  I know not what the future May have in store for me, I only know that God is God And He may trusted be. The past with all its pleasure And all its sorrow too, Has been but a probation To prove me false or true. If in my earthly mission No progress has been made Toward a higher spirit— No growth of soul displayed— Then dark, sad, and foreboding The future must appear, The soul must shrink in terror When death's hour draweth near. If in the past no brother Has felt my outstretched hand, To aid him on his pilgrimage Toward a better land, No word of mine brought solace To a weary careworn soul; No hand of mine has pointed To the Christian's heavenly goal; No thought, or word, or action To lead to better life; No balm to heal deep anguish; No anodyne for strife; Then shall I hear the sentence, "You did it not to me," Come from the sacred Teacher Who taught in Gallilee. If I have wronged my brother, In action or in thought; Have forced him into sorrow, Or counted him as naught, Have borne false witness of him Or robbed him of his peace; Unjustly taken from him Or hindered his increase, The words of condemnation, "You did it unto me," Will fill my soul with terror, Distress, and misery. My soul has wronged no being Of just and honest part; But on this sole reliance It would not dare depart. Not in its own weak merit, Not in itself alone, But in the great redemption Of Him who did atone For man, and bid him enter, The gates of joy and rest, Through faith, and prayer, and penitence, Upon a Savior's breast. I shrink not at the future Whatever it may be, But joy in full assurance Of faith's expectancy. Let me pass away when my work is done, Like a cloudless day whose setting sun Leaves a smile on the evening sky; Let this transient clay when deprived of breath, With the earth yet stay, it alone knows death, Myself must live on and cannot die. |
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