not in vain, Confessor old,
     Unto us the tale is told
Of thy day of trial;
     Every age on him who strays
From its broad and beaten ways
     Pours its seven-fold vial.

Happy he whose inward ear
     Angel comfortings can hear,
O'er the rabble's laughter;
     And while Hatred's fagots burn,
Glimpses through the smoke discern
     Of the good hereafter.

Knowing this, that never yet
     Share of Truth was vainly set
In the world's wide fallow;
     After hands shall sow the seed,
After hands from hill and mead
     Reap the harvests yellow.

Thus, with somewhat of the Seer,
     Must the moral pioneer
From the Future borrow;
     Clothe the waste with dreams of grain,
And, on midnight's sky of rain,
     Paint the golden morrow!

1847