But when I saw it on its mother's arm, So for the mother's sake the child was dear, THE VIRGIN'S CRADLE-HYMN. COPIED FROM A PRINT OF THE VIRGIN, IN A ROMAN CATHOLIC VIL LAGE IN GERMANY. DORMI, Jesu! Mater ridet Quæ tam dulcem somnum videt, Dormi, Jesu! blandule! Si non dormis, Mater plorat, Inter fila cantans orat, Blande, veni, somnule. ENGLISH. Sleep, sweet babe! my cares beguiling: If thou sleep not, mother mourneth, EPITAPH ON AN INFANT. Its balmy lips the infant blest And such my infant's latest sigh! MELANCHOLY. A FRAGMENT. STRETCH'D on a mouldered Abbey's broadest wall, That pallid cheek was flushed: her eager look And her bent forehead worked with troubled thought. TELL'S BIRTH-PLACE. IMITATED FROM STOLBERG. I. MARK this holy chapel well! The birth-place, this, of William Tell. II. Here, first, an infant to her breast, Him his loving mother prest; And kissed the babe, and blessed the day, And prayed as mothers used to pray. III. "Vouchsafe him health, O God! and give The child thy servant still to live!" But God had destined to do more Through him, than through an armed power God IV. gave him reverence of laws, Yet stirring blood in Freedom's cause- The eye of the hawk, and the fire therein! V. To Nature and to Holy Writ Alone did God the boy commit: Where flashed and roared the torrent, oft VI. The straining oar and chamois chase VII. He knew not that his chosen hand, A CHRISTMAS CAROL. I. THE shepherds went their hasty way, And now they checked their eager tread, II. They told her how a glorious light, Blest Angels heralded the Saviour's birth, III. She listened to the tale divine, And closer still the Babe she prest; And while she cried, the Babe is mine! The milk rushed faster to her breast: Joy rose within her, like a summer's morn; IV. Thou Mother of the Prince of Peace, O why should this thy soul elate? V. And is not war a youthful king, A stately hero clad in mail? Beneath his footsteps laurels spring; Him Earth's majestic monarchs hail Their friend, their playmate! and his bold bright eye Compels the maiden's love-confessing sigh. VI. Tell this in some more courtly scene, To maids and youths in robes of state! I am a woman poor and mean, And therefore is my soul elate. War is a ruffian, all with guilt defiled, VII. "A murderous fiend, by fiends adored, He kills the sire and starves the son; The husband kills, and from her board Steals all his widow's toil had won; Plunders God's world of beauty; rends away All safety from the night, all comfort from the day. VIII. "Then wisely is my soul elate, That strife should vanish, battle cease: I'm poor and of a low estate, The Mother of the Prince of Peace. Joy rises in me, like a summer's morn : HUMAN LIFE, ON THE DENIAL OF IMMORTALITY. IF dead, we cease to be; if total gloom Which, as she gazed on some nigh-finished vase She formed with restless hands unconsciously! If rootless thus, thus substanceless thy state, Go, weigh thy dreams, and be thy hopes, thy fears, The counter-weights-Thy laughter and thy tears. Mean but themselves, each fittest to create, And to repay the other! Why rejoices Thy heart with hollow joy for hollow good? Why cowl thy face beneath the mourner's hood, Why waste thy sighs, and thy lamenting voices, Image of image, ghost of ghostly elf, That such a thing as thou feel'st warm or cold? |