They sang their sevenfold litany:
"Hear us, O God of Heaven and Earth,
Thou Lord of sorrow and of mirth,
Thou Worker of the second birth,
Hear us, O Lord, and save!
From plague and famine, fire and sword,
From Pagans fierce and foes abhorred,
From death and Hell, O gracious Lord,
From darkness and the grave.
Have mercy, Lord, on man and beast,
Mercy, from greatest to the least;
Be all from bonds of sin released;
Set free the captive slave!"
"O Lord, have mercy," so they sang,
And through the air their accents rang,
Like sad sweet sound of midnight breeze,
Whispering soft music to the trees,—
"O Miserere, Domine!"
Fathers and children, youth and maid,
Their eager supplication made,
And e'en from bridegroom and from bride
The same sad music rose and died,
"O Miserere, Domine!"
And, last of all, no emperor now,
With eastern diadem on his brow,
No triumph car bedecked with gold,
No purple chlamys' drooping fold;
But pale and worn, his hair all white,
His face with gleam unearthly bright,
As one to whom the heavens all night
Their glory had revealed;
A smile through all his sorrow shone,
That told of peace and victory won,
A fight well fought, a race well run,
And God his strength and shield:
So marched Gregorios, ruler sage,
Great glory of Rome's later age;
And next him came with golden hair,
That floated wildly to the air,
With clear blue eyes, and cheeks that showed
How fresh and full the young life glowed,
A troop of boys, whose unshod feet
Kept measured time to voices sweet;
Angles were they, from far-off shore,
Where loud the northern surges roar,
Rescued from wrath, and sin and shame,
Worthy to bear an angel's name;
These, couching in their brute despair,
Like wolf's young whelps in mountain lair,
Fettered and bound, and set for sale,
Each with his own sad, untold tale,
The good Gregorios saw;
Some thought of homes in distant isles,
A father's love, a mother's smiles,
Some feared the scourge, the bondslave's name,
And some their doom of foulest shame;
And throbs of anguish thrilled their frame
With power to touch and awe.
He looked and pitied, gems and gold,
From out the church's treasures old,
In fullest tale of weight he told,
And gave their price and set them free,
Heirs of Christ's blessed liberty.
And now they followed slow and calm,
Each chanting penitential psalm,
Each bearing branch of drooping palm,
Each lifting high a taper's light,
And clad in garments pure and white;
And these with voices soft and slow,
As streams 'mid whispering reeds that flow,
Still sang, all pitiful to see,
"O Miserere, Domine!"
So onward still they marched; at last
By Trajan's forum on they passed,
And there the memories of the place,
The tale of that imperial grace,
Flashed on Gregorios' soul, and led,
Ere yet the sunset's glow had fled,
To strange new thoughts about the deed.
"Ah me!" he sighed in grief and fears,
"Is he whose name all Rome reveres,
The just, the true, the warrior brave,
Firm to his trust, and strong to save,
Is he where souls to darkness flit,
Gehenna's flames, the unfathomed pit?
He knew not thee, O Lord, I own;
His knee ne'er bent before thy throne;
He lived his life, by evil chance,
In darkness and in ignorance;
And ne'er, O Lord, thy dread decree
His wandering steps led on to Thee.
And so he dwells throughout the years,
Where neither sun nor star appears,
And all around is still the same,
One dreary night, one dusky flame:
And must his doom, O Lord, be this,
That changeless future in the abyss?
Is there no hope for him whose will
Was bent all duty to fulfill,
Whose eye discerning saw aright,
The false how foul, the true how bright? He, Lord, had pity, so they tell,
On that poor child of Israel;
He heard the widow's anguished prayer,
He left her not to her despair:
And wilt thou leave him, Lord, to bear
That doom eternal, full of fear?
Can prayers avail not to atone
And bring the wand'rer to the Throne?
Ah Lord, whose pitying love ne'er spurned
The vilest, when to Thee they turned,
Whose glance, with gentle pardoning eyes,
Where love was blended with surprise,
Looked on Rome's captain, Zidon's child,
And there, in accents soft and mild,
Owned that their faith was nobler found
Than aught that sprang on Israel's ground,
And said'st that from the East and West,
A countless host should share Thy rest;
Wilt thou not write that just one's name
Within Thy book of deathless fame?
