From the Rock Island Argus, August 13, 1913. By Henry Howland.
He is not a man whom the world will praise,
For he daily walks in the lowly ways;
His clothes are poor and his earnings small,
And the great know naught of his worth at all;
His beard is gray and his form is bowed,
His name is strange to the rich and proud.
Down in the dismal places where
Contagion lurks in the murky air,
Where the people are sick and lame and blind,
Where many are weary and few are kind,
He kneels with those who have need of cheer,
Imparting hope and dispelling fear.
Those who sit where the light is dim
Have learned to eagerly welcome him;
His clothes are poor, but within his eyes
The gleam of faith that is deathless lies;
And little ones lisp the Savior’s name
Where scoffers grumbled before he came.
He has taught the wronged that there still is good,
That there still is kindness and brotherhood;
He has called men back from their shamefulness,
He has brought them love who were pitiless;
He has knelt with those who had blindly strayed,
And made them hopeful and unafraid.
His beard is gray and his form is bowed,
His name is strange to the rich and proud;
He is not a man whom the world will praise,
For his light is shed in the darkened ways;
The lips of the fallen have soiled his hand—
But the Lord will probably understand.
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