As well as pray.
"What was his creed?"
I cannot say.
In words he did not put his trust;
His faith in words he never writ;
He loved to share his cup and crust
With all mankind who needed it.
In time of need
A friend was he.
"What was his creed?"
He told not me.
He put his trust in heaven, and he
Worked well with hand and head;
And what he gave in charity
Sweetened his sleep and daily bread.
Let us take heed,
For life is brief.
What was his creed—What
his belief?
ANONYMOUS.
*
THE PHILOSOPHER TOAD.
Down deep in the hollow, so damp and so cold,
Where oaks are by ivy o'ergrown,
The gray moss and lichen creep over the mould,
Lying loose on a ponderous stone.
Now within this huge stone, like a king on his throne,
A toad has been sitting more years than is known;
And, strange as it seems, yet he constantly deems
The world standing still while he's dreaming his dreams,—
Does this wonderful toad in his cheerful abode
In the innermost heart of that flinty old stone,
By the gray-haired moss and the lichen o'ergrown.
Down deep in the hollow, from morning till night,
Dun shadows glide over the ground,
Where a watercourse once, as it sparkled with light,
Turned a ruined old mill-wheel around:
Long years have passed by since its bed became dry,