“The specters of long-buried hours
Throng round me, thick and fast;
‘The might have been’ of life is lost
In the unreturning past.”
The Christian’s Response.
“Hush! these are tones unfit for thee,
Heaven’s chosen one! It cannot be
That thou, in mere humanity,
Canst chide ‘what is.’
What ‘might have been’ is none of thine;
It sounds no chord, no note divine;
It tells of earth, of man, of time,
That ‘might have been.’
Or know’st thou not what hand has traced
Thy path, thy portion, through the waste?
There’s naught of chance, of loss, of haste,
In His ‘What is.’
‘Tis He who once came very man,
And knows man’s need and will, and can
Make part of His eternal plan
Thy ‘might have been.’
Amen! amen! (the soul replies),
Blest hand that curbs, controls, denies:
Each ‘loss’ with Thee becomes a prize, ―
Each ‘might have been’ a loss.”