The Poetical Works of Robert Montgomery :: :: University of Virginia Library

How eloquent the ruin'd shrine
August, or sad, or lowly!
'Tis haunted with a spell divine
Deeper than melancholy:
For still it breathes of poetry and prayer,
And mild dejection woos Religion there.

Temples, and tombs, and cities vast,
The roofless cot, or home
O'er which Destruction's wings have past,
And where pale memories roam,
How are we moved by their mysterious sway
And lulling sadness of severe decay?

Strange though it seem, not royal state,
Nor brilliant pomp and pride
Encircled round the earth-born great
To rank and wealth allied,
Attract the spirit with so true a power
As wreck and ruins in some pensive hour.

591

Engirdled are they by a spell,
A wordless charm of mind,
And something more than tones can tell
Sinks o'er the soul refined,
When the dead glories of departed Years
Moisten the eye with meditation's tears.

But, what are we, but wrecks of man,
A fallen race of sin,
Creatures who marr'd the Almighty plan
And let rebellion in,
Through that pure Will which Heaven created free,
Whose law was Love, and that was Deity.

And thus, perchance, for ruin'd Things
Our moral instinct wakes,
And o'er the heart's electric strings
A breath from Eden breaks,—
A mournful sense of forfeit-bloom and bowers
When Eve was perfect as the vestal flowers.

But if o'er what is dumb and dead,
A palace, shrine, or cot,
The tears of History are shed
And sanctify the spot
Where genius wept, or wisdom thrill'd and thought,
The martyr burn'd, or heroes bled and fought,

Shall not a living wreck of love,
An orphan sad and lone,—
Children whose angels stand above
So near the Glory-throne,
Soften the heart when sounds the touching phrase,
Heard in some homely tale of “Better Days?”

It is, indeed, a moving sight!
A pale and pensive child
Whose brow enthrones no young delight;
As though it ne'er had smiled;
Friendless and homeless, with dejected face
Too early touch'd with sorrow's withering trace.

Around it once fond parents hung
With love's enamour'd eye;
And Age itself again grew young
With that bright creature nigh!
Pangless the heart, the step was like the breeze
In bounding gladness borne above the seas.

Wealth, home and peace were there combined
To make that child secure;
And all which moulded heart and mind
Was radiant, sweet and pure:
Soft Innocence unveil'd her beauteous smile
And childhood flourish'd free from want and guile.

Prophetic dreams must oft have play'd
Around its virgin morn,
Ere baffled circumstance betray'd
A lot now bleak and lorn:
The future seem'd the poesy of life
Read by a heart with golden fancies rife.

But all is wither'd, changed and gone,
Friend, home and fortune o'er!
And hard-eyed worldlings cease to own
The wreck of wealth no more;
That once gay child is now a gloomy Thing
Wan with disease, or worn by suffering.

Blessings divine, then, hallow those
Who sheltering mansions build
To anchor from tempestuous woes
Children, whose hearts are fill'd
By past remembrance, blent with present grief,
Where life seems darkness, waiting death's relief!

Never till Christ unveils His throne
Whose heart beats human there,
And echoes to each plaintive tone
Breathed in the sigh, a prayer,—
Will the vast mercy these Asylums prove
Be understood, except by boundless love.

Long may they flourish! like the shrine,
St. Ann's of regal name;
Where better days, with love combine
To form a noble claim
For pleading orphans, and the helpless poor
In whom Christ owns His lot repeated o'er.