HYMNS.
I.
‘The Earth is the Lord's.’
I
Lord of the Lords of all the earth!
Lord of the souls of men!
From Thee all heavenly gifts have birth;
To Thee return again!
II
The lightnings flashed from off Thy throne
Fill Heaven and Earth with light;
And by that living flame alone
Men read the world aright.
III
On every crown and sceptre shed
Thy beams of glory shine;
And burn round every Father's head,
That rules by right Divine.
IV
The Priests by thee anointed, stand
Beside his altar, each;
And all the Wise, a Prophet-band,
What Thou hast taught them teach.
V
Thy voice, O Father, rolls around
The world for evermore;
The speech we know not but the sound
In silence we adore.
VI
The Heavens themselves repose thereon:
Thereon the Earth is stayed:
And seasons change, and rivers run
By Thee ordained and swayed.
II.
PEACE.
I
We lead a gentle life below:
Our days, that seem to pass,
Glide on and blend—before Thy throne
Thus spreads the sea of glass.
II
One image fills that crystal sea;
One light o'er all doth shine:
Yet every separate drop hath power
That radiance to enshrine.
III
Nor less in unity and light
True brethren, we abide;
‘Like drops of Hermon's dew’ that still
Into each other slide.
IV
Eternal glory, thanks and praise
To Thee, O God, to Thee,
Who buildest all the peace of men
Upon that prime decree:
V
That he who loves the Lord his God
Should hold all creatures dear;
And whoso fears his God, henceforth
Should feel no baser fear.
III.
I
‘He giveth His beloved sleep.’
The haughty sow the wind:
The storm they sow; the tempest reap;
But rest they cannot find.
II
In sleep itself their furrowed brows,
That care-worn mark retain;
Avenger of the guilt it shows,
The curse and brand of Cain!
III
Rest is of God. He doth not sleep;
But while His children rest
His hand outstretched and still doth keep
O'er earth, their shadowed nest.
IV
His holy Angels chaunt around,
To chase dark dreams away,
That slumbers innocent and sound
May leave serene the day.
IV.
I
In that cold cave with spices sweet
When Christ, our Lord, lay dead,
An Angel sat beside His feet,
An Angel by His head.
II
All night their eyes to Heaven they raised
Their wings around Him spread
All day on those dark eyelids gazed
But not a word they said.
III
And when the morn sabbatical
Its Paschal light had spread,
A chrysome robe o'er Earth's dark ball
To Heaven those Angels sped.
IV
Keep, holy Angels, keep, O keep
Such vigil by our bed:
Calm visions from the urns of sleep,
O'er us calm visions shed!
V
But when we wake to morning life
And night's pure calm is fled
Stay near us in our daily strife,
Or we are worse than dead!
V.
I
The stars shine bright while earth is dark
While all the woods are dumb
How clear those far off silver chimes
From tower and turret come!
II
Chilly but sweet the midnight air:
And lo! with every sound
Down from the ivy-leaf a drop
Falls glittering to the ground.
III
'Twas night when Christ was born on earth;
Night heard His faint, first cry;
While Angels carolled round the star
Of the Epiphany.
IV
Alas! and is our love too weak
To meet Him on His way?
To pray for nations in their sleep?
For Love then let us pray!
V
Pray for the millions slumbering now:
The sick, who cannot sleep:
O may those sweet sounds waft them thoughts
As peaceful, and as deep.
VI
Pray for the unholy and the vain:
O may that pure-toned bell
Disperse the Demon Powers of Air,
And evil Dreams dispel!
VII
Pray for the aged, and the poor;
The crown-encompassed head;
The friends of youth, now far away;
The dying; and the dead.
VIII
And ever let us wing our prayer
With praise; and ever say
Glory to God Who makes the night
Benignant as the day!
VI.
I
A low sweet voice from out the brake
Provoked a loud reply:
Now half the birds are half awake;
They feel the morning nigh.
II
Fainting beneath her load of dreams
The Moon inclines her brows,
Expectant, towards those mightier beams
That grant her toils repose.
III
Long streaks, the prophets of the Sun,
Illume the dusk, grey hill:
But still the heart of Heaven is dun;
The day is virgin still!
IV
O Christ! ere yet beheld on earth
How oft, incarnate Word,
Thy Prophets heralded Thy birth!
