University of Virginia Library

500.

[Thou call'st us at our latest hour]

About the eleventh hour he went out, and found, &c. —xx. 6.

Thou call'st us at our latest hour,
When life is ready to depart,
Thou show'st Thine all-sufficient power
On the decrepit sinner's heart:
He wakes; the work of life begins,
Before its final hour is pass'd,
And old and dying in his sins
Repents, and lives to God at last.
Merciful God, what crowds receive
A gift whose use they will not know,
Till just as life the triflers leave,
Thou show'st them their great task below!
To labour doom'd, to labour born,
They idle all day long remain;
Yet if even then to Thee they turn,
Thy grace will not reject them then.