Sacred Meditations and Moral Themes In Verse By the Rev. Robert Montgomery ... Third Edition--Revised and Enlarged |
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MORAL OMNIPOTENCE OF THE
SCRIPTURES. |
 | Sacred Meditations and Moral Themes In Verse |  |
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MORAL OMNIPOTENCE OF THE SCRIPTURES.
Transcendent thought!—when changing years have flown,
These Bibles speak to ev'ry clime and zone;
The hut, the hovel, or the cottage wild,
Where Sorrow shudders o'er her weeping child,
Their living voice of holiness and love,
Like angel-tones, shall visit from above.
Omnipotence is there!—a power to be
The God on earth, salvation's deity.
Thou Infidel! in tomb-like darkness laid,
By Heaven deserted, and by earth betrayed;
And thou pale mutt'rer in some midnight cell,
Whose sad to-morrow is a dream of hell;
There is a voice to wake, a word to spread,
Deep as the thunders that arouse the dead;
That sound is heard;—a welcome from the skies!
Despair is vanquish'd, and Dejection flies;
Hope fills a heart where agonies have been,
The dungeon brightens, and a God is seen.
These Bibles speak to ev'ry clime and zone;
The hut, the hovel, or the cottage wild,
Where Sorrow shudders o'er her weeping child,
Their living voice of holiness and love,
Like angel-tones, shall visit from above.
Omnipotence is there!—a power to be
The God on earth, salvation's deity.
Thou Infidel! in tomb-like darkness laid,
By Heaven deserted, and by earth betrayed;
And thou pale mutt'rer in some midnight cell,
Whose sad to-morrow is a dream of hell;
There is a voice to wake, a word to spread,
Deep as the thunders that arouse the dead;
That sound is heard;—a welcome from the skies!
Despair is vanquish'd, and Dejection flies;
Hope fills a heart where agonies have been,
The dungeon brightens, and a God is seen.
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Immortal pages! may your spirit pour
Unceasing day, till savage night be o'er
In fiery lands, where roving Ganga reigns,
Eternal pilgrim of a thousand plains,
The tawny Indian, (when the day is done,
And basking waters redden in the sun,
While shadowed branches, in their boundless play
Of leafy wantonness, the earth array,)
Behold him seated, with his babes around,
To fathom myst'ries where a God is found!
Unceasing day, till savage night be o'er
In fiery lands, where roving Ganga reigns,
Eternal pilgrim of a thousand plains,
The tawny Indian, (when the day is done,
And basking waters redden in the sun,
While shadowed branches, in their boundless play
Of leafy wantonness, the earth array,)
Behold him seated, with his babes around,
To fathom myst'ries where a God is found!
The book is oped, a wondrous page began,
Where heaven is offered to forgiven man;
Lo! as he reads, what awe-like wonder steals
On all he fancies, and on all he feels;
Till o'er his mind by mute devotion wrought,
The gleaming twilight of celestial thought
Begins, and heaven-eyed Faith salutes above
The God of glory, and the Lord of love.—
“Thou dread Unknown! Thou unimagined Whole!
The vast Supreme, and Universal Soul,
Oft in the whirlwind have I shaped Thy form,
Or throned in thunder heard Thee sway the storm;
And when the ocean's heaving vastness grew
Black with Thy curse,—my spirit darkened too;
But when the world beneath a sun-gaze smiled,
And not a frown the sleeping air defiled,
Then I have loved Thee, Thou parental One,
Thy wrath a tempest, and Thy smile a Sun!
But if there be, as heaven-breathed words relate,
A seraph-home in some hereafter state,
Almighty Power! thy dark-souled Indian see,
And grant the mercy that has bled for me.”
Where heaven is offered to forgiven man;
Lo! as he reads, what awe-like wonder steals
On all he fancies, and on all he feels;
Till o'er his mind by mute devotion wrought,
The gleaming twilight of celestial thought
Begins, and heaven-eyed Faith salutes above
The God of glory, and the Lord of love.—
“Thou dread Unknown! Thou unimagined Whole!
The vast Supreme, and Universal Soul,
Oft in the whirlwind have I shaped Thy form,
Or throned in thunder heard Thee sway the storm;
And when the ocean's heaving vastness grew
Black with Thy curse,—my spirit darkened too;
But when the world beneath a sun-gaze smiled,
And not a frown the sleeping air defiled,
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Thy wrath a tempest, and Thy smile a Sun!
But if there be, as heaven-breathed words relate,
A seraph-home in some hereafter state,
Almighty Power! thy dark-souled Indian see,
And grant the mercy that has bled for me.”
| Sacred Meditations and Moral Themes In Verse | |