AFTERWARD.

Great God of storm and battle, We feel Thy clasping hand; Thy voice along the wilderness We hear and understand. The constellations hymn Thy praise; Thy glory crowns the day; Thine awful wrath, in swinging seas, Commands and we obey. The vanquished with the victors rest; They sleep on hill and plain; The heaven’s azure noon descends, And wraps as one the twain. In fondest brotherhood they share One common lot of land; Great God of storm and battle, We feel Thy clasping hand! How undiscerned Thy sovran laws, Thy wisdom how sublime; Thy torch of progress ever leads The flying march of Time; And though athwart the fiery track Contending armies fall, How soon the chastening blossoms come And smile above them all. Great God of storm and battle, We feel Thy clasping hand, The lightning is Thy chariot, We see and understand. The conquered and the conqueror, Each wears the hero’s star, Amidst his blood-stained wreath of thorns The iron wheels of war Are rusting in the mountain-side, By thick roots intertwined, Unmindful of the broken hearts Their madness left behind; While Peace, Thy benediction, With outspread wings hath spanned Our country; God of battles, We feel Thy clasping hand.