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The Paschal 
 
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 FOR PASSION-TIDE AND EASTER 
 
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 BY 
 
 ( API 19 1885. 
 
 
 A. CLEVELAND COXE 
 
 5 
 
 3 
 
 £tre ^.qnus *3n 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 JAMES POTT & COMPANY 
 
 1889 
 

 Copyright, 1889, 
 By A. CLEVELAND COXE. 
 
 Press of J. J. Little & Co., 
 Astor Place, New York. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 The poems here collected have been written, 
 nearly all of them, at the Season they celebrate, 
 in successive years. Some of them were written 
 more than forty years ago. The "Paschal New- 
 Moon," if I recollect, is the oldest of the series". 
 
 All that it may be desirable to say as intro- 
 ductory to this book will be found in the Notes. 
 I beg my kind reader to consult them, on points 
 that may require Scripture citations and other 
 references for the elucidation of the text. If any 
 of the poems are worth reading at all, they will 
 be found worth reading more than once, in con- 
 nection with the Church Lessons of the Season. 
 
 The Paschal-Season, as here understood, ex- 
 tends from the appearance of the Paschal New- 
 Moon to the octave of Pentecost, or Trinity Sun- 
 day. How sublimely the Christian poet has 
 said — 
 
 '• As through a zodiac moves the ritual year 
 Of Holy Church : stupendous mysteries, 
 Which whoso travels in her bosom eyes, 
 As he approaches them, with solemn cheer." 
 
 This book is designed to open some of those 
 " stupendous mysteries," especially to minds just 
 
IV PREFACE. 
 
 beginning to know and love the Church's system, 
 and to feel the attractions of her holy methods 
 for imparting a knowledge of the Scriptures, and 
 of those "truths that wake to perish never." 
 I pray God that all who accept my guidance in 
 these Scriptural Meditations may be helped by 
 it toward that Heavenly City which the glory of 
 the Lord doth lighten, and " the Lamb is the 
 light thereof." 
 
 A. C. C. 
 
 Leacote, Rhinebeck-on-Hudson, 
 April, 1889. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Proem i 
 
 The Paschal New-Moon 6 
 
 Prophecy g 
 
 Abel , 1 1 
 
 Melchizedek 13 
 
 The Great High Priest 15 
 
 Marah 17 
 
 The Transfiguration 19 
 
 The Garden 22 
 
 Spring Rains 25 
 
 Paschal Emblems 27 
 
 Symbols in Art 30 
 
 Hidden Flowers 33 
 
 The Saviour 36 
 
 Scripture Tokens 38 
 
 The Day of Palms 40 
 
 Leaven 49 
 
 The Well-Spring 51 
 
 A Hymn of Faith 53 
 
 The Rose of Sharon 59 
 
 Holy- Week 61 
 
 Messiah 63 
 
 Gethsemane 66 
 
 The Betrayer 69 
 
 The Council 74 
 
 Caiaphas 78 
 
 Pontius Pilate. . . . 80 
 
 Gabbatha 93 
 
 Calvary 96 
 
 Following the Lamb 98 
 
 The Cross-Bearer 100 
 
 The Way of Sorrows 102 
 
VI CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Golgotha 104 
 
 The Man of Sorrows 107 
 
 The Cross no 
 
 The Three Crosses 112 
 
 The Atonement 116 
 
 The Desire of Nations 120 
 
 Nicodemus. ... 122 
 
 The Burial 124 
 
 The Sepulchre 126 
 
 Easter 129 
 
 Easter in the Garden 131 
 
 The Easter Eucharist 134 
 
 The Bird Song 135 
 
 The Butterfly 1 37 
 
 Easter-Eggs .... 139 
 
 The Royal Yarn 143 
 
 Easter Virelay. 147 
 
 Song for Easter 149 
 
 Easter in Patmos 151 
 
 The Angels on the Ark 154 
 
 Rhoda 156 
 
 The Walk to Emmaus 159 
 
 The Earthquake 163 
 
 The Mystery of Life 167 
 
 Eudora 170 
 
 The Innocents 173 
 
 The Unbaptized 175 
 
 Euthanasia. 17S 
 
 A Thought from the Fathers 182 
 
 Amaranth 184 
 
 The Ascension 186 
 
 The Unspeakable Gift 188 
 
 The Two Pentecosts 190 
 
 Whitsunday 192 
 
 Homeward 194 
 
 The Giver of Life 196 
 
 The Trinity 195 
 
TO MARY AND ELIZABETH, 
 
 IN PARADISE. 
 
 PROEM. 
 
 The rainbow oft, on tears of April-tide, 
 In the sweet week of Easter, we behold ; 
 
 Its bow of beauty, like the Crucified 
 
 Bending from heaven, all nature to enfold 
 In Love's embrace. Then from that throne of 
 gold, 
 
 'Mid iris-lustres, in the highest sphere, 
 Seems to bend down its arch of emerolde ; 
 
 And Paradise, it seemeth very near, 
 
 As if the dwellers there perchance our sighs 
 might hear. 
 
 Sweet sisters, in repose ye wear new names, 
 Yet let me dream ye hearken. Once, in time, 
 
 Ye were my muses, and ev'n more than fame's 
 I courted your applause, in youth's glad prime, 
 When oft ye listened to my boyish rhyme 
 i 
 
2 TO MARY AND ELIZABETH. 
 
 With eyes that shone, as now they shine in 
 bliss. 
 Ah, borne too early to abodes sublime, 
 Fain would I know ye take it not amiss 
 Though angels' songs ye hear — to list a lay like 
 this. 
 
 Ye cannot hear my later songs, alas ! 
 
 Ye dearest ones that deign'd to praise my first : 
 So grieved the Weimar poet, in the glass 
 Of memory gazing on fair forms that nurst 
 His young adventure, ere its blossoms burst 
 In fancy's flowers and fragrance. Such my 
 thought 
 When for these songs, my last — perchance my 
 worst, 
 I coveted your ear. Yet are they fraught 
 With His dear Name of Names, who our redemp- 
 tion bought. 
 
 We grew together, lov'd by one whose pride 
 
 Watched o'er the budding of your loveliness ; 
 Nor knew we, for too soon, alas ! ye died, 
 
 All that he wrought our tender years to 
 bless, 
 
 Mingling wise counsel with his fond caress. 
 Wisdom and wit were his, and nature gave 
 
 His manly heart a maiden's tenderness ; 
 
TO MARY AND ELIZABETH. 3 
 
 And Christian hope adorns his lowly grave, 
 Where, on the field he fell, Christ's soldier, true 
 and brave. 
 
 5- 
 
 Nor less, while your sweet life was link'd with 
 mine, 
 I shared her love, who o'er your cradle bent 
 And trained your earliest thought to thoughts 
 divine : 
 For oft to me her kindly care was lent 
 In words of cheer, with gentle warning blent, 
 When to the poet's shell I tuned my youth. 
 She loved all arts the soul that ornament, 
 And wing'd her nestlings, like young birds for- 
 sooth, 
 To soar aloft betimes and bask in light and truth. 
 
 We parted, where the snow-peaks all aglow 
 Shone like an opal, and the setting sun 
 
 Flamed o'er the Pyrenees, in pleasant Pau, 
 Along the vale where restless Gave doth run : 
 And as we gazed, each an enraptured one, 
 
 'Twas well we heard no voices, save our own ; 
 For seem'd our life beginning — when 'twas 
 done ; 
 
 And with that sunset, oh ! forever flown 
 
 Are joys so long we knew, and hopes no longer 
 known. 
 
4 TO MARY AND ELIZABETH. 
 
 7- 
 
 Yet may I glean a moral from that dav 
 
 Of parting, and its light o'er mount and glen, 
 For in the Sun's own clime, the poets sav 
 
 He reigns at sunset, wears no crown till then. 
 
 So goes the adage, too, of meaner men ; 
 The end crowns labour. Welcome life's soft 
 eve ! 
 
 Who sings the Resurrection cries Amen, 
 As length'ning shadows mark the hour to leave 
 This life's deceitful scene, for scenes that ne'er 
 deceive. 
 
 S. 
 
 Ev'n as a bird forgets its wonted note 
 
 When death o'ershades its bower, and comes 
 no more 
 
 The smile that seemed upon its song to dote. 
 So when ye slept, my listless hand gave o'er 
 And lost its cunning ; for I grieved heart-sore, 
 
 Tuneless my shell and unfulfilled my dream. 
 Now, faith reproacheth that 1 thus forbore ; 
 
 Wake, languid shell nor moan, bv Babel's stream ; 
 
 Wake, from the willows wake, to Faith's trans- 
 porting theme. 
 
 Yes, wake my soul, in swan-like notes to sing 
 Of that blest home, where, nevermore to die, 
 
TO MARY AND ELIZABETH. 5 
 
 To them that slept comes Life's eternal spring, 
 Where Love enthron'd all human tears shall 
 
 dry, 
 Hearts claim their kin and brightens eye to eye. 
 Sweet sisters, ye are safe. For me, how rife 
 
 Perils of conflict, ev'n as years draw nigh 
 That bring the grateful furlough after strife, 
 And shines our even-star, the dawn of deathless 
 life. 
 
THE PASCHAL NEW-MOON. 
 
 Welcome thou little bow of light, 
 Faint gleaming in the Western height 
 
 O'er Day's decline ! 
 Thou, to the busy world of men, 
 Art but the month begun again ; 
 
 But to this eye of mine 
 Lighted by Faith's diviner ken, 
 
 A season and a sign. 
 
 2. 
 
 Welcome, reflected in the rill, 
 Thine image on the waters, chill 
 
 From melting snows : 
 But brighter, in the depths serene, 
 Of my glad soul, thy sacred sheen 
 
 The Church's index shows ; 
 Regent of holy-tides, and Queen 
 
 Of Easter's dawn and close. 
 
 3- 
 
 Thou hast been waited for : the lore 
 Of holy sages, long before 
 
 Hath marked thy day : 
 
THE PASCHAL NEW-MOON. 
 
 For with thy heavenly march sublime, 
 The Paschal-eve and Paschal-prime 
 
 One Lord, one law, obey ; 
 The Church hath calendar'd thy time, 
 
 And traced thy starry way. 
 
 And key-note of her Easter-song, 
 Is thy sweet tune, thy path along 
 
 In yon blue deep : 
 We watch thy crescent, till its rim 
 Is filled with glory to the brim, 
 
 And still our fast we keep ; 
 Then, tide-like, swells our Easter-hymn, 
 
 Round the whole earth to sweep. 
 
 5- 
 
 Thou bringest cheer ; thou endest days 
 Of fast with feast, of plaint with praise, 
 
 Of rue with balm. 
 Beauty for ashes thou dost bring ; 
 The oil of joy for sorrowing ; 
 
 For grief thou bringest calm ; 
 Thou changest tears to triumphing, 
 
 And Litany to Psalm. 
 
 6. 
 
 The bow of Joseph, thou ! Thy light 
 Reminds me of the Hebrew's right 
 And Egypt's wrong ; 
 
THE PASCHAL NEW-MOON. 
 
 Reminds me of Mosaic priests, 
 
 Their hyssop-branch, their bleeding beasts. 
 
 The prophet's goodly throng ; 
 Their bitter herbs, unleavened feasts, 
 
 And hallelujah-song : 
 
 7- 
 
 Reminds me of that night of gloom ; 
 The Twelve, the One, the upper-room ; 
 
 The Bread and Wine : 
 Of Olivet remindeth me, 
 OfKedron and Gethsemane ; 
 
 Of Thee, Redeemer mine ! 
 Thy cross, Thy cries, Thy victory, 
 
 Stupendous love divine. 
 
 8. 
 
 O Paschal moon, to wax and wane, 
 Though short thy date, how wide thy reign 
 
 Afar and near. 
 Thou art the Church's harvest-moon : 
 She sows in tears, but reapeth, soon, 
 
 A sheaf for every tear. 
 Shine on ! We catch thy heavenly tune, 
 
 And shout the harvest-cheer. 
 
PROPHECY. 
 
 Her seed shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his 
 heel. — Genesis, iii. 15. 
 
 Sweet spring, from clefts of Eden's Rock, 
 
 Freshening its meads that poured, 
 Grateful to man and herd and flock, 
 
 And birds that stooped and soared; 
 Bright rill, whose waters crystal-clear 
 
 Ev'n Silo's fount excelled, 
 And sent, meand'ring far and near, 
 
 Broad brooks thenceforth that well'd : 
 
 Oh ! fount of life to slake our thirst, 
 
 Four mighty streams that fed ; 
 Fair Paradise that water'd first, 
 
 Then parted, from each head, 
 To East and West and South and North, 
 
 Bestowing health and youth, 
 I joy to view, as from their birth, 
 
 Those streams of Light and Truth ! 
 
IO PROPHECY. 
 
 3- 
 
 Streams that are one as on they flow, 
 
 From age to age the same, 
 Yet broader and more glorious grow, 
 
 Rivers of Life their name; 
 Refreshing earth, reflecting skies 
 
 That smile above and shine, 
 Till, in the better Paradise, 
 
 They lose their flood divine. 
 
 4- 
 
 Sweet parable of promised grace, 
 
 The serpent's head to crush ; 
 I love th' unnumber'd rills to trace 
 
 That from that Promise gush ; 
 To see how confluent words of love 
 
 Enlarge their onward tide ; 
 And how, as to that sea above, 
 
 The waters grow and glide ; 
 
 5- 
 
 How prophecy becomes, at last, 
 
 The Gospel in its strength, 
 Flooding the world, and forth and fast 
 
 To heavenward speeds, at length ; 
 How in that ocean, boundless all, 
 
 Where faith is turned to sight, 
 The streams of truth and promise fall 
 
 And lose themselves in light. 
 
ABEL. 
 
 By it, he being dead, yet speaketh.— Heb. xi. 4. 
 
 Tis at fair Eden's gate, where bright 
 Shine the rapt cherubim, 
 
 And waves that flaming blade of light, 
 Barring the way* to Him 
 
 Whose fiery Law hath set the sword, 
 
 Whose Love the reconciling Word. 
 
 2. 
 
 Who shall that gate of glory ope 
 
 And Paradise unbar ? 
 Behold the Promised Seed, our Hope ; 
 
 Of Life the Morning-Star : 
 Whose symbol is a lamb that died, 
 With spotless fleece our shame to hide. 
 
 3- 
 
 Lo ! first of woman born, appear 
 Brothers in manly youth, 
 
 And to that golden gate draw near, 
 
 Where Mercy shines, and Truth. 
 
 Time's earliest Paschal-tide to keep, 
 
 One brings the choicest of his sheep. 
 
12 ABEL. 
 
 4- 
 
 Anon, their votive altars rise : 
 
 Faith's altar Abel rears, 
 And binds the lamb of sacrifice 
 
 With contrite prayer and tears ; 
 While for atoning love he pleads, 
 And views the mystic lamb that bleeds. 
 
 5- 
 
 Forth flames the fire of love divine, 
 But, of those altars twain, 
 
 On one alone its glories shine : 
 Cold is the pile of Cain, 
 
 Where, piled with gourds and berries crude, 
 
 God may partake a sinner's food. 
 
 6. 
 
 Cold is the heart of unbelief 
 
 That spurns the bleeding Lamb. 
 
 But hot is envious hate, and brief 
 
 Its slighted conscience-qualm. 
 
 Abel, faith's earliest martyr, dies, 
 
 Yet lives and speaks his sacrifice. 
 
 7- 
 Oh ! dread rehearsal, long before 
 
 Of Calv'ry's darker day, 
 When the Good Shepherd came and bore 
 
 In death our sins away : 
 When envious hate, with deeper stain, 
 Renewed the sacrifice of Cain. 
 
MELCHIZEDEK. 
 
 He was the Priest of the Most High God. — Genesis, xiy. 18. 
 
 OUT of the mist of ages comes, unknown, 
 
 His crown'd and mitred mien, 
 Who evermore, a Priest upon His throne, 
 
 Shall live and reign serene : 
 The King of righteousness His sceptre shews, 
 While palms and olives near the Prince of Peace 
 disclose. 
 
 2. 
 
 And Father Abraham bends and bows before 
 
 One greater far than He ; 
 Forth come the Bread and Wine, prefiguring 
 more 
 Than feeble sense may see : 
 The offer'd tithes His sacrifice proclaim, 
 And His High-priesthood own of everlasting 
 Name. 
 
 3- 
 
 Thus Abraham saw Christ's day. The man of 
 woes 
 Is Salem's mystic king ; 
 
14 MELCHIZEDEK. 
 
 The King of Righteousness whose names disclose 
 
 Of Peace the Prince and spring: 
 The wine-press, for our thirst, who comes to 
 
 tread, 
 And for our hungering souls to break the Living 
 Bread. 
 
THE GREAT HIGH PRIEST. 
 
 A Priest upon his throne. — Zech. vi. 13. 
 
 'Mid Alpine peaks, a hoary height and lone 
 
 Oft makes the morn its crown, 
 Bright o'er the mists. So shines the heavenly 
 throne 
 Where Abram's faith bows down, 
 And comes — tremendous Name — God's own 
 High Priest, 
 With faith's mysterious feast. 
 Unsired, Unborn, the Wonderful and dread, 
 
 He brings forth Wine and Bread, 
 Which, on that spot, he means to give afresh, 
 Disclosed at last and known, th' Eternal Word 
 made flesh. 
 
 In Salem's upper-room, that awful night, 
 
 See One with twelve recline. 
 With bitter herbs they keep the Paschal rite ; 
 
 Then takes He Bread and Wine. 
 Think, O my soul, 'tis He, the very same, 
 
 Melchizedek His Name, 
 
1 6 THE GREAT HIGH PRIEST. 
 
 The Man that is God's fellow, from of yore, 
 
 All human priests before, 
 Whom Abram met and own'd mankind's Desire, 
 Who blest that faithful man of faithful men the 
 Sire. 
 
 3- 
 
 We, then, his sons, as Father Abraham bent, 
 
 To Salem's Prince bow down ; 
 To Salem's Great High Priest our souls present, 
 
 And own His Cross and Crown. 
 His pierced hands we kiss, and pierced feet ; 
 
 For offertory meet, 
 Our alms, our hearts, ourselves bestow, 
 
 And all our pride down throw, 
 Athirst for God, and crying to be fed 
 Lord give us ever more Thyself, the Living Bread. 
 
 4- 
 
 For Oh ! once more, where thrones confess the 
 shock, 
 
 Our eyes shall see the same, 
 Ancient of Days, of ages the great Rock, 
 
 Who comes on wheels of flame ! 
 Serene He reigns o'er earth and earthly things, 
 
 The Lord, and King of Kings ; 
 And sits, a priest upon His throne, 
 
 Th' unchanging priest and lone 
 The Order of Melchizedek sublime 
 Before all worlds who bore, and bears beyond all 
 
 time. 
 
 f 
 
MARAH. 
 
 The waters of Marah were bitter: therefore the name 
 
 of it was called Marah And the Lord shewed him a tree, 
 
 which when he had cast into the waters, the waters were 
 made sweet. — Exod. xv. 23-25. 
 
 The Branch that sweetens Marah's wells, 
 Of Mary and Messiah tells : 
 How she, whom all mankind shall bless, 
 Yet shared our nature's bitterness, 
 Till He, upon her breast that lay, 
 Took the sad taint of Eve away. 
 
 2. 
 
 Hark ! o'er the Erythrean main, 
 
 'Tis Miriam's timbrel flings the strain, 
 
 Prelusive, to the faithful ear, 
 
 Of Mary's song- and rapture clear ; 
 
 For Miriam's name and Miriam's woe 
 
 Alike the taintless Maid foreshow. 
 
 The Sun with healing in His wings, 
 
 The Branch from David's root that springs, 
 
MARAH. 
 
 Of Gilead's Tree the spicy fare, 
 The balm and the Physician there, 
 To Marah and to Miriam give 
 The touch that bids the leper live. 
 
 4- 
 
 Mysterious tokens, from afar 
 
 That antedate Messiah's Star, 
 
 The rapt Magnificat foretell, 
 
 And shew the Branch to Israel, 
 
 Who reigns and speaketh from the Tree, 
 
 I am the Lord that healeth thee. 
 
THE TRANSFIGURATION. 
 
 Moses and Elias appeared in glory, and spake of His 
 decease which He should accomplish at Jerusalem. — St. Luke, 
 ix. 31. 
 
 Transfigured on the height, 
 
 Ere yet two thieves between, 
 Betwixt two saints in light, 
 
 Behold the Nazarene. 
 Behold the Lowly One, 
 
 In vesture like the snow, 
 And glistening like the sun, 
 
 In glory's noontide glow. 
 
 From Pisgah's grave atar, 
 
 'Tis Moses hovering here, 
 And from his fiery car 
 
 Elijah comes anear : 
 By saints of ancient names, 
 
 From seats of heav'nly rest, 
 For Peter, John, and James, 
 
 Messiah reigfns confest. 
 
20 THE TRANSFIGURATION. 
 
 3- 
 
 Hear Him, th' Incarnate Word, 
 
 Words from high heaven declare 
 Son of the Living Lord, 
 
 His Well-Beloved Heir. 
 Yet talk with Him the twain 
 
 Of death, reproach and loss, 
 Of thorns and nails the pain, 
 
 Of wormwood and the Cross. 
 
 Where naught the faithless eye 
 
 But shame and death can see, 
 These holy ones descry 
 
 O'er death his victory : 
 For, in that dazzling blaze, 
 
 The true Shekinah sheen, 
 Outshining noontide's rays, 
 
 The Cross transformed is seen. 
 
 5- 
 
 They talk with Him of death, 
 
 Like those who sing the psalm 
 With harps, and trumpets' breath, 
 
 Of Moses and the Lamb: 
 Breaks forth St. Peter's tongue, 
 
 He seems to heaven so near, 
 As if response were sung, 
 
 'Tis blessed to be here. 
 
THE TRANSFIGURATION. 21 
 
 Soon shall this scene' recall 
 
 Those blest apostles three, 
 When bends the Gocl of all, 
 
 In dark Gethsemane : 
 When, of the Lord of Life, 
 
 The bloody sweat they scan, 
 And horrours gathering - rife 
 
 Around the Son of Man. 
 
 Dejected, yet sustained, 
 
 In that mysterious hour, 
 Scattered, but yet regained, 
 
 When rises Christ with power. 
 How joys the little flock 
 
 In Tabor's light to see, 
 Of ages the great Rock, 
 
 The Lamb of Calvary. 
 
THE GARDEN. 
 
 They heard the voice of God, walking in the garden in 
 the cool of the day. — Gen. iii. 8. 
 
 I. 
 
 The flowers are zealous Christians in our clime, 
 And oft with their sweet selves they seem to vie, 
 Upspringing, as with holy rivalry, 
 
 Which shall look cheerfulest at Easter-time. 
 
