Read "To One Threatened with Blindness" by George MacDonald online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
I. Lawrence, what though the world be growing dark, / And twilight cool thy potent day inclose! / The sun, beneath the round earth sunk, still glows / All the night through, sleepless and young and stark. / Oh, be thy spirit faithful as the lark, / More daring: in the midnight of thy woes, / Dart through them, higher than earth's shadow goes, / Into the Light of which thou art a spark! / Be willing to be blind -- that, in thy night, / The Lord may bring his Father to thy door, / And enter in, and feast thy soul with light. / Then shall thou dream of darksome ways no more, / Forget the gloom that round thy windows lies, / And shine, God's house, all radiant in our eyes.
II. Say thou, his will be done who is the good! / His will be borne who knoweth how to bear! / Who also in the night had need of prayer, / Both when awoke divinely longing mood, / And when the power of darkness him withstood. / For what is coming take no jot of care: / Behind, before, around thee as the air, / He o'er thee like thy mother's heart will brood. / And when thou hast wearied thy wings of prayer, / Then fold them, and drop gently to thy nest, / Which is thy faith; and make thy people blest / With what thou bring'st from that ethereal height, / Which whoso looks on thee will straightway share: / He needs no eyes who is a shining light!