Alas, how seldom heard!
V
Rise, holy Brethren, rise, and sing
A prayer: and while we pray
The morn shall fan with heavenly wing
Our lethargy away.
VI
Burst Thou, O God, these chains of flesh!
These languid eyes inspire:
Our spirits make as morning fresh,
And pure as solar fire:
VII
And grant us, fronting thus the East,
When all the heavenly Powers
Come forth to deck the bridal feast,
A place among Thy bowers!
VIII
Come, Lord and Master! come and take
At last Thy ransomed home:
Bid all Thy faithful dead awake;
And may Thy Kingdom come!
VII.
CHRIST OUR EXAMPLE.
I
With virgin heart, undazzled eye,
The Virgin-born went on
Each snare surmounted or passed by,
Until His task was done.
II
With bleeding feet but lifted head
The waste of life He trod:
Tinging, each step, with holy red
The consecrated sod.
III
Those steps our earth doth yet retain:
And when dark vapours hide
That Sun which lights our pilgrim-train
She too can be our guide.
IV
Father of Him and us! Thy grace
On us and all bestow
Who seek the goal He sought, to trace
His footmarks in the snow!
V
O joy to follow Him in hope
For days, for months, for years:
Our steps in turn o'er His to drop
And o'er His blood our tears!
VIII.
TO THE HOLY SPIRIT.
I
The wind rang out from depths of woods
And pealed through valleys bent
Among the echoing hills like tubes
Of some vast instrument.
Its sound we heard; but know not whence
It came, nor whither went.
II
The wind upon our forehead blows:
In gleams of lambent flame
The sunbeams flash from wave and leaf:
The hour is now the same
As when to Christ's anointed Twelve
That promised Spirit came.
III
The sound as of a rushing wind
Before His wings He flung:
And leaped on those uplifted brows
In many a flaming tongue!—
O breathe on us Thy seven-fold powers:
O dwell our hearts among!
IV
Live Thou in Christ's mysterious Vine
Until her branches spread
Among the stars—to them as flowers
'Mid locks of one new-wed:
And clasp in their descending arch
The Earth's wide bridal-bed!
HYMN.
FOR THE FEAST OF THE HOLY INNOCENTS.
I
Let the Proto-martyr rest
Earliest honoured of the dead;
John! upon thy Saviour's breast
Drop once more that saintly head!
All the Church is met to-day
Unto God to sing and pray;
Remembering those, the Babes, to whom was given
First for their Lord to die and meet Him first in Heaven!
II
Yield the children readiest place!
Tender parents, near them stand!
From each mother's tearful face
All that little awe-struck band
Well may learn and aptly teach
That God's electing love can reach,
Winding untracked its own mysterious way
Souls which have only learned to suffer and obey.
III
As from some Hesperian Isle
Ravished rose-leaves loosely strewn
Through a dark lake's dim defile
When the morning breeze hath blown—
Such were ye: so smooth the breath
That snatched you, blushing, on to death.
Mourn, Rachel, mourn no longer! lest your sighs
O'ertake those vernal souls soft journeying to the skies!
IV
Blessed infants timely caught
From a mortal mother's breast,
That wondering Angels might be taught
What of earth is best!
They with food of heavenly grain
Meet your lips your strength sustain,
And teach you words of heavenly lore, and keep
A low and dulcet chaunt around you while you sleep.
V
Hark, I hear them as they bend
O'er your cots, and gently sway them;
Angels' songs with ours they blend:
Night or morn they never stay them.
‘Glory be to God,’ they cry,
‘To, and from Eternity:
To God the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
All glory be from men, and from the Angel host.’
HYMN.
THE MEEK.
‘Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth.’
I
Meek souls! whose humble faith can prize
Those heavenliest gifts of man,
Obedience, and Self-sacrifice,
Life's first, last, only plan
By which we mount ‘from grace to grace’
Toward our celestial resting-place!
II
All hail! the haughty from their towers
Look down on you with scorn
On you, scarce seen like meadow flowers
Grass-hid, that perfume morn!
Unmarked the while for them ye pray:
Earth's salt that keeps her from decay.
III
Taught by the Church and by the Spirit
Ye know that all things good
Are yours, unsought; that ye inherit
By virtue of your blood
Old Adam's blood in Christ made pure
Whate'er is worthy to endure.
