the good from ill;
And,
binding nature fast in fate,
Left free the human will:
What conscience dictates to be done,
Or warns me not to do,
This,
teach me more than hell to shun,
That, more than heaven pursue.
What blessings thy free bounty gives
Let me not cast away;
For
God is paid when man receives,
To enjoy is to obey.
Yet not to earth's contracted span
Thy goodness let me bound,
Or
think thee Lord alone of man,
When thousand worlds are round:
Let not this weak, unknowing hand
Presume thy bolts to throw,
And deal damnation round the land
On each I judge thy foe.
If I am right thy grace impart
Still in the right to stay;
If I am wrong,
O, teach my heart
To find that better way!
Save me alike from foolish pride
And impious discontent
At aught
thy wisdom has dented,
Or aught thy goodness lent.
Teach me to feel another's woe,
To hide the fault I see;
That mercy
I to others show,
That mercy show to me.
Mean though I am, not wholly so,
Since quickened by thy breath;
O,
lead me wheresoe'er I go,
Through this day's life or death!
This day be bread and peace my lot;
All else beneath the sun,
Thou
knowest if best bestowed or not,
And let thy will be done.
To thee, whose temple is all space,
Whose altar, earth, sea, skies,
One chorus let all Being raise,
All Nature incense rise!
ALEXANDER POPE.
ODE.
FROM "THE SPECTATOR."
The spacious firmament on high,
With all the blue ethereal sky,
And spangled heavens, a shining frame,
Their great Original proclaim;
The unwearied sun, from day to day,
Does his Creator's power
display,
And publishes to every land
The work of an Almighty
hand.
Soon as the evening shades prevail,
The moon takes up the wondrous
tale,
And nightly to the listening earth
Repeats the story of her birth;
While all the stars that round her burn,
And all the planets in their
turn,
Confirm the tidings as they roll,
And spread the truth from
pole to pole.
What though, in solemn silence, all
Move round the dark terrestrial
ball?
What though no real voice or sound
Amid their radiant orbs
be found?
In Reason's ear they all rejoice,
And utter forth a glorious
voice,
Forever singing, as they shine,
"The hand that made us is
divine!"
JOSEPH ADDISON.
LORD! WHEN THOSE GLORIOUS LIGHTS I SEE.
HYMN AND PRAYER FOR THE USE OF BELIEVERS.
Lord! when those glorious lights I see
With which thou hast adorned
the skies,
Observing how they moved be,
And how their splendor
fills mine eyes,
Methinks it is too large a grace,
But that thy love
ordained it so,--
That creatures in so high a place
Should servants
be to man below.
The meanest lamp now shining there
In size and lustre doth exceed
The noblest of thy creatures here,
And of our friendship hath no need.
Yet these upon mankind attend
For secret aid or public light;
And from the world's extremest end
Repair unto us every night.
O, had that stamp been undefaced
Which first on us thy hand had set,
How highly should we have been graced,
Since we are so much
honored yet!
Good God, for what but for the sake
Of thy beloved
and only Son,
Who did on him our nature take,
Were these
exceeding favors done?
As we by him have honored been,
Let us to him due honors give;
Let us uprightness hide our sin,
And let us worth from him receive.
Yea, so let us by grace improve
What thou by nature doth bestow,
That to thy dwelling-place above
We may be raised from below.
GEORGE WITHER.
HYMN
BEFORE SUNRISE, IN THE VALE OF CHAMOUNI.
Hast thou a charm to stay the morning star
In his steep course? So
long he seems to pause
On thy bald, awful head, O sovran Blanc!
The Arve and Arveiron at thy base
Rave ceaselessly; but thou, most
awful Form,
Risest from forth thy silent sea of pines
How silently!
Around thee and above,
Deep is the air and dark, substantial, black--
An ebon mass. Methinks thou piercest it,
As with a wedge! But
when I look again,
It is thine own calm home, thy crystal shrine,
Thy habitation from eternity!
O dread and silent Mount! I gazed upon
thee,
Till thou, still present to the bodily sense,
Didst vanish from
my thought. Entranced in prayer
I worshipped the Invisible alone.
Yet, like some sweet beguiling melody,
So sweet we know not we are
listening to it,
Thou, the mean while, wast blending with my
thought,--
Yea, with my life and life's own secret joy,--
Till the
dilating soul, enrapt, transfused,
Into the mighty vision passing, there,
As in her natural form, swelled vast to Heaven!
Awake, my soul! not only passive praise
Thou owest! not alone these
swelling tears,
Mute thanks, and secret ecstasy! Awake,
Voice of
sweet song! Awake, my heart, awake!
Green vales and icy cliffs, all
join my hymn.
Thou first and chief, sole sovereign of the vale!
O, struggling with the
darkness all the night,
And visited all night by troops of stars,
Or
when they climb the sky, or when they sink,
Companion of the
morning-star at dawn,
Thyself Earth's rosy star, and of the dawn
Co-herald,--wake, O, wake, and utter praise!
Who sank thy sunless
pillars deep in earth?
Who filled thy
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