Poems of Thomas Bailey Aldrich / [by Thomas Bailey Aldrich] [electronic text]

V.
A PREACHER.

THUS spake the Preacher: "O, my friends, beware! How ever smooth and tempting seems the path, With bowers of cooling shade, the end is wrath: Here 't is unsafe, that's dangerous footing there; But follow me and have no further care; Make me your guide, for I am one that hath Lived long and gathered in life's aftermath— Experience. I bid you not despair. Reach me your hands and cast away all doubt; I'll lead you safe along the glacier's shelf:You say 't is dark? 'T is noon-day, I insist; Besides, I know each pitfall hereabout, I know each chasm"—just then the Preacher's self Stumbled and plunged into eternal mist.