A Library of Poetry and Song: Being Choice Selections from the Best Poets

POEMS OF RELIGION

The angel wrote, and ornished. The wat
with a great wakening light.

It came again,

night

And shewd the names whom love of god had berid,
And lo! Ben Adhem's name lid all the rest-

Here on this bless Thanksging tight, The raise to the am gratiful voico; For what then doest, Lad, is right

And thus believing, que ryoies.

CHILD
MEMORIAL
LIBRARY

POEMS OF RELIGION.

For as thou dost impart thy grace,
The greater shall our glorie be.

The measure of our joyes is in this place,
The stuffe with thee.

Let me not languish, then, and spend
A life as barren to thy praise

As is the dust, to which that life doth tend,
But with delaies.

All things are busie; only I
Neither bring hony with the bees,

Nor flowres to make that, nor the husbandrie
To water these.

I am no link of thy great chain, But all my companie is a weed. Lord, place me in thy consort; give one strain To my poore reed.

GEORGE HERBERT.

THE NEW JERUSALEM.

O MOTHER dear, Jerusalem, When shall I come to thee?

When shall my sorrows have an end, -
Thy joys when shall I see?

O happy harbor of God's saints !
O sweet and pleasant soil!
In thee no sorrow can be found,
Nor grief, nor care, nor toil.
No dimly cloud o'ershadows thee,
Nor gloom, nor darksome night;
But every soul shines as the sun,
For God himself gives light.

Thy walls are made of precious stone,
Thy bulwarks diamond-square,
Thy gates are all of orient pearl, -
O God! if I were there!

O my sweet home, Jerusalem!

Thy joys when shall I see?— The King sitting upon thy throne, And thy felicity?

258

DROP, drop, slow tears,

And bathe those beauteous feet
Which brought from heaven

The news and prince of peace!
Cease not, wet eyes,

His mercies to entreat;

To cry for vengeance

Sin doth never cease;

In your deep floods

Drown all my faults and fears;
Nor let his eye

See sin but through my tears.

PHINEAS FLETCHER.

DARKNESS IS THINNING.
DARKNESS is thinning; shadows are retreating;
Morning and light are coming in their beauty.
Suppliant seek we, with an earnest outery,
God the Almighty!

So that our Master, having mercy on us,
May repel languor, may bestow salvation,
Granting us, Father, of thy loving kindness
Glory hereafter !

This of his mercy, ever-blesséd Godhead,
Father, and Son, and Holy Spirit, give us,
Whom through the wide world celebrate forever
Blessing and glory!

ST. GREGORY THE GREAT (Latin). Translation
of J. M. NEALE.

I LOVE, AND HAVE SOME CAUSE

I LOVE, and have some cause to love, the earth, —
She is my Maker's creature, therefore good;
She is my mother, for she gave me birth;

She is my tender nurse, she gives me food:
But what's a creature, Lord, compared with
thee?

Or what's my mother or my nurse to me?

I love the air, - her dainty sweets refresh
My drooping soul, and to new sweets invite me;
Her shrill-mouthed choir sustain me with their
flesh,

And with their polyphonian notes delight me :
But what's the air, or all the sweets that she
Can bless my soul withal, compared to thee?
I love the sea, she is my fellow-creature,

My careful purveyor; she provides me store; She walls me round; she makes my diet greater; She wafts my treasure from a foreign shore: But, Lord of oceans, when compared with thee, What is the ocean or her wealth to me!

To heaven's high city I direct my journey,
Whose spangled suburbs entertain mine eye,
Mine eye, by contemplation's great attorney,
Transcends the crystal pavement of the sky:
But what is heaven, great God, compared to
thee?

Without thy presence, heaven 's no heaven to

me.

Without thy presence, earth gives no refection,
Without thy presence, sea affords no treasure;
Without thy presence, air's a rank infection;
Without thy presence, heaven's itself no
pleasure:

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