"But, O blithe breeze, and O great seas,
Though ne'er that earliest parting past,
On your wide plain they join again;
Together lead them home at last.
"One port, methought, alike they sought,
One purpose hold where'er they fare.
O bounding breeze, O rushing seas,
At last, at last, unite them there!" *
* Clough, Ambarvalia.
This is not mere longing; it is prophecy. So over these too, our old
friends, who are friends no more, we sorrow not as men without hope. It
is only for those who seem to us to have lost compass and purpose, and
to be driven helplessly on rocks and quicksands, whose lives are spent
in the service of the world, the flesh, and the devil, for self alone,
and not for their fellow-men, their country, or their God, that we must
mourn and pray without sure hope and without light, trusting only that
He, in whose hands they as well as we are, who has died for them as well
as for us, who sees all His creatures
"With larger other eyes than ours,
To make allowance for us all,"
will, in His own way and at His own time, lead them also home.
Another two years have passed, and it is again the end of the summer
half-year at Rugby; in fact, the School has broken up. The fifth-form
examinations were over last week, and upon them have followed the
speeches, and the sixth-form examinations for exhibitions; and they too
are over now.
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