The Poetry of Wales | Page 7

his throne are placed;
The impartial judge the book

of fate shall scan,
The unerring records of the deeds of man.
The book is opened! mark the anxious fear
That calls the sigh and
starts the bitter tear;
The good shall hear a blessed sentence read,

All mourning passes--all their griefs are fled.
No more their souls
with racking pains are riven,
Their Lord admits them to the peace of
heaven;
The sinner there, with guilty crime oppressed,
Bears on his
brow the fears of hell confess'd.
Behold him now--his guilty looks--I
see
His God condemns, and mercy's God is He;
No joy for him, for
him no heaven appears
To bid him welcome from a vale of tears.

Hark! Jesu's voice with awful terrors swell,
It shakes even heaven, it
shakes the nether hell:
"Away ye cursed from my sight, retire
Down
to the depths of hell's eternal fire,
Down to the realms of endless pain
and night,
Ye fiends accursed, from my angry sight
Depart! for
heaven with saintly inmates pure
No crime can harbour or can sin
endure,
Away! away where fiends infernal dwell,
Down to your
home and taste the pains of hell.
Behold his servants--Lo, the virtuous bands
Await the sentence which
the life demands;
All blameless they their course in virtue run
Have
for their brows a crown of glory won.
Their Saviour's voice, a sound
of heavenly love,
Admits them smiling to the realms above:

"Approach, ye faithful, to the heaven of peace,
Where worldly
sorrows shall for ever cease.
Come, blessed children, share my bright
abode,
Rest in the bosom of your King and God,
Where thousand
saints in grateful concert sing
Loud hymns of glory to th' Eternal
King."
For you, beloved, I hung upon the tree,
That where I am
there also ye might be;
The infernal god (ye trembling sinners quake)

Shall hurl you headlong on the burning lake,
There shall ye die,
nor dying shall expire,

Rolled on the waves of everlasting fire,

Whilst Christ shall bid his own lov'd flock rejoice,
And lead them
upward with approving voice,
Where countless hosts their heavenly
Lord obey,
And sing Hosannas in the courts of day.
O gracious God!

each trembling suppliant spare--
Grant each the glory of that song to
share;
May Christ, my God, a kind physician be,
And may He grant
me bless'd Eternity!
THE IMMOVABLE COVENANT.
[The Reverend David Lewis Pughe, who translated the following piece
from the Welsh of Mr. H. Hughes, was a Minister in the Baptist Church,
and was possessed of extensive learning, and a highly critical taste.
After officiating as Minister at a Church in Swansea and other places,
he finally settled at Builth, where he died at an early age.]
Ye cloud piercing mountains so mighty,
Whose age is the age of the sky;
No cold blasts of winter affright ye,
Nor heats of the summer defy:
You've witness'd the world's
generations
Succeeding like waves on the sea;
The deluge you saw, when doom'd
nations,
In vain to your summits would flee.
You challenge the pyramids lasting,
That rolling milleniums survive;
Fierce whirlwinds, and thunderbolts
blasting,
And oceans with tempests alive!
But lo! there's a day fast
approaching,
Which shall your foundations reveal,--
The powers of heaven will be
shaking,
And earth like a drunkard shall reel!
Proud Idris, and Snowdon so tow'ring,

Ye now will be skipping like lambs;
The Alps will, by force
overpow'ring
Propell'd be disporting like rams!
The breath of Jehovah will hurl
you--
Aloft in the air you shall leap:
Your crash, like his thunder's who'll
whirl you,
Shall blend with the roars of the deep.
All ties, and strong-holds, with their powers,
Shall, water-like, melting be found;
Earth's palaces, temples, and
towers,
Shall then be all dash'd to the ground:
But were this great globe
plunged for ever
In seas of oblivion, or prove
Untrue to its orbit, yet never,
My God, will thy covenant move!
The skies, as if kindling with ire and
Resentment, will pour on this ball
A deluge of sulphurous fire, and
Consume its doom'd elements all!
But though heaven and earth will
be passing
Away on time's Saturday eve;
The covenant-bonds, notwithstanding,
Are steadfast to all that believe!
I see--but no longer deriding--
The sinner with gloom on his brow:
He cries to the mountains to hide
him,

But nothing can shelter him now!
He raves--all but demons reject
him!
But not so the Christian so pure;
The covenant-arms will protect him,
In these he'll be ever secure!
Thus fixed, while his triumphs unfolding,
Enrapture his bosom serene:
In sackcloth the heavens he's beholding,
And nature dissolving is seen;
He mounts to the summits of glory,
And joins with the harpers above,
Whose theme is sweet Calvary's
story--
The issue of covenant love.
Methinks, after ages unnumber'd
Have roll'd in eternity's flight,
I see him, by myriads surrounded,
Enrob'd in the garments of light;
And shouting o'er this world's cold
ashes--
"Thy covenant, my God, still remains:
No tittle or jot away passes,
And thus it my glory sustains."
He asks, as around him he glances,
"Ye sov'reigns and princes so gay,
Where are your engagements and
pledges?
Where are they--where are they to-day?
Where are all the