Where angels down the lucid stair
Came hovering to our sainted sires,
Now, in the twilight, glare

The heathen's wizard fires.

Go, with thy voice the altar rend,
Scatter the ashes, be the arm,
That idols would befriend,

Shrunk at thy withering charm.

Then turn thee, for thy time is short,
But trace not o'er the former way,
Lest idol pleasures court

Thy heedless soul astray.

Thou know'st how hard to hurry by,
Where on the lonely woodland road
Beneath the moonlight sky
The festal warblings flow'd;

Where maidens to the Queen of Heaven
Wove the gay dance round oak or palm,
Or breath'd their vows at even

In hymns as soft as balm.

Or thee perchance a darker spell
Enthralls the smooth stones of the flood,*
By mountain grot or fell,

Pollute with infant's blood;

The giant altar on the rock,

The cavern whence the timbrel's call
Affrights the wandering flock:
Thou long'st to search them all.

* Isaiah lvii. 6. Among the smooth stones of the stream is thy portion; they, they are thy lot.

Trust not the dangerous path again—
O forward step and lingering will!
O lov'd and warn'd in vain!
And wilt thou perish still?

Thy message given, thine home in sight,
To the forbidden feast return?

Yield to the false delight

Thy better soul could spurn?

Alas, my brother! round thy tomb
In sorrow kneeling, and in fear,
We read the Pastor's doom
Who speaks and will not hear.

The gray-hair'd saint may fail at last,
The surest guide a wanderer prove;
Death only binds us fast
To the bright shore of love.

NINTH SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY.

ELIJAH IN HOREB.

And after the earthquake a fire; but the Lord was not in the fire: and after the fire, a still small voice. 1 Kings xix. 12. [First Evening Lesson, Church of England.]

[Grant to us, Lord, we beseech thee, the spirit to think and do always such things as are right; that we, who cannot do any thing that is good without thee, may by thee be enabled to live according to thy will, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.]

IN troublous days of anguish and rebuke,

While sadly round them Israel's children look,
And their eyes fail for waiting on their Lord:

While underneath each awful arch of green,
On every mountain top, God's chosen scene
Of pure heart-worship, Baal is ador'd:

'Tis well, true hearts should for a time retire
To holy ground, in quiet to aspire

Towards promis'd regions of serener grace;
On Horeb, with Elijah, let us lie,

Where all around on mountain, sand, and sky,
God's chariot-wheels have left distinctest trace:

There, if in jealousy and strong disdain
We to the sinner's God of sin complain,
Untimely seeking here the peace of heaven-
"It is enough, O Lord! now let me die
Even as my fathers did: for what am I

That I should stand, where they have vainly striven?"

Perhaps our God may of our conscience ask,
"What doest thou here, frail wanderer from thy task?
Where hast thou left those few sheep in the wild?"*
Then should we plead our heart's consuming pain,
At sight of ruin'd altars, prophets slain,

And God's own ark with blood of souls defil'd;

He on the rock may bid us stand, and see
The outskirts of his march of mystery,

His endless warfare with man's wilful heart;
First, His great Power He to the sinner shows,
Lo! at His angry blast the rocks unclose,

And to their base the trembling mountains part:

Yet the Lord is not here: 'tis not by Power
He will be known-but darker tempests lower;
Still, sullen heavings vex the labouring ground:

* 1 Sam. xvii. 28.

Perhaps His Presence thro' all depth and height,
Best of all gems, that deck his crown of light,
The haughty eye may dazzle and confound.
God is not in the earthquake; but behold
From Sinai's caves are bursting, as of old,

The flames of his consuming, jealous ire.
Wo to the sinner, should stern justice prove
His chosen attribute;-but he in love

Hastes to proclaim," God is not in the fire."
The storm is o'er-and hark! a still small voice
Steals on the ear, to say, Jehovah's choice

Is ever with the soft, meek, tender soul:
By soft, meek, tender ways He loves to draw*
The sinner, startled by his ways of awe:

Here is our Lord, and not where thunders roll.
Back then, complainer; loathe thy life no more,
Nor deem thyself upon a desert shore,

Because the rocks the nearer prospect close. Yet in fallen Israel are their hearts and eyes† That day by day in prayer like thine arise:

Thou know'st them not, but their Creator knows.‡

[Beautifully descriptive of the Saviour's way of drawing sinners unto him. "He shall not strive nor cry, neither shall any man hear his voice in the street. A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not quench." St. Matthew xii, 20.]

[Yet I have left me seven thousand in Israel, all the knees which have not bowed unto Baal, and every mouth which hath not kissed him." 1 Kings xix. 18.]

[THE SYNAGOGUE.

"But even unto this day, when Moses is read, the vail is upon their heart. Nevertheless, when it shall turn to the Lord, the vail shall be taken away."St. Paul.

I saw them in their synagogue, as in their ancient day,
And never from my memory the scene will fade away,

Go, to the world return, nor fear to cast
Thy bread upon the waters, sure at last*
In joy to find it after many days,

The work be thine, the fruit thy children's part:
Choose to believe, not see: sight tempts the heart
From sober walking in true Gospel ways.

For dazzling on my vision still, the latticed galleries shine With Israel's loveliest daughters, in their beauty half divine! It is the holy Sabbath eve,-the solitary light

Sheds, mingled with the hues of day, a lustre nothing bright; On swarthy brow and piercing glance it falls with saddening tinge, And dimly gilds the Pharisee's phylacteries and fringe.

The two-leaved doors slide slow apart before the eastern screen,
As rise the Hebrew harmonies, with chanted prayers between,
And mid the tissued vails disclosed, of many a gorgeous dye,
Enveloped in their jewelled scarfs, the sacred records lie.

Robed in his sacerdotal vest, a silvery-headed man
With voice of solemn cadence o'er the backward letters ran,
And often yet methinks I see the glow and power that sate
Upon his face, as forth he spread the roll immaculate.

And fervently that hour I prayed, that from the mighty scroll,
Its light, in burning characters, might break on every soul,
That on their hardened hearts the vail might be no longer dark,
But be for ever rent in twain like that before the ark.

For yet the tenfold film shall fall, O Judah! from thy sight,
And every eye be purged to read thy testimonies right,
When thou, with all Messiah's signs in Christ distinctly seen,
Shall, by Jehovah's nameless name, invoke the Nazarene.
Rev. William Croswell.]

* Eccles. xi. 1.