A PRAYER

Master of sweet and loving lore,
    Give us the open mind
To know religion means no more,
    No less, than being kind.

Give us the comprehensive sight
    That sees another's need;
And let our aim to set things right
    Prove God inspired our creed.

Give us the soul to know our kin
    That dwell in flock and herd,
The voice to fight man's shameful sin
    Against the beast and bird.

Give us a heart with love so fraught
    For all created things,
That even our unspoken thought
    Bears healing on its wings.

Give us religion that will cope
    With life's colossal woes,
And turn a radiant face of hope
    On troops of pigmy foes.

Give us the mastery of our fate
    In thoughts so warm and white,
They stamp upon the brows of hate
    Love's glorious seal of light.

Give us the strong, courageous faith
    That makes of pain a friend,
And calls the secret word of death
    'Beginning,' and not 'end.'

Poems of Progress and New Thought Pastels by Ella Wheeler Wilcox.
London: Gay & Hancock, 1911.


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