IV
Therefore while haughtier hands up-pile
Their towers of sun-burned clay
On yielding sand, volcanic isle,
A brief and perilous stay;
Ye dwell in tents, removed at will:
They fall; yet safe their inmates still!
V
‘What man shall reign’ No matter who!
Alas! we rave, and fret,
We press, we struggle, we pursue;
For what? for Power! And yet
On us submissive Angels wait,
Pleased with their mild Diaconate.
VI
O place us on the lowliest ground
That we, thus low, may see,
Upreared above us, and around,
Rank, Order, and Degree:
Terrace o'er terrace ranged on high
To lure and rest the heavenward eye!
VII
All Earth is yours; her mild increase;
Her lore through types laid bare;
Her generous toils; her grateful ease;
Her duties; and whate'er
To nature, with a ‘natural art’
Freedom and heavenly peace impart.
VIII
Nature to docile hearts, and minds
That sympathise with her
In sunniest calms or dreariest winds
Alike doth minister:
Dark days her fasts the Fancy calls
And bright her moving festivals.
IX
The soul uncumbered with a load
Of self-dependent care
Moves forth on equal plumes abroad,
A Spirit of the air:
Its own identity forsakes;
Its own all shapes of beauty makes.
X
How much that Genius boasts as hers
And fancies hers alone,
On you, meek Spirits, Faith confers!
The proud have further gone
Perhaps, through life's deep maze; but you
Alone possess the labyrinth's clue.
XI
To you the costliest spoils of Thought
Wisdom, unclaimed, yields up;
To you her far-sought pearl is brought
And melted in your cup.
To you her nard and myrrh she brings
Like orient gifts to infant kings.
XII
The ‘single eye’ alone can see
All Truths around us thrown
In their eternal unity:
The humble ear alone
Has power to grasp, and time to prize,
The sweetness of life's harmonies.
XIII
Notions, to Thought made visible
Are but the smallest part
Of those immortal Truths, which dwell
Self-radiant in man's heart.
With outward beams are others bright;
But God has made you ‘full of light.’
XIV
One science well ye know; the Will
Of God, to man laid bare:
One art have mastered; to fulfil
The part assigned you there:
If other, meaner lore ye sought,
This first ye learned—to need it not!
XV
Empiric Laws, that hide the grace
Of human life, as hard
As iron mask upon a face
From answering eyes debarred,
Form but a lucid veil to you
With all the Godhead shining through.
XVI
Yes, Angels prompt us, Spirits fence!
But ye, a Father's hand
Who trace through all His Providence,
Discern that Angel-band;
'Tis yours alone their choirs to mark
Descending to our precincts dark.
XVII
One half of all our cares and woes
Exist but in our thought;
And lightly fall the rest on those
With them who wrestle not.
The feather scarcely feels that gale
Which bursts the seaman's strongest sail.
XVIII
Yourselves not loving, room have ye
For love of all your kind:
And ye revere the mystery
Of Love Divine enshrined
In human ties that, day by day
Some portion lose of mortal clay.
XIX
And dearer far become the names
Of Father, Child, and Wife
To those who feel their heavenly claims:
And holier earthly Life
To those who in that myriad mirror
See thus their Lord undimmed by error.
XX
In Kings you see Him on His throne:
In Priests before the shrine:
In suffering men you hear Him groan:
Thus life becomes divine;
Each shower with Fontal grace imbued,
And Eucharistic all your food!
XXI
Your virtues shall not die with you
Or those you leave behind,
Destined each year to bloom anew,
And ampler space to find
For boughs o'er earth that spread and wave
Though centered in your silent grave.
XXII
That Race ordained so long to be
Sole witness here of God
Formed but a single Family,
Yea, scattered now abroad,
Are still his seed whose marvelling eyes
First saw them star-like in the skies!
XXIII
What, though the long-lived Patriarchs saw
Their offspring as the sands!
To those who see them not that Law
Unchanged and changeless stands,
That Law which honours in the dust
The Souls that placed with God their trust.
XXIV
Even now in each fair infant's face
The eye of Faith can see
A mild and patriarchal grace
A Regal dignity:
He sits by future throngs half hid;
His throne that living pyramid!
XXV
Hail, noble Spirits, hail, O hail!
