 | Lyra Apostolica (1864) |  |
149
EXPOSTULATION
1.
Why is our glorious Angel seen to mourn,With earth-bent brow forlorn?
Why hangs the cold tear on his cheeks?
Ah me! his silence speaks;
It is the Spoiler's parricidal hand,
And the apostate land,
Which would herself God's candlestick displace,
And put aside her cup of grace:
Hence, darkly gleaming through the nightly grove,
Bow'd down in pitying love,
Thou hearest all alone
The short precursive moan,
When in their mountain lair th' awakening thunders move.
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2.
“Not for the Spoiler's parricidal hand,Nor the apostate land,
That I am darkly seen to mourn,
With earth-bent brow forlorn;
But that the widowed Church, in hour of pride,
Her sackcloth laid aside,
Slumbering in Canaan's camp, and wakes to mourn
Her ancient strength and glory shorn.
Where are thy weekly fasts? Thy vigils where?
Therefore each wandering air
Comes o'er thee desolate;
And ere it reach Heaven's gate,
Blows frustrate o'er the earth thy feeble-hearted prayer.”
3.
The flood-gates on me open wide,And headlong rushes in the turbulent tide
Of lust and heresies! a motley troop they come;
And old imperial Rome
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Her seven-horned head;
And Schism and Superstition, near and far,
Blend in one pestilent star,
And shake their horrid locks against the Saints to war.
4.
“Not for the flood-gates opening wide,I fear, nor for the turbulent rushing tide;
But for the Church, so loth at her mysterious board
To see her present Lord.
Therefore, around thine Altars deep,
The Angels bow and weep;
Or oh, in strength of Heaven's ennobling might,
How should we see the light!
And one a thousand chase, ten thousand turn to flight!”
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5.
Again I hear thy plaintive taleIn the autumnal gale;
But since thou passed'st through the fires,
With our old martyr Sires,
Thou seem'st as one escaped the flame,
But looking back for something left behind,—
The unshackled high resolve, the holier aim,
Single-eyed faith in loyalty resign'd,
And heart-deep prayers of earlier years.
And since that popular billow o'er thee past,
Which thine own Ken from out the vineyard cast,
Now, e'en far more
Than then of yore,
An altered mien thy holy aspect wears.
And oft thy half-averted brow
Doth seem in act to go,
With half out-spreading wings,
And foot that heavenward springs;
Therefore to thee I draw, by fear made bold,
And strive with suppliant hand thy mantle skirts to hold.
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6.
“Can they who flock to Freedom's shrine,Themselves to me resign?
There lift the Heav'n defying brow,
And here in meekness bow?
There to put on the soul aggrieved,
And attitude their high deserts to claim;
Here kneel from their deserts to be relieved,
Claim nothing but the Cross, and their own shame?
And now, behold and see
In holy place abomination stands,
Whose breath hath desolated Christian lands,
In semblance fair,
And saint-like air,
The Antichrist of heathen liberty!
E'en on Religion's hallowed ground,
He hath his altar found;
And now ere winter's net
Is o'er thy pathway set,
Haste and arise, to Judah's mountain flee,
And drink the untainted fount of pure Antiquity.”
γ.
| Lyra Apostolica (1864) | |