Evening Prayer.
“Let my prayer be ------ as the Evening Sacrifice.”
—Ps. cxli. 2.
Almighty Priest! in prayer to Thee
Are secrets Angels yearn to see;
And duties are delights to all
Who Christ in heaven their glory call.
And thus, when toil-worn day is done
And meditative eve begun,
Devotion feels a mystic spell
To consecrate the sun's farewell.
Religion in that radiance glows,—
A deeper charm than light bestows
Of mournfulness, whose mild appeals
The heart approves, and conscience feels.
Nature is one mysterious plan
That moves in sympathy with Man;
Her scenes are parables to thought,
With types of teaching wisdom fraught.
Round hill and valley, sea and shore,
The leafy wood and forest hoar,
Cathedrals, cots, and village-plains,
A lulling sense of beauty reigns.
Thy truth, oh Lord! in each we trace,
As inward law of outward grace,
And think, how bright this world can be
When all its glories mirror Thee!
Creation seems at vespers, now:
And saints, who in Thy worship bow,
While dying beams array the west
Commune with Nature's holy rest.
But, prayer and penitence are due
For all the sins our soul must rue,
And boundless guilt, Thy Blood alone
Can
whiten at the Judgment-throne!
A prayerless mood, at such an hour,
What is it, but a Belial-power,—
A blinding haze of self and sin
Which hides the demon-heart within?
Then, dear the chime of evening-bells!
Whose music like emotion swells;
And blest the pathways, meekly trod,
Whose windings seek the House of God.
All treasures in that Church abound
Where
Christ is heard, and pardon found:
And Souls, who would their Master see,
Await Him where He loves to be.
There may we nurse Devotion's awe;
His Word receive as light, and law;
And near, and nearer round the Throne
Encircle HIM Faith calls her own.
From thence return'd, in peace and prayer,
God of the hearth-side! meet us there;
And give to Thy belovèd sleep,
Whose hearts full often wake, and weep!
Be each fond babe on mother's breast
In pillow'd beauty rock'd to rest;
And show the orphan's inward eye
Parental Forms beyond the sky.
O Thou! Who art the Slumberless,
Protect our sleeping helplessness;
And be to saints that Spirit given
Who breathes on earth the balm of heaven.