 2. 
 
 Therefore, to me, all gardens in the spring, 
 Seem Joseph's garden, with religion rife ; 
 Full of the Resurrection and the Life ; 
 
 Of teachings full and holy worshipping. 
 
 3- 
 
 Blest be the darling crocus in its birth, 
 That from its icy sepulchre doth burst 
 Full of divine ambition to be first 
 
 Of all God's flowers, in holy Easter-mirth. 
 
 And blest the hyacinth, of varied dyes, 
 
 That forth, all fragrance from a rotten root, 
 Like grace from nature's misery, doth shoot, 
 
 In the bright season when the Lord did rise. 
 
THE GARDEN. 23 
 
 5- 
 
 Yea, blessed be all flowers that come in time 
 To deck the Paschal altar; violet, 
 Snowdrop, and arbutus, and mosses wet 
 
 From rills that cheer the forest with their chime. 
 
 There, 'mid the new-sprung grass, I love to walk, 
 Or where the upland wood in tender green 
 Of its first verdure, like a mist is seen, 
 
 Fringing each tiny shrub and wintry stalk ; 
 
 Where every sunbeam lights a miracle, 
 The clothing of each cold unsightly thing, 
 The spreading of the hills with carpeting, 
 
 The garnishing of moor and rock and fell ; 
 
 Where near at hand, or down the vista opes 
 The view of earliest blossoms, red and white, 
 'Mid tints of leafy emerald, dark and light, 
 
 And the sun's gilding on the hilly slopes; 
 
 9- 
 
 Where o'er the landscape everything I see 
 Impatient of its deadness, and with power 
 Asserting life in its appointed hour, 
 
 True to God's call, with wondrous energy: 
 
24 THE GARDEN. 
 
 IO. 
 
 So, walking in the garden, heard God's voice 
 Our fallen parents, but they heard with fear ; 
 While we, redeemed, exult His call to hear, 
 
 And with all nature in His smile rejoice. 
 
 II. 
 
 For who, that lives by faith in his true heart, 
 Knows not the meaning of returning Spring, 
 Lifts not toward heaven the soul's aspiring 
 wing, 
 
 Longs not thus upward dovelike to depart ? 
 
 12. 
 
 Oh ! shame, when flowers are Christians and 
 athirst 
 With all their beauty to adorn the Feast, 
 That Christian men should oft be last and 
 least, 
 Though bidden to the marriage-supper first. 
 
SPRING RAINS. 
 
 There went up a mist . . . and watered the whole face of 
 the ground. And the Lord God formed man.— Gen. ii. 6, 7. 
 
 I. 
 
 The showers of April on the violet's bed, 
 And on the earliest snowdrop's drooping head, 
 
 And on the new-sprung blade 
 Of promised harvest, shed — 
 
 How fragrant have they made 
 Each breeze of the sweet morn that round our 
 home hath played ! 
 
 2. 
 
 So every joy of home and love and life, 
 The tender love of mother, sister, wife, 
 
 The bliss that children bring 
 To cheer this mortal strife 
 
 And Time's o'ershadowing wing ; 
 These give their fragrance forth in Christ alone, 
 our Spring. 
 
 3- 
 
 'Tis His baptismal shower of love and grace, 
 Brings forth from dearest friendship's fond em- 
 brace, 
 And from sweet kindred's ties, 
 
26 SPRING RAINS. 
 
 And answering face to face 
 
 With commerce of kind eyes, 
 The perfume that is best, and all that deepest 
 lies. 
 
 4- 
 
 None know what loves, none know what friend- 
 ships mean, 
 Save they whose life in Christ is hid serene, 
 
 Who live and love in Him ! 
 Only such love, I ween, 
 
 Grows bright as eyes grow dim, 
 And lives beyond the grave among the Seraphim. 
 
PASCHAL EMBLEMS. 
 
 Beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded 
 unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Him- 
 self. — St. Luke, xxiv. 27. 
 
 I. 
 
 why to those whose art might rainbows throw 
 On clouds and shadows of the Law — so rare 
 Is given the heart to sketch in colours fair, 
 
 Those golden parables the Scriptures show ? 
 
 2. 
 
 Deem not St. Luke the first our Lord to paint ; 
 For in the Prophets, as in diadems 
 That flash and sparkle with imperial gems, 
 
 1 see His beauty crowned, nor dim nor faint. 
 
 3. 
 
 And were the pencil mine it should express 
 How, year by year, the Holy Week meseems 
 A vision multiform, wherein, like dreams, 
 
 Angels appear, 'mid bowers of loveliness. 
 
 4- 
 
 And dullest wits should warm and generous grow 
 The tap'stry work of Scripture to perceive ; 
 Not thread by thread, but as they interweave 
 
 Messiah's image, first and last, to show. 
 
28 PASCHAL EMBLEMS. 
 
 5- 
 
 Not of His glorious countenance one trace 
 Would I of painters borrow. That, for me, 
 Shines out in His Evangel, even as He 
 
 To those who love Him would reveal His face. 
 
 But the red rood in colours would I shrine 
 And glorify ; as, 'mid the stars, alone, 
 That cross shall glitter when the trump is 
 blown ; 
 
 Ev'n as it glitter'd once, to Constantine. 
 
 And as a portrait is with brilliants set, 
 I would enrich that sign, beneath, above, 
 And all around, with emblems of God's love, 
 
 Entwined with arabesque and quaint vignette. 
 
 8. 
 
 Eve's fig-leaves should be figured, sere and 
 strown, 
 Poor human arts to hide our sin and shame ; 
 And coats of skins, whose fleecy snows pro- 
 claim 
 The Lamb can clothe the sinner ; He alone. 
 
PASCHAL EMBLEMS. 29 
 
 And Cain's oblation, that high heaven offends, 
 Melons and gourds Faith's sacrifice should 
 
 mock, 
 While, on the firstling of blest Abel's flock, 
 
 The fire of God, in flaming love, descends. 
 
 10. 
 
 On Jacob's dying eye each form that rose 
 And kindled rapture would I trace around ; 
 There should the Shepherd and the Stone be 
 found, 
 
 And Joseph bleeding 'mid his archer foes. 
 
 11. 
 
 While in far vision, half assuming shape, 
 Should Judah's blessing ante-date the day 
 That from His vine unbinds and leads away 
 
 The ass's foal, and presses its red grape. 
 
 12, 
 
 And there that Rock should rise, engrav'd of yore 
 With Paschal emblems, by the Uzzian's hand, 
 That he who runs might read and understand — 
 
 Our dear Redeemer lives, for evermore. 
 
SYMBOLS IX ART. 
 
 A light that shineth in a dark place, until the Day dawn 
 and the Day-star arise. — 2 Peter, i. 19. 
 
 In an old castle, 'neath the Pyrenees — 
 
 I see ev'n now each height 
 
 Glitt'ring with opal light, 
 And the rich meads below, the river and the 
 trees ; 
 
 In that old castle, thro' long corridors, 
 
 The guide me led, one 
 
 As 'twere thro' history's way, 
 Where the dead past revived sad loves and 
 bitter wars. 
 
 3- 
 
 Behind the arras of a lordly hall 
 
 He brought me, and I stood 
 
 A moment in deep mood, 
 Where once th' assassin lurked, close crouching 
 by the wall. 
 
SYMBOLS IN ART. 31 
 
 4- 
 
 Behind the tap'stry, in a dubious light, 
 
 Its rougher side I read, 
 
 Just making out a head, 
 A hand, and what ? 'twas hard to read aright. 
 
 5- 
 
 And yet, methought, a figure on a hill 
 
 Seemed glittering like a shrine, 
 
 As if some grand design 
 Were hidden in the woof, but half emerging still. 
 
 Blindly I strove its story to descry, 
 
 Its hero or its scheme ; 
 
 But, as in mystic dream, 
 I felt Messiah's form was on that mountain high. 
 
 7- 
 
 I felt, but could not see ; for me defied 
 
 Crewel and scarlet thread 
 
 'Mid golden gleams or red, 
 Those traces faint, and rude of Art's untoward 
 side. 
 
 But when I came that tap'stried hall within, 
 Full flash'd, with wondrous sheen, 
 The whole transporting scene : 
 
 How on my vision blest it shone like Moses' skin ! 
 
32 SYMBOLS IN ART. 
 
 9- 
 
 Brighter than Moses' face, in morning light 
 
 Messiah's form I viewed; 
 
 And what before was crude 
 Came out in full design, as day deposes night. 
 
 10. 
 
 No more I spell'd and groped some clue to find 
 
 'Mid weavings deftly wrought ; 
 
 Clear was the artist's thought. 
 Who could not see it all, his eyes indeed were 
 blind. 
 
 n. 
 
 And as I went, this moral deep I drew : 
 
 Ev'n so, of Holy Writ 
 
 So dark to human wit, 
 And those twin Testaments, the Old and New, 
 
 12. 
 
 The Myst'ry is made plain ; who runs may read. 
 
 Even on the side severe 
 
 Messiah's signs appear, 
 Though faintly, in the Law, we trace the Prom- 
 ised Seed. 
 
 13- 
 Yet as in these old patterns of the loom, 
 Of yore the prophets wove 
 Their tapestry of Love ; 
 Who scans the Gospel-side sees what they meant 
 and Whom. 
 
HIDDEN FLOWERS. 
 
 The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. 
 
 When o'er the Spirit's words I pore intent, 
 My soul is like a maid 
 
 That goes a-Maying in the woodland shade, 
 Her peering eye down bent, 
 To spy here, there and everywhere, the flower 
 That most she covets for her own bright bower. 
 
 2. 
 
 So everywhere I seek, and always find, 
 The fragrant thing I prize, 
 The flower of flowers, whose beauty in mine 
 eyes 
 Surpasseth every kind 
 Of plant or gem, or creature blest with grace, 
 As childhood with its smiles, or woman's face. 
 
 3- 
 
 I find, as violets are found in Spring, 
 Stones and dead leaves amid, 
 But all too bright and fragrant to be hid, 
 Ev'n so that blessed thing 
 Where all seems lifeless if our faith be dim, 
 The name of Jesus, or some trace of Him. 
 3 
 
34 HIDDEN FLOWERS. 
 
 4- 
 
 I find my Saviour in the Rock ; the fount 
 That gushes from its cleft ; 
 In the cross'd hands of Jacob, right and left, 
 In Moses' Burning Bush and fiery Mount, 
 In Bread, in Wine, in wood, in nails, in thorns, 
 In every figure that the Psalms adorns. 
 
 5- 
 
 And when there pass, athwart the scenery 
 dread 
 Of the rapt prophet's dream, 
 Mysterious shadows, flecking the sunbeam 
 With something dark and undistinguished, 
 As in the wood that made the iron swim, 
 So, in the cloud, I still see only Him. 
 
 6. 
 
 In Miriam's song 'tis Mary's voice I hear ; 
 And Marah's bitter well 
 Sweet'ned by that fresh Branch of Israel, 
 Is the foul pool of nature made sincere 
 In Mary's womb, by Him she did conceive, 
 The Second Adam, born of the new Eve. 
 
 7- 
 
 Nor, as my foot along the desert shore 
 
 Treads in old Israel's way, 
 
 Beneath that fire by night and cloud by day, 
 Fails my fond heart to find, as I explore, 
 
HIDDEN FLOWERS. 35 
 
 The sands beneath me sparkling- with His love, 
 Ev'n as those symbols of His Truth above. 
 
 So, when in Elim's grateful shade I bait, 
 The good Physician nigh, 
 I count the wells of health that spring hard by, 
 And then the trees that bear the luscious date, 
 And find the Seventy, in that grove of palm, 
 Beside the Twelve Apostles of the Lamb. 
 
 9- 
 
 'Tis sweet to trace the Gospel in the Law ; 
 Faint outlines and obscure 
 Like the first crayon traits of portraiture, 
 Which the great Masters were enforced to draw, 
 Ere in the amber light of art divine 
 Transfigured Christ might on their canvas shine. 
 
 10. 
 
 So ever, as the Book of Life I scan, 
 Still be my soul a maid 
 
 Seeking the flower she loves in sun and shade. 
 I'd rather shout with Eve — "I've found THE 
 Man," 
 Four thousand years too soon, than live or die 
 Without the Faith that breathed in that fond cry. 
 
THE SAVIOUR. 
 
 Thou shalt call His Name JOSHUA, for He shall save. 
 I. 
 
 The serpent's head to bruise whose heel shall 
 bleed ? 
 
 What shall His Name be called — that Promised 
 Seed? 
 The oracles were dark, 
 
 Yet oft that name was heard as from the cur- 
 tained Ark. 
 
 " Tell me thy Name," the wrestling Jacob cries : 
 " Why dost thou ask my Name ? " the Word re- 
 plies. 
 And Jacob spake, o'erawed — 
 " This place is Peniel : I saw the face of God." 
 
 3- 
 
 " Thy name no more henceforth shall Jacob be, 
 But prince of God, for thou hast power with Me — " 
 
 So spake that tongue of flame ; 
 And Israel knew 'twas God, even from his own 
 new name. 
 
THE SAVIOUR. 37 
 
 Saviour and God ! a mystic name that weaves 
 Both words in one, the Son of Nun receives 
 
 As leader of God's band — 
 Where Moses could not lead — into the Promised 
 
 Land. 
 
 5- 
 Yet, on that Paschal Eve, at Canaan's door, 
 Comes the true Captain of God's host. Before 
 
 That Joshua divine 
 The meaner Joshua kneels, a shadow and a sign. 
 
 6. 
 
 Comes the true Joshua now, the Virgin's Son, 
 That Saving Name of the Anointed One 
 
 Unfolds prophetic art ; 
 And Mary kept such things and pondered in her 
 
 heart. 
 
 7- 
 
 Back on the Pentateuch like morning's fire 
 His coming flashes light ; and David's lyre, 
 
 Like Moses' face that shined, 
 Glows with the Saviour's name in mystic words 
 enshrined. 
 
 8. 
 As mountains dull thro' all the silent night 
 Glitter at dawn and show their crests in light, 
 
 So everywhere that Name 
 Forth from the prophets starts, as in the Day- 
 star's flame. 
 
SCRIPTURE TOKENS. 
 
 When Moses is read the veil is upon their hearts. 
 
 Some fail Messiah's radiant signs to see 
 In each prophetic scroll 
 Which the old rabbins of the Law unroll. 
 
 They read the page of mystic history, 
 The flaming Psalm, or Canticle benign, 
 As though 'twere human lore, and not divine. 
 
 Forgive poor Israelites when souls baptized 
 God's glorious Word explore, 
 To grope and feel their way and find no more 
 
 Than the blind leaders of the circumcised, 
 Where Israelites-indeed with rapture scan 
 The Son of God, the promised Son of Man. 
 
 So everywhere th' anointed eye descries 
 A greater Solomon, 
 A nobler David, the Almighty One 
 Whom Abraham saw with Faith's uplifted eyes. 
 For not in feasts alone, but, day by day, 
 The Scripture, as with sunshine, cheers our 
 way. 
 
SCRIPTURE TOKENS. 39 
 
 And me, Christ's footprints striving oft to trace, 
 As following'where He led, 
 By old prophetic symbols comforted 
 And plodding onward as with patient pace — 
 Me oft a rapture seizes — when I view 
 Some veil withdrawn — faith making all things 
 new. 
 
 As where they wash the glitt'ring sands for gold 
 In bright Golconda's mines, 
 Oft 'mid the sparkling grains a diamond shines, 
 Which the well-shaken sieve with greed must 
 hold; 
 It cannot pass, it is so great a thing — 
 And then 'tis claimed for tribute to the king : 
 
 So, when some word in Holy Writ shines out, 
 Dazzling- my ardent sight, 
 
 As 'twere that Indian gem, the Mount-of-Light, 
 I claim it for my King. 'Tis Christ's, no doubt; 
 
 For claim it lawfully what mortal can ? 
 
 'Tis far beyond the measure of a man. 
 
THE DAY OF PALMS. 
 
 Thy King cometh unto thee : He is just and having sal- 
 vation : lowly and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt, the 
 foal of an ass. — Zech. ix. 9. 
 
 I. 
 
 The Paschal-moon proclaims the Feast is nigh, 
 Whose sign in heaven the faithful still obey ; 
 And as she sails through airy waves on high, 
 Cleaving the clouds that break like ocean's 
 
 spray, 
 My soul, like her, finds out its heavenly way, 
 And walks with God. I taste Siloam's spring ; 
 
 While the high service of this holy day, 
 This Feast of Palms, prolongs my worshipping, 
 And all that scene brings back of Salem's tri- 
 umphing. 
 
 2. 
 
 A light on Zion of the Spring's sweet morn 
 Is glistening from the Temple's every spire ; 
 
 An early crowd through each high gate is borne, 
 And thronging pilgrims, with insane desire, 
 Hither and thither, for their way inquire, 
 
 Urged by some strange alarm, they know not 
 why ; 
 The truant boy runs past, with soul on fire; 
 
 And Judah's mothers, as the surge goes by, 
 
 Strain o'er the long highways a vaguely vacant 
 eye. 
 
THE DAY OF PALMS. 41 
 
 " Ho, child ! what makes thee from thy tasks 
 to-day ? " 
 " Nay, blame me not, thou reverend Saddu- 
 cee, 
 The world goes out to meet Him, for they say 
 The Nazarene draws nigh. Nay, hark ! 'tis 
 
 He 
 Outside the Sheep-gate ; do not hinder me ! 
 Thou, too, shouldst see Him. With a word He 
 can 
 Cast out the devils, still the raging sea, 
 And lately He upcalled a buried man 
 That had been four days dead ! Hark ! " cried 
 the boy, and ran. 
 
 All this — while bitter Rabbins heard to spurn, 
 And mocked with sneers the idly prating 
 wight — 
 A ruler heard and felt within him burn 
 
 The soul that communed once with Christ by 
 
 night. 
 'Twas Nicodemus; taught to frame aright 
 The urchin's babble, its intent he knew. 
 
 Anon, upon the Temple's massive height, 
 Musing and lonely, stood that noble Jew ; 
 There let us stand with him, and all the 
 pageant view. 
 
42 THE DAY OF PALMS. 
 
 5- 
 
 Along the vale, and clown green Olivet, 
 
 Judaea's peasants come in straggling throng ; 
 And one among them on a beast is set, 
 In lowly state, yet passing meek along. 
 Loudly they chaunt ; and now the mellowed 
 song, 
 By starts, upon the fitful breeze upswells. 
 
 Unwonted strains the echoing cliffs prolong ; 
 That rapt hosanna, 'mid Moriah's dells, 
 Alike strange things recalls and stranger things 
 foretells. 
 
 6. 
 
 Yestreen the Sabbath closed. To-day the rocks 
 
 Resound with bleatings ; from the emptied 
 fold 
 The little lambs, in droves and frighted flocks, 
 
 Are led to bleed like Abel's lamb of old. 
 
 Another Lamb comes with them; and behold ! 
 While bitter herbs are for the Paschal bought, 
 
 Tokens abound, and symbols manifold, 
 That ne'er before unleavened bread was sought, 
 Or hyssop from the wall, with like fulfilment 
 fraught. 
 
 7- 
 For yonder crowd upsends the very word 
 
 That long agone was heard from Zachary, 
 Bidding Jerusalem behold her Lord, 
 
 And promising His coming thus should be 
 
 Majestical, in meek humility. 
 
THE DAY OF PALMS. 43 
 
 Hosanna ! Yes, the very stones outcry; 
 
 And shall the tribes of Jacob sullenly 
 
 Refuse hosannas, when, before their eye, 
 
 The Son of David comes, and God Himself draws 
 
 nigh ? 
 
 8. 
 
 'Tis thy last Paschal, Salem ; fatlings fed 
 
 And turtle-doves anon shall cease to bleed; 
 For he that thus to sacrifice is led 
 
 Is Abra'm's Lord and Eve's expected Seed. 
 He that makes all things new for human need 
 Comes like the sheep before her shearers dumb 
 
 To bear the thorny crown and barren reed ; 
 Yes, this is He — amid the city's hum, 
 The patient Paschal Lamb that sayeth — Lo, I 
 come. 
 
 9- 
 Though speechless He, thus, to the hurtling 
 crowd 
 Whispers the Spirit ; while from palm and 
 bay 
 They tear green spoils to bear, before Him 
 bowed, 
 And fragrant things to strew His royal way: 
 And clambering youth wave branches freshly 
 
 gay. 
 
 Of peaceful olive o'er the Prince of Peace. 
 
 Oh, Paradise ! so waves each palmy spray 
 Thy shining legions bear, in sweet release 
 Where swells the Paschal Hymn that never more 
 shall cease. 
 
44 THE DAY OF PALMS. 
 
 IO. 
 
 All this, the while, full many a faithless eye 
 From roof and terrace, faithless still, hath 
 seen ; 
 And dull Herodians, trembling at the cry 
 
 Of Pilate's minions, seek what this may mean. 
 For now, emerging from the deep ravine, 
 The pomp hath passed within the ponderous 
 gate. 
 From porch and jealous lattice forth they lean, 
 Mother and maiden ; hoary fathers wait, 
 Uplifting shrivelled hands, to view this kingly 
 state. 
 
 ii. 
 "Back, brawling slave. While Csesar is your 
 king 
 This shall not be," a mailed centurion said, 
 And struck to earth a youth, that, clamouring 
 He knew not what, his errant comrades led. 
 " What next ? " a Levite breathed, and shook 
 his head ; 
 A PvOman knight came prancing by and sneered; 
 
 A flaunting Pharisee deep curses shed 
 On vulgar skulls, whileas a lawyer leered ; 
 And close at hand — 'twas He — the Xazarene 
 appeared. 
 
 12. 
 
 The foal unloosed from Judah's vine he rides, 
 But low derision frights the stumbling beast. 
 
THE DAY OF PALMS. 45 
 
 One cries : " A cross is scored on asses' hides : " 
 "Yes, mark that token well," responds a 
 
 priest. 
 "' Nay, father ! so 'twas prophesied, at least, 
 Our King should ride," rejoined one gentle 
 tongue. 
 'Twas hers that poured the spikenard at the 
 feast, 
 And o'er His feet with streaming tresses hung, 
 That, much forgiven, loved much, and thus to 
 Jesus clung. 
 
 13. 
 Stand thou within this portal, and thine eyes 
 
 Shall see Melchizedek, of ancient day. 
 Lo ! on the ass's foal, in lowliest guise, 
 
 The Man that is God's fellow ! Breathless stay, 
 And wait with throbbing heart till comes this 
 way 
 The Man of Sorrows. Yes, He draweth near. 
 
