PSALM 114. (L. M.) Miracles attending Israel's Journey.
I
When Israel, freed from Pharaoh's hand,
Left the proud tyrant, and his land,
The tribes with cheerful homage own
Their King, and Judah was his throne.
II
Across the deep their journey lay;
The deep divides to make them way:
Jordan beheld their march and fled
With backward current to his head.
III
The mountains shook like frighted sheep,
Like lambs the little hillocks leap;
Not Sinai on her base could stand,
Conscious of sovereign power at hand.
IV
What power could make the deep divide?
Make Jordan backward roll his tide?
Why did ye leap, ye little hills?
And whence the fright that Sinai feels?
V
Let every mountain every flood,
Retire and know the approaching God,
The King of Israel: see him here;
Tremble, thou earth, adore and fear.
VI
He thunders, and all nature mourns,
The rock to standing pools he turns;
Flints spring with fountains at his word,
And fires and seas confess the Lord.
This psalm appears to me an admirable ode; but if I had introduced
the presence of God into the camp of Israel removing from
Egypt, as all my predecessors have done, I had lost the divine beauty
of the psalm: For had God appeared at first, there could be no wonder
why the mountains should leap, and the sea retire; therefore that
this convulsion of nature may be brought in with due surprise, the
sacred poet conceals his name till afterward, and then with a very
agreeable turn of thought, God is introduced at once in all his
majesty. This is what I have attempted to imitate, and to preserve
what I could of the spirit of the inspired author.
