Is it a fallen world on which I gaze ?
Am I as deeply fallen as the rest?
Yet joys partaking, past my utmost praise,
Instead of wandering forlorn, unblest!
It is as if an unseen spirit strove
To grave upon my heart, that God is Love!
Yet wouldst thou see, my soul, this truth displayed In characters which wondering angels read,
And read, adoring; go, imploring aid
To gaze with faith, behold the Saviour bleed! Thy God in human form! oh, what can prove, If this suffice thee not, that God is Love?
Cling to His cross, and let thy ceaseless prayer
Be, that thy grasp may fail not! and, ere long, Thou shalt ascend to that fair temple, where
In strains ecstatic an innumerous throng
Of saints and seraphs, round the throne above,
Proclaim for evermore that God is Love!
"'Tis Summer, joyous Summer-time!
In noisy towns no more abide ;
The earth is full of radiant things,
Of gleaming flowers and glancing wings,
Beauty and joy on every side."
OUD is the Summer's busy song,
The smallest breeze can find a tongue,
While insects of each tiny size
Grow teasing with their melodies,
Till noon burns with its blistering breath
Around, and day lies still as death.
The busy noise of man and brute
Is, on a sudden, lost and mute;
Even the brook, that leaps along,
Seems weary of its bubbling song,
And, so soft its waters creep,
Tired Silence sinks in sounder sleep;
The cricket on its bank is dumb,
The very flies forget to hum ;
And, save the wagon rocking round,
The landscape sleeps without a sound.
The breeze is stopped, the lazy bough
Hath not a leaf that danceth now.
BUT who the melodies of morn can tell?
The wild brook babbling down the mountain side ;
The lowing herd; the sheepfold's simple bell;
The pipe of early shepherd, dim descried
In the lone valley; echoing far and wide
The clamorous horn along the cliffs above;
The hollow murmur of the ocean tide;
The hum of bees, the linnet's lay of love,
And the full choir that wakes the universal grove.
The cottage-curs at early pilgrim bark;
Crowned with her pail the tripping milkmaid sings;
The whistling ploughman stalks afield; and, hark!
Down the rough slope the ponderous wagon rings;
Through rustling corn the hare astonished springs ;
Slow tolls the village-clock the drowsy hour;
The partridge bursts away on whirring wings;
Deep mourns the turtle in sequestered bower,
And shrill lark carols clear from her aërial tour.
"Thou, O God, didst send a plentiful rain, whereby Thou didst confirm Thine inheritance when it was weary."—Psalm lxviii. 9.
How beautiful is the rain!
After the dust and heat,
In the broad and fiery street,
|