 O God ! I cannot look without dismay : 
 His youth is old, and on His cheek the tear 
 Hath early worn full deep the marks of many a 
 year. 
 
 14. 
 Mercy and Majesty ! I see God's face 
 
 In this the Son of Man. Divinest thought 
 Hath in His front its un mistaken trace, 
 
 And His mild eye with Love immense is 
 
 fraught, 
 While the shorn lamb is thus to slaughter 
 brought, 
 
4.6 THE DAY OF PALMS. 
 
 And bulls of Basan roar with maddened men. 
 Joy lights the scribe's dark brow to see Him 
 
 caught 
 In toils full deftly spread. Why thus, again, 
 Where late they took up stones, seeks He their 
 
 wolfish den ? 
 
 15- 
 
 " Hosanna to the Son of David ! " Yes, 
 
 The shouting people know not what they 
 mean ; 
 Yet oft the voice of man cloth God's express, 
 
 And as o'er chaos moved the Dove serene, 
 
 So oft in tumult is the Spirit seen. 
 Hosanna ! let the Temple open wide 
 
 Her golden gates, thrice-blessed Nazarene, 
 To welcome Thee, whom prophets glorified; 
 For Shiloh is thy name; the sceptre thine beside. 
 
 16. 
 
 So to His Temple came the Holy One ; 
 
 And He who heeded not the people's cheers, 
 When lisping babes proclaim Him David's Son, 
 
 How tenderly their infant tongues He hears ! 
 
 His kindly voice their cherub voices cheers, 
 And, while blaspheming priests with bitter 
 tongue 
 
 Repress the chorus, lo ! with loving tears 
 He owns their homage, long by seers fore-sung, 
 The perfect praise and pure of babes and suck- 
 lings young. 
 
THE DAY OF PALMS. 47 
 
 17. 
 
 Nor marvel thou if on the backs abhorr'd 
 
 Of thieves, that chaffer'd in the House of 
 Prayer, 
 Sounded the threshings of that whip of cord, 
 Proclaiming that the Temple's Lord was 
 
 there : 
 So Judah's Lion riseth from his lair. 
 Meanwhile the Lamb in all His features shone, 
 And that same hour, more wont man's woes 
 to bear, 
 He healed the sick, assuaged the sufferer's moan, 
 Leper and blind and lame — all sorrows but His 
 own. 
 
 Oh ! Lamb of God, that tak'st our sins away, 
 
 So moved the Infinite within Thy breast, 
 With myst'ries from before Creation's Day, 
 
 Thus to take part in our poor world's unrest ; 
 
 For our relief to be Thyself distressed, 
 For man's release to be the victim bound ! 
 
 Trembling, I worship, my Redeemer blest; 
 For not, like Thomas, would I probe Thy wound, 
 Or that abyss explore whose fathom ne'er was 
 found. 
 
 19. 
 
 Yet bid me meet Thee, from the tomb un- 
 sealed, 
 And walking to Emmaus ; like a coal 
 
48 THE DAY OF PALMS. 
 
 To feel my heart burn in me, when reveal 'd 
 I see the Law's dread page, the prophet's 
 
 scroll, 
 And trace Thy tokens down from Eden's goal : 
 For thus is purged from rheums and scales as 
 vile 
 Man's skeptic eye, and parables unroll 
 And ^Psalms unfold Thy Name — each weary 
 
 mile 
 Of those that walk with Thee to brighten and 
 beguile. 
 
 20. 
 But lo ! the Paschal moonbeam from the 
 East 
 On Kedron's rill sheds holy influence bright ; 
 Now cleanse their platters Pharisee and priest, 
 Their hearts fermenting still with Cain's 
 
 despite, 
 Their leaven of malice taints the legal rite, 
 For Joseph's breth'ren hate him. He afar 
 
 Hath gone where Martha's kindly lamp gives 
 light, 
 And Mary listens with enrapt Lazar, 
 Till shines o'er Bethany once more the Morning 
 Star. 
 
LEAVEN. 
 
 Not the leaven of bread.— St. Matt. xvi. 12. 
 I. 
 The moon is full, the moon shines fair ; 
 The feast is nigh ; of leaven beware ! 
 Unleavened bread be Judah's care. 
 
 2. 
 
 One crumb of leaven, it taints the whole 
 So reads the great Law-giver's scroll, 
 Confirm'd by Sinai's thunder-roll. 
 
 3- 
 Ye sons of Jacob stand aloof 
 From Gentile tables ; make sure proof 
 Of house and home from floor to roof. 
 
 4- 
 Scour cup and platter. Leave no trace ; 
 Scrape, purge and every spot efface, 
 Lest leaven be there, so bad and base ! 
 
 5- 
 
 Outside so clean, but all within 
 Fermenting malice, crime and sin ; 
 So did th' unleavened days begin. 
 
 6. 
 The leaven of bread is put aside, 
 But envy, hate, and guile abide, 
 For Jesus must be crucified ! 
 
50 LEAVEN. 
 
 7- 
 
 They would not enter Pilate's hall : 
 'Twould leaven and defile them all. 
 Horrours, to think of such a fall ! 
 
 So taught the scribes, and wonder we 
 Such blind and senseless rites to see : 
 We marvel at the Pharisee. 
 
 9- 
 
 We marvel ; but ourselves, the while, 
 Doth naught of that old leav'n defile ? 
 Of malice naught — nor hate, nor guile ? 
 
 10. 
 
 How dare we, Shepherd of the sheep, 
 With Thee our Passover to keep, 
 Unpurified from stains as deep ? 
 
 n. 
 
 Gracious the Lent and blest the week, 
 If steadfast, and in duty meek, 
 Sincerity and truth we seek. 
 
 12. 
 
 So may we joy to keep the Feast, 
 From chains of sin and shame released, 
 With Thee our Prophet, King, and Priest. 
 
THE WELL-SPRING. 
 
 Then Israel sang this song, Spring up, O Well. — Numb. 
 xxi. 17. 
 
 I. 
 
 The great Law-giver smote the Rock : 
 Forth gushed the waters at the shock, 
 And Israel drank the wave, as 'twere a shep- 
 herd's flock : 
 
 Spring up^ O Well ! 
 
 2. 
 
 Nor ceased that Rock to slake their thirst ; 
 It followed them as at the first. 
 Where'er they went afresh the Rock would burst: 
 c, Spring up, O Well ! 
 
 3- 
 
 No servile toil to dig the sands ! 
 But nobles, with their sceptred hands 
 Struck the parched soil and spake their mild 
 commands : 
 
 Spring up, O Well ! 
 
 4- 
 Their princes pierced the arid plain, 
 And gushed the hidden springs amain ; 
 While Israel's daughters danced and sang the 
 strain — 
 
 Spring up, O Well ! 
 
52 THE WELL-SPRING. 
 
 5- 
 
 That Rock was Christ the Crucified ; 
 Nor, till the soldier pierced His side, 
 Knew they what Well of Life it signified : 
 Spring up, O Well ! 
 
 And still along Life's desert way 
 That Rock yet follows us each day : 
 We ope that streaming font where'er we pray— 
 Spring up, O Well ! 
 
 7- 
 
 The babe that to the font they bring 
 Invokes again the hidden Spring ; 
 Those rosy lips, had they but words, would sing 
 Spring up, O Well ! 
 
 The priest, that in the utmost lands 
 Before the Christian altar stands, 
 Says, o'er the crimson 'd cup uplifting hands — 
 Spring up, O Well ! 
 
 9- 
 
 Oh! then, to cleanse my soul begin, 
 Bath of my soul, from shame and sin : 
 And that I thirst no more, spring up within ; 
 Spring up, O Well ! 
 
A HYMN OF FAITH. 
 
 How are the dead raised up ? and with what body do they 
 come ? — i Cor. xv. 35. 
 
 How can these things be ?— St. John, iii. 9. 
 
 I do not exercise myself in great matters which are too 
 high for me. — Ps. cxxxi. 2. 
 
 I. 
 
 There are, like that old Pharisee by night, 
 Who talk, in darkness, with the Light of Light, 
 Answering, like cuckoos, to each mystery — 
 How can it be ? 
 
 How are the dead raised up ? — as 'twere in strife 
 With Him, the Resurrection and the Life ; 
 As if no mystery to sight and thought 
 Were daily brought ! 
 
 But me, content, the Psalmist's rule restrains, 
 And from presumptuous words my soul refrains, 
 Happy may I but live, all undefiled, 
 A weaned child. 
 
54 A HYMN OF FAITH. 
 
 4- 
 
 For base, at best, that impudence of doubt, 
 That mocks the Infinite, with searching out; 
 As if Who wrought of Nature the deep plan 
 Were weak as Man, 
 
 5- 
 
 I would not be more wise than what is writ, 
 In things that are too high for human wit, 
 Sublimer far to own th' unbounded Vast 
 Around us cast ; 
 
 Where oft, like men of lore who read the face 
 Of spangled Night, I seem to feel in space 
 New worlds, that were not made for mortal eye, 
 To Faith draw nigh. 
 
 7- 
 
 Nor would I follow where, if man hath trod, 
 Or mounted as on waxen wings to God, 
 Perchance he ventured towards the throne — 
 too near 
 
 For holy fear. 
 
 There is a holiest of the holies— where 
 The seraphs veil their faces, nor would dare 
 Look curious upward : for the Holy One 
 Outshines the sun. 
 
A HYMN OF FAITH. 55 
 
 9- 
 
 Stone-blind the bard — too bold of mind and eyes 
 Who there presumed in fancy's flight to rise — 
 Stone-blind he turn'd : yet sung of Eden's prime 
 In dream sublime. 
 
 10. 
 
 Perchance he err'd, ev'n dreaming, so to blend 
 With truth his fable, as if truth to mend. 
 Nor yet, like Dante, would I pass below, 
 Where spirits go. 
 
 ii. 
 
 Not me the sibyl's bough or lips should win 
 Profanely venturing, with the dead in sin, 
 To follow Virgil and the Florentine 
 
 'Mid depths unseen. 
 
 12. 
 
 For oh ! what better things, from pride concealed, 
 Glorious and vast are to the meek revealed : 
 How oft of Heaven we gain what we forego 
 By stooping low. 
 
 13- 
 
 How oft, in God's stupendous book, unroll 
 Tokens of things unseen, that lift my soul 
 Out of earth's dross, beyond this life of sense, 
 To realms immense ! 
 
56 A HYMN OF FAITH. 
 
 14. 
 
 How sweet in childlike love to meet Thy test ; 
 Because Thyself I know, to trust the rest ; 
 Because Thou mak'st eternity mine own, 
 Much to postpone. 
 
 15- 
 
 Not less where Science bids her tapers burn 
 It me delights with her to muse and learn, 
 Discov'ring more and more, in Nature's plan, 
 That humbles man. 
 
 16. 
 For He who all things made, makes all things 
 
 new ; 
 Makes bare His works to prove His word most 
 
 true ; 
 Upbraids our sloth and saith to sense and sight : 
 Let there be Light. 
 
 17. 
 
 Hail ! childlike Wisdom, hail Elect of men 
 Who range through space, as 'twere with angel's 
 
 ken, 
 Yet own how all that makes progressive lore 
 Faith knows before. 
 
 18. 
 A Holy Ark fast closed ! 'Neath Nature's lid, 
 What worlds of wonder unattained lie hid ! 
 Sure, of all knowledge and all truth — the key 
 Is knowing Thee : 
 
A HYMN OF FAITH. 57 
 
 I 9 . 
 
 Is knowing Thee, of Love the Bleeding- Lamb ; 
 Is knowing Thee, th' unsearchable I Am ; 
 Is in the soul thy seven-fold gifts to shrine, 
 Spirit Divine. 
 
 20. 
 Thine the true Science, Thine the rainbows 
 
 bright 
 On Newton's glass where falls one ray of light ; 
 For God is Light, and light in reason's noon 
 Is found triune. 
 
 21. 
 
 Hail, star-eyed Science ! Welcome to the choir 
 Where saints with Seraphim attune the lyre ! 
 Welcome the seer august who comes to prove 
 God's earth doth move : 
 
 22. 
 
 Whose reverent thought, baptiz'd in heavenly 
 
 dews, 
 Not less the Moving Hand discerns and views; 
 Discovers, as he scans the starry zone, 
 That naught is known : 
 
 2 3- 
 Naught but faint whispers from Eternity : 
 While dark and deep abides the shoreless sea, 
 Where gleans the sage some shells from Na- 
 ture's verge, 
 
 Hard by its surge. 
 
58 A HYMN OF FAITH. 
 
 24. 
 
 Thus let us deal with matter as 'tis meet. 
 Tis naught but ashes under Faith's firm feet, 
 Naught but the nest where grows the Phoenix- 
 wing 
 
 Soon forth to spring : 
 
 25. 
 
 Naught but the cottage frail of moulded clay 
 Whose shatter'd walls let in some light of day ; 
 Where yearns the soul in life and light to soar, 
 Forevermore. 
 
THE ROSE OF SHARON. 
 
 I am the Rose. — Cant. ii. i. 
 I. 
 
 SOME say Crusaders, in Gethsemane, 
 
 Found blood-red flowers that now grow every- 
 where ; 
 But me, each thorny rose that scents the air, 
 
 Minds of that gory crown on Calvary. 
 
 2. 
 
 Perhaps 'tis true, from spicy seeds that fell 
 
 At Christ's embalming, 'round the rocky door, 
 Even as the Saviour to His rest they bore, 
 
 Sprung amaranth and fragrant asphodel. 
 
 3- 
 
 Howe'er it be, I deem since time began 
 The flowers were parables to wounded hearts : 
 And still their silent fragrance often starts 
 
 Refreshing tears and speaks in signs to man. 
 
 4- 
 
 They rise in beauty, at our Easter tide, 
 From nothingness asserting life anew, 
 Rise in all colours bursting into view, 
 
 And quickened every one because it died. 
 
60 THE ROSE OF SHARON. 
 
 5- 
 
 I know their meaning. To my gladsome ear 
 The voice of God seems most articulate : 
 " Ev'n so," it tells me, " let the dead await 
 
 My call to rise : in time they too shall hear " 
 
 6. 
 
 And shall His children then like earth-worms 
 
 grope, 
 
 And bred of earth with earth contented be ? 
 
 Nay, dear Redeemer, Heaven is ours in Thee, 
 
 And though we die our flesh shall rest in Hope. 
 
HOLY-WEEK. 
 
 This that is glorious is His apparel . . . Mighty to save. 
 — Isaiah, lxiii. i. 
 
 I. 
 
 Who comes from Edom ? Who with garments 
 
 dyed, 
 
 As from the battle comes the conqueror ? 
 Thus, 'mid confused noise, the prophet spied 
 Far off Immanuel's Day, the crimson gore — 
 The battle and the victor-spoils He bore. 
 Can this the Lion be — this snow-white Lamb, 
 That comes from Bozrah ; while with wild 
 uproar, 
 The crowds, around Him, lift the wavy palm, 
 And shout, for David's Son, his sweet hosanna- 
 psalm ? 
 
 2. 
 
 Can this be He, the Mighty One to save, 
 
 Who meek and lowly rides the ass's foal ? 
 Such were the tokens Zechariah gave, 
 
 But where the hero of Isaiah's scroll ? 
 
 The Victor in the Victim— O my soul, 
 The Lion in the Lamb have faith to see. 
 
 And hear'st thou not, as 'twere the thunder's 
 roll, 
 The voice prophetic that proclaims — 'tis He, 
 Who comes His war to wage, foretelling Victory? 
 
62 HOLY-WEEK. 
 
 3- 
 
 Thus Faith discerns, in prophecy twofold, 
 The Hero-King, the Lamb of lowliest guise : 
 
 Nor marvels that his signs are doubly told, 
 Whose many crowns are as the starry skies : 
 Whose many wounds are countless mysteries. 
 
 So Judah's lion is his title, there, 
 
 Where stands on Zion, full of wounds and eyes, 
 
 The Lamb once slain : the Lamb our sins to bear, 
 
 Nor less the Lion too, our dragon-foe to tear. 
 
 4- 
 
 For this is He, disclosed in after day, 
 
 On the white horse who rode, with eyes of 
 flame : 
 Him all the armies of the heavens obey, 
 
 Whom Lord of lords and King of kings they 
 
 claim. 
 The seer of Patmos saw them as they came 
 On snow-white steeds, and robes as white are 
 theirs. 
 Faithful and true His Everlasting Name : 
 And diadems upon His head He wears, 
 Supreme o'er thousand thrones, who God's own 
 glory shares. 
 
MESSIAH. 
 
 Because of the savour of Thy good ointments ; Thy Name 
 is as ointment poured forth : therefore do the virgins love 
 Thee. — Cant. i. 3. 
 
 I. 
 
 No name but Thine, thou bleeding Lamb, 
 From earth's foundations known ; 
 
 No name but Thine, the great I am, 
 Is faith's sure corner-stone. 
 
 The martyr's crown, the victor's palm, 
 
 And heaven's eternal Paschal Psalm, 
 Exalt that name alone. 
 
 Thy many ointments, Priest and King, 
 
 Messiah Thee proclaim ; 
 Thee, Samuel's oil of hallowing, 
 
 On David's youth that came. 
 Jacob's anointed Stone — we sing, 
 That Rock, the Christ, prefiguring 
 Thine own sweet-savoured name. 
 
 3- 
 
 And many crowns, dear Lord, are Thine ; 
 
 Be crowned with Love to-day ! 
 The virgins love Thy names divine ; 
 
 The pure in heart are they. 
 
64 MESSIAH. 
 
 At Simon's feast, where guests recline, 
 While breaks this loving heart of mine, 
 All this the nard shall say. 
 
 4. 
 
 So Mary mused — and on His head 
 Poured forth the sweet perfume ; 
 
 Silent her lips, but all was said 
 When fragrance filled the room. 
 
 She gave it for His burial dread, 
 
 Whose Name, like precious ointment shed, 
 May sweeten ev'n the tomb. 
 
 5- 
 
 The virgins love Thee. Simon's board 
 Shall know with love how deep. 
 
 For all who love Thy Name, is poured 
 This balm Thy locks to steep ; 
 
 Ere thorns entwine Thy brow adored, 
 
 Ere 'gainst Thy flock awakes the sword, 
 Oh, Shepherd of the sheep ! 
 
 It fills the room ; it fills the earth ; 
 
 Where'er the Promised Seed 
 Is worshipp'd, in His dew of birth, 
 
 His Gospel tells her deed. 
 Such meet memorial of her worth, 
 In Paschal fast and Paschal mirth 
 The willing- nations read. 
 
MESSIAH. 65 
 
 For oh ! death reign'd, and Nature's moan 
 From babes and children came ; 
 
 From kings and cotters, born to groan, 
 From poor and proud the same. 
 
 Till He the Mighty to atone, 
 
 Made Life and Light and glory known, 
 By His Anointed Name. 
 
 8. 
 
 Uprose His Cross ! To mortal eyes 
 
 The Dayspring after Night : 
 So doth the Morning Star arise 
 
 Where wand'rers hail its light. 
 Messiah's Name and Sacrifice, 
 The Christian altar glorifies, 
 
 That shines to Faith so bright. 
 5 
 
GETHSEMANE. 
 
 Though He were a Son, yet learned He obedience by the 
 things which He suffered. — Hebrews, v. 8. 
 
 I. 
 
 'Mid olive groves the lantern gleams, 
 And water'd glades of Kedron's streams ; 
 With sword and staves and front austere 
 The lawless band by night draw near, 
 While Jesus, on the bended knee, 
 Suffers in lone Gethsemane. 
 
 Oh ! stand aside ; draw not too nigh— 
 Tis not for mortal ear nor eye 
 That conflict or that prayer to scan. 
 'Tis not for mind, or thought of man : 
 An angel stoops to bear Him up, 
 While Jesus drains the Father's cup. 
 
 3- 
 
 The Man of Sorrows — breathes His moan ; 
 
 His pangs unknowable, unknown ! 
 
 A Son, the well-beloved, but still 
 
 Content to do His Father's will, 
 
 Thrice crying to the Holy One, 
 
 " Father, Thy will not mine be done." 
 
GETHSEMANE. 67 
 
 4- 
 Thus in His agonizing swound 
 His bloody sweat bedews the ground, 
 And perfect made by human fears 
 The Man of Sorrows and of Tears, 
 Of brother men all tears can share, 
 Our pangs can heal, our guilt may bear. 
 
 5- 
 
 But clouds have dimmed the Paschal moon ; 
 Of night draws nigh the sombre noon ; 
 Heard in the fear His soul that frayed 
 The Shepherd, where His sheep are laid, 
 Draws nigh, the drowsy flock to seek, 
 Of spirit strong, of flesh so weak. 
 
 " Could ye not watch with me one hour ? 
 But, oh ! of darkness 'tis the power, 
 Sleep while ye may and take your rest. 
 But, nay ! no more by sloth oppress'd, 
 Wake, let us go ! For lo ! at hand 
 Is he who leads their armed band." 
 
 With swords and staves they come — and this 
 Is he who gives the treach'rous kiss ! 
 " Whom seek ye ? " "Jesus ! " "I am He, 
 Let then my harmless flock go free." 
 
68 GETHSEMANE. 
 
 The Shepherd smitten — flees the flock, 
 And trembles he surnamed a Rock. 
 
 Lo ! prompt to fight with flesh and blood, 
 He strikes — to make his promise good, 
 Yet quails — that bleeding ear restored, 
 When Jesus bids — " Put up thy sword." 
 Oh ! slow to learn not steel to bare, 
 In faith's stern fight of watch and prayer ! 
 
 9- 
 Behold the Lamb to slaughter led, 
 By wolves athirst His blood to shed, 
 And mute as Paschal victims are, 
 While Peter follows Him — afar ! 
 Far off he follows Christ, and all 
 Like him who halt like him must fall. 
 
THE BETRAYER. 
 
 They were exceeding sorrowful, and began every one of 
 them to say unto Him, Lord, is it I ? — St. Matt. xxiv. 22. 
 
 If you fare along the Rhine, 
 When the moon at full may shine, 
 
 Be sure to halt at Speyer. 
 And when lights and shadows fall 
 Hard by the minster wall, 
 You may see what I recall, 
 
 And admire. 
 
 Admire, tho' rude the art, 
 For it moved my inmost heart, 
 
 And its parable I felt. 
 It brought to mind that cry 
 Of apostles—" Is it I ? " 
 And my heart, as I drew nigh, 
 
 Seemed to melt. 
 
 3- 
 
 Of the river from afar 
 No murmur came to jar, 
 
 Of the nearer town no hum. 
 
JO THE BETRAYER. 
 
 One feels 'tis holy ground, 
 'Mid the trees and shrubs around, 
 And a holy awe profound 
 Strikes you dumb. 
 
