The Poetry of Wales | Page 7

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 covenants sacred
That mortal with mortals e'er made?"?A silent voice whispers,--"Departed--
'Tis long since their records did fade!"
I hear him again, while he's winging
His flight through the realms of the sky,?Th' immovable covenant singing
With voice so melodious and high?That all the bright mountains celestial
Are dancing, as thrill'd with delight:?Too lofty for visions terrestial--
He vanishes now from my sight.
Blest Saviour, my rock, and my refuge,
I fain to thy bosom would flee;?Of sorrows an infinite deluge
On Calv'ry thou barest for me:?Thou fountain of love everlasting--
High home of the purpose to save:?Myself on the covenant casting,
I triumph o'er death and the grave.
AN ODE TO THE THUNDER.
TRANSLATED BY THE REV. R. HARRIES JONES, M.A.
[The author of the following poem, Mr. David Richards, better known by his bardic name of Dafydd Ionawr,