THE MEDITATION. Ir must be done, my soul, but 'tis a strange, When thou shalt leave this tenement of clay, When time shall be eternity, and thou Shalt be thou know'st not what, and live thou know'st not how. Amazing state! No wonder that we dread To think of death, or view the dead. Thou'rt all wrapped up in clouds, as if to thee Our very knowledge had antipathy. Death could not a more sad retinue find Sickness and pain before, and darkness all behind. Some courteous ghost, tell this great secresy, You warn us of approaching death, and why When life's close knot, by writ from destiny, When after some delays, some dying strife, Does she launch out into the sea of vast eternity! So when the spacious globe was deluged o'er, On the utmost bough the astonished sinners stood, NORRIS. HYMN TO DARKNESS. HAIL, thou most sacred, venerable thing! Thee, from whose pregnant, universal womb, Who can the secrets of thy essence tell? Before great Love this monument did raise, Before the folding circles of the sky Before the birth of either time or place, Thou reign'st unquestioned monarch in the empty space. Thy native lot thou didst to light resign, Here with a quiet, but yet awful hand, Y To thy protection fear and sorrow flee, And those that weary are of light, find rest in thee. Though light and glory be the Almighty's throne, From that his radiant beauty, but from thee Thus, when he first proclaimed his sacred law, Like princes on some great solemnity, He appeared in's robes of state, and clad himself with thee. The blessed above do thy sweet umbrage prize, When, cloyed with light, they veil their eyes; The vision of the Deity is made More sweet and beatific by thy shade; But we, poor tenants of this orb below, Don't here thy excellences know Till death our understandings does improve, And then our wiser ghosts thy silent night-walks love. But thee I now admire, thee would I choose For my religion, or my muse. "Tis hard to tell whether thy reverend shade And from thick groves went vows to Heaven. CHARITY. DID Sweeter sounds adorn my flowing tongue Softens the high, and rears the abject mind: Each other gift, which God on man bestows, Thus, in obedience to what heaven decrees, Knowledge shall fail and Prophecy shall cease; Nor bound by time nor subject to decay, In happy triumph shall for ever live, And endless good diffuse and endless praise receive. As through the artist's intervening glass Our eye observes the distant planets pass, A little we discover, but allow That more remains unseen than art can show: So, whilst our mind its knowledge would improve, Dawning of beams and promises of day; Heaven's fuller effluence mocks our dazzled sight, The sun shall soon be face to face beheld, In all his robes, with all his glory on, Seated sublime on his meridian throne. Then constant faith and holy hope shall die, One lost in certainty, and one in joy. Lasting thy lamp, and unconsumed thy flame, Shalt stand before the host of heaven confest, PRIOR. |