 4- 
 
 On a knoll, in soft moonlight, 
 Lo ! figures that affright, 
 
 With staves and swords that slay ; 
 Climbing on they seem to go, 
 Seem moving to and fro, 
 Like robbers creeping slow, 
 
 To their prey. 
 
 5- 
 
 Like a serpent's cruel coils 
 They wind and weave their toils 
 
 Round a hillock clad with palm ; 
 And there, with strange grimace, 
 Stands one of thievish face, 
 Who points with finger base 
 
 At the Lamb. 
 
 6. 
 
 The Lamb of God I scan, 
 The suffering Son of Man, 
 
 And the angel hov'ring o'er; 
 As He sinks on bended knee, 
 Those pangs I seem to see, 
 Which, all for men like me, 
 
 Jesus bore. 
 
THE BETRAYER. Jl 
 
 7- 
 
 Seen of angels ! So He kneels, 
 And mine the guilt He feels, 
 
 And it makes me sore afraid ; 
 For oh ! that serpent old, 
 His arts are manifold, 
 And still is Jesus sold, 
 
 And betrayed. 
 
 Saviour, but for grace, 
 
 Is the human heart so base, 
 
 So prompt to go amiss ! 
 As he stands upon the brink, 
 
 1 look, and seem to shrink 
 From the traitor, when I think 
 
 Of his kiss ! 
 
 9- 
 Is this the man that sate 
 And with the Saviour ate 
 
 The supper, ev'n to-day ! 
 Whose feet He washed, unclean, 
 That hasted from ihe scene, 
 Swift to shed His blood, I ween, 
 
 And betray ? 
 
 10. 
 
 From a heart that knows no guile, 
 Who turns supremely vile 
 
 In a moment's fiery flame ? 
 
72 THE BETRAYER'. 
 
 Tis habit, nurs'd full long, 
 Makes the last temptation strong, 
 And breeds the lust of wrong, 
 With its shame. 
 
 ii. 
 
 And so from Holy Writ 
 
 Comes this warning, fair and fit, 
 
 To the heart of one and all : 
 Fear and tremble to begin ; 
 For adding sin to sin, 
 As gamesters waste to win, 
 
 So men fall. 
 
 12. 
 
 If the world from pole to pole 
 One might gain, but lose his soul, 
 
 What the profit with the cost ? 
 Full many a warning word, 
 Like this the traitor heard, 
 For pelf that sold his Lord, 
 
 And was lost. 
 
 13-' 
 And oh ! his madden'd mood, 
 When down the price of blood 
 
 At their feet he dash'd amain — 
 Who mock'd with scorn and hate, 
 As forth he rushed to fate; 
 For repentance came too late, 
 
 And was vain. 
 
THE BETRAYER. 73 
 
 14- 
 
 But I smite my breast and cry, 
 Holy Jesus, " Is it I ?" 
 
 As I linger long" and gaze ; 
 God be merciful to me, 
 For not the Pharisee, 
 But the publican I'd be, 
 
 All my days. 
 
 15- 
 'Tis mine — the guilt He feels, 
 'Neath the angel as He kneels, 
 
 Mine His Father's mystic frown : 
 Methinks I see it yet, 
 That brow with dew-drops wet, 
 And beads of bloody sweat, 
 
 Dropping down ! 
 
 16. 
 
 Tho' rude and crude the art, 
 It stamped upon my heart 
 
 Such thoughts like coals of fire : 
 I seem'd indeed to see 
 A true Gethsemane, 
 As by chance it came to me, 
 
 There in Speyer. 
 
THE COUNCIL. 
 
 Let our strength be our justice. — Wisdom, ii. n. 
 
 Who wrote the Book of Wisdom ? From his 
 pen 
 Distill'd the ichor of the prophets' lore. 
 What Caiaphas would do, he shewed before, 
 And how they slew the Just, foresaw with keen- 
 est ken. 
 
 2. 
 
 For while the worldly wise proclaimed their 
 dream, 
 Should perfect virtue on the earth appear, 
 Him all mankind would worship and revere, 
 What of the human heart did that true wisdom 
 deem ? 
 
 Ev'n Plato, taught by Scriptures of the Jew, 
 Foretold what cruel death the Just should die : 
 If seen on earth, Him they would crucify 
 
 With shame and scourging : this the sage of 
 Greece foreknew. 
 
THE COUNCIL. 75 
 
 4- 
 Come then, pedestrian muse, while I transcribe 
 From Wisdom's page those counsels of the 
 
 night 
 By forecast written, of the high-priests' spite, 
 With scribe and Pharisee and chiefs of every 
 tribe. 
 
 5- 
 Let us oppress the righteous Man — they cry, 
 And for the just man lie in wait, because 
 He blames us for transgressing our own laws ! 
 He is not of our sort, and sure he ought to die. 
 
 6. 
 And contrary to all our ways is he ; 
 Rebukes our education and our life ; 
 Child of the Lord, with other men at strife, 
 Such is this man self-styled, who chides our 
 infamy ! 
 
 7- 
 As filth he shuns our ways, as if 'twere his 
 Alone to know the Lord ! He seemeth made 
 Our thoughts to challenge and our deeds 
 upbraid. 
 We cannot bear a man so just, forsooth, as this. 
 
 Grievous to bear the fashion of his ways 
 Whose life is not like ours. If he is gold 
 Then we are counterfeits ! Who can behold 
 
 A man so strangely just, nor hate him while they 
 gaze ! 
 
76 THE COUNCIL. 
 
 9- 
 
 God is his Father ! And he maketh boast 
 That such as he are blessed in their end ! 
 Ha ! let us see — if God be this man's friend — 
 
 What happens in his end, when help he needeth 
 most ? 
 
 10. 
 
 Let then His God deliver this His Son, 
 
 If He will have Him — lrom the cross and rod ! 
 Blasphemer ! if He be the Son of God, 
 
 Then let the Father save from death His Holy 
 One. 
 
 II. 
 
 So they fulfil what law and prophet saith ; 
 Such things did they imagine — self-deceived, 
 And blind through wickedness — such things 
 believed ; 
 Let us condemn him then, they said, to shameful 
 death. 
 
 12. 
 
 Of blameless souls they loved not the reward, 
 Nor knew God's mysteries ; nor wages sought 
 Of righteousness — but death, by Satan brought, 
 
 While lo ! the just shall live immortal with the 
 Lord. 
 
THE COUNCIL. JJ 
 
 13- 
 
 So far the Book of Wisdom ; thus they spake, 
 As 'twas forewritten. In the midnight dark, 
 They wait their victim with their band : and 
 hark ! 
 They come with clamours rude, the welkin that 
 awake. 
 
 14. 
 
 Last prophet of the Jews — 'twas Caiaphas 
 
 Said — " for the Jews, 'twas good, this man 
 
 should die : " 
 Now, let the people hear him' prophesy 
 What Romans next will do ; for so 'twill come 
 to pass. 
 
 15. 
 
 " They shall come hither and our place make 
 void, 
 
 And take away our Nation." Even so ! 
 
 In Rome that arch of Titus still may show 
 How soon the Romans came and all destroyed. 
 
CAIAPHAS. 
 
 The high-priest rent his clothes. — St. Matt. xxvi. 65. 
 I. 
 
 NIGHT in the cruel high-priest's hall 
 
 And night his soul within ! 
 Of Caiaphas— that whited wall, 
 
 Who hath the greater sin. 
 How blood-stained in the book of time 
 
 The page that doth record 
 His deed of darkness and of crime, 
 
 Who judged his judge and Lord. 
 
 2. 
 Go read how meekly him before 
 
 The Lamb of Abel stood ; 
 How he who Aaron's mitre bore 
 
 Could shed Messiah's blood : 
 Mere type and shadow of the law 
 
 He scorns the substance true, 
 And God's High-Priest, whom Abra'm saw, 
 
 This priestly traitor slew. 
 
 3- 
 
 Aye, read that oracle of flame, 
 
 His victim's answer dread ; 
 Adjured in great Jehovah's name, 
 
 What God's co-equal said : 
 Hereafter, thou who judgest Me 
 
 Before My bar shalt stand, 
 
CAIAPHAS. 79 
 
 In clouds the Son of Man shalt see 
 Enthroned at God's right hand. 
 
 4- 
 The high-priest rent his clothes, but knew 
 
 Not half that rending meant ; 
 That day, the temple of the Jew, 
 
 That day, its veil was rent. 
 His shadowy priesthood thus he doff'd 
 
 With that symbolic vest ; 
 Melchizedek, while yet he scoffd 
 
 Before him stood confess'd. 
 
 5- 
 Now Caiaphas was he who gave 
 
 This counsel — so it saith — 
 The people of the Jews to save 
 
 One man should die the death. 
 Like Balaam's beast he prophesied, 
 
 Nor knew 'twas of the Lord ; 
 Not of himself he spake, nor lied, 
 
 But voiced the Spirit's word. 
 
 6. 
 Then let the Romans come ; their prey 
 
 Their eagles may consume : 
 The carcass let them bear away, 
 
 To give the Living room : 
 For He the one High-Priest must reign 
 
 Whom Caiaphas made known — 
 The Lamb for all the nations slain, 
 
 And not for Jews alone. 
 
PONTIUS PILATE. 
 
 The Priest shall make an Atonement for the soul that 
 sinneth ignorantly and for the stranger that sojourneth 
 among them.— Numb. xv. 24-29. 
 
 I. 
 
 Some say he was a Teuton. Where the vine 
 
 Purples the hillsides of his fatherland 
 Were bred those hinds, they say, beside the 
 Rhine, 
 Who toss'd the dice, with red remorseless 
 hand, 
 On Jesu's raiment. These His corse divine 
 Watch'd in the sepulchre ; a brutal band 
 Pacing, stern sentries, round that sealed tomb, 
 Their shimmering helmets glittering in the 
 gloom. 
 
 2. 
 
 It may be so ; the legend suits my song. 
 
 With Pilate came they, those barbarians bold, 
 To make his weak dominion sternly strong 
 
 And quell the tribes of Jacob in their hold ; 
 Those tribes so fierce against the Romans' wrong, 
 
 Untamed and turbulent and uncontroll'd, 
 And daring oft ev'n Roman chiefs to vex, 
 W T hile Csesar's yoke weigh'd heavy on their 
 necks. 
 
PONTIUS PILATE. 8l 
 
 3- 
 With these, 'twas Pilate's task and toil austere 
 
 To make Tiberius' mastery supreme ; 
 Nor marvel that with policy severe 
 
 He scorned their superstitions as a dream. 
 Not worse than other Romans, his career 
 
 Was cruel and remorseless in its scheme. 
 'Twas policy alike for Jew and Greek 
 To trample on the proud and spare the meek. 
 
 4- 
 A heathen ; but where Caiaphas was priest, 
 
 And Judas an apostle, soft should be 
 A Christian's sad reproaches. This at least 
 
 Concede to Pilate in the history 
 Of that portentous day, that bloody feast, 
 
 When even apostles trembl'd and could flee : 
 Not all, perchance, ignoble was his mood, 
 Who strove and pleaded, feared, and yet with- 
 stood. 
 
 5- 
 Stern, tearless, of the earth so earthy all, 
 
 Dragg'd from his rest at day-break, see him 
 tread 
 Contemptuous o'er the marbles of his hall, 
 
 Scorning the rabble that disturb'd his bed. 
 Fierce he goes forth, impatient at their call, 
 And lo ! the Lamb, rope-bound and thief-like 
 led, 
 'Mid priests and nobles with their motley crowd, 
 Meekly majestic stands, His forehead bowed. 
 6 
 
82 PONTIUS PILATE. 
 
 6. 
 
 Grand in his awful goodness, lambkin dumb 
 Before his shearers — how the satrap shrinks 
 
 From that dejected front, amid the hum 
 
 Of voices claiming judgment. Courage sinks 
 
 Before his victim, as like fiends they come, 
 Clinch'd fists uplifted, and strange tongues 
 methinks, 
 
 Greek, Hebrew, Latin mingled. Hear their cry ! 
 
 Can Pilate scruple one more Jew should die ? 
 
 7- 
 Now opes the dreadful drama of that day ! 
 
 "Take him, and judge him for yourselves." 
 He turns 
 As one contemptuous from their hordes away. 
 
 Louder they clamour, he more fiercely spurns, 
 While thirsting for Messiah's blood they say — 
 "Not ours to deal the shameful death he 
 earns, 
 Who breaks our law ; and then 'tis thine alone, 
 'Gainst Caesar's rival, to uphold the throne." 
 
 " He makes himself a king ! " they said. 'Twas 
 meet 
 
 The son of David, of that palace floor, 
 Should tread its art Mosaic under feet ! 
 
 There — never stood a Nazarene before ; 
 But Pilate leads him towards his judgment seat, 
 
 And talks with him apart, where arching o'er 
 
PONTIUS PILATE. 83 
 
 The glistening" pavement, set with coloured stones, 
 Vaults flamed with gold, a glory meet for 
 thrones. 
 
 9- 
 " Art thou a king, then ? " to the Lamb serene 
 His judge makes question ; while, instinct with 
 fear, 
 His eye surveys that meek yet manly mien, 
 And feels 'tis strange that he should stand so 
 near 
 The heir of Solomon. He hearkens keen : 
 
 "Thou sayest it— Who told it thee?" But 
 
 hear — 
 More strange those words that followed, when, 
 
 forsooth, 
 Of truth He spake ! Said Pilate : " What is 
 
 truth ? " 
 
 10. 
 
 Think of that moment, when, more bright than 
 morn, 
 Light o'er that heathen flash'd, and left him 
 dazed. 
 Echoes within his breast a thought new-born, 
 
 As on that awful sufferer he gazed : 
 Yes — " What is truth ? " he answered, not with 
 scorn ; 
 From Truth incarnate, turning more amazed, 
 To speak God's truth, defiant of assault: 
 Hear him proclaim, " I find in him no fault." 
 
84 PONTIUS PILATE. 
 
 II. 
 
 Comes to his ear, amid their wild uproar, 
 Herod's foul name. Of guilt in Galilee, 
 
 They charge this man of Nazareth ! Full sore 
 The hate twixt him and Herod ; yet, thought he, 
 
 This shall make peace between us twain once 
 more. 
 I'll send the case to Herod for decree: 
 
 " Take him to Herod, then," if so ye say. 
 
 Frantic they hear and sullen they obey. 
 
 12. 
 
 Behold " that fox" ! To his hyaena-den 
 They drag the pallid Jesus. Bloody sweat, 
 
 And those long hours of wakefulness — and then 
 His famishing and shiv'ring, why forget ? 
 
 These have already marr'd this "scorn of men," 
 This patient Man of sorrows. Lo ! 'tis set, 
 
 The court of Herod, and amid their bands, 
 
 Silent, while they make mirth, Messiah stands. 
 
 13- 
 "No answer and no miracle," exclaim 
 
 The slaves of Herod ; " let him give us sport." 
 Yes, " turn him o'er to spitting and to shame," 
 
 The tyrant bids. They mock his mute deport, 
 And men of war deride his regal fame : 
 
 " Now, send him back to Pilate's meaner 
 court, 
 And deck'd in robes of lustre he shall go, 
 Led forth with laughter, o'er his way of woe." 
 
PONTIUS PILATE, 85 
 
 14. 
 
 Behold, once more 'round Pilate rings their call ; 
 
 Once more his pride confronts their rage, alas ! 
 Peevish, far more than proud, and scorning all 
 
 He sees or hears ; for now the surging mass 
 Rages like stormy tides of mire and gall, 
 
 Resentful, as they beg for Bar- Abbas. 
 " Not Jesus, but the robber ! " so they cried. 
 " But, Jesus, then ? " " Let him be crucified ! " 
 
 15- 
 
 Pilate, thy time has come, if man thou art, 
 
 To show thy manhood once, if nevermore ! 
 Nay, see him, baffled, feebly faint of heart, 
 
 Of motives mix'd, as 'mid the mad uproar, 
 Trembles the balance and new fears upstart. 
 One moment — while their clamour calls for 
 gore- 
 He feels a conscience in his bosom beat ; 
 And, silent, ponders on his judgment-seat. 
 
 16. 
 For Claudia's message meets him with her plea, 
 Her dream of " that Just Man." And shall it 
 win 
 Justice from such a spouse ? Affrighted he — 
 
 Nay, more affrighted — turns once more within, 
 
 To ask — " Whence art thou ? " Awful mystery ! 
 
 They call'd him "Son of God" amid their din. 
 
 Yes — oh ! " whence art thou ? " What if so it 
 
 were ? 
 Could God more god-like meet a worshipper ? 
 
86 PONTIUS PILATE. 
 
 17- 
 
 As the weak wall resists and not the rock, 
 So he withstands ; so smite in dread recoil 
 
 Those waves of fury. Hear their frightful mock — 
 " Thou art not Cassar's friend ! " Their wild 
 turmoil 
 
 Strikes at his master-passion, like the shock 
 Of ocean, when its depths uprise and boil. 
 
 Once more, while yet their crafty cries they urge, 
 
 Pilate acquits — and gives Him to the scourge. 
 
 18. 
 Then cometh Jesus forth, in thorny crown 
 
 And robe of purple purpled now afresh : 
 For streams the beaded blood his face adown ; 
 
 And of his shoulders bleeds the furrow'd flesh. 
 Behold that diadem of Christ's renown ; 
 
 No sheen of gold that glitters in the mesh 
 Shows like those thorns — withstand the sight, 
 
 who can ? 
 So Pilate feels and cries, — " Behold the man ! " 
 
 19. 
 Behold the Man : behold God's only Son ! 
 
 Pilate turns preacher : and who else, like him, 
 Before mankind hath set the Holy One ? 
 
 So, seen of angels and the seraphim, 
 And seen of sinners thus, while Time shall run, 
 
 Through dazzled eyes, which contrite tears 
 bedim — 
 Behold the Lamb ! They see — and yet they cry, 
 " Away with Him ! Him let us crucify." 
 
PONTIUS PELATE. 87 
 
 20. 
 
 Bring hither water and the laver bring ! 
 
 See Pilate wash his hands ; he deems 'tis fit 
 To them and to their seed this guilt should cling: 
 
 *' His blood on us shall be " — they echo it ! 
 " His cross, at least, shall bear His claim of 
 King : 
 
 And mine the maxim — What is writ is writ." 
 " See, I am innocent of blood," he cries, 
 Uplifting his wash'd hands before their eyes. 
 
 21. 
 
 Mock not this rite baptismal : Who art thou 
 Call'd Christian, but in spirit all unbless'd, 
 
 And oft ashamed of Jesus ? On thy brow 
 The cross is seal'd, but when with loyal breast 
 
 Hast thou for Him fulfilled the soldier's vow, 
 Or for that thorny crown and purple vest 
 
 Stood forth like Pilate ! When hast thou, sore- 
 tried, 
 
 Wash'd ev'n thine hands to own the Crucified." 
 
 22. 
 
 Take heed when Sodom's self at Christ's right 
 hand, 
 And foul Gomorrah plead before His bar, 
 Lest Pilate rise to judge thee, and may stand 
 
 At that great day anear and thou afar : 
 Art thou Christ's soldier ? 'Mid the guilty band 
 Of them that hate Him, hast thou gained one 
 scar ? 
 
88 PONTIUS PILATE. 
 
 Scoff not at Pilate's laver, self-baptized, 
 If less than his thy christ'ning hath sufficed. 
 
 23- 
 
 Yet can such guilt be pardon'd ! Who shall say ? 
 
 Faith may remove great mountains, and who 
 knows 
 That Pilate ne'er repented ? But that day 
 
 Full many a Christian Pilate shall disclose ; 
 And if that blood their sins can wash away, 
 
 Who crucify afresh the Man of Woes, 
 Why not poor Pilate's ? Christ's atonement free, 
 Washeth all nations, like the vasty sea. 
 
 24. 
 
 Much have I ponder'd Pilate with such thought, 
 Weighing His Word, whose ev'ry word is 
 weigh'd, 
 And while I hope for him, presuming naught, 
 'Tis mine own sin that makes my soul dis- 
 may 'd, 
 Lest to the Christian's door the crime be brought 
 
 While ev'n for Pilate pardon is up laid. 
 Before that day judge nothing : leave him there, 
 With Him who for His murderers poured His 
 prayer. 
 
 25- 
 Yet for all heathen in their vale of death 
 
 Make broad this hope ; and think of Pilate 
 then, 
 
PONTIUS PILATE. 89 
 
 How day by clay, as with all nations' breath, 
 His name is named in all the tongues of men. 
 
 "Suffer'd by Pontius Pilate " — so it saith ; 
 Nor is one human name within my ken 
 
 So frequent utter'd as this name unblest, 
 
 O'er all the lands and oceans, east or west. 
 
 26. 
 By men, by maids, by boys, by women all, 
 
 And all their years of life 'tis said or sung-. 
 Where the great Minster lifts its lofty wall, 
 
 Who hath not heard its echoes, while the 
 tongue 
 Upsends the Creed, before the people fall 
 
 Upon their bended knees — the old and young ? 
 Ev'n at his mother's knee the babe must frame 
 With pouting lip to lisp poor Pilate's name. 
 
 27. 
 Sounds not the dread indictment too severe, 
 
 Roll'd round the globe, and, like the wand'ring 
 Jew, 
 Never let die ? But — mercy's accents hear : 
 
 " The princes of this world, they never knew 
 The wisdom that for Christians shines so clear, 
 
 Else had they never done the deed — who slew 
 The Lord of Glory," So exclaims St. Paul, 
 And let his verdict plead for Gentiles all. 
 
 28. 
 And ev'n at Pilate's bar, that bleeding Lamb 
 Hear how His lips dropp'd mercy 'mid his foes: 
 
90 PONTIUS PILATE. 
 
 " Not thine the greater sin." Nor Creed nor 
 psalm 
 Forbids the hopes that spring from words like 
 those. 
 This of his great Atonement lifts the palm 
 
 Victorious over Satan ! Still it flows 
 That fountain of Salvation ; still arise 
 The fuming savours of that sacrifice. 
 
 29. 
 Hear Peter plead : " My brethren : Well, I wot 
 
 Through ignorance ye did it, as did they — 
 Your rulers : for ev'n Pilate faltered not, 
 
 Determined to release him — nor gave way 
 Till ye denied the Just One." Ne'er forgot, 
 
 Be what the Man of Tarsus too might say, 
 As for himself so for the world beside: 
 " Mercy I gain'd, for blindly I denied." 
 
 3o. 
 Nor shall the rocks of Sinai with their flame 
 Prevail against the Cross ; nor those dread 
 seals 
 Against the Lamb that opes them. His blest 
 claim 
 The rainbow round His throne in light re- 
 veals ; 
 And sure the heathen in Messiah's name 
 
 May see Salvation. Ev'n the law appeals 
 For mercy to "the stranger," and makes room 
 For Gentiles, where its Hebrew censers fume. 
 
