| James and Mary Ford, eds. Every Day in the Year. 1902. | | | | June 4 | | Grattan | | By Aubrey T. De Vere (1814–1902) |
| | | | An Irish orator and statesman who died on June 4, 1820. |
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GOD works through man, not hills or snows! | |
| In man, not men, is the godlike power; | |
| The man, God’s potentate, God foreknows; | |
| He sends him strength at the destined hour. | |
| His spirit he breathes into one deep heart; | 5 |
| His cloud he bids from one life depart; | |
| A Saint!—and a race is to God re-born! | |
| A Man!—one man makes a nation’s morn! | |
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| A man, and the blind land by slow degrees | |
| Gains sight! A man, and the deaf land hears! | 10 |
| A man, and the dumb land like wakening seas | |
| Thunders low dirges in proud, dull ears! | |
| One man, and the People, a three days’ corse, | |
| Stands up, and the grave-bands fall off perforce; | |
| One man, and the nation in height a span | 15 |
| To the measure ascends of the perfect man. | |
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| Thus wept unto God the land of Eire; | |
| Yet there rose no man, and her hope was dead; | |
| In the ashes she sat of a burned-out fire, | |
| And sackcloth was over her queenly head. | 20 |
| But a man in her latter days arose; | |
| A deliverer stepped from the camp of her foes; | |
| He spake; the great and the proud gave way, | |
| And the dawn began which shall end in day! | | | |
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