K 
 
 UliMlis: 
 
OUT OF DARKNESS INTO LIGHT 
 
 POEMS AND nRAWINGS 
 
 1/ 
 MARY A. LATHBURY. 
 
 " So is ever\-one that is born of the Spirit" — John 3 : 8. 
 
 \o,. 1879. .<^JJ 
 
 ^Of WA^W*^^' 
 
 BOSTON: 
 D.LOTHROP AND COMPANY. 
 
 FRAXKLIJI ST., CORNER OF IIAWLEY. 
 
 
?s 
 
 
 COPYRIGHT, 
 
 D. LOTHROP & CO., 
 
 1878. 
 
 C. A. HACK AND SON, PRINTERS, 
 TAUNTON, MASS. 
 
s. ©. w. 
 
 IN GRATITUDE. 
 
The titorld sits at the feet of Christ, 
 Unknowing, blind, and unconsoled ; 
 It yet shall touch His garment's fold, 
 And feel the heavenly Alclicmist 
 Transform its very dust to gold. 
 
 The theme heftting angel tongues 
 Beyond a mortal 's scope has grown. 
 O heart of mine ! with reverence own 
 
 The fullness lohich to it belongs, 
 And trust the unknown for the known. 
 
 J. G. WniTTrER. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 [The engravings are by Wm. J. Dana.] 
 
 MV LIFE. 
 
 Vignettes: "A storm-swept flower; " " Seed-germs." 
 Full Page : " What is my life ? " 
 
 II. 
 
 DA WN. 
 
 Vignettes : " The promise of the Sun ; " "I have no pleasure in then 
 Full Page : " So wanes the world." 
 
 III. 
 
 WITH BOOKS. 
 
 Vignettes : " Like a tired insect ; " " What canst thou know .' " 
 Full Page : " With all the wise and great I walk." 
 
 IV. 
 
 AL TAR-B UILDING. 
 
 Vignettes: "I stifle in an air made dense with sacrifice.' 
 Full Page: " I read, and all my spirit faints." 
 
Contents. 
 
 V. 
 
 IN SHADOW. 
 
 Vignettes: Sinai; Zion. 
 
 Full Page: "I hear 
 
 Dread voices from the holy Book." 
 
 VI. 
 
 WAITING. 
 
 Vignettes -. " O helpless human heart ! " " Through cloud and chill." 
 Full Page: "Doubt, like a shadowy shape of wrong, 
 Pursues — appalls me." 
 
 VII. 
 
 DA YBREAK. 
 
 Vignettes : " Celled in the prison-house ; " "Be free ! " 
 Full Page: "Saved by Hope." 
 
 VIII. 
 
 SUNWARD. 
 
 Vignettes : " Earth and shadows drift away ; " " Light on the cross." 
 Full Page : " The end of the law." 
 
[* 
 
 
MY LIFE. 
 
 " Behold, God is great, and we know Him not.' ' — Job. 36 : 26. 
 
 What is my life ? I only trace 
 
 My being backward, through its birth, 
 To the low level of the earth — 
 
 The birth and death bed of my race. 
 
 I live — fast rooted in the clay; 
 
 Yet I, in my allotted hour. 
 
 Shall vanish like a storm-swept flower 
 
 That lives its own fair, fleeting day. 
 
 And yet, if I may feel — not know. 
 
 This sentient seed beneath its clod, 
 That lifts its infant face to God, 
 
 Hath other air wherein to grow! 
 
 What is my life ? I can but wait 
 
 The springing of a deathless germ, 
 Or the fixed fate of flower and worm ; 
 
 God may be good as he is great ! 
 
 fd- 1 
 
"It a man die, shall he live again ? "—Job 14: 14. 
 
DAWN. 
 
 "The glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another." ■ — I. Cor. 15: 40. 
 
 There is a dying in my days, 
 
 As when the moon grows faint at morn, 
 And stars die when the day is born ; 
 
 So wanes the world o'er all my ways. 
 
 Its hours of brightness are not bright ; 
 
 Its golden lamps, a-bloom with flame, 
 Its altars to the unknown Name, 
 
 Burn with a false and fitful light. 
 
 Though Pleasure sits a syren there, 
 
 And lifts the voice that lulled me long 
 To airy altitudes of song. 
 
 It dies upon the heedless air. 
 
 Lo — from the heavens, one by one. 
 
 The stars are sinking ; and my life — 
 Mute witness of the unequal strife — 
 
 Thrills with the promise of the Sun. , 
 
"I have no pleasure in tliem."— Eccl. 12: i. 
 
WITH BOOKS, 
 
 ' But where shall wisdom be found?" — Job zS: 
 
 I STRETCH my hands as blind men do, 
 And grope for paths that lead 
 
 to God ; 
 But men less blind these ways 
 have trod, 
 And found but " figures of 
 the true." 
 
 the misty aisles of eld 
 all the wise and good I walk, 
 in their silent language talk, 
 And question of the hopes they held; 
 
 Of old philosophies, long dead, 
 
 Whose shuttles, plying in the shade, 
 
 A dark and tangled web have made. 
 
 With no upleading golden thread ; 
 
 Of preacher and apologist, 
 
 Who change their cruel creeds at 
 Till infinite TOod and endless ill 
 
 Upbraid each other in the mist 
 
 Like a tired insect, overborne 
 
 With honied weights that are not food 
 I turn to thee thou unseen Good, 
 And wait, and wonder 
 till the morn. 
 