PONTIUS PILATE. 91 
 
 3i- 
 
 Yes, for "the stranger" are soft words engrav'd 
 Deep in the law by Moses' iron pen : 
 
 For sins of ignorance the sin-enslaved 
 
 Find mercy in the sweet Atonement then. 
 
 For oh ! the depth ! if Pilate may be saved, 
 Sure there is pardon for the world of men, 
 
 And for all sinners grace is multiplied, 
 
 Through the dear love of that blest Lamb that 
 died. 
 
 32. 
 
 Methinks poor Pilate stands for human kind, 
 For all who sin and know not what they do; 
 
 So tenderly did Jesus love the blind, 
 
 So did His prayer ascend for them that slew. 
 
 Sure, where that crimson Cross hath never 
 shined, 
 Forgiveness may be found and glory too. 
 
 What Aaron's priest in type might waft away, 
 
 'Twas God's High-Priest wash'd out that dread- 
 ful day. 
 
 33- 
 Yes, worthy is the Lamb, and who shall tell 
 
 How worthy, save His ransom'd there above, 
 Where those sweet Paschal anthems ever swell, 
 
 And higher raptures in the angels move. 
 There they who drink from life's exhaustless 
 well, 
 And sing the wonders of redeeming love, 
 
92 PONTIUS PILATE. 
 
 Shall show how mercy to the blind is given: 
 'Tis our presumptuous sins that cry to heaven ! 
 
 34- 
 And this my comfort when I chant the Creed, 
 
 That not for doom we name poor Pilate's 
 name, 
 But, as it were, for guilty souls to plead, 
 
 Who sin like him, unknown of sin the shame. 
 Oh ! blest be He who died to intercede, 
 
 Methinks the depths of pardon we proclaim — 
 Naming one sinner's name, for whom He cried, 
 " Father, forgive them " — through the Crucified. 
 
GABBATHA. 
 
 Ecce Homo. — S. John, xix. 5. 
 I. 
 
 The ploughers ploughed their furrows red 
 
 Upon His back bent down, 
 Then, in the purple robe — His head 
 
 Torn by the thorny crown — 
 Came forth of men the Man — and Pilate said : 
 Behold the Man ! 
 
 2. 
 The Man that is my fellow — saith 
 
 God in the prophet's page : 
 Behold the Man of Nazareth 
 
 Confronts the rabble's rage ; 
 'Tis God-with-us consents to scorn and death. 
 Behold the Man ! 
 
 3- 
 
 He comes, He bleeds, and meek He stands, 
 
 And mute His murderers gaze ; 
 The reed bemocks His royal hands, 
 
 Who God's own sceptre sways : 
 Bows ev'n the Roman heart that thus com- 
 mands : 
 
 Behold the Man ! 
 
94 GABBATHA. 
 
 4- 
 
 Oh ! moment in the march of time 
 
 The greatest and the worst, 
 When stoops the Son of God sublime 
 
 So low, 'mid men accurst. 
 'Tis heathen Pilate thus rebukes their crime : 
 Behold the Man ! 
 
 5- 
 Poor Pilate ! That stupendous scene 
 
 He made, for oh ! he felt 
 How meek in Majesty His mien, 
 
 And — sure their hearts must melt ; 
 So thought he — and he spake with awe, I ween: 
 Behold the Man ! 
 
 6. 
 
 Not then, as now, might instant Art 
 
 That sight so dread make fast, 
 And grave, as with the sunbeam's dart, 
 
 What they beheld aghast ; 
 But Lord ! of all mankind, make every heart 
 Behold the Man ! 
 
 7- 
 For nevermore shall fade away 
 
 That momentary view ; 
 Age after age, day after day, 
 
 To faithful sOuls made new: 
 Echoes that voice, and still shall sound for aye: 
 Behold the Man ! 
 
GABBATHA. 95 
 
 Nor yet that voice shall cease to thrill 
 
 Ev'n those who sing the psalm 
 Of Moses on the heavenly hill ; 
 For while they see the Lamb 
 And sing - the Lamb once slain they hear it 
 still : 
 
 Behold the Man ! 
 
CALVARY. 
 
 In the Mount of the Lord it shall be seen.— Gen. xxii. 14. 
 In this Mountain.— Isaiah, xxv. 6. 
 
 I. 
 
 As the strong swimmer spreads his hands to swim 
 
 So shall his hands be spread, 
 And seen of angels, seen of seraphim 
 
 Work wonders 'mid the dead ; 
 Shall spoil — of powers and princedoms of the 
 air — 
 
 Their portion and their prey, 
 Like Moses, when the Cross he made in prayer, 
 
 On old Rephidim's Day. 
 
 2. 
 Here the dark veil of death that covers o'er 
 
 The face of nations all, 
 Those pierced hands shall rend, and nevermore 
 
 Their tears undried shall fall. 
 Death shall be swallowed up that day of days, 
 
 In victory and peace ; 
 And in this mount of God shall songs of praise 
 
 Begin, no more to cease. 
 
 3- 
 And there the Lord shall make our Paschal 
 Feast ; 
 Wines on the lees refined. 
 
CALVARY. 97 
 
 While swells the Alleluia, west and east, 
 
 From all redeem'd mankind, 
 A man shall be our refuge from the storm, 
 
 From blighting heat and shade ; 
 When for the poor oppress'd Immanuel's form 
 
 The Crucified is made. 
 7 
 
FOLLOWING THE LAMB. 
 
 Whithersoever he goeth.— Rev. xiv. 4. 
 
 The patient Lamb of God, I see, 
 As forth He goes to Calvary, 
 And travels o'er that doleful road, 
 Bearing the cross, his bitter load. 
 
 2. 
 
 That cross, my soul, thy sins have made, 
 On Him thy sins that cross have laid : 
 How should the thought thy heart appall, 
 Beneath such load, to see Him fall ! 
 
 3- 
 
 Oh, Lamb before Thy shearers dumb, 
 Like the Cyrenian lord I come, 
 And fain like him compelled would be, 
 To bear Thy burden after Thee. 
 
 Let me for Thee take up the cross, 
 And count my life, my all, but loss, 
 If so partaker of Thy pain, 
 Thy crown at last may be my gain. 
 
FOLLOWING THE LAMB. 99 
 
 5- 
 
 Dear Lord, whatever cross it be 
 Thy love on earth allots to me, 
 Oh, may Thy servant ne'er repine, 
 Remembering what a cross was Thine ! 
 
 Yet make no sorer cross my share 
 Than Thou canst teach me how to bear ; 
 Remember, Lord, how frail I am, 
 How faint in following the Lamb ! 
 
THE CROSS-BEARER. 
 
 Him they compelled to bear His cross. — St. Matt. 
 xxvii. 32. 
 
 The rustic Simon from Cyrene came, 
 
 A Gentile born, 
 Perchance of Ham's dejected race and name, 
 
 Who little dreamed that morn, 
 As to the town he fared to keep the Feast, 
 His name should be remember'd, west and east, 
 Forever and forever, as of one 
 Who did that day the deed which angels would 
 have done. 
 
 Him they compelled Messiah's cross to bear, 
 
 With rude arrest ; 
 Mocking the plain wayfarer's vacant stare, 
 
 His awe and look distress'd. 
 A stranger proselyte, amaz'd was he 
 Entangl'd in that rabble throng to be, 
 To hear the soldiers' cry and see withal 
 Beneath his cruel load the dear Redeemer fall. 
 
THE CROSS-BEARER. IOI 
 
 3- 
 
 Unseen, what heavenly legions then down flew 
 
 Him to upbear ! 
 Archangels stretch'cl their loving arms — but" 
 
 knew 
 They might no further dare : 
 'Twas Simon's lot alone to lift the load, 
 And following Jesus o'er the tearful road, 
 To share his Saviour's burden : foremost he 
 Of all that bear the cross ; who would not 
 
 Simon be ? 
 
 4- 
 Who would not give his dearest Lord relief 
 
 'Mid shame and blows ? 
 Who covets not to soothe the Saviour's grief 
 
 With tender words, like those 
 Who follow'd near with woman's tears and cries ? 
 Nay, from such longings to life's duties rise : 
 Bear but the cross thou art compelled to bear, 
 And following thus thy Lord — so shalt thou do 
 thy share. 
 
THE WAY OF SORROWS. 
 
 Bearing His cross. — St. Luke. 
 I. 
 
 Bearing the cross, that baleful load, 
 He toils along the bitter road ; 
 The patient Lamb, the cruel tree 
 Drags forth to ghastly Calvary. 
 
 When faint He falls, so worn and weak, 
 How to my soul His sorrows speak, 
 For in that load my sins I scan, 
 Borne by the lowly Son of Man. 
 
 3- 
 
 Soon was that cross His racking bed 
 For quivering limbs and writhing head, 
 Where streaming wound and straining eye 
 Told of His mortal agony. 
 
 4- 
 
 Blest Saviour, this for me to bear 
 Was thine, and what for Thee my share ? 
 Shall I for Thee no prize lay down, 
 Accept no cross, yet claim the crown ? 
 
THE WAY OF SORROWS. 103 
 
 5- 
 
 Take up the cross ! Tis hard to do, 
 But mercy comes with precept too : 
 Mine be the cross Thy love ordains, 
 What Christ compels His grace sustains. 
 
GOLGOTHA. 
 
 And Abraham said, My son, God will provide Himself 
 a Lamb. —Gen. xxii. 8. 
 
 I. 
 
 Little the rich man thought, 
 
 When as that place of skulls, that field 
 Of frightful Golgotha he bought, 
 All that he did was sealed 
 Long time before, in old Isaiah's song ; 
 Strange what his gold might buy should not to 
 him belong. 
 
 It was Moriah's height, 
 
 On the third day that did arise, 
 Marked by the dread Shekinah's light, 
 To Father Abraham's eyes : 
 Fast by his side a youth pursued the road 
 Who on his shoulders bore a fagot's fearful 
 load. 
 
 3- 
 
 " Here on this mount — God's hill," 
 
 The patriarch said, "it shall be seen — 
 Let us but work His holy will — 
 What all these wonders mean." 
 
GOLGOTHA. 105 
 
 "But where the Lamb?" the voice of Isaac 
 
 cried : 
 " Here in this mount, my son, God will the Lamb 
 
 provide." 
 
 4- 
 
 Lo ! where the ram of old 
 
 Was in the tangled thicket caught, 
 Where Isaac's bonds the cross foretold, 
 That field the rich man bought. 
 In vile neglect Jehovah-Jireh lay ; 
 And none remembered now that name of 
 Abraham's day. 
 
 5- 
 
 The gibbet's baleful gloom, 
 
 The jackal's loathsome feast was there, 
 Till Joseph made the rock a tomb 
 And hedged a garden fair : 
 Nor dreamed that priests should seek, in Pilate's 
 
 name, 
 That ransomed rock, once more, to rear a cross 
 of shame. 
 
 6. 
 Isaiah's words fulfilled ! 
 
 On either hand a felon's tree, 
 For so the loving Father willed 
 That His dear Son should be. 
 As with the wicked in his death of gloom, 
 So with the rich, in state, in faithful Joseph's 
 tomb. 
 
106 GOLGOTHA. 
 
 7- 
 That Golgotha accurst 
 
 Holds the new Adam in its cave ; 
 And oh ! how all unlike the first — 
 An Eden from a grave 
 He gives in that sweet garden, where his Bride 
 Rose, like a fairer Eve, forth from his wounded 
 side. 
 
THE MAN OF SORROWS. 
 
 Is it nothing to you ? — Lamentations, i. 12. 
 I. 
 
 They err not who have said, of yore, 
 
 Ev'n the child Jesus suffer'd sore, 
 
 And all His days for us the cross of Calvary bore. 
 
 2. 
 
 And Art this truth hath well made known, 
 Where — ev'n with Joseph's tools, is shown 
 The child who frames a cross to wake his 
 
 mother's moan. 
 
 3- 
 Those lesser sorrows why forget, 
 That strewed the path before Him set, 
 And gathered 'round his death, as 'twere an evil 
 
 net ? 
 
 4- 
 He fasted in the desert bare ; 
 But every day — behold His care 
 Of our indulgent flesh to taste no pleasing share. 
 
 5- 
 Those senses five that work our fall, 
 And oft the nobler mind enthrall, 
 How, in his passion's pangs, they suffered one 
 and all ! 
 
Io8 THE MAN OF SORROWS. 
 
 He saw — constrain 'd His aching sight — 
 Men's faces fierce as beasts that fright, 
 Or made like shapes that scowl in visions of the 
 night. 
 
 7- 
 
 He heard — as 'twere of fiends that fell — 
 The curses and the wolfish yell, 
 While murd'rers gnash'd their teeth and howl'd 
 like hounds of hell. 
 
 He smell'd — the savour foul and rank, 
 Ere gall and vinegar he drank ; 
 And spittle smear'd his face from mouths like 
 tombs that stank. 
 
 9- 
 
 He tasted — while they mock'd and laugh'd — 
 The dripping sponge, but left unquaffd, 
 Ev'n in his thirst of death, that nauseous dole and 
 draught. 
 
 10. 
 
 He felt — the blows, the thorns — but this 
 
 More keen than nails — the serpent-hiss 
 
 Of him who stung his cheek with treacherous lip 
 
 and kiss. 
 
THE MAN OF SORROWS. IO9 
 
 II. 
 
 "Ye that pass by — behold and see, 
 The sorrows that are done to me. 
 And is it naught to you ? " He asks — and answer 
 ye. 
 
 12. 
 
 We answer at the font, and there 
 Promise for His dear sake the cross to bear ; 
 But, oh ! forgive us Lord, and us poor sinners 
 spare. 
 
THE CROSS. 
 
 And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men 
 unto me. — St. John, xii. 32. 
 
 I. 
 
 Saviour, on thine uplifted Tree 
 How soon Thy saving work began, 
 
 Drawing all human hearts to Thee, 
 For dying men the dying Man. 
 
 2. 
 Foremost of those who fled — draws near, 
 
 With Mary by the cross to stand, 
 That one whom Jesus loved — to hear 
 
 His pard'ning word, His sweet command. 
 
 3- 
 Full soon is changed the. vacant stare 
 
 Of those who raised the cross so high, 
 For sitting down they watched Him there, 
 
 Touched by that meek, forgiving cry. 
 
 4- 
 Then scribe and priest the ebb discerned 
 
 Of passion's tides that stormed before ; 
 When smote their breasts and slow returned 
 
 Mockers who now could mock no more. 
 
 5- 
 Vain those appeals and scoffs renew'd — 
 " Others He saved, not self, we see : " 
 
THE CROSS. Ill 
 
 For conscience owns ingratitude ; 
 So base ourselves, so gracious He ! 
 
 6. 
 
 And lo ! the thief reclaimed at last 
 
 Seems tow'rds the Christ more near to move, 
 
 For ev'n those arms, though pinioned fast, 
 Embrace His all-embracing love. 
 
 7- 
 'Tis finished ! At the mighty cry 
 
 Uprose the dark that veiled His death, 
 Forth flames the cross, in victory, 
 
 While rend the flinty rocks beneath. 
 
 8. 
 
 Then broke one Roman heart as hard, 
 That long had pondered with amaze, 
 
 And marvelled at the victim marr'd, 
 That fixed his stern, astonish'd gaze. 
 
 9- 
 
 The moment that his Saviour died, 
 
 Fresh from that heart came forth his creed : 
 
 " This was a righteous man," he cried — 
 " This was the Son of God, indeed." 
 
 io. 
 
 O Lamb of God — that cross of thine, 
 When shall mankind its glory see ? 
 
 When shall be felt its might divine, 
 To draw all human hearts to Thee ? 
 
THE THREE CROSSES. 
 
 He said unto Jesus, Lord, remember me, when Thou 
 comest into Thy kingdom. — St. Luke, xxiii. 42. 
 
 I. 
 
 At morn or eve, one shining sphere 
 Sheds its reflected light serene, 
 
 But holds its course the sun so near, 
 That few the little star have seen. 
 
 2. 
 
 Behold in all its solar blaze 
 
 The Cross of Christ, the death divine ! 
 How mean beside its morning rays 
 
 The martyr's noblest trophies shine ! 
 
 3- 
 
 The thief's repentant cross to view 
 Not many for a moment turn : 
 
 The Cross of Christ so near — how few 
 Those meaner splendors can discern ! 
 
 4- 
 Yet think what ev'n that cross supplies, 
 
 And what reflected light it throws : 
 How the Great Cross it glorifies, 
 
 And all its might and mercy shows ! 
 
THE THREE CROSSES. 113 
 
 5- 
 
 Not the mere martyr Jesus hangs 
 Upon the nails and bows his head ; 
 
 For His are our redemption's pangs, 
 His blood is for atonement shed. 
 
 That other cross the Saviour's power 
 Displays in all His might to save ; 
 
 He dies, but in that awful hour 
 
 From Satan's thralidom frees the slave. 
 
 7- 
 
 Nor frees alone, but clothes with light 
 The soul so dark to Him that turns : 
 
 For when were faith and hope more bright 
 Than His, who there his God discerns ? 
 
 A king — though like a worm he seems ; 
 
 Almighty — though they crucify ; 
 His God — though Him the priest blasphemes ; 
 
 His Saviour — who consents to die ! 
 
 9- 
 
 The Resurrection and the Life, 
 
 While groaning on the cross he hung ; 
 
 How strong the faith, with fact at strife, 
 That fired the malefactor's tongue ! 
 8 
 
114 THE THREE CROSSES. 
 
 IO. 
 
 A thief, a sinner base at morn, 
 
 On that blest Lamb has fix'd his eyes, 
 
 And heard His words — till, newly born, 
 He lives — and all in glory dies. 
 
 II. 
 
 Dies, but confesses, first, his Lord ; 
 
 Pleads with his twin in shame and crime ; 
 Repents and prays, and wins the word 
 
 Of peace and promise so sublime. 
 
 12. 
 
 The faith that prayed — " Remember Me 
 When Thou shalt in Thy kingdom come "- 
 
 How great ! His kingdom to foresee ; 
 That Lamb before His shearers dumb ! 
 
 13- 
 
 Back to fair Eden's guarded door 
 Redeeming love in mercy goes ; 
 
 The flaming sword is seen no more, 
 Of Paradise the gates unclose. 
 
 14. 
 
 Of Paradise — but not the same, 
 
 Nor of a kingdom far away ; 
 But " thou, with me, who own'st my Name, 
 
 Shalt be in Paradise this day." 
 
THE THREE CROSSES. 115 
 
 15. 
 
 Thus dies the Christ, the war to wage 
 With hosts of hell ; while yet to prove 
 
 His power to save — behold the gauge 
 In this the trophy of His love ! 
 
 16. 
 
 The earth its depth, the heaven its height, 
 Its breadth the widespread world may know, 
 
 And lo ! the fourfold cross, in light, 
 This parable might seem' to show. 
 
 17. 
 Of Golgotha — those crosses three, 
 
 That Cross of Christ, the twain between, 
 Unfold Redemption's mystery, 
 
 And tell what all life's myst'ries mean.- 
 
 18. 
 
 He that believes, though dead he were, 
 Shall in His kingdom live and reign ; 
 
 Who scorns the Atoning Sufferer, 
 Beholds His crimson 'd cross in vain. 
 
THE ATONEMENT. 
 
 No man may deliver his brother nor make agreement 
 unto God for him, for it cost more to redeem their souls.— 
 Ps. xlix. 7, 8. 
 
 I. 
 
 Hail Cross of Christ, whose crimson stains 
 
 Flow from the dear Redeemer's veins ; 
 
 Our only hope, our only plea, 
 
 Our refuge from the storm is He ; 
 
 And blest the Father's love, who gave — 
 
 In Him — the Mighty One to save. 
 
 Of sinful flesh how poor the dream 
 That man his brother may redeem, 
 Or for himself redemption win, 
 By human merit cleansed from sin. 
 Dear Lamb of God, thy blood alone 
 Is all-sufficient to atone. 
 
 3- 
 
 Hail Cross of Christ, o'er life's dark sea, 
 
 Rising our Star of Hope to be ! 
 
 Through clouds and storms that lower around 
 
 Thy radiance breaks, and peace is found, 
 
 And guided by thy light, at last, 
 
 The port appears, the waves are passed. 
 
THE ATONEMENT. 117 
 
 4- 
 Poor pilgrim through a world of woe, 
 While here I fare and toil below, 
 Cheer'd by thy beams, as pilgrims are 
 Who but descry one friendly star, 
 Still shall my heart contented sing, 
 Hail Cross of Christ, my God and King ! 
 
HYSSOP. 
 
 Purge me with hyssop and I shall be clean.— Psalm, li. 7. 
 I. 
 
 The bitter hyssop, springing from the wall, 
 While Solomon the king is passing by, 
 Of that imperial sage attracts the eye ; 
 
 But did that eye foresee the vinegar and gall ? 
 
 2. 
 A greater King than Solomon is here, 
 Of that strange herb, the true interpreter, 
 Whose pungent scent is as the bitter myrrh, 
 Whose taste like Sodom's sea, or Marah's fount 
 austere. 
 
 3- 
 O'er Moses' book its spray the hyssop throws ; 
 Its crimson stain the Hebrew's door makes 
 
 sure ; 
 The purge of sin, the loathsome leper's cure, 
 All teach — from Christ alone the blood of sprin- 
 kling flows. 
 
 4- 
 The awful groan from His deep heart that burst 
 When, uncomplaining on the nails He hung, 
 When, from the dust of death, His parched 
 tongue 
 The last fierce torture told in that one word — I 
 thirst: 
 
HYSSOP. II9 
 
 5- 
 That cry expounds the Levite's hyssop-bough, 
 The sponge, with gall and acrid juice, that 
 
 drips, 
 The reed with hyssop bound that mocks his 
 lips — ■ 
 All these, Messiah's signs, are seen in Jesus now. 
 
 6. 
 
 Kneel we beneath His Cross of Sacrifice, 
 
 Smiting the breast, and trembling to draw 
 
 near ; 
 Yet all these tokens reading, with deep fear, 
 While Nature blackens o'er : the Lord of Nature 
 dies. 
 
 7- 
 For so, in jot and tittle, all fulfill'd, 
 
 Even to the hyssop are His signs foreshown ; 
 Behold the pierced side, th' unbroken bone ; 
 The Paschal Lamb with bitter herbs is killed. 
 
 Around the cross, with thorn and spear and 
 
 reed, 
 
 This plant we twine, of mystic worth not least ; 
 
 Behold and see, how for Our Great High Priest, 
 
 The Law and Prophets blend, to deck those 
 
 hands that bleed ! 
 
