Jas. A. Browne, "The Voice of Wisdom" (1902)
Innumerable, and our friendly foes,
Once our affections gained, unmask deceit
Hard by the place where love and wisdom meet.
Bewailing follows grief and sore regret―
The lot of all who wisdom's laws forget.
So may discretion urge thy soul to give
Its chiefest love to Heaven while yet you live;
Then should affliction make thy steps to pause,
Thou shalt endure it for a nobler cause.
But Heaven assures its own peculiar race
No evil can come nigh their dwelling place;
The noisome pestilence, the fowler's snare,
The thousand ills that would annoy us here,
Are rendered harmless by the shield of youth
The quite impregnable defense of truth.
Thus base ambitions yield their deadly power
To aspirations high, whose fragrant flowers
Perfume our prayers, our fleeting joys extend,
And bring the fellowship of better friends.
Published in Colored American Magazine, August 1902