Classic Poem

OF A NEWSPAPER OFFICE .

Friends , while we lay the corner stone,
Whereon a lofty fane shall rise,
Hope utters in an undertone
Her golden prophesies.

Says: " Here a Phaenix shall be born,
With glowing heart and eagle eyes,
And wings where radiant thoughts shall burn,
As stars along the skies. "

And day and night, through years to be,
From this fair temple of its birth,
It shall go forth by land and sea,
Over the broad, green earth.

With touching tales of love and truth,
With earnest pleadings for the poor,
Beguiling age, restraining youth,
Teaching from door to door.

Warning the present by the past,
Far seeing with prophetic sight;
And when the sky is overcast,
Saying: " Let there be light. "

Shielding the innocent, the weak,
Pointing the shame of sin and crime,
Teaching all men to think and speak,
In every land and clime.

Searching the deepest mine of thought,
Comparing, scanning, weighing all
The gems that gifted minds have wrought,
Of good, or great, or small.

Unawed by law of clan or creed,
Unswayed by forms of Now or Then,
Working and taking earnest heed
For the sole good of men.

A faithful warder on the walls
That guard our country's jewels rare,
To stir the world with clarion calls
When danger threatens there.

To guard through darkest days and nights,
Through good and ill, through bar and ban,
The glorious charter of our rights —
The eternal rights of man.

A leader, faithful to his trust,
To guide aright in storm or calm,
Bearing aloft from soil and dust,
Fair Freedom's oriflamme.

Leaving the old, dead past behind,
Bridging the space from clime to clime,
And ushering in with heart and mind
The coming, better time.

And, stronger than the warrior's sword,
And mightier than the monarch's crown
Shall be the thunder of his word,
To trample error down.

To mold perverted minds anew,
To rend the bigot's veil apart,
And write the pure, the good, the true
Deep in the world's great heart.