Rosicrucian Writings Online

By Ariel
 
[From The American Rosae Crucis August 1916]

Priests to God! In distant ages
            Did we tend the altar fire,
Where the pyramids of sages
            Rose to say--"Lo! we aspire"--?
 
Were our hearts in consecration
            On those altars purified,
That in future incarnation
            Ne'er the Faith should be denied?
 
Priests to God! The vaulted arches
            Of the heaven's lofty dome
Form the temple-close, where marches
            Man to his eternal home.
 
Let us bear our tapers, lighted
            At the altars of the East;
Keep the Faith that once we plighted,
            Clad in spotless robe of priest.
 
Brothers, let us humbly labor
            As God's earthly temple throws
Light divine on friend and neighbor,
            Till each looks aloft and knows;--
 
Knows the sanctity of living,
            Knows the Holy Place within,
Knows the incense born of giving
            Life itself, to save from sin.
 
Priests and Brothers, death may sever
            Ties that bind us to this sod,
But the Temple stands forever,
            And we serve, as Priests to God.