THE DESIRE OF NATIONS. 
 
 So shall He sprinkle many nations.— Isaiah, Hi. 15. 
 
 Saviour, sprinkle many nations ! 
 
 Fruitful let thy sorrows be, 
 By thy pains and consolations 
 
 Draw the Gentiles unto thee. 
 Of thy Cross the wondrous story, 
 
 Be it to the nations told : 
 Let them see Thee in thy glory, 
 
 And thy mercy manifold. 
 
 Far and wide, though all unknowing, 
 
 Pants for thee each mortal breast : 
 Human tears for Thee are flowing, 
 
 Human hearts in Thee would rest. 
 Thirsting as for dews of even, 
 
 Or the new-mown grass for rain, 
 Thee they seek as God of Heaven, 
 
 Thee as man for sinners slain. 
 
 Saviour, lo ! the isles are waiting, 
 
 Stretched the hand and strained the sight. 
 
THE DESIRE OF NATIONS. 121 
 
 For thy spirit, new-creating, 
 
 Love's pure flame and wisdom's light : 
 Give the word, and of the preacher 
 
 Speed the foot and touch the tongue, 
 Till on earth, by every creature, 
 
 Glory to the Lamb be sung. 
 
NICODEMUS. 
 
 With the rich in his death. — Isaiah, liii., 9. 
 I. 
 
 They came to Nicodemus, him to mock 
 Because with them no part he bore, 
 And they had mock'd him once before : 
 
 Now let him share the shame and feel its shock ! 
 
 2. 
 
 Him then they told his prophet was no more ; 
 
 Was hanging lifeless on the tree ; 
 
 With thieves was hanging — there on Calvary, 
 Just as the serpent was uphung of yore ! 
 
 3- 
 
 Started that ruler at the taunt severe : 
 
 Nay, have they made his blood to stream ? 
 Made that white Lamb a serpent seem ? 
 
 Oh ! where was I ? Alas ! too late I hear. 
 
 4- 
 
 Came back those words — came back that lamp- 
 lit scene, 
 
 When first he sought the Christ to see, 
 
 And came by night so stealthily, 
 'Mid Olive's groves to find the Nazarene : 
 
NICODEMUS. 123 
 
 5- 
 
 " As Moses lifted up that brazen sign, 
 So must the Son of Man," he said, 
 " Be lifted up." Strange words and dread ! 
 
 But now 'tis all unveil'd — their sense divine. 
 
 Uprose that ruler of the Jews : uprose 
 Unwonted courage in his breast. 
 He came with Joseph, and thrice blest 
 
 These bore the dear Redeemer to repose. 
 
THE BURIAL. 
 
 Then took they the body of Jesus and wound it in linen 
 clothes, with the spices as the manner of the Jews is to bury. 
 St. John, xix., 40. 
 
 1. 
 
 Yes, 'tis finished ! All is done 
 Man could do to God the Son. 
 Hangs He there upon the Tree ; 
 In His side the Fountain see, 
 Gory hands and drooping brow, 
 Bruised and marr'd ! 'Tis finished now. 
 
 2. 
 
 Loose we then the thorny crown ; 
 Take the glorious victim down ; 
 Draw the nails with tender care ; 
 Gently, now, the body bear: 
 Spread and fold his winding-sheet, 
 Store its bands with spices sweet. 
 
 3- 
 
 Through the garden, seek the tomb; 
 Lift the torch to light its gloom ; 
 Lo ! about the sacred bier 
 Prince and senator appear ! 
 With the poor his dwellings were 
 With the rich his sepulchre ! 
 
THE BURIAL. 125 
 
 4- 
 
 Roll the stone upon the door ! 
 Longing, looking back once more, 
 Turn we as we beat the breast, 
 Leaving Jesus to His rest. 
 Gentle Marys, do not stay ; 
 Hallow yet one Sabbath-day ! 
 
THE SEPULCHRE. 
 
 To the mountain of myrrh and to the hill of frankincense, 
 until the day break and the shadows flee away.— Canticles, 
 iv., 6. 
 
 I. 
 
 Ye that, lingering near the spot, 
 Keep your vigil fearing not ; 
 Musing, weeping, where the grave 
 Holds the g-uest that died to save. 
 
 Holy Marys — saw ye then, 
 How they came with armed men ? 
 Heard, as through a wilderness, 
 Heavy footsteps near you press ? 
 
 3- 
 
 " Whose the tomb ? For whom ? " they cry, 
 As their torches blaze on high ; 
 "Come we, lest the dead should stir — 
 Sentries round a sepulchre ? " 
 
 4- 
 Tell them 'tis the royal bed 
 Where a conqueror lays his head : 
 'Tis the rest of David's son ; 
 'Tis the couch of Solomon ! 
 
THE SEPULCHRE. 127 
 
 5- 
 
 By these signs of pillar'd smoke, 
 Learn of what the prophet spoke ; 
 For the funeral lights ye bear, 
 Fume with spice and incense rare. 
 
 Let the glorious Victor sleep, 
 Threescore guards his state shall keep, 
 Posted round, a goodly sight, 
 Sword on thigh, through all the night. 
 
 7- 
 
 Roman guards, expert in war, 
 Israel's too, not less ye are : 
 If — " no king but Caesar " — then, 
 Ye are Israel's valiant men ! 
 
 Jealous Jews, that slew your King, 
 Lo ! what royal pomp ye bring, 
 Guilty fears may thus provide 
 Honours for the Crucified. 
 
 9- 
 Shines the moon — the guard is set ; 
 Glistening helms with dew-drops wet, 
 And their spears make shining show, 
 Pacing slowly to and fro. 
 
128 THE SEPULCHRE. 
 
 IO. 
 
 Seal the stone with Pilate's gem ; 
 Daughters of Jerusalem, 
 By the hinds and by the roes 
 Rouse him not from sweet repose. 
 
 ii. 
 
 Where the mountain scents of myrrh, 
 Frankincense and fragrant fir, 
 He is gone, till break of day, 
 Till the shadows flee away. 
 
 12. 
 
 He that in the garden knelt, 
 He in Olive's groves that dwelt, 
 Here His bruised flesh hath laid, 
 In a garden's grateful shade. 
 
 13- 
 Leave Him — 'tis the prophet's word — 
 Till the turtle's voice is heard ; 
 Leave Him till the darkness flees : 
 Wake Him not until He please. 
 
EASTER. 
 
 The Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, hath 
 prevailed.— Rev. v., 5. 
 
 Wake the world ! The morning breaks, 
 
 Lo ! the Lord of life awakes, 
 
 See his glory in the skies ! 
 
 Christ is risen : let us rise. 
 
 Of His Promise naught hath failed: 
 
 Judah's Lion hath prevailed. 
 
 2. 
 
 Sing the patient Lamb's repose, 
 Sing the Lion that uprose : 
 Lamb of God, our sins to bear, 
 Lion, death and hell to tear ; 
 Lamb-like in the grave to lie ; 
 Judah's Lion ne'er to die. 
 
 3- 
 
 Wake, the wondrous tale to tell 
 How He broke the bars of hell. 
 He that lay among the dead, 
 Death itself hath captive led : 
 Death and hell, the sting and flame, 
 Judah's Lion overcame. 
 9 
 
I30 EASTER. 
 
 4- 
 
 Wake the never-ending psalm ; 
 
 Song of Moses and the Lamb ; 
 
 Of the Lamb, a Victim rent, 
 
 Of the Lion's hardiment, 
 
 Spread His praise from shore to shore 
 
 Judah's Lion dies no more. 
 
 5- 
 
 Sing His waking from the dead ; 
 Shook the hills, the ocean fled : 
 Springs of life the grave revealed, 
 Garden closed and fountain sealed ; 
 And, like lightning from the gloom, 
 Judah's Lion rent the tomb. 
 
 6. 
 Christ is risen ! weep no more : 
 Sing the glorious Conqueror ; 
 Songs of His salvation sing : 
 Where, O Death, thy cruel sting ! 
 Worthy is the Lamb once slain ; 
 Judah's Lion, live and reign ! 
 
EASTER IN THE GARDEN. 
 
 Very early in the morning, the first day of the week, they 
 came unto the Sepulchre at the rising of the sun. — St. Mark, 
 xvi., 2. 
 
 MARY AND SALOME. 
 
 Tell us, Gard'ner dost thou know 
 Where the Rose and Lily grow, 
 Sharon's Crimson Rose and pale 
 Judah's Lily of the Vale ? 
 Rude is yet the opening year, 
 Yet their sweetest breath is here. 
 
 GARDENER. 
 
 Daughters of Jerusalem, 
 Yes, 'tis here we planted them, 
 'Twas a Rose all red with gore, 
 Wondrous were the thorns it bore ! 
 'Twas a body swathed in white, 
 Ne'er was Lily half so bright. 
 
 THE WOMEN. 
 
 Gentle Gard'ner, even so, 
 
 What we seek thou seem'st to know. 
 
 Bearing spices and perfume, 
 
 We are come to Joseph's tomb ; 
 
 Breaks ev'n now the rosy day ; 
 
 Roll us, then, the stone away. 
 
132 EASTER IN THE GARDEN. 
 
 GARDENER. 
 
 Holy women ! this the spot. 
 Seek Him, but it holds Him not. 
 This the holy mount of myrrh, 
 Here the hills of incense were, 
 Here the bed of His repose, 
 Till, ere dawn of day, He rose. 
 
 MAGDALENE. 
 
 Yes, my name is Magdalene : 
 I myself the Lord have seen. 
 Here I came, but now, and wept 
 Where I deem'd my Saviour slept. 
 But He called my name — and lo ! 
 Jesus lives, 't is even so. 
 
 GARDENER. 
 
 Yes, the mountains skipped like rams ; 
 Leaped the little hills like lambs. 
 All was dark, when shook the ground, 
 Quaked the Roman soldiers round, 
 Streamed a glorious light, and then 
 Lived the Crucified again. 
 
 THE WOMEN. 
 
 Magdalene hath seen and heard ! 
 Gard'ner, we believe thy word. 
 But oh ! where is Jesus fled, 
 Living and no longer dead ? 
 Tell us, that we too may go 
 Where the Rose and Lily grow. 
 
EASTER IN THE GARDEN. • 1 33 
 
 MAGDALENE. 
 
 Come, the stone is rolled away ; 
 
 See the place where Jesus lay ; 
 
 See the lawn that wrapp'd His brow ; 
 
 Here the angel sat but now. 
 
 " Seek not here the Christ," he said ; 
 
 "Seek not life among the dead." 
 
 ALL. 
 
 Seek we then the life above ; 
 Seek we Christ, our Light and Love. 
 Now His words we call to mind : 
 If we seek Him we shall find ; 
 If we love Him we shall go 
 Where the Rose and Lily grow. 
 
THE EASTER EUCHARIST. 
 
 He was known of them in breaking of bread.— St. Luke, 
 xxiv., 35. 
 
 I. 
 
 Body of Jesus, oh sweet food ! 
 Blood of my Saviour, precious Blood ! 
 On these thy gifts, Eternal Priest, 
 Grant Thou my soul in faith to feast. 
 
 Weary and faint I thirst and pine 
 For Thee my Bread, for Thee rny Wine, 
 Till strengthen'd— as Elijah trod, 
 I journey to the Mount of God. 
 
 3- 
 There, clad in white, with crown and palm, 
 At the great supper of the Lamb, 
 Be mine, with all thy Saints to rest, 
 Like him that leaned upon thy breast. 
 
 4- 
 Saviour, till then, I fain would know 
 That feast above by this below ; 
 This Bread of Life, this wondrous Food, 
 Thy Body and Thy precious Blood. 
 
THE BIRD SONG. 
 
 The flowers appear on the earth, the time of the singing of 
 birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land. 
 — Canticles, ii., 12. 
 
 1. 
 
 The winter is over and gone at last, 
 The days of snow and rain are past, 
 Over the fields the flowers appear, 
 It is the Turtle's voice we hear. 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 The singing of birds, 
 
 A warbling band, 
 
 And the Spirit's voice ! 
 The voice of the Turtle is heard in our land. 
 repeat. — The time it is of the singing of birds, 
 
 The singing of birds, etc. 
 
 2. 
 And gone are the plaintive days of Lent, 
 The week of the Cross with Christ we spent. 
 Now he giveth us joy for woe — 
 Gather the flowers the first that blow. 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 The singing of birds, 
 
 A warbling band, 
 
 And flowers are words, 
 Are words the faithful may understand. 
 repeat. — The time it. is, etc. 
 
136 THE BIRD SONG. 
 
 3- 
 
 A sepulchre sealed, a rock its door, 
 But winter is gone and comes no more. 
 The seal is broken, and now are seen 
 Valleys and woods and gardens green ! 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 The singing of birds, 
 A warbling band, 
 'Mid flocks and herds 
 The song of all Nature is heard in our land ! 
 
 REPEAT. — The time it is, etc. 
 
 And Christ is the song of everything ! 
 For Death is winter, and Christ the spring ; 
 Fountains that warble in purling words — 
 Hark ! how they echo the " Song of Birds : " 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 The singing of birds, 
 A warbling band, 
 And the purling words 
 Of brooks and waters are heard in our land. 
 
 repeat. — The time it is of the singing of birds, 
 
 The singing of birds, 
 
 A warbling band, 
 
 And the Spirit's voice ! 
 The voice of the Turtle is heard in our land. 
 
THE BUTTERFLY. 
 
 I have said to corruption thou art my father ; to the worm 
 thou art my mother and my sister. — Job, xvii., 14. 
 
 WHERE the grave-digger plies his fearful trade, 
 
 With mattock and with spade, 
 Upturning bones and skulls of hollow eye, 
 Oft lights upon a head, the butterfly, 
 Cresting its forehead with a gaudy wing, 
 And fluttering, like a soul, about that horrid 
 thing. 
 
 2. 
 An idle thought ; but, in that garden's bound, 
 
 That place of skulls around, 
 Hovered, perchance, that day the Saviour rose, 
 The Tyrian moth, as beautiful as those 
 Whose purpled pinions glitter in the sun 
 Of Ormuz or of Ind, arrayed like Solomon. 
 
 3- 
 Nor deem it vain, a worm may seem sublime 
 
 In Easter's golden prime, 
 Thus deck'd, and flitting like embodied breath 
 That pants in resurrection out of death, 
 For thus to me a parable is shown ; 
 What Christ of lilies spake expounds not flowers 
 alone. 
 
I38 THE BUTTERFLY. 
 
 4- 
 
 For if a worm in winding-sheet down lies, 
 
 Instinct with power to rise ; 
 If the poor thing - that crawled may soar — a 
 
 nymph, 
 That fed on dust — may suck the honey 'd lymph, 
 That rotted in dishonour — may be seen 
 Transfigur'd ev'n like him that dazzled Sheba's 
 
 Queen. 
 
 5- 
 Oh ! faithless we, shall God so clothe a worm, 
 
 So raise from earth that form, 
 And leave His children dear, in icy shade, 
 All unremember'd and forgotton laid ? 
 Shall we, when Christ returns, less glorious 
 
 spring 
 Out of the dust of death than that transfigur'd 
 
 thing ? 
 
EASTER-EGGS. 
 
 My hand hath found, as a nest, the riches of the people, 
 and as one gathereth eggs.— Isaiah x. 14. 
 
 I. 
 
 My godson, dear delighted child, 
 Held up his Easter-eggs, and wild 
 
 With Easter-mirth, ranged here and there, 
 To show their colours, manifold, 
 Their dappled hues, their blue and gold, 
 
 Like mossy agates rich and rare. 
 
 2. 
 
 Nonsense profane for Easter day, 
 Away with toys — the churl might say : 
 
 But nay, dear boy, hear words of mine ! 
 These colours kindly Art hath made; 
 But hidden in the forest's shade, 
 
 The birds have brighter eggs than thine. 
 
 3- 
 
 Where thickest hazels weave a screen, 
 The school-boy prying through the green, 
 
 When blossoms first the fragrant May, 
 Spies, deep the tangled boughs amid, 
 The mother-bird, in nest half-hid, 
 
 Till — there, alas ! she whirrs away. 
 
140 EASTER-EGGS. 
 
 4- 
 He gazes — but he scorns a theft : 
 What pebbles in her nest she left, 
 
 What marvels and what wondrous dyes ! 
 How strange, beneath a warbler's wings, 
 That God should hide such mystic things 
 
 From man's cold heart and faithless eyes. 
 
 5- 
 
 Night's glitt'ring worlds the Maker plann'd, 
 Yet deigned the same Almighty hand 
 
 To deck the little linnet's nest, 
 And freak with many a brilliant boss, 
 Those pearls, within their bed of moss, 
 
 She presses with maternal breast. 
 
 6. 
 Then let the precious gems lie hid ; 
 For so thy mother, boy, would bid, 
 
 She that hath made thy bed so soft ; 
 Yet come thou mayest, to watch the spot, 
 Till forth from each enamell'd grot, 
 
 Breaks life, at last, and springs aloft. 
 
 7- 
 Heavenward it soars, and soaring, sings 
 An Easter-song, on joyous wings, 
 
 For lo ! what seem'd a stone is rent ; 
 Like Joseph's sepulchre it breaks ; 
 Forth springs a living thing, and wakes 
 
 Each list'ning ear to ravishment. 
 
EASTER-EGGS. 141 
 
 There's not a wing that cleaves the sky 
 But once did, like the Saviour, lie 
 
 All seal'd, as in a stony grave. 
 These creatures scarce to earth belong ; 
 They fill the firmament with song; 
 
 They sing the Lamb that died to save. 
 
 9- 
 The Resurrection and the Life 
 Well may their nests, with myst'ry rife 
 
 To man's dull soul and sense portend. 
 So, when Christ's coming gilds its gloom, 
 Shall break the torpor of the tomb ; 
 
 So, shall the sons of God ascend. 
 
 to. 
 
 And such the sympathy, they say, 
 Of birds with Christ, on Easter-Day, 
 
 When from His rocky tomb He sprung, 
 That every Qgg, in every nest 
 Of Golgotha, gave forth its guest, 
 
 And with their songs the garden rung. 
 
 11. 
 As seeds to flowers, so eggs had turn'd 
 To brilliant things the earth that spurn 'd, 
 
 And sought the skies on gladsome wing 
 Birds of all plumages, 'tis said, 
 Sung — Christ is risen from the dead, 
 
 And taught us Easter-hymns to sing. 
 
142 EASTER-EGGS. 
 
 12. 
 
 And so, where Carmel's lily grows, 
 Where wafts the scent of Sharon's rose, 
 
 Where warbles sweet Siloah's rill, 
 The pilgrim, at the Paschal-tide, 
 May hear, with many a song beside, 
 
 The turtle's voice of rapture still. 
 
 13- 
 Then marvel not, where mystery lies 
 Of life in eggs, that God most wise 
 
 Disdains not, thus, to bid us learn ; 
 Teaching alike the boy and man 
 By faith fond Nature's lore to scan, 
 
 With childlike hearts within that burn. 
 
 14. 
 
 So she, the Second Adam's Bride, 
 That rose like Eve from Jesu's side, 
 
 Of Him " who dwells in gardens " sings, 
 And still in gardens hears His voice, 
 Where birds, at Easter-tide rejoice, 
 
 And every nest breaks forth and sings. 
 
THE ROYAL YARN. 
 
 i. Bind this line of scarlet thread in the window. — Joshua, 
 ii. 18. 
 
 2. Take cedar-wood, scarlet, and hyssop. — Levit. xiv. 4. 
 
 3. He took blood and water, and scarlet wool, and hys- 
 sop. — Heb. ix. 19. 
 
 Shone the sun, that Easter-Monday, 
 
 O'er the new-grown grass and green, 
 O'er the pleasant slopes of Greenwich 
 
 And the sports that there were seen : 
 But, while youth around me frolicked 
 
 In that holiday of Spring, 
 Sat I by an ancient sailor, 
 
 With the sailor gossiping. 
 
 Told he me how, under Nelson, 
 
 From the Indies to the Nile, 
 Served he, till at fierce Trafalgar, 
 
 He had seen his dying smile : 
 How he whisper'd — " Kiss me, Hardy,' 
 
 How in death he laid him down : 
 But he sigh'd that such a hero 
 
 Fought not under Jesu's Crown. 
 
144 THE ROYAL YARN. 
 
 3- 
 
 Changed his gossip as I questioned 
 
 How his sailor-life, so free, 
 Him had made so good a Christian : 
 
 " 'Twas the royal yarn," quoth he. 
 " Through my life, that thread is woven ; 
 
 With my christ'ning it began ; 
 Everywhere, that kingly token 
 
 Marks my story, boy and man." 
 
 " Now, you know," quoth he, " good Master, 
 
 How the royal yarn is sign 
 That the Crown claims all that bears it, 
 
 Canvass, cordage, rope, and twine ; 
 So, one time, I heard the parson 
 
 Say, by Faith we might discern 
 Woven in our life and fortunes 
 
 Christ our Saviour's royal yarn : " 
 
 " How we are His Crown's possession, 
 
 Marked for Him ; and by this clue 
 We may trace His grace and goodness 
 
 Running all our lifetime through. 
 What the parson preach'd I thought of" — 
 
 So the sailor's tale ran on, 
 " When off Moro-Castle lying, 
 
 Sick I lay and well nigh gone." 
 
THE ROYAL YARN.. 145 
 
 " For the royal yarn was woven 
 
 In my hammock as I swung, 
 And my conscience saw another 
 
 All my threads of life among ; 
 So upon my weary pallet, 
 
 As I turn'd and thought it o'er, 
 Swore I, to Christ's Crown forever 
 
 I'd be faithful, ship and shore." 
 
 Prosed yet more that ancient sailor, 
 
 But no more his yarn I heard : 
 For another thought had started 
 
 In my spirit, at his word : 
 For that sign of Crown-possession, 
 
 And that thread of royal hue 
 Gave me insight of the Scriptures ; 
 
 Gave me to its types a clue. 
 
 8. 
 
 Of the Royal line of Judah, 
 
 See what scarlet symbols show ; 
 See how, like the weaver's shuttle, 
 
 Prophets thread them to and fro ; 
 How, on Zarah's wrist withdrawing, 
 
 Scarlet mark'd redemption's claim ; 
 How, in Rahab's window glowing, 
 
 'Twas Messiah's royal Name. 
 10 
 
I46 THE ROYAL YARN. 
 
 9- 
 
 So the scarlet wool of Moses 
 
 Did the scarlet robe foretell, 
 So, proclaiming — Ecce Homo, 
 
 Jesus King- of Israel, 
 Through the symbols of His passion 
 
 Scourges, thorns, and scoffs amid, 
 Weaves this one Imperial token, 
 
 Gleaming forth, or deftly hid. 
 
