Still be to me my only guide, For oh, if aught our steps can guide, Yes, love to God and love to man, Oh! may that light which heaven can shed, HAPPINESS. One morning in the month of May Tho' nature all around was gay, Can God, I thought, the just, the great, The boon of happiness? Tell me, ye woods, ye smiling plains, In which of nature's wide domains The birds wild caroll'd over head, No bless for man she knew. WEIR. I question'd LOVE, hose early ray And heard the timid genius say His light was dimm'd by tears. I question'd FRIENDSHIP: FRIENDSHIP sigh'd, I ask'd if VICE could bless bestow? I sought of FEELING, if her skili I question'd VIRTUE: Virtue sigh'd, I question'd DEATH-the grisly shade And "I AM HAPPINESS," he said, HYMN: WHEN rising from the bed of death, O'erwhelm'd with guilt and fear, I see my Maker face to face, O! how shall I appear? HEBER. If yet, while pardon may be found, My heart with inward horror shrinks When thou, O Lord, shalt stand disclos'd In majesty severe, And sit in judgment on my soul, O! how shall I appear? But thou hast told the troubled soul, Shall endless woe prevent. Then see the sorrows of my heart, And hear my Saviour's dying groans, For never shall my soul despair Who knows thy only Son has died ANON. AN EVENING SERVICE. THE cold wind strips the yellow leaf, While day's fair book is clos'd before us. On the tir'd world so softly sleeping. O! in an hour so still as this, From care, and toil, and tumult stealing, I'll consecrate an hour to bliss To meek devotion's holy feeling; Gave light to morn, and shade to even. Being, whose all-pervading might The laws of countless worlds disposes; Yet gives the sparkling dews their lightTheir beauty to the blushing roses; Thou, Ruler of our destiny! With million gifts hast Thou supplied us, Hidd'n from our view futurity, Unveiling all the past to guide us. Tho' dark may be earth's vale, and damp, Gladdens and gilds our path before us. BOWRING. THE SPRING FLOWER. A LOVELY flower, at morning hour, I saw no more the beauteous gem: Its every promise lost for ever; And all the dewdrops from the skies Thus have I seen a flower as fair; A doating parent's only joy, Bud forth, when storms were beating there, She withered, but unlike the flower, Which saw its early blossoming. To live, beside those living streams, Beneath those uncreated beamsWhose blessed light, and ceaseless ray, Make Heaven's eternal summers day. WEIR. VENI CREATOR SPIRITUS,' PARAPHRASED. CREATOR Spirit, by whose aid The world's foundations first were laid, Come visit every pious mind; Come pour thy joys on human kind. From sin and sorrow set us free, O source of uncreated light, Plenteous of grace, descend from high, Rich in thy sevenfold energy! |