Sketches of Natural History :: :: University of Virginia Library

The Power that formed the violet,
The all-creating One;
He made the stately Cedar trees
That crowned Mount Lebanon.

And all within the garden
That angels came to see,—
He set in groves and on the hills
The goodly Cedar tree.

There played the gladsome creatures,
Beneath its shadow dim;
And from its spreading, leafy boughs
Went up the wild bird's hymn.

And Eve in her young innocence
Delayed her footsteps there;
And Adam's heart grew warm with praise
To see a tree so fair.

And though the world was darkened
With the shade of human ill,
And man was cast from Paradise,
Yet wast thou goodly still.

And when an ancient poet
Some lofty theme would sing,
He made the Cedar symbol forth
Each great and gracious thing.

And royal was the Cedar
Above all other trees!
They chose of old its scented wood
For kingly palaces.

And in the halls of princes,
And on the Phœnix-pyre,
'Twas only noble cedar-wood
Could feed the odorous fire.

In the temple of Jerusalem,
That glorious temple old,
They only found the cedar-wood
To match with carved gold.

Thou great and noble Solomon,
What king was e'er like thee?
Thou 'mong the princes of the earth
Wast like a Cedar tree!

But the glory of the Cedar tree
Is as an old renown,
And few and dwindled grow they now
Upon Mount Lebanon.

But dear they are to poets' heart;
And dear to painter's eye;
And the beauty of the cedar tree
On earth will never die!