Poems of Peace/The Inward Purity
THE INWARD PURITY
Find ye that life is anguish, and that self-love is a chain
That binds thy quivering soul, and cuts with biting
stings of pain?
Grieve ye where Slander’s serpents trail beneath fair
flowers of Trust?
Or weep where Friendship buried lies ’neath Hatred’s
fulsome dust?
Then listen,—Selfish sweets are brief, and fleeting self-
hood’s ties,
But there abides a fadeless Love, a Life that never dies;
A path there is which Serpent slime hath never yet
defiled,
Where weary feet find rest and peace, and are no more
beguiled:
And that pure Love and Life are his whose inmost heart
is free
From unforgiveness, judgment false, and self and
enmity;
And that fair Path of Peace he walks whose memory
holds no stain
Of injuries past; that blameless heart hath reached the
end of pain.