 10. 
 
 And the Bride, with lips of scarlet, 
 
 Thus expounds the mystic Word, 
 Where with hyssop, and with cedar, 
 
 Scarlet binds the living bird : 
 Where, through all the Scriptures woven, 
 
 Bright this royal yarn is seen, 
 Everywhere Messiah's token, 
 
 Token of the Nazarene. 
 
EASTER VIRELAY. 
 
 Wake thou that sleepest and arise from the dead and 
 Christ shall give 'thee light. — Ephesians, v. 14. 
 
 Wake thou that sleepest ! 
 Joy thou that weepest, 
 
 Lift up the head ! 
 Cease from thy moaning 
 Sighing and groaning, 
 
 Rise from the dead. 
 
 2. 
 Weary wayfarer, 
 Fainting cross-bearer, 
 
 Bending adown ; 
 Hark ! how the Spirit 
 Bids thee inherit 
 
 Life and a crown. 
 
 3- 
 
 Lo ! to restore thee 
 Christ goes before thee, 
 
 Through the deep vale, 
 Gloomy and darkling ; 
 Paradise sparkling 
 
 There shall unveil. 
 
148 EASTER VIRELAY. 
 
 4- 
 
 Flee to the mountain ! 
 There, find the fountain ; 
 
 Wash and be white. 
 Joy thou that weepest, 
 Wake thou that sleepest, 
 
 Christ gives thee light. 
 
SONG FOR EASTER. 
 
 Break forth into singing.— Isaiah. 
 I. 
 
 Christ hath arisen ! 
 Broken His prison, 
 Man to deliver 
 
 From death's gloomy reign. 
 Victor Immortal ! 
 Hell's gloomy portal 
 Of brass and of iron 
 He rendeth in twain. 
 
 2. 
 
 Wake every nation ! 
 Songs of salvation 
 
 Round the great earth 
 Let them echo to-day. 
 Life to the dying ! 
 Sorrow and sighing 
 The sunrise of glory 
 Hath driven away. 
 
 3- 
 
 Darkness hath vanished ! 
 Death's sting is banished : 
 See the bright mansions 
 Of Paradise ope ! 
 
I50 SONG FOR EASTER. 
 
 Grave thou art broken ; 
 Jesus hath spoken 
 Joy to the Universe, 
 Glory and Hope. 
 
 4- 
 Tell how He liveth : 
 Sing what He giveth ; 
 Sound the great name 
 Of the risen I-AM 
 Feed on His manna : 
 Raise the Hosanna ! 
 Full be the choral-song 
 Worthy the Lamb. 
 
EASTER IN PATMOS. 
 
 I was in the Spirit on the day of the Lord. — Revelation, 
 io. 
 
 I. 
 
 'Twas on the day the Lord had made, 
 
 The day that rent his rocky tomb, 
 St. John in lonely Patmos strayed, 
 
 While glorious, as from ocean's womb, 
 Arose the sun — and lo ! there came 
 
 A trumpet voice; the exile turned, 
 And One whose eyes were fiery flame 
 He saw — the Word of God His Name, 
 
 Where sevenfold lights about him burned. 
 
 2. 
 
 In rapture, by that sea-girt shore, 
 
 He Jesus sees, whom Jesus loved, 
 Who was and is forevermore, 
 
 Faithful and true His promise proved. 
 Breathes from his lips the Spirit's sword, 
 
 Shines from his face the noon-tide sun ; 
 Of death and hell the mighty Lord, 
 His are the keys and His the Word 
 
 Of Life— the everlasting One. 
 
 3- 
 
 A voice of many waters — His, 
 
 Who liveth and was dead the while ; 
 
152 EASTER IN PATMOS. 
 
 He opes the seven-seal'd book, and this 
 
 Is Easter in that holy isle : 
 A vision of the Lamb and throne, 
 
 Of Judah's Lion and His might, 
 Worthy to loose the seals alone, 
 And all the Church's way make known, 
 
 Through death and darkness into light. 
 
 The Paschal hymns of heaven are heard, 
 
 The Lamb that once was slain, their song- 
 From numbers without numbers stirred, 
 
 Response with rapture to prolong. 
 I read and lo ! I seem to hear 
 
 From great creation's dawn and end, 
 From earth and sky and every sphere, 
 One Alleluia broad and clear, 
 
 From all the sons of God ascend. ' 
 
 5- 
 Day of the Lord, of year or week, 
 
 Whene'er it shines a Paschal Feast, 
 On that blest day His flock to seek 
 
 The Shepherd comes, our Great High Priest; 
 Comes to our sins a flame of fire, 
 
 Comes to our faith like Gilead's balm, 
 Comes to our love and fond desire, 
 And joins us to the heavenly choir 
 
 In that eternal Paschal Psalm. 
 
EASTER IN PATMOS. 1 53 
 
 He comes, our prophet, priest and king-, 
 
 That Alpha and Omega scroll 
 To open, and what Time shall bring — 
 
 Age upon ages — to unroll. 
 Of earth and heaven the keynote words 
 
 He gives His suffering saints to guide, 
 Till ceaseth din of spears and swords, 
 Till King of kings and Lord of lords, 
 
 He comes again to crown His Bride. 
 
 7- 
 Descends the New Jerusalem ; 
 
 He reigns who maketh all things new ; 
 The Church in sparkling diadem, 
 
 In white those virgin souls we view. 
 The sea of glass, so bright and calm, 
 
 Glitters the rainbow'd throne before, 
 And sounds th' eternal Paschal Psalm, 
 That song of Moses and the Lamb, 
 
 With Alleluias, evermore. 
 
THE ANGELS ON THE ARK. 
 
 To the intent that now unto the principalities and powers 
 in heavenly places might be known by the Church, etc. — 
 Ephesians, iii. 10. 
 
 I. 
 
 The cherubim o'ershadowing the Ark 
 
 Looked clown upon the mercy-seat that shone, 
 
 And covered o'er the Law profoundly dark, 
 Those tables twain by Moses hewn of stone ; 
 That writing of no hand save God's alone, 
 
 That was against us — flaming red, 
 
 Like Tekel on the wall so dread, 
 
 To poor Belshazzar's ear that was interpreted. 
 
 What things those cherubs seemed intent to scan 
 
 The same all angels scan with awe to-day ; 
 The Law's dire curse, condemning sinful man, 
 By mercy covered — ta'en by it away. 
 And oh, the depth ! still, oh ! the depth — they 
 say : 
 The depth and height and breadth sublime 
 Of Jesu's mercy covering crime, 
 Of Christ, the only Ark, the Word made flesh in 
 time. 
 
 3- 
 Bring forth the deaf with ears that will not hear, 
 Bring forth the blind with eyes that will not 
 see 
 
THE ANGELS ON THE ARK. 1 55 
 
 What wondrous things are in that Law austere, 
 Beneath that golden lid enshrined that be, 
 Where the Shekinah shines eternally. 
 
 Behold ! the Ark, God's glorious Son, 
 
 Th' atoning Lamb, the Holy One, 
 
 That takes away our sins : He bleeds and it is 
 clone. 
 
 4- 
 
 Lo ! when on earth, responsive to the skies, 
 Uprises like a cloud upon the gale, 
 
 The incense of our Easter sacrifice, 
 
 When the pure altar's mysteries unveil, 
 And high Trisagion thrills our spirits frail, 
 
 In holy awe and thought intent, 
 
 I seem to see all heaven down bent, 
 
 To learn from saints below new songs of ravish- 
 ment. 
 
 5- 
 New songs, which none but pardon'd sinners 
 know ; 
 Love which the much forgiven alone can feel ; 
 The love of Christ to heirs of sin and woe; 
 
 These to the height of heaven our deeds reveal. 
 The chariots of God, on burning wheel, 
 Pause in full course our hymns to hear ; 
 Legions of angels bow their ear, 
 And through the Church on earth they draw to 
 God more near. 
 
RHODA. 
 
 A damsel named Rose. — Acts, xii. 13. 
 I. 
 
 Sweet Paschal Rose, thy fragrant name 
 Blossoms in all the golden flame 
 
 Of that blest Easter Morn, 
 When Peter, from the bonds abhorr'd 
 Of Herod and his .threatened sword, 
 Rose glorious, like His risen Lord, 
 
 To light and life new-born. 
 
 2. 
 Dark was the Paschal Eve, that year, 
 When met the trembling saints in fear, 
 
 All night for him to pray. 
 The great apostle, doom'd to die, 
 Though soaring where the angels fly, 
 Must leave the flock forlorn to sigh, 
 
 Ev'n on an Easter-Day. 
 
 3- 
 Meanwhile, in prison-bonds he slept, 
 Peaceful — yet dreaming that he wept 
 
 Once more his shameful fall : 
 " Dear Master," in his dream, said he, 
 " My oath, at last, redeemed shall be ; 
 In chains and death I follow Thee ; 
 
 My sin — forgive it all ! " 
 
RHODA. 157 
 
 4- 
 
 Again, the crowing cock he hears, 
 And flow afresh those bitter tears : 
 
 But — does he wake or sleep ? 
 Like Lot's, his hand an angel takes : 
 From hands and feet the chains he shakes, 
 Bars fall and every barrier breaks — 
 
 " Go, Peter ! feed my sheep." 
 
 5- 
 The guards are passed, strong gates unfold, 
 He breathes sweet air ! A morn of gold 
 
 Reddens the eastern skies. 
 From death's dark dungeon of the night, 
 A parable of Jesus' might, 
 He rises into life and light, 
 
 As all the saints shall rise. 
 
 6. 
 
 'Tis Easter ; and while yet 'tis dark, 
 The faithful, like the soaring lark, 
 
 Have changed to praise their prayer : 
 At Mary's gate is heard a knock ! 
 And Rhoda hastes to loose its lock — 
 When oh ! what voice, with wonder's shock, 
 
 Sounds on her startled ear ! 
 
 7- 
 Affrighted child she backward hies : 
 " 'Tis Cephas at the door," she cries, 
 
 While still he knocks and waits : 
 
158 RHODA. 
 
 His angel ? Nay, himself ! Tis he : 
 The Lord hath set his pris'ner free ! 
 Once more the Church his face shall see ! 
 Go haste, unbar the gates ! 
 
 Sweet Rose, of Easter flowers the first, 
 So did that Paschal morning burst 
 
 On thine elected sight ! 
 Damsel august, though meek of mien, 
 In Holy Writ, with saintly sheen, 
 Stands thy blest name ! No sceptred queen 
 
 Wears diadem so bright. 
 
 9- 
 Therefore, where Easter altars shine, 
 One rose with Easter flowers entwine, 
 
 Her name still fresh to keep ! 
 Children, like her — his lambs — to bear, 
 The Shepherd loves ; and thousands there 
 Follow the Lamb in pastures fair 
 
 Where Jesus folds His sheep. 
 
THE WALK TO EMMAUS. 
 
 Of which salvation the prophets have inquired. . . . 
 Searching what or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ, 
 which was in them, did signify, when it testified beforehand 
 the sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow. — I 
 St. Peter, i. n. 
 
 Did not our heart burn within us, while He talked with 
 us by the way and while He opened to us the Scriptures. — 
 St. Luke, xxiv. 32. 
 
 I. 
 
 Once gazing on a craftsman's curious die 
 
 Deep in the temper'd metal wrought, 
 I strove its cunning plan to spy, 
 
 Yet seem'd to. profit naught. 
 The quaint device was intricate and blind : 
 Backward the figures ran, its scheme I could not 
 find. 
 
 2. 
 
 Smiled at my task the artist, as he came 
 Bearing embossed a golden shield ; 
 
 Its rich devices flashed like flame 
 And in its light, revealed, 
 
 I saw the mystery and sublime intent 
 
 That in the matrice dark me foiled with wonder- 
 ment. 
 
 3- 
 
 Great God thy wondrous ways and work obscure 
 Seem'd in that happy art exposed : 
 
l6o THE WALK TO EMMAUS. 
 
 Dropt from mine eyes the scales impure 
 
 That Faith's clear eyesight closed. 
 Of dim prophetic signs I felt the scope, 
 And saw, the veil withdrawn, thy glorious coun- 
 sels ope. 
 
 4- 
 
 Before all worlds, Faith's shield of shining gold 
 
 With God's device was glorified, 
 Where wondering angels might behold 
 
 The Lamb of God that died ; 
 There stood His cross, with types to intertwine, 
 Tokens so rich and rare, enwreathed with His 
 true Vine. 
 
 5- 
 
 That shield the Gospel shows in all its light ; 
 
 But till that came — the matrice dark 
 God gave to be explored, by night, 
 
 As 'twere the Holy Ark 
 Within the veil, — a mystery sublime, 
 To be devoutly kept for His appointed time. 
 
 So, all that hoary seers and prophets gave, 
 
 All that by lips inspired was sung 
 In Salem's royal halls, by Chebar's wave, 
 
 Or Uzzian rocks among ; 
 First, in the Gospel's gold I rightly scan ; 
 Then trace the mould obscure to find the Son 
 of Man. 
 
THE WALK TO EMMAUS. l6l 
 
 7- 
 
 So, while I gaze, how burns within my heart, 
 Though all around me owlets hoot, 
 
 To scan the emblems of the graver's art, 
 Olive and vine and fruit, 
 
 Enfolding and emblazoning the cross, 
 
 Incisions deeply sunk and dark inverted boss. 
 
 8. 
 
 The backward letters of the groping Jew, 
 
 Thus searching out I read aright ; 
 Mosaic symbols strange and dim to view 
 
 Now flash with Tabor's light ; 
 The mystic seal by what it stamps is known, 
 The Gospel in the Law by prophecy foreshown. 
 
 9\ 
 O fools and slow of heart, as Jesus said, 
 
 Are they, of dullard wit and cold, 
 Who set their barren brains and lore of lead 
 
 Against this lore of gold. 
 Reading Mosaic mould and prophet's page 
 All uncompared with Christ and His foretoken'd 
 Age. 
 
 io. 
 
 For me, not so the prophets' goodly band 
 Unfold the characters they traced ; 
 
 Which ev'n their ken might fail to understand, 
 Till all by Faith embraced, 
 n 
 
1 62 THE WALK TO EMMAUS. 
 
 Searching of what and whose blest days they 
 sung, 
 
 While Christ himself within inspired each rap- 
 turous tongue. 
 
 ii. 
 
 Great pupil of Gamaliel, oft with thee, 
 
 As at thy saintly feet I learn, 
 I seem, outshining noontide, Christ to see, 
 
 And His clear cross discern, 
 Where, but for thee, and thine anointed eyes, 
 Naught but dull forms abound and senseless 
 sacrifice. 
 
 12. 
 
 Or walking to Emmaus, with the twain, 
 'Neath the first Easter's Evening Star, 
 Me Christ draws near, nor shows his hands in 
 vain, 
 And in His side the scar, 
 Sprinkling the Book with hyssop and with gore, 
 That so who runs may read and live forever- 
 more. 
 
THE EARTHQUAKE. 
 
 There was a great earthquake. — St. Matt, xxviii. 2. 
 
 Early in the morning. — Ps. v. 3. 
 
 I myself will awake right early. — Ps. lvii. 9. 
 
 The sun leaps up the golden skies, 
 
 And seems to say, 
 Ev'n so the Son of God did rise 
 
 On Easter-Day : 
 Then early from my bed let me 
 
 Rise on the Resurrection Morn ; 
 
 The dancing sunbeams let me see 
 
 Soon as the joyous feast is born. 
 
 Yes, early to the church away : 
 
 'Tis Easter-Day, 'tis Easter-Day ! 
 
 2. 
 
 The moon went down, and in the dark 
 
 The garden lay, 
 Nor yet had lifted wing the lark 
 
 That Easter-Day, 
 When holy women, as they went 
 To seek the glorious slumberer, 
 Felt, as if earth itself were rent, 
 
 The shock that shook the sepulchre : 
 
 For leap'd the mountains far away, 
 
 That Easter-Day — that Easter-Day. 
 
164 THE EARTHQUAKE. 
 
 3- 
 
 Tabor and Hermon skipped like rams 
 
 In gladsome May ; 
 And leap'd the little hills like lambs, 
 
 That Easter-Day. 
 From Libanus, like thunder heard — 
 
 That rumbles in the distant sky, 
 Came sounds as if the mountains stirr'd 
 To lift their hoary heads on high. 
 
 Trembled the earth at morning's ray, 
 
 That Easter-Day — that Easter-Day. 
 
 4- 
 
 For then, as with the lightning's stroke, 
 
 Was roll'd away 
 The massy stone ; and God awoke, 
 
 That Easter-Day ! 
 Frightened the Roman sentries fell, 
 
 Then fled as from the day of doom ; 
 They heard the rending gates of hell, 
 
 They saw a birth from morning's womb : 
 
 Forth shone the Christ, to live for aye, 
 
 That Easter-Day — that Easter-Day. 
 
 5. 
 
 What ailed thee, ocean ? Saw, and fled 
 
 Thy waves away ! 
 And Jordan — vanished from its bed, 
 
 That Easter-Day. 
 Nature's untutored worshipper 
 
 Who deemed his god was dead, yestreen, 
 
THE EARTHQUAKE. 1 65 
 
 Far off at sea — poor mariner, 
 
 Cried — "the Great Pan revives, I ween," 
 For so the pagan, in his way, 
 Kept Easter-Day — kept Easter-Day. 
 
 6. 
 But not those gracious women turn'd, 
 
 Not they ! Not they ! 
 Brighter their faith within them burned 
 
 That Easter-Day. 
 And now the flying guards they met, 
 
 And now the garden's wall was nigh ; 
 There stood the ghastly crosses yet ; 
 They saw, and uttered with a sigh — 
 
 " But who shall roll the stone away ? " 
 'Twas Easter-Day, 'twas Easter-Day. 
 
 7- 
 Then came of faith the great reward : 
 
 Begone dismay ! 
 Angels they met — not yet their Lord — 
 
 That Easter-Day. 
 " Here seek Him not" — the angels said— 
 
 " The Lord is risen ; search not here ! 
 Why seek the living 'midst the dead ? 
 Go tell His flock the Lord is near, 
 
 Behold the place where Jesus lay ! " 
 'Twas Easter-Day — 'twas Easter-Day. 
 
 8. 
 Then, like those Marys, let us rise, 
 Ere morning's ray, 
 
l66 THE EARTHQUAKE. 
 
 Before the dayspring greets our eyes 
 
 On Easter-Day ; 
 Forth to His altar, hasten we 
 
 Where faith beholds His presence sweet, 
 For Christ is with His two or three, 
 That worship at the mercy-seat. 
 
 Right early let us wake to pray, 
 On Easter-Day — on Easter-Day ! 
 
 
THE MYSTERY OF LIFE. 
 
 Dost thou show wonders among the dead ? — Psalm, 
 lxxxviii. 10. 
 
 How are the dead raised up ? — I. Cor. xv. 35. 
 
 I. 
 
 Master, we see Thy signs, 
 The wonders wrought by Thee, yet fail in faith; 
 Thy power of life we see, yet cling to death, 
 
 Like those who dwell in mines, 
 
 And burrow like blind moles ev'n where the 
 daylight shines. 
 
 Saviour, Thy signs we see, 
 In things discovered late by human thought, 
 But proudly claim'd, as if by mortals wrought, 
 
 Though all vouchsafed by Thee — 
 
 And given in Thy good time, as Time's occa- 
 sion be. 
 
 3- 
 Why, if the human mind 
 Moves of itself and is its own quick spring, 
 Is progress slow to mark the simplest thing ? 
 Why, for long ages blind — 
 Where God points out the way— lags mortal 
 wit behind ? 
 
1 68 THE MYSTERY OF LIFE. 
 
 4- 
 
 Thou givest power to men 
 To stretch their wiry fibres 'neath the sea, 
 And bid the lightings go, in mimicry 
 
 Of power divine. Why then 
 
 Doubt we Thy power to work beyond our 
 feeble ken ? 
 
 5- 
 
 Thus, in Thy days below, 
 Thy word ran swiftly, and was felt afar 
 Like arrowy rays of sun or faintest star, 
 
 Soothing a sufferer's woe : 
 
 No need of clumsy wires to bid Thy lightings 
 go ! 
 
 A father told his grief, 
 And in a moment, on his bed of pain, 
 The lov'd one, far away, felt life again ; 
 
 Of sons of men the Chief 
 
 Gave but His word to heal and came the swift 
 relief 
 
 7- 
 
 We note the comet's blaze : 
 Nay — Thy sweet law makes music 'mid the 
 
 spheres; 
 Yet in the ordered course of days and years 
 Men fail to see Thy ways — 
 Marvels of boundless power that angels might 
 amaze. 
 
THE MYSTERY OF LIFE. 169 
 
 Wonders among the dead 
 Thou showest when the flowery spring returns 
 And clothes the fields and woods with flowers 
 and ferns ; 
 Or where mankind is fed 
 
 By the mere corn of wheat that multiplies 
 their bread. 
 
 9. 
 
 Or where the mummy's hand 
 Gives up perchance the grains that Joseph stored, 
 And lo ! though ages held the secret hoard, 
 It lives at thy command, 
 
 And harvests of that seed are gathered from 
 the land. 
 
 10. 
 
 Shall God revive that corn 
 And not the coffin'd flesh that held, so long, 
 A buried thing in Death's enthrallment strong? 
 
 Shame on the fool's poor scorn, 
 We see in signs like these the breaking of the 
 morn. 
 
EUDORA. 
 
 A gracious woman retaineth honour. — Proverbs, xi. 16. 
 
 Her smile was many smiles in one; 
 
 As o'er the dimpled tide, 
 A wavy laughter seems to run, 
 
 Where gentle waters glide. 
 
 It came as comes the morning star 
 
 Day after day so bright, 
 To set the pearly doors ajar, 
 
 And usher in the light. 
 
 3- 
 
 Sweet sister ! from my sight removed- 
 
 Upon the shining shore, 
 So pure, so glad, so stainless proved, 
 
 Lives then that smile no' more ? 
 
 4- 
 
 When angels bore her radiant sprite 
 
 To Paradise, meseems 
 Her smile met theirs in calm delight, 
 
 Commingling kindred beams. 
 
EUDORA. 171 
 
 She slept and seemed to smile in sleep ; 
 
 'Twas on the Lady-Day 
 She went her Easter-tide to keep, 
 
 Where Easter reigns for aye. 
 
 6. 
 
 That smile upon her features played 
 
 When, raimented in white, 
 Her form in soft repose was laid, 
 
 And seemed a saint in light. 
 
 7- 
 
 Oh ! can it be, if e'er shall meet 
 
 Again thy soul with mine, 
 A smile so heavenly and so sweet 
 
 Shall be no longer thine ? 
 
