EPIPHANY.

BRIGHTEST and best of the sons of the morning!

Dawn on our darkness and lend us thine aid ! Star of the East, the horizon adorning,

Guide where our infant Redeemer is laid !

Cold on his cradle the dew drops are shining,

Low lies his head with the beasts of the stall, Angels adore him in slumber reclining,

Maker and Monarch and Saviour of all!

Say, shall we yield him, in costly devotion,

Odours of Edom and offerings divine? Gems of the mountain and pearls of the ocean,

Myrrh from the forest or gold from the mine?

Vainly we offer each ampler oblation ;

Vainly with gifts would his favour secure : Richer by far is the heart's adoration ;

Dearer to God are the prayers of the poor.

Brightest and best of the sons of the morning!

Dawn on our darkness and lend us thine aid ! Star of the East, the horizon adorning,

Guide wh re our infant Redeemer is laid !

FIRST SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY.

LUKE II.

ABASH'd be all the boast of age !

Be hoary learning dumb ! Expounder of the mystic page,

Behold an Infant come!

Oh, Wisdom, whose unfading power

Beside th' Eternal stood,
To frame, in nature's earliest hour,

The land, the sky, the flood ;

Yet didst not Thou disdain awhile

An infant form to wear ;
To bless thy mother with a smile,

And lisp thy falter'd prayer.

But, in thy Father's own abode,

With Israel's elders round, Conversing high with Israel's God,

Thy chiefest joy was found.

So may our youth adore thy name!

And, Saviour, deign to bless With fostering grace the timid flame

Of early holiness!

FIRST SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY.

By cool Siloam's shady rill

How sweet the lily grows !
How sweet the breath beneath the hill

Of Sharon's dewy rose !

Lo! such the child whose early feet

The paths of peace have trod;
Whose secret heart, with influence sweet,

Is upward drawn to God!

By cool Siloam's shady rill

The lily must decay;
The rose that blooms beneath the hill

Must shortly fade away.

And soon, too soon, the wint'ry hour

Of man's maturer age
Will shake the soul with sorrow's power,

And stormy passion's rage!