Give me O God to sing that thought,
Give me, give him or her I love this quenchless faith
In Thy ensemble, whatever else withheld withhold not
     from us,
Belief in plan of Thee enclosed in Time and Space,
Health, peace, salvation universal.

Is it a dream?
Nay but the lack of it the dream,
And failing it life's lore and wealth a dream,
And all the world a dream.

1874 1881

PIONEERS! O PIONEERS!

                      COME my tan-faced children,
Follow well in order, get your weapons ready,
Have you your pistols? have you your sharp-edged axes?
                      Pioneers! O pioneers!

                      For we cannot tarry here,
We must march my darlings, we must bear the brunt of
     danger,
We the youthful sinewy races, all the rest on us depend,
                      Pioneers! O pioneers!

                      O you youths, Western youths,
So impatient, full of action, full of manly pride and
     friendship,
Plain I see you Western youths, see you tramping with the
     foremost,
                      Pioneers! O pioneers!

                      Have the elder races halted?
Do they droop and end their lesson, wearied over there
     beyond the seas?

We take up the task eternal, and the burden and the
     lesson,
                      Pioneers! O pioneers!

                      All the past we leave behind,
We debouch upon a newer mightier world, varied world,
Fresh and strong the world we seize, world of labor and
     the march,
                      Pioneers! O pioneers!

                      We detachments steady throwing,
Down the edges, through the passes, up the mountains steep,
Conquering, holding, daring, venturing as we go the unknown
     ways,
                      Pioneers! O pioneers!

                      We primeval forests felling,
We the rivers stemming, vexing we and piercing deep the mines
     within,
We the surface broad surveying, we the virgin soil upheaving,
                      Pioneers! O pioneers!

                      Colorado men are we,
From the peaks gigantic, from the great sierras and the high
     plateaus,
From the mine and from the gully, from the hunting trail we
     come,
                      Pioneers! O pioneers!

                      From Nebraska, from Arkansas,
Central inland race are we, from Missouri, with the continental
     blood intervein'd,
All the hands of comrades clasping, all the Southern, all the
     Northern,
                      Pioneers! O pioneers!

                      O resistless restless race!
O beloved race in all! O my breast aches with tender love for
     all!
O I mourn and yet exult, I am rapt with love for all,
                      Pioneers! O pioneers!

                      Raise the mighty mother mistress,
Waving high the delicate mistress, over all the starry mistress,
     (bend your heads all,)
Raise the fang'd and warlike mistress, stern, impassive,
     weapon'd mistress,
                      Pioneers! O pioneers!

                      See my children, resolute children,
By those swarms upon our rear we must never yield or falter,
Ages back in ghostly millions frowning there behind us urging,
                      Pioneers! O pioneers!

                      On and on the compact ranks,
With accessions ever waiting, with the places of the dead
     quickly fill'd,
Through the battle, through defeat, moving yet and never
     stopping,
                      Pioneers! O pioneers!

                      O to die advancing on!
Are there some of us to droop and die? has the hour come?
Then upon the march we fittest die, soon and sure the gap is
     fill'd,
                      Pioneers! O pioneers!

                      All the pulses of the world,
Falling in they beat for us, with the Western movement beat,
Holding single or together, steady moving to the front, all
     for us,
                      Pioneers! O pioneers!

                      Life's