Their next, from heart to heart to clear the way a

For mutual love without alloy :

Never so blest, as when in JESUS' roll

They write some hero-soul,

More pleas'd upon his brightening road To wait, than if their own with all his radiance glow'd.

O happy spirits, mark'd by God and man
Their messages of love to bearb,

What though long since in Heaven your brows began
The genial amarant wreath to wear,
And in th' eternal leisure of calm love

Ye banquet there above,

Yet in your sympathetic heart

We and our earthly griefs may ask and hope a part.

Comfort's true sons! amid the thoughts of down
That strew your pillow of repose,

Sure, 'tis one joy to muse, how ye unknown
By sweet remembrance sooth our woes,
And how the spark ye lit, of heavenly cheer,
Lives in our embers here,

a Acts ix. 27. Barnabas took him, and brought him (Saul) to the Apostles.

b Acts xi. 22. xiii. 2.

Where'er the Cross is borne with smiles, Or lighten❜d secretly by Love's endearing wiles:

Where'er one Levite in the temple keeps
The watch-fire of his midnight prayer,
Or issuing thence, the eyes of mourners steeps
In heavenly balm, fresh gather'd there;
Thus saints, that seem to die in earth's rude strife,
Only win double life:

They have but left our weary ways

To live in memory here, in Heaven by love and praise.

ST. JOHN BAPTIST'S DAY.

Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord: and he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers. Malachi iv. 5, 6.

TWICE in her season of decay

The fallen Church hath felt Elijah's eye
Dart from the wild its piercing ray:
Not keener burns, in the chill morning sky,
The herald star,

Whose torch afar

Shadows and boding night-birds fly.

Methinks we need him once again, That favour'd seer-but where shall he be found? By Cherith's side we seek in vain, In vain on Carmel's green and lonely mound: Angels no more

From Sinai soar,

On his celestial errands bound.

But wafted to her glorious place

By harmless fire, among the ethereal thrones,
His spirit with a dear embrace
Thee the lov'd harbinger of Jesus owns,
Well-pleas'd to view

Her likeness true,

And trace, in thine, her own deep tones.

Deathless himself, he joys with thee To commune how a faithful martyr dies, And in the blest could envy be,

He would behold thy wounds with envious eyes, Star of our morn,

Who yet unborn c

Didst guide our hope, where Christ should rise.

Now resting from your jealous care For sinners, such as Eden cannot know, Ye pour for us your mingled prayer, No anxious fear to damp Affection's glow, Love draws a cloud

From you to shroud

Rebellion's mystery here below.

St. Luke i. 44. The Babe leaped in my womb for joy.

And since we see, and not afar,

The twilight of the great and dreadful day,

Why linger, till Elijah's car

Stoop from the clouds? Why sleep ye? rise and pray, Ye heralds seal'd

In camp or field

Your Saviour's banner to display.

Where is the lore the Baptist taught,
The soul unswerving and the fearless tongue?
The much-enduring wisdom, sought
By lonely prayer the haunted rocks among?
Who counts it gaind

His light should wane,

So the whole world to Jesus throng?

Thou Spirit who the Church didst lend Her eagle wings, to shelter in the wild,

We pray thee, ere the Judge descend, With flames like these, all bright and undefil'd, Her watchfires light,

To guide aright

Our weary souls, by earth beguil❜d.

St. John iii, 30. He must increase, but I must decrease.
Revelations xii. 14.