■Andthouchl . . . understand all mysteries and all knowledse . . . I .1111 nothinj."— I. Cuk 
 
ALTAR-BUILDING, 
 
 ' For I desired mercy and not sacrifice." — Hosea 6 ; 6, 
 
 From books, I turn mc to the Book : 
 As pilgrims read the legend o'er 
 Upon a temple's carven door, 
 
 To this unveile'd Word I look. 
 
 Forever — so the Fathers taught — 
 Behind its quaintly-lettered gate 
 Pure presences of spirit wait 
 
 To lead the seeker to the Sought. 
 
 I read — and all my spirit faints ! 
 
 " Be holy — perfect — pure and true; 
 Love God, and his commandments do, 
 
 If thou wouldst stand aniona: his saints.' 
 
 Thee only. Source of good, I seek, 
 
 Yet naught of good, no holy thing. 
 Have these unhallowed hands to bring, 
 These lips no fitting word to speak 
 
 Perhaps, if years of yearning lift 
 My life above its earth, to be 
 A soul that suns itself in thee. 
 
 Thou wilt accept the humble gift. 
 
 \\ Perhaps — yet. Lord, forgive the thought! 
 I stifle in an air made dense 
 With sacrifice that breathes offense 
 \\ To Love, whose gifts are all unbought. 
 
' I have hoped in iliy word."— Ps i lo^ 74 '' But thy commandment is exceeding broad." — Ps. i lo: o'l- 
 
IN SHADOW. 
 
 "And where is now my hope ?" — Job ly. 15. 
 
 The clouds hang low above my life, 
 And mingle in a murky gray 
 That gives faint hope of that blue day 
 Of sun and calm, the end of strife ; 
 
 While in the closing gloom I hear 
 
 Dread voices from the holy Book ; 
 And from the years my sins do look 
 
 With eyes that smite me through with 
 fear. 
 
 Into a land whose shadowing wings 
 
 Are doom and death my soul is led, 
 Bound like a prisoner to the dead — 
 The heavens are filled with 
 thunderings! 
 
 O strength of God ! I faint for thee, 
 For I my worthless girdle spun 
 In Egypt, singing in the sun, 
 
 And in my need it faileth me ! 
 
 " Not to the mount that burns with fire," 
 (So sings an angel in the dark. 
 And all my soul springs up to mark 
 His voice with infinite desire ) 
 
 " But unto Zion are ye come — 
 Fair city of the living God, 
 By holy men and angels trod, 
 
 And henceforth your eternal home ! " 
 
' Whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all." — James 2 : 10. 
 
WAITING. 
 
 " Until the day dawn." — II. Peter i ; rg. 
 
 I HEARD, far up some heavenly height, 
 
 A prophet angel sing, and though 
 No word in all his song I know, 
 
 I know that somewhere all is light. 
 
 Doubt, like a shadowy shape of wrong. 
 
 Pursues — appalls me ; but I hold 
 A little leading thread of gold ; 
 
 Therefore, O doubting heart, be strong 
 
 " Through sunless seas, through cloud and chill. 
 
 The Lord from Egypt calls his son. 
 And Love in darkness knows its own ; 
 
 Therefore, O doubting heart, be still." 
 
 O helpless human heart of mine ! 
 
 Unweaned from thy mother earth, 
 Wait thou in quietness the birth — 
 
 The Had release of the Divine! 
 
" L'ali now, if tliere be any that will answer ihee, and lo which of ihe saints wilt tliou turn ?" — Job 5; 
 
DAYBREAK. 
 
 "We are saved by Hope." — Rom. S : 24. 
 
 Look up, thou waking seed of God, 
 Celled in the prison-house of Hope ; 
 Shall spirit, born of Spirit, grope 
 
 In dust when Easter suns the sod ? 
 
 ■ The Lord, thy Life, hath entered in 
 
 Through the rent veil of himian woe. 
 Making complete atonement. Lo, 
 
 What canst thou offer for thy sin ? 
 
 No longer, then, a servant be 
 
 To Law, for thou art under Grace : 
 Enter with Christ the holy place 
 Beyond the altar, and be free ! ' 
 
 That voice (from mine own heart, the Book, 
 Or heaven, I know not) through my night 
 Dropped its divine " Let there be light ! " 
 And, listening, earth and heaven shook 
 
 As with removal. Cloud and clod 
 
 Broke into glory — burst with life ; 
 Peace touched the jarring chords of 
 strife, 
 And all the silence thrilled with 
 God! 
 
\"t: art; nut uiiiit-T ilie law, but under grace." — Rom. 6; 14. 
 
SUNWARD. 
 
 " He that hnth the Son, hath life."— 1. John 5: 12. 
 
 Strong Elder-Brother — Son of God ! 
 
 I kiss thy gUstening garment's fold, 
 And follow where its hem of gold 
 
 Transfiafures with its touch the sod. 
 
 I marvel at the Love that laid 
 
 Upon itself the nameless woe 
 
 That broke thy human heart to know, 
 
 Yet, knowing, left thee undismayed. 
 
 But more I marvel that the Love 
 
 \^^-lich yielded to the touch of death 
 Still lives — of all that lives the breath — 
 
 The Life of life below — above. 
 
 O Life, how limitless thy day 1 
 
 I float upon the blessed air 
 
 A mote — yet conscious of thy care, 
 
 While earth and shadows drift away 
 
»wiiriM i:? I 
 
 lie tiiu ut the law for righteousness to ever>' one that believeth." — Rom. lo ; 4.