While bleats the lamb or cooes the dove,
Your gentle kind shall never fail,
Nor earth wax faint in love.
Hail, kings of peace: to you are given
Flower-crowns on earth, star-crowns in Heaven!
HYMN.
FOR THE BUILDING OF A COTTAGE.
I.
Lay foundations deep and strong
On the rock, and not the sand—
Morn her sacred beam has flung
O'er our ancient land.
And the children through the heather
Beaming joy from frank bright eyes
Dance along, and sing together
Their loud ecstasies.
Children, hallowed song to-day!
Sing aloud; but singing pray.
Orphic measures proudly swelling
Lifted cities in old time:
Build we now a humbler dwelling
With a humbler rhyme!
Unless God the work sustain
Our toils are vain and worse than vain.
Better to roam for aye than rest
Under the impious shadow of a roof unblest!
II.
Mix the mortar o'er and o'er
Holy music singing:
Holy water o'er it pour
Flowers and tresses flinging!
Bless we now the earthen floor:
May good Angels love it!
Bless we now the new-raised door
And that cell above it!
Holy cell, and holy shrine
For the Maid and Child divine!
Remember thou that see'st her bending
O'er that babe upon her knee
All Heaven is ever thus extending
Its arms of love round thee!
Such thought thy step make light and gay
As yon elastic linden spray
On the smooth air nimbly dancing,
Thy spirits like the dew glittering thereon and glancing!
III.
Castles stern in pride o'er-gazing
Subject leagues of wolds and woods;
Palace fronts their fretwork raising
'Mid luxurious solitudes!
These, through clouds their heads uplifting,
The lightning wrath of heaven invoke:
His balance power is ever shifting;
The reed outlasts the oak.
Live, thou cottage! live and flourish
Like a bank which mild dews nourish
Bright with field flowers self-renewing,
Annual violets, dateless clover;
Eyes of flesh thy beauty viewing
With a glance may pass it over;
But to eyes that wiser are
Thou glitterest like the morning star!
O'er every heart thy beauty breathes
Such sweets as morn shall waft from those new planted wreaths!
IV.
Our toils—not toils—are all but ended;
The day has wandered by:
Her silver gleams the moon hath blended
With the azure of the sky:
Yet still the sunset lights are ranging
On from mossy stem to stem;
Low winds their odours vague exchanging
Chaunt day's requiem.
Upon the diamonded panes
The crimson falls with fainter stains:
More high in heavenward aspiration
The gables shoot their mystic lines:
While now, supreme in grace as station
The tower-like chimney shines.
Beneath that tower an altar lies.
Bring wood: light up the sacrifice!
Now westward point the arched porch—
Crown with a Cross the whole: our cot becomes a Church!
V.
Strike once more a livelier measure
Circling those fair walls again:
Songs of triumph, songs of pleasure
Well become you, gladsome train!
Mark that shadowy roof! each angle
Angel heads and wings support:
Those the woodbine soon must tangle
These the rose shall court,
And mingling closer hour by hour
Enclose ere long a sabbath bower.
There shall the Father oft at even
Entone some ancient hymn or story
Till earth once more grows bright as heaven
With days of long past glory,
When Truth and Honour ranged abroad
To cleanse the world from Force and Fraud;
When Zeal was humble; Hope was strong:
And Virtue moved alone the angelic scourge of Wrong!
VI.
O happy days! exhaustless dower
Of spotless joys and hours well spent
Renewed while moons their radiance shower
Upon the Acacia's silver tent,
Or airs of balmiest mornings thrill
And swell with renovated play
The breasts of children, childlike still
And innocent alway.
O'er them light flit our woes and jars
As shades o'er lilies, clouds o'er stars:
Even now my fancy hears the cooing
Of doves from well-known perch or croft;
The bees even now the flowers are wooing
With sleepy murmur soft.
Glad home, from menial service pure!
Thee shall no foreign wants obscure:
Here all the ties are sacred ties:
And Love shines clear through all, and Truth asks no disguise.
VII.
Kings of the earth! too frail, too small
This humble tenement for you?
Then lo! from Heaven my song shall call
A statelier retinue!
They come, the twilight ether cheering
Not vain the suppliant song, not vain,
Our earth on golden platform nearing,
On us their crowns they rain!
Like Gods they stand, the portal
Lighting with looks immortal!
