6

A-men.

1 I

T singeth low in every heart,
We hear it each and all,

A song of those who answer not,
However we may call:

They throng the silence of the breast,
We see them as of yore,

The kind, the brave, the true, the sweet,
Who walk with us no more.

2 'Tis hard to take the burden up, When these have laid it down; They brightened all the joy of life, They softened every frown:

But oh, 'tis good to think of them,
When we are troubled sore;
Thanks be to God that such have been,
Although they are no more.

3 More homelike seems the vast unknown,
Since they have entered there;
To follow them were not so hard,

Wherever they may fare;

They cannot be where God is not,
On any sea or shore;
Whate'er betides, Thy love abides,
Our God, for evermore.

John W. Chadwick, 1876

RUTHERFORD 7. 6. 7. 6. 7. 6. 7. 5.

Arr. from Chrétien Urhan, 1834, by Edw. F. Rimbault, 1867

of heaven breaks,

: 4

LEOMINSTER S. M. D.

George W. Martin, 1862; har, by Arthur Sullivan, 1874

1

"FOR ever with the Lord!"

Amen so let it be!

Life from the dead is in that word, 'Tis immortality.

Here in the body pent,

Absent from Him I roam,

Yet nightly pitch my moving tent A day's march nearer home.

2 My Father's house on high,

Home of my soul, how near,

At times, to faith's foreseeing eye
Thy golden gates appear!
Ah, then my spirit faints

To reach the land I love,
The bright inheritance of saints,
Jerusalem above.

3 I hear at morn and even,

At noon and midnight hour, The choral harmonies of heaven, Earth's Babel-tongues o'erpower.

Then, then I feel that He,
Remembered or forgot,
The Lord, is never far from me,
Though I perceive Him not.

4 "For ever with the Lord!"
Father, if 'tis Thy will,

The promise of that faithful word,
E'en here to me fulfil.
Be Thou at my right hand,
Then can I never fail;
Uphold Thou me and I shall stand,
Fight and I must prevail.

5 So when my latest breath

Shall rend the veil in twain,
By death I shall escape from death,
And life eternal gain.
Knowing as I am known,

How shall I love that word, And oft repeat before the throne, "For ever with the Lord!"

James Montgomery, 1835

PILGRIMS 11. 10. 11. 10. 9. 11.

48

Henry Smart, 1868

1

HA

swelling

O'er earth's green fields and ocean's wave-beat

shore:

The voice of Jesus sounds o'er land and sea; And laden souls, by thousands meekly stealing, Kind Shepherd, turn their weary steps to Thee.

telling

Of that new life when sin shall be no more! Angels of Jesus, angels of light, Singing to welcome the pilgrims of the night!

2 Onward we go, for still we hear them singing, "Come, weary souls, for Jesus bids you come," And through the dark, its echoes sweetly ringing, The music of the gospel leads us home.

dreary,

The day must dawn and darksome night be past; All journeys end in welcomes to the weary,

And heaven, the heart's true home, will come at last.

5 Angels, sing on, your faithful watches keeping; Sing us sweet fragments of the songs above; Till morning's joy shall end the night of weeping, And life's long shadows break in cloudless love. Frederick W. Faber, 1854: v. 5, lines 3, 4, alt.