VII. Village Psalmody.
All my fresh springs shall be in thee.
And is it not thy praise, Church of our love,
That thou unto each little rural nook
Of quiet hast soft golden plumage shook
From off the wing of thine own David's dove,
And turn'd the melodies, that nearest prove
To the heart of man, into a sacred book,—
Key to the soul's best avenues,—a brook
That steals into Religion's secret grove?
If those straw roofs and ivied cots among
There play a gleam of song, 'tis no wild fire,
But sparks, tho' scatter'd, from a heav'n-strung lyre.
Thus, when the cloud of music roll'd along
Fills the melodious dome, blest sounds inspire
Each cloistral nook, vocal with sacred song.
