OUR wealth has wasted all
Our pleasures have found wings;
The night is long until the day;
Lord give us better things—
A ray of light in thirsty night.
And secret water-springs.
Our love is dead, or sleeps, or else
Is hidden from our eyes:
Our silent love, while no man tells
Or if it lives or dies.
Oh, give us love, O Lord, above
In changeless Paradise.
Our house is left us desolate,
Even as Thy Word hath said.
Before our face the way is great,
Around us are the dead.
Oh guide us, save us from the grave,
As Thou Thy saints hast led.
Lead us where pleasures evermore
And wealth indeed are placed,
And home on an eternal shore,
And love that cannot waste;
Where joy Thou art unto the heart,
And sweetness to the taste.
CHRISTINA ROSSETTI.
AND dost Thou, holy Shepherd, leave
Thine unprotected flock alone,
Here, in this darksome vale, to grieve,
While Thou ascend'st Thy glorious throne?
O, where can they their hopes now turn
Who never liv'd but on Thy love?
Where rest the hearts for Thee that burn,
When Thou art lost in light above?
How shall those eyes now find repose
That turn, in vain, Thy smile to see?
What can they hear save mortal woes,
Who lose Thy voice's melody?
And who shall lay his tranquil hand
Upon the troubled ocean's might,
Who hush the winds by his command,
Who guide us thro' this starless night?
For Thou art gone!—that cloud so bright,
That bears Thee from our love away,
Springs upward thro' the dazzling light,
And leaves us here to weep and pray.
LUIS PONCE DE LEON.
(Trs. George Ticknor.)
“ARISE, SHINE, FOR THY LIGHT IS COME."
STERN Daughter of the Voice of God!
O Duty! if that name thou love,
Who art a light to guide, a rod
To check the erring, and reprove;
Thou who art victory and law
When empty terrors overawe;
From vain temptations dost set free,
And calm'st the weary strife of frail humanity.
There are who ask not if thine eye
Be on them; who, in love and truth, Where no misgiving is, rely
Upon the genial sense of youth: Glad hearts! without reproach or blot Who do thy work, and know it not;
Oh! if through confidence misplaced
They fail, thy saving arms, great Power! around them
I, loving freedom, and untried,
No sport of every random gust,
Yet being to myself a guide,
Too blindly have reposed my trust:
And oft, when in my heart was heard
Thy timely mandate, I deferred
The task in smoother walks to stray;
But thee I now would serve more strictly, if I may.
Through no disturbance of my soul,
Or strong compunction in me wrought,
I supplicate for thy controul;
But in the quietness of thought;
Me this unchartered freedom tires;
I feel the weight of chance desires :
My hopes no more must change their name; I long for a repose which ever is the same.
Stern Lawgiver! yet thou dost wear
The Godhead's most benignant grace;
Nor know we anything so fair
As is the smile upon thy face:
Flowers laugh before thee on their beds,
And fragrance in thy footing treads;
Thou dost preserve the stars from wrong,
And the most ancient heavens, through thee, are fresh and strong.
To humbler functions, awful Power!
I call thee: I myself commend
Unto thy guidance from this hour;
O, let my weakness have an end!
Give unto me, made lowly wise,
The spirit of self-sacrifice;
The confidence of reason give,
And in the light of Truth Thy Bondman let me live!
GRACE rules below and sits enthroned above,
How few the sparks of wrath! how slow they move
And drop and die in boundless seas of love!
But me, vile wretch, should pitying Love embrace
Deep in its ocean, Hell itself would blaze,
And flash and burn me through the boundless seas.
Yea, Lord, my guilt, to such a vastness grown,
Seems to confine Thy choice to wrath alone,
And calls Thy power to vindicate Thy throne.
Thine honour bids "avenge Thine injured name,'
Thy slighted loves a dreadful glory claim,
While my moist tears might but incense Thy flame.
Should Heaven grow black, almighty thunder roar,
And vengeance blast me, I could plead no more,
But own Thy justice dying, and adore.
Yet can those bolts of Death, that cleave the flood
To reach a rebel, pierce this sacred shroud
Tinged in the vital stream of my Redeemer's blood.
ISAAC WATTS (from the French).
SPEAK low to me, my Saviour, low and sweet
From out the hallelujahs, sweet and low,
Lest I should fear and fall, and miss Thee so
Who art not missed by any that entreat.
Speak to me as to Mary at Thy feet!
And if no precious gums my hands bestow,
Let my tears drop like amber while I
go
In reach of Thy divinest voice complete
In humanest affection-thus, in sooth,
To lose the sense of losing, As a child,
Whose bird-song seeks the wood for evermore,
Is sung to in its stead by mother's mouth
Till, sinking on her breast, love-reconciled,
He sleeps the faster that he wept before.
E. BARRETT BROWNING.
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