The Poetry of Wales | Page 6

to praise their mountain land?
Thou stand'st immovable, and firmly fixed
As Cambria's sons in battle, when they met
The Roman legions, and
their weapons mixed,
And clash'd as bravely as they can do yet.
The Saxon, Dane, and
Norman, knew them well,
And found them--as they are--invincible!
Majestic Snowdon! proudly dost thou stand,
Like a tall giant ready for the fray,
The guardian bulwark of thy
mountain land;
Old as the world thou art! As I survey
Thy lofty altitude, strange
feelings rise,
Of the unutterable mind's wild sympathies.
Thou hast seen many changes, yet hast stood
Unaltered to the last, remained the same
Even in the wildness of thy
solitude,
Even in thy savage grandeur; and thy name
Acts as a spell on
Cambria's sons, that brings
Their heart's best blood to flow in rapid
springs.
And must I be the only one to sing
Thy dear loved name? and must the task be mine,
To the insensate
mind thy name to bring?

Oh! how I grieve to think, when songs divine
Have echoed to thy
praises night and day,
I can but offer thee so poor a lay.
THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.
BY GORONWY OWAIN.
[This poet, who was born in 1722, obtained great celebrity in Wales; he
was a native of Anglesea, and entered the Welsh Church, but removed
to Donington in Shropshire, where he officiated as Curate for several
years. There the following poem was composed and afterwards
translated by the poet. The poem has been copied from a MS of the
poet, and is now, it is believed, published for the first time.]
Almighty God thy heavenly aid bestow,
O'er my rapt soul bid
inspiration flow;
Let voice seraphic, mighty Lord, be mine,
Whilst I
unfold this awful bold design.
No less a theme my lab'ring breast
inspires,
Than earth's last throes and overwhelming fires,
Than man
arising from his dark abode
To meet the final sentence of his God!

The voice of ages, yea of every clime,
The hoary records of primeval
time;
The saints of Christ in glowing words display,
The dread
appearance of that fateful day!
Oh! may the world for that great day
prepare
With ceaseless diligence and solemn care,
No human
wisdom knows, no human power
Can tell the coming of that fatal
hour.
No warning sign shall point out nature's doom;
Resistless,
noiseless it shall surely come,
Like a fierce giant rushing to the fight,

Or silent robber in the shades of night.
What heart unblenched can
dare to meet this day,
A day of darkness and of dire dismay?
What
sinner's eye can fearless then--behold
The day of horrors on his sight
unfold,
But to the good a day of glorious light,
A day for chasing all
the glooms of night.
For then shall burst on man's astonished eyes

The Christian banner waving in the skies,
Borne by angelic bands
supremely fair,
By countless seraphs through the pathless air.
The
heavenly sky shall Christ's proud banner form,
A sky unruffled by a
cloud or storm;
The bloody cross aloft in awful pride
Shall float

triumphant o'er the airy tide.
Then shall the King with splendour
cloth'd on high
Ride through the glories of the golden sky,
With
power resistless guide his awful course,
And curb the whirlwinds in
their wildest force.
The white robed angels shall resound the praise,

Ten thousand saints their choral songs shall raise
Now through the
void a louder shout shall roar
Than surges dashing on a rocky shore.

An awful silence reigns!--the angels sound
The final sentence to
the worlds around;
Loud through the heavens the echoing blast shall
roll,
And nature, startled, shake from Pole to Pole.
All flesh shall
tremble at the fearful sign,
And dread to approach the judgment seat
divine;
The loftiest hills, which 'mid the tempest reign,
Shall sink
and totter, levelled with the plain.
The hideous din of rushing torrents
far
Augment the horrors of this final war;
The glorious sun, the
gorgeous eye of day,
Shall faint and sicken in this vast decay.
From
our struck view his golden beams shall hide,
As when the Saviour on
Calvaria died;
The lovely moon no more in beauty gleam,
Or tinge
the ocean with her silv'ry beam;
Ten thousand stars shall from their
orbits roll,
In dread confusion through the empty pole.
At the loud
blasts hell's barriers fall around,
Even Satan trembles at the awful
sound!
Far down he sinks, deep in the realms of night,
And strives
to shun the glorious Son of Light.
"Rise from your tomb," the mighty
angel cries,
"Ye sleeping mortals, and approach the skies,
For
Christ is thron'd upon his Judgment Seat,
And for his mercy may ye
all be meet!"
The roaring ocean from its inmost caves
Shall send
forth thousands o'er the foaming waves;
From earth the countless
myriads shall arise,
Like corn-land springing 'neath benignant skies;


For all must then appear--we all shall meet
In dread array before
Christ's Judgment Seat!
All flesh shall stand full in its Maker's view--

The past, the present, and the future too;
Not one shall fail, for rise
with one accord
Shall saint and sinner, vassal and his lord.
Then
Mary's Son, in heavenly pomp's array,
Shall all his glory to the world
display;
The faithful twelve with saintly vesture graced,
Friends of
his cross around