University of Virginia Library

2. PART II.

SCENE I.

Naomi, Ruth, and Moabites.
RECITATIVE.
Nao.
Daughters of Moab, hear! By famine's hand
Opprest, erewhile I left my native land—
To you I came; ye took the stranger in,
And fill'd the place of country and of kin.
Now home recall'd, for leave to part I sue,
And my full heart must take the last adieu!

RECITATIVE.
Moab.
Wouldst thou their blessing from thy servants take?
Your LORD loves Moab for Naomi's sake.
AIR.
Where'er thy visit is addrest,
The household and the house are blest!

RECITATIVE.
Nao.
Though you, my friends, I quit, my broken heart
Leaves in your hospitable earth its better, dearer part!
AIR.
A long, long adieu, my kind neighbours, I take,
Ye wealth of the wealthless, ye strength of the weak!
While worth shall endear, or beneficence bind,
Your memory shall hold the first place in my mind:
And if ever your lot should oblige you to stray,
May others the friendship you shew'd me repay!

RECITATIVE.
Ruth.
Come, mother, come! no more indulge delay!
Towards your Israel's pleasant land I long to bend my way.

RECITATIVE.
Nao.
What means my daughter? would she leave
Her friends of Moab for her loss to grieve?

AIR.
Ruth.
Yes, mother, yes; with thee,
Though faint from travel and from toil,
Each land will prove a native soil,
Each house a home to me!
Companion'd with thee, as we journey along,
No time can be tedious, no road can be wrong!
RECITATIVE.
By wedlock, Ruth, allied to thee,
Became a graft of Israel's tree—
So firmly fix'd, so strongly tied,
No storm can shake, no stroke divide!

AIR.
Nao.
O flower of Moab, passing fair!
Say, shall my unpropitious hand
Thee, from thy native garden, bear,
To wither in a foreign land?

RECITATIVE.
Ruth.
Some power, unconquerably strong,
Impells thy daughter's steps along.
AIR.
As the LORD of thy Israel now reigneth above,
In his Kingdom of Peace, and his Regions of Love,
'Tis in vain
To restrain;
With thee I will wander, with thee will remain.
To the lot that is thine,
Or pleasant, or painful, with joy I resign;
Thy people, thy God, and thy grave, shall be mine!

RECITATIVE.
Nao.
O child, above all kindred dear,
Thou bless'd of our JEHOVAH, hear!
AIR.
I see, I see with other eyes,
From darkness distant radiance rise!
Soon shall the Promised Son be born,
And come on Solyma like morn,
Enlightening all her skies!

CHORUS of Moabites.
Amid the great the glorious thought,
Our souls to future times are caught.
We see, with other eyes,
From darkness distant radiance rise!
Soon shall the Promised Son be born,
And come on Moab like the morn,
Enlightening all her skies!