Faith, on her chalice gazing deep:
And Justice with uplifted scale:
Meek Reverence; pure, undreaming Sleep:
Valour in diamond mail:
There Hope with vernal wreath: hardby
Indulgent Love; keen Purity;
And Truth with radiant forehead bare:
And Mirth, whose ringing laughter triumphs o'er Despair.
VIII.
Breathe low! stand mute in reverent trance!
Those Potentates their mighty eyes
Have fixed: Right well that piercing glance
Roof, wall, and basement tries!
Foundations few that gaze can meet:
Therefore the Virtues bide with few:
But where they once have fixed their seat
Her home Heaven fixes too!
They enter now with awful grace
Their acceptable dwelling-place:
In tones majestical yet tender
They chaunt their consecration hymn
From jewelled breasts a sacred splendour
Heaving through shadows dim.
The rite is done: the seed is sown:
Leave, each his offering, and be gone!
Stay, ye for whom were raised these walls!
Possession God hath ta'en: and now His guests He calls.
HYMN.
FOR GOOD FRIDAY.
I
O Lamb of God! on Whom alone
Earth's penal weight of sin was thrown,
Have mercy, Saviour, on Thine own.
For thou art Man. The Virgin gave
To Thee her breast; the earth a grave.
If smiles, while Infant yet, on Thee
Were found, Thy Mother knows, not we.
A man, o'er Lazarus lulled asleep,
With them that wept Thou too didst weep.
Thy tears in dust of Salem sunk
Ere yet her heart Thy blood had drunk.
All griefs of mortals Thou hast known—
Have mercy, Saviour, on Thine own.
II
O Lamb of God, on Whom was laid
That debt all worlds had never paid,
Have mercy, Saviour; hear and aid.
For Thou art God. With God, behold,
Thou sat'st upon His throne of old:
Dread throne surpassing depth and height,
Eternal throne, and infinite!
Yet pity reached Thee there for man,
Ere worlds were made, or pain began.
With Abel bleeding Thou didst lie,
With Isaac forth wast led to die,
With Stephen stoned, and since, and yet,
With all Thy Martyrs' blood art wet.
III
O Lamb of God, on Whom alone
Earth's penal weight of sin was thrown,
Have mercy, Saviour, on Thine own.
Again the depths are stirred: we wait
Before the shrine's forbidding gate,
We stand in sable garments clad:
The infant at the breast is sad.
This day unconsecrated lies
The Host: unblessed the Sacrifice!
Tremble the altars disarrayed:
The mighty temples are dismayed:
Their chaunts are dead: nor lamp, nor light
Save from the Sepulchres at night.
IV
O Lamb of God, on Whom was laid
The debt all worlds had never paid,
Have mercy, Saviour; hear and aid.
Again rings out that sound abhorred:
Again, O widowed Church, the sword
Pierces thy sacred heart—the cry
Of ‘Crucify Him, Crucify.’
The Priest his garment rends again;
Once more blaspheme that perjured Twain;
Once more the upbraiding voice foretold
Peals through dark shades from gardens cold.
—Prince of the Apostles! ah that we,
Like thee who fall, might weep like thee!
V
O Lamb of God, on Whom alone
Earth's penal weight of sin was thrown,
Have mercy, Saviour, on Thine own.
By each step along that road:
By that Cross, Thine awful load:
By the Hebrew women's wail:
By the sponge, and lance, and nail:
By Mary's martyrdom, when she
In Thee died, yet offered Thee:
By that mocking crowd accursed:
By Thy dreadful, unquenched thirst:
By Thy three hours' agony:
And by that last unanswered cry—
VI
O Lamb of God, on Whom was laid
The debt all worlds had never paid,
Have mercy, Saviour, hear and aid.
Like shapes at God's last trump new-risen,
My sins time-buried rise—and listen.
The veil is rent; the rocks are riven;
And demons sweep yon darkened heaven.
Three crosses bar the black on high—
That Thief beside Thee hung so nigh—
How rolls he now on Thee his eye;
Nor sees beyond Thee hills or sky!
Thus, Christ, we turn from all to Thee
‘Miserere Domine.’
HYMN.
THE WASHING OF THE ALTAR ON GOOD FRIDAY.
