O, Glad New Year

O, glad New Year, with what a wealth of hope
 Thou comest to the world of toiling men,
Bringing glad days that proffer strength and scope
 For earnest thought and noble work again.


Thou wearest on thy young, smooth brow a smile
 Of happy peace and joy and tender love,
Speaking in soft yet earnest tones the while
 The eternal message utter'd from above:


Holiest of messages that come from high,
 Teaching that earth is but the vantage ground
For men to reach the fadeless things that lie
 With God, beyond this dim and earthly bound:


Sending in deep, full whispers through the breast
 The impulses for higher range and trust,
That hold this earth is not for sloth and rest,
 But for all labour till we turn to dust:


Speaking of toil, too, none may idly shun,
 But each work at his part, and bear within
All kindlier feeling for the weaker one
 Who in life's tide still struggles on to win.


O, if such message in the human heart
 Could find fit resting-place, until it knew
Its tasks, how would the better nature start,
 And tint the earth again with primal hue!


Yet come thou to us, happy young New Year,
 Fresh in thy new birth from the womb of Time;
And work, O heart of mine, till fair and clear
 Thy tasks grow up, and with them higher climb.