“The Divine Image”
To Mercy, Pity, Peace, and Love
All pray in their distress;
And to these virtues of delight
Return their thankfulness.
For Mercy, Pity, Peace, and Love
Is God, our father dear,
And Mercy, Pity, Peace, and Love
Is Man, his child and care.
For Mercy has a human heart,
Pity a human face,
And Love, the human form divine,
And Peace, the human dress.
Then every man, of every clime
That prays in his distress,
Prays to the human form divine,
Love, Mercy, Pity, Peace.
And all must love the human form,
In heathen, turk, or jew;
Where Mercy, Love & Pity dwell
There God is dwelling too.
***
Memoirs from the House of the Dead
I remember the first time I was given money in charity. I was returning from the day’s work alone except for a guard. Coming towards me were a mother and her daughter, a little girl about ten years old, as pretty as an angel. I had seen them once before. The mother was a widow. Her husband, a young soldier, had died under arrest in the prison ward of the military hospital at a time when I was ill there. His wife and daughter came to say good-bye to him; they both wept very bitterly. When they saw me, the little girl blushed and whispered to her mother who immediately stopped, found a quarter copeck in her purse and gave it to her daughter. The little girl ran after me … ‘Here, poor man, take this copeck in Christ’s name,’ she cried, running round in front of me and thrusting the copper into my hand. I took it and the little girl returned well contented to her mother. I kept that piece of money carefully for a long time.
