Thou, who dost dwell alone;
Thou, who dost know thine own;
Thou, to whom all are known,
From the cradle to the grave,—
Save, O, save!
From the world’s temptations;
From tribulations;
From that fierce anguish
Wherein we languish;
From that torpor deep
Wherein we lie asleep,
Heavy as death, cold as the...
Away, haunt thou not me,
Thou vain Philosophy!
Little hast thou bestead,
Save to perplex the head,
And leave the spirit dead.
Unto thy broken cisterns wherefore go,
While from the secret treasure-depths below,
Fed by the skyey shower,
And clouds that sink and rest on hill-tops high,
Wisdom at once, and Power,
Are...
From the recesses of a lowly spirit,
Our humble prayer ascends; O Father! hear it.
Upsoaring on the wings of awe and meekness,
Forgive its weakness!
We see thy hand,—it leads us, it supports us;
We hear thy voice,—it counsels and it courts us;
And then we turn away; and still thy kindness
Forgives our blindness....
MY times are in thy hand!
I know not what a day
Or e’en an hour may bring to me,
But I am safe while trusting thee,
Though all things fade away.
All weakness, I
On him rely
Who fixed the earth and spread the starry sky.
My times are in thy hand!
Pale poverty or wealth,...
Oh the wonder of our life,
Pain and pleasure, rest and strife,
Mystery of mysteries,
Set twixt two eternities!
Lo, the moments come and go,
E’en as sparks, and vanish so;
Flash from darkness into light,
Quick as thought are quenched in night.
With an import grand and strange
Are they fraught in ceaseless change...
Robert of Sicily, brother of Pope Urbane
And Valmond, emperor of Allemaine,
Apparelled in magnificent attire,
With retinue of many a knight and squire,
On Saint John’s eve, at vespers, proudly sat
And heard the priests chant the Magnificat.
And as he listened o’er and o’er again
Repeated, like a burden or refrain,
He caught the...
From “Pippa Passes”
ALL service ranks the same with God:
If now, as formerly he trod
Paradise, his presence fills
Our earth, each only as God wills
Can work—God’s puppets, best and worst,
Are we; there is no last nor first.
Say not “a small event”! Why “small”?
Costs it more pain than this, ye call
A “great event,” should...
God called the nearest angels who dwell with Him above:
The tenderest one was Pity, the dearest one was Love.
“Arise,” He said, “my angels! a wail of woe and sin
Steals through the gates of heaven, and saddens all within.
“My harps take up the mournful strain that from a lost world swells,
The smoke of torment clouds the light and blights the...
There came a soul to the gate of Heaven
Gliding slow—
A soul that was ransomed and forgiven,
And white as snow:
And the angels all were silent.
A mystic light beamed from the face
Of the radiant maid,
But there also lay on its tender grace
A mystic shade:
And the angels all were...
From “Ion,” Act I. Sc. 2.
’T IS a little thing
To give a cup of water; yet its draught
Of cool refreshment, drained by fevered lips,
May give a shock of pleasure to the frame
More exquisite than when nectarean juice
Renews the life of joy in happier hours.
It is a little thing to speak a phrase
Of common...