My prayer at least shall rise for him
By night and day, in chant and hymn;
For him I ask on bended knee,
"O Miserere, Domine!"
So spake the gray-haired saint, and lo! As died the flush of sunset's glow, There came, in visions of the night The form of One divinely bright,
(The nail prints still in hands and feet) And spake in music low and sweet:
"Fear not, thou wise and true of heart,
Fear not from narrowing thoughts to part;
And didst thou feel the pain of love?
Could one soul's doom thy pity move?
And shall not mine flow far and wide
As ocean spreads his boundless tide?
Is my heart cold while thine is warm?
Not so: cast off the false alarm;
The man thou pray'st for dwells with me,
Where true light shines and shadows flee.
The sins that sprang from life's ill chance,
Deeds of those times of ignorance
These God has pardoned. Just and right,
He owns all souls that loved the light,
And leads them step by step to know
The source from whence all good things flow.
Though yet awhile in twilight rest
They wait, as those but partly blest, -
Though grief for all the evil past
The opening joy of heaven o'ercast,
Yet doubt not; trust my Father's will,
As just and good and loving still:
For those who, filled with holiest awe,
Still strove to keep the Eternal Law, -
For those who knew me not, yet tried
To live for those for whom I died, -
For them who give to child or saint
One cup of water as they faint,—
For these, be sure that all is well;
I hold the keys of Death and Hell."
FROM ST. AUGUSTINE'S "CONFESSIONS."
[ST. AUGUSTINE, the greatest of the Latin Church fathers, was born in North Africa, A.D. 354. He was educated at Carthage, and became a noted lawyer and orator, a Manichæan in religion despite Christian teaching from his mother. He was converted to Christianity by St. Ambrose at Milan, when something over thirty. In 396 he became bishop of Hippo in Africa, continuing such till his death in 430. The form of Catholic doctrine as it stands is mainly due to him. His greatest work is the " City of God," but he is best known by his "Confessions."]
I WILL now call to mind the uncleannesses of my former life, and the carnal corruptions of my soul, not that I love them,
but that I may love thee, my God. For the love of thy love I do this, reviewing my most wicked ways in the bitterness of my remembrance, that thou mayest become sweet to me, who art a sweetness without deceit, a sweetness happy and secure ; recollecting me from that dispersion in which I was rent, as it were, piecemeal, whilst departing from one [i.e. from the one Sovereign Good] I was lost in the pursuit of many [i.e. of multiplicity of creatures].
For there was a time when I was all on fire in my youth to be satiated with the things below, and I ventured to spread and branch out into various and shady loves; and the beauty of my soul was consumed away, and I was quite putrefied in thy sight, whilst I was pleasing myself and desiring to please the eyes of
OF HIS UNRULY LUSTS IN THE SIXTEENTH YEAR OF HIS AGE.
And what was it that delighted me but to love and to be loved? But in this love the due manner was not observed betwixt soul and soul, as far as the bounds of friendship go without fault, but black vapors were exhaled from the muddy concupiscence of the flesh, and the bubbling source of my luxuriant age, which so overclouded and darkened my heart, as not to discern the serenity of love from the obscurity of lust. Both boiled together within me, and hurried my unsettled age down the cliffs of unlawful desires, and plunged me into the gulf of criminal actions. Thy wrath was grown strong against me, and I knew it not. I was deafened with the noise of the chain of my mortality, the punishment of the pride of my soul, and I went still further from thee, and thou didst let me alone; and I was tossed hither and thither, and poured out, and was shed abroad, and boiled over by my fornications, and thou wast silent. Oh! my Joy, which was so long deferred! thou wast silent then, and I departed still farther from thee, after more and more barren seeds of sorrows, by a proud dejection and an unquiet weariness [i.e. sinking down the more by how much the more my pride aspired to raise me up; and ever weary yet never quiet].
Oh! who was there then to restrain my misery? and render useful the fleeting beauties of these lowest things, and set bounds to their allurements, that those billows of that age of mine might
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