I
Pour forth the wine-floods rich and dark
Over the altar-stone:
The time is short; the yew-trees, hark,
How mournfully they moan—
It is the sacred blood of Christ
By angels poured o'er earth;
While sable turns to amethyst
And death to the new birth.
II
O'er all the altar pour the wine
With joyful strength amain;
The streams alone from God's great vine
Can clear that altar's stain—
It is the Saviour's wondrous blood:—
The ensanguined planet now
Ascends from this baptismal flood
As bright as Christ's own brow.
III
The flood that cleanses on and in
Roll, sacred brethren, roll;
But Thou whose suffering purged our sin,
O wash each sinful soul!
It is the atoning blood of Him
By Whom all worlds are shriven:
Who lights with love our midnight dim
And changes earth to Heaven.
MAUNDY THURSDAY.
THE WASHING OF THE FEET.
Once more the Temple-Gates lie open wide:
Onward, once more
Advance the Faithful, mounting like a tide
That climbs the shore.
Naked as tombs the Altars stand to-day:
The shrines are bare:
Christ of His raiment was despoiled; and they
His livery wear.
This day the mighty and the proud have heard
His ‘Mandate New;’
That which He did, their Master, and their Lord
This day they do.
This day the mitred foreheads, and the crowned
In meekness bend:
New tasks this day the sceptred hands have found:
The Poor they tend.
To-day those feet which tread in lowliest ways
Yet follow Christ
Are by the secular lords of power and praise
Both washed and kissed.
Hail Ordinance sage of hoar antiquity
Which she retains
That Church who teaches man how meek should be
The head that reigns.
SELF-SACRIFICE.
I
When Christ let fall that sanguine shower
Amid the garden dew
O say what amaranthine flower
In that red rain up grew?
If yet below, the blossom grow
Then earth is holy yet:
But if it bloom forgotten, woe
To those who dare forget!
II
No flower so precious, sweet, and lone
Expands beneath the skies:
In Eden bowers it lurked unblown—
Its name? Self-sacrifice!
The very name we scarce can frame,
And yet that secret root
The monsters of the wild might tame,
And Heaven is in the fruit!
III
Alas! what murmur spreads around?
‘The news thereof hath been:
But never yet the man was found
Whose eye that flower hath seen.’
Then nobles all! leave court and hall
And search the wide world o'er;
For whoso finds this Sancgreall
Stands crowned for evermore!
THE CREATION OF MAN.
A RABBINICAL TRADITION.
When but the first page of the Book of Fate
As yet lay open—thus the Seers relate—
When through the new-born woods the lion ran
The pard, but eyed not yet their master, Man;
When blindly worked through clay the thing that creeps;
When hung, amazed, the eagle o'er the deeps;
The great Creator, bending from the shore
Of heaven, awhile His six days' work forbore:
He willed not that like beast or bird should rise
That Race whose forehead parleys with the skies;
That even man's earthly garb should take its mould
Save from Himself, the Eternal One of Old.
Ere yet His ‘hour was come,’ the All-Wise, All-Good
In human form, then first Incarnate, stood:
Behind Him sank the sun o'er pastures golden;
Man-shaped before Him stretched His sacred shade;
He stood, He spake with sceptred hand high-holden;
‘Rise, Man, from earth in God's own Image made:’
And where that shadow on the sward was stayed
Forth from his native dust ascending, Man obeyed.
AN ANCIENT LEGEND, AND ITS ANSWER.
[_]
[‘Through Alexandria there rushed of old, a Woman with
disordered garb that held high in one hand a Torch, and in the
other bore a Jar of Water, and cried aloud, saying, “With this
Torch I will burn up Heaven, and with this Jar of Water I will
quench Hell, that henceforward God may be loved for His own
sake alone.”’]
TRIAL.
ST. FRANCIS DE SALES.
As when for weeks the tempest blinds
Some sea-girt mountain, night and day,
So storms of trial, clouds and winds
Besieged his soul till not a ray
Could reach him of that glory streamed
From God upon the new-born world:
An erring star and lost he seemed
Through endless darkness onward hurled.
At last, his large heart breaking, down
He knelt his latest prayer to make,
True heart that, shrivelling in the frown
Of God, that God would not forsake,
‘If I must lose Thee there beneath,
Lord, let me love Thee till I die!’—
It sank—the black cloud's latest wreath;
And God was his eternally!