 Transformed, but yet the same to view, 
 
 Was Abr'am seen afar : 
 So Moses and Elias flew 
 
 Anear the Morning Star ; 
 
 9- 
 
 And saints that with the Saviour rose 
 
 In their immortal sheen 
 Were yet the same that slept — like those 
 
 By John in Patmos seen. 
 
172 EUDORA. 
 
 IO. 
 
 All tears from off all faces — He 
 The Lamb Himself shall dry, 
 
 But that sweet smile He gave to thee 
 Methinks shall never die. 
 
 II. 
 
 On some, made meet for worlds more fair, 
 
 While here they linger yet, 
 Not all of earth are graces rare 
 
 That like a seal are set. 
 
 12. 
 
 And we shall know thee, still the same, 
 By that transporting charm, 
 
 If but, like thine, our faith may claim 
 The Everlasting Arm. 
 
THE INNOCENTS. 
 
 Refrain thy voice from weeping' and thine eves from 
 tears, for .... thy children shall come again to their 
 own border. — Jeremiah, xxxi. 17. 
 
 I. 
 
 Reading the stones that marked a field of death, 
 I heard a sigh, as 'mid the mounds I trod : 
 
 It seem'd to say — as 'twere with sobbing breath — 
 My heart is buried here, O Christ, my God ! 
 
 2. 
 
 A mother by a new-made bed that knelt, 
 
 I saw — and turned my steps with rev'rent fear ; 
 Yet lingering in the church-yard walks, I felt, 
 
 Dear Lord ! how many hearts are hoarded 
 here. 
 
 3- 
 How many buds and blossoms of the spring, 
 
 By frosts too early nipp'd, lie thickly strown ; 
 Or like the swallows oft, on eager wing, 
 
 That come untimely and too soon are flown. 
 
 4- 
 
 Yet 'neath these heaps of buried hopes that tell 
 Are sown not less the seeds of life's return : 
 
 God's ore is treasured in each narrow cell, 
 Where gold refines and only dross can burn. 
 
174 THE INNOCENTS. 
 
 5- 
 
 Oh ! weep not, mother, o'er that bed of love 
 Where innocence awaits the trumpet's sound, 
 
 While many a mother mourns her dead above 
 And weeps no more for children under ground. 
 
 6. 
 
 But come this way when holy hymns are sung, 
 And sounds the air with Paschal-anthems rife, 
 
 To charge with notes ot joy thy plaintive tongue, 
 And sing the Resurrection and the Life. 
 
 7- 
 
 For sweetly sleeps the chrisom-child at rest, 
 And fain with such the Christian heart would 
 lie! 
 
 If so God wills — of all His gifts 'tis best, 
 
 Fresh from the font, in Christ new-born, to die. 
 
THE UNBAPTIZED. 
 
 Is it well with the child ? 2 Kings, iv. 26. 
 
 I. 
 
 A LADY wept, with tears undried — 
 
 For her bright boy who came 
 Only to close his eyes, and died 
 Unchristen'd, with no name — 
 Lest he should wear no coronal divine 
 Among those innocents like stars of morn that 
 shine. 
 
 2. 
 
 Is then the guiltless babe shut out 
 
 From that palm-bearing band ? 
 Resolve, O man of God, my doubt ! 
 
 Fain would I understand, 
 Where is my darling's soul, or where his lot ? 
 Hath He no place for such, who said, " Forbid 
 them not " ? 
 
 3- 
 
 O mother, faithless are thy fears, 
 
 Tho' sore thy faith be tried ; 
 Triumphant hope may smile thro' tears 
 
 And trust in Him who died ; 
 From thine embrace of love a lamb is torn, 
 But on thy Shepherd's breast doubt not that 
 lamb is borne. 
 
176 THE UNBAPTIZED. 
 
 4- 
 Thy child is His far more than thine ; 
 
 He claims it for His fold ; 
 And grace — unfetter'd by its sign — 
 
 Is giv'n to young and old. 
 Tis no presumptuous thought, of human wit, 
 But lo ! such light shines clear in lines of Holy 
 Writ. 
 
 5- 
 As on its stem, all undefiled, 
 
 The lily's bud is seen, 
 Hath He not said the Christian's child 
 
 Is holy, not unclean ? 
 For, hallow'd by the mother's faith and prayer, 
 With her the babe unborn is fed on angels' fare. 
 
 6. 
 If holy be the planted root, 
 
 Planted in God's own ground, 
 Holy the flower and blest the fruit 
 
 Upon its branches found. 
 Nor one poor blighted bud shall fall to earth 
 Too soon for Him to save who gives the second 
 birth. 
 
 7- 
 Nor deem from Paynim fields afar 
 
 He gleans no holy seed : 
 Nations that ne'er beheld His star, 
 
 His rod and staff may lead. 
 Where Hagar faints — how near the angel wing 
 That for her dying boy reveals the hidden spring. 
 
THE UNBAPTIZED. 1 77 
 
 Unnumber'd are the babes on whom 
 
 No christ ning dews were shed, 
 Who yet were His, within the womb, 
 
 And with His flock are fed, 
 Who guides His sheep the living streams among, 
 And gently leadeth those who yet enfold their 
 young. 
 
 9- 
 
 Such be thy trust, such hope be thine — 
 
 All else is mystery. 
 The nameless babe let faith resign 
 
 To Mercy's mild decree, 
 Full sure not woman's love itself can teach 
 Aught of true love to Him whose love surpasseth 
 speech. 
 
 10. 
 
 Where God is silent — more to seek 
 
 Or prompt the Holy One, 
 Is faithless thought. This only speak : 
 
 Father, Thy will be done. 
 To save all souls that sin, the Saviour died : 
 For souls that never sinned, trust then the Cruci- 
 fied. 
 
 12 
 
EUTHANASIA. 
 
 She answered, It is well.— 2 Kings, iv. 26. 
 
 I. 
 
 Thee, 'mid the flowers of paradise, as fair and 
 
 undefined ; 
 Thee, happy daughter of thy God — how dare I 
 
 call thee child ? 
 Yet let me name thee with the blest, and, 
 
 though thy date was brief, 
 Think only of thy new estate, with joy and not 
 
 with grief. 
 
 2. 
 So soon to leave far far below our vale of tears 
 
 and pain ; 
 Through earth so soon and bright to pass, a 
 
 sunbeam without stain ; 
 To come, and in thy Saviour's arms baptismal 
 
 life to win — 
 Then take thy flight, a sinless one, from such 
 
 a world of sin : 
 
 3- 
 Sure this is blessedness ! How blest a ransom'd 
 
 one to be, 
 So short thy little moment here, so long eternity ! 
 'Tis thine, on wings unstained as theirs, to soar 
 
 with cherubim, 
 Yet, with a love no angel knows, Redemption's 
 
 song to hymn ! 
 
EUTHANASIA. 1 79 
 
 4- 
 
 Thou blue-eyed darling of my soul — from such a 
 
 life divine, 
 Sweet Dora, could I call thee down to share a 
 
 life like mine ? 
 Or could we pray for thy return to selfish eyes 
 
 and arms, 
 Thine the hard lot of earth to bear — and ours 
 
 thy captive charms ? 
 
 5- 
 
 Nay, let me rather share with thee thy life of 
 
 joy and love ! 
 Part of my flesh is in thy grave — part of my 
 
 soul above ; 
 And oft in dreams I seem to rest, since thou art 
 
 gone before, 
 Where the Good Shepherd folds the lambs that 
 
 once in arms He bore. 
 
 6. 
 
 Yet can it be, for oft such thoughts of bitterness 
 
 upspring, 
 That such as I, with such as thou, the Lamb's 
 
 new song may sing ? 
 That I with thee, in Paradise, may walk in robes 
 
 that shine, 
 And share th' eternal marriage-feast with virgin 
 
 souls like thine ? 
 
l8o EUTHANASIA. 
 
 7- 
 
 So turns my spirit, Lord, to Thee, as with his 
 aching- sight, 
 
 Who from thy crimsoned cross received a wel- 
 come into light ; 
 
 And for a childlike heart, once more, my inmost 
 nature cries, 
 
 To Thee — alone who wipest tears forever from 
 our eyes. 
 
 Oh ! let not hopes that heavenward soar be 
 
 thrust adown to hell ; 
 These hopes of immortality, this thirst with 
 
 Thee to dwell ; 
 But, out of longings after life, let Thy sweet 
 
 Spirit give 
 Strength to assert our destiny and by Thy life to 
 
 live ! 
 
 9- 
 Ev'n as young wings are stretch'd for flight 
 
 while plumeless in the nest ; 
 As dreaming babes with rosy lips invite the 
 
 balmy breast ; 
 As flowers uplift the fragrant cup ere evening's 
 
 dews are given, 
 So faith, with all its pure desires, foretells its 
 
 home in heaven. 
 
EUTHANASIA. l8l 
 
 IO. 
 
 Dear Lamb of God, though far below the clear 
 
 one of my heart, 
 Be mine at least the sight of those who see Thee 
 
 as Thou art, 
 And grant me but the meanest place among the 
 
 glorified ; 
 For whom have I in heaven but Thee, or what 
 
 on earth beside ? 
 
A THOUGHT FROM THE FATHERS. 
 
 My burden is light. — S. Matt. xi. 30. 
 
 See how yon little lark is borne 
 With music up to heaven, 
 
 To bask in sunlight ere the morn 
 To vales beneath is given. 
 
 That bird salvation's sign hath made 
 By stretching forth his wings ; 
 
 The cross upon his back is laid, 
 And lo ! he soars and sings. 
 
 3- 
 
 Take off the fardel that he bears, 
 
 He falleth in his flight ; 
 The cross is in the wings he wears ; 
 
 He proves the burden light. 
 
 4- 
 
 So Christ hath laid His cross on me ; 
 
 It wings me to the sky, 
 And day by day, though sore it be, 
 
 By that dear cross live I. 
 
A THOUGHT FROM THE FATHERS. 1 83 
 
 5- 
 
 It beareth those by whom 'tis borne ; 
 
 And by its weight we rise. 
 Who casts it down, he sinks forlorn ; 
 
 Who takes it up, he flies. 
 
 6. 
 
 Easy the yoke, and light the load, 
 
 Indeed, my spirit sings ; 
 To him that pants for God's abode, 
 
 His cross shall prove his wings. 
 
AMARANTH. 
 
 We have forsaken all ... . what shall we have therefore ? 
 -S. Matt. xix. 27. 
 
 Be still, my fluttering- heart, nor dim 
 
 The flame of faith divine ; 
 But say — All things are mine in Him 
 
 If only Christ be mine. 
 
 2. 
 
 Not here are amaranthine bowers ; 
 
 But, loving and forgiven, 
 Thine yet shall be, for earthly flowers, 
 
 Their antitypes in heaven. 
 
 3- 
 
 Not all to mock our waking sight 
 Fair forms in sleep we view ; 
 
 But oft our visions of the night 
 Are figures of the true. 
 
 Then look beyond, with sweet content, 
 
 When, o'er the April sky, 
 Is seen that arch of glory bent 
 
 Which glitters but to die. 
 
AMARANTH. 1 85 
 
 5- 
 Not all unseen, not all unknown, 
 
 Are things within the veil ; 
 There is a rainbow round the throne, 
 
 Whose hues nor fade nor fail. 
 
 6. 
 
 There's not a bliss we sigh for here 
 
 That is not kept above, 
 Pure as the heavenly atmosphere, 
 
 For hearts that Jesus love. 
 
 7- 
 
 There's not a toy that is cast down 
 
 By souls the cross that bear, 
 That helps not to the glittering crown 
 
 Reserved in glory there. 
 
 And if the restless heart we tame 
 
 Its idols to forego, 
 Treasures of love, in Christ's dear name, 
 
 The Father will bestow. 
 
 9- 
 For, sure as in the soul are powers 
 
 Which here we must restrain, 
 There's something that shall yet be ours 
 
 To prove them not in vain. 
 
THE ASCENSION. 
 
 Oh that I had wings like a dove ! for then would I fly 
 away, and be at rest.— Ps. lv. 6. 
 
 I. 
 
 LIKE shapes the mirror's depth within, 
 That, in their fashions, come and go, 
 
 A world that is not, nor hath been, 
 Of phantoms passing to and fro ; 
 
 Ev'n thus unreal and as vain, 
 
 The scene that mocks the human eye, 
 Where pomp, with flattery in its train, 
 
 Struts forth, or flaunts disdainful by. 
 
 3- 
 
 I saw an empire's rise and fall ; 
 
 Its monstrous birth, its hasty end ; 
 One rose and reigned and ruined all, 
 
 Himself and all that call'd him friend. 
 
 4- 
 Not such His realm who bore the reed 
 
 Of mock'ry in His mighty hand ; 
 Who stooped to suffer and to bleed, 
 
 But r6se to reign o'er every land ; 
 
THE ASCENSION. 1 87 
 
 5- 
 
 Who bowed to taste the wayside rill, 
 
 That mock'd His thirst ; then raised His head. 
 
 With living streams the world to fill, 
 And light and life o'er all to shed ; 
 
 6. 
 
 Who rose the gates of bliss to ope, 
 And bids us rise His throne to share : 
 
 Like Him to die and rest in hope, 
 Like Him to reign in glory there. 
 
 7- 
 Oh for the wings, consoling Dove, 
 
 Thou lendest to the spirit pure, 
 To flee away and soar above, 
 
 To worlds of glory that endure ! 
 
THE UNSPEAKABLE GIFT. 
 
 Shall He not, also, with Him, freely give us all things? 
 -Rom. viii. 32. 
 
 I. 
 
 Oh Thou whose blood my soul to heal 
 
 As Gilead's balm, at times I feel, 
 
 Saviour divine, I find Thee more 
 
 Than I had thought, or dreamed, before ; 
 
 Content, if but such bliss may be, 
 
 To breathe, and move, and live in Thee. 
 
 My soul is dark, be Thou my day, 
 My light within and on my way ; 
 Athirst and faint, I find Thee still 
 Like Silo's fount, or Kedron's rill; 
 Or if by hunger's pang subdued, 
 Bread of the soul, Thou art my food. 
 
 When howls the storm, my safe retreat ; 
 My shelter from the burning heat, 
 My anchor when the billows rise, 
 My soaring wing to brighter skies ; 
 All this and more, Thee, Lord, I call, 
 My Light, my Life, my all in all. 
 
THE UNSPEAKABLE GIFT. 1 89 
 
 4- 
 
 And oft, dear Lord, in sorest need, 
 On barren husks enforced to feed, 
 Be mine the pardon'd wand'rer's lot, 
 And his, beside, who wandered not : 
 A home in Thine embrace divine, 
 Ever with Thee and all things mine. 
 
THE TWO PENTECOSTS. 
 
 I will make all my goodness pass before thee.— Exod. 
 xxxiii. 19. 
 
 I. 
 
 O Sinai ! dark and thunder-scarr'd, 
 How oft, as in a dismal dream, 
 
 Thy clouded heights so hard, 
 Before my sight uplifted seem, 
 With cavern'd sides and clefts extreme ; 
 
 Gigantic quarry of the Law, 
 Womb of those stony slabs austere 
 
 Whereon I read with awe 
 
 Letters of fire and flame that fill my soul with 
 
 fear. 
 
 2. 
 
 Yet even here, on Law's dread throne, 
 Whence came the thunder and the ban, 
 
 Ev'n here was mercy shewn ; 
 Mercy and love to sinful man, 
 When Moses long'd God's bliss to scan 
 
 For comfort not revealed to sense, 
 And cried : Thy glory let me trace. 
 
 Oh ! for that joy intense ; 
 Shew me, O Lord, I pray, the glory of Thy face. 
 
 3. 
 Comes the blest answer, o'er and o'er, 
 In echoes from that awful Rock ; 
 
THE TWO PENTECOSTS. 19I 
 
 Hear it, and evermore 
 Rejoice, poor erring, cowering flock, 
 Stunn'd by the trumpet and the shock — 
 
 Hear Mercy's promise, even there, 
 Soft as He spake on Calvary's tree 
 
 Of Paradise so fair : 
 Goodness my glory is — that will I shew to Thee. 
 
 4- 
 
 He changeth not. Long years had pass'd, 
 And lo ! Elijah thither came ; 
 
 Came to those caverns vast, 
 'Mid earthquake, winds, and lightning's flame, 
 To know — if God were still the same, 
 
 Tho' Israel's foul idolatries 
 Cried from the ground, invoking ire ; 
 
 Soft as the summer's breeze 
 The still small voice was His : God spake not in 
 the fire. 
 
 5. 
 
 So on that mount of Pentecost, 
 Whence came the fiery Law of Death, 
 
 O God, the Holy Ghost, 
 Came words of Life, came Thy soft breath, 
 As when a mother comforteth 
 
 The child her loving arms enfold. 
 That still small voice was Power and Might ; 
 
 Backward the thunders rolled, 
 And came the cloven tongues of Love and Life 
 and Light. 
 
WHITSUNDAY. 
 
 There were seven lamps of fire burning' before the 
 throne, which are the seven Spirits of God. — Rev. iv. 5. 
 
 Breath of the Lord, Spirit blest, 
 Inspiring Guide, consoling Guest, 
 Thy perfect gifts and lights to lend, 
 On mortal heads and hearts descend; 
 Come to the sluggish sense and mind 
 As comes the rushing, mighty wind. 
 
 2. 
 
 Come, Promise of the Holy One ; 
 Come, Paraclete of God the Son ; 
 Come like the Spring's reviving gale 
 To furrowed soil or flagging sail ; 
 Or come as first Thy presence came, 
 With fiery tongues of cloven flame. 
 
 3- 
 
 Spirit of power, come down ; draw near, 
 Spirit of truth and holy fear ; 
 Succour poor souls that strive with sin, 
 The foes without, the foe within : 
 And, like the morning's sun, dispel 
 The shades of death, the powers of hell. 
 
WHITSUNDAY. 1 93 
 
 Spirit of Christ our Paschal 'Lamb, 
 On mortal wounds come pour Thy balm ; 
 To fainting flesh the oil supply- 
 That heals the soul, that opes the eye ; 
 The sinner's broken heart restore, 
 Forgiven much that loves the more. 
 
 5- 
 
 Dove of the Lord, with brooding wings 
 Creative o'er created things, 
 Come build anew thy peaceful nest 
 Where sorrows vex the human breast ; 
 There 'mid its thorns thy note be heard — 
 The turtle's voice, the Spirit's Word. 
 
 6. 
 
 Fire of the Lord and Light Divine, 
 Thou glory of th' Eternal Trine, 
 Come and this gloomy world inflame, 
 With Jesus' love, Jehovah's name, 
 And, from those lamps before the throne, 
 Send sevenfold radiance all thine own. 
 
 7- 
 River of Life, make all things new ; 
 Come, flow the thirsty fallows through ; 
 From sweet Siloam's fount, above, 
 Shed showers of grace, shed dews of love ; 
 Come, spread thy living streams abroad ; 
 Make glad the city of our God. 
 13 
 
HOMEWARD. 
 
 Toiling in rowing, for the wind was contrary. — S. Mark, 
 48. 
 
 I. 
 
 Breath of the Lord, come, Holy Ghost ! 
 Come speed me to the heavenly coast, 
 
 Me, weary at the helm ; 
 Helpless alike in storm or calm 
 To reach the soul's sure port I am, 
 
 And fears like seas o'erwhelm. 
 
 2. 
 To breast the tide and shun the shore, 
 Vainly I toil with faithless oar, 
 
 And drifts my bark so frail. 
 Breath of the Lord, O Spirit, come ! 
 Come waft me to my heavenly home, 
 
 And swell my drooping sail ! 
 
THE GIVER OF LIFE. 
 
 The Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus. — Rom. viii. 2. 
 
 1. 
 
 COME, Breath of God ; come, breath of lives 
 Whose kiss the life of man revives ; 
 Come and my sinful flesh restore 
 Like his who bathed seven times of yore. 
 
 2. 
 
 Come, Balm of God ; come, Gilead's balm ; 
 Come seek me, outcast that I am ; 
 Come pour Thyself into my mind, 
 Its wounds to heal, its rents to bind. 
 
 3- 
 Come, Dew of Heaven ; O Spirit, come, 
 To call my wandering spirit home ; 
 My senses touch, inspire, refine, 
 Restore the likeness lost, to Thine. 
 
 4- 
 My body, mind and spirit, Lord, 
 To these Thy life and love afford ; 
 Giver of Life alone art Thou, 
 Spirit of God, to whom we bow. 
 
THE TRINITY. 
 
 HYMN OF THE EARLY CHRISTIANS AT CANDLE- 
 LIGHT. 
 
 At eventide it shall be light. — Zechariah, xiv. 7. 
 
 MESSIAH, Thou brightness benign, 
 Of the Holy One, image express ; 
 Jesu, Thou glory divine, 
 
 Of the Father of Lights, whom we bless, 
 While sunlight grows dim, 
 Our eventide hymn 
 
 Shall be thine. 
 
 2. 
 
 Now twinkles the starlight in heaven, 
 
 The day dieth out in the west, 
 While kindle our lamps for the even, 
 Our songs shall to Thee be address'd. 
 Father, Spirit, and Son, 
 Thy name trine and one 
 
 Shall be blest. 
 
 3- 
 
 Son of God, ever-blest life bestower, 
 
 Our well-spring and day-spring most bright, 
 
THE TRINITY. 1 97 
 
 Holy voices of saints Thee adore, 
 
 And the world, both by day and by night : 
 All times are Thine own : 
 Thou art worthy alone, 
 
 Light of light. 
 
NOTES. 
 
 I. 
 
 The Easter Festival has, of late years, com- 
 mended itself to the Christians of America and even 
 to the people more generally. It is more and more 
 religiously observed, and it is popularly recognized in 
 all parts of our country. This indicates a great relig- 
 ious revolution ; for, in the boyhood of the writer, it 
 seemed to be almost unknown in New England, where 
 he passed some of his school-days ; while in New 
 York, where his childhood and youth were chiefly 
 spent, it was devoutly observed only by Church- 
 folk, and the remnant of the old settlers from Hol- 
 land. The fact that it was also kept, in their way, 
 by members of a foreign communion perpetuated a 
 narrow prejudice against it. So that the inspiration 
 of a popular feeling favourable to the nationalizing of 
 the Easter Feast, if not of the solemnities preceding 
 it, has been the work of " the little leaven " imparted 
 to American Christianity by the Anglo-American 
 Church. 
 
 Very early in life it occurred to the author that 
 he might do something to teach his countrymen the 
 great importance, to a great people, of Christian obser- 
 vances, harmonized with historic Christianity. In a 
 
200 NOTES. 
 
 country where all is raw and recent, the only hold 
 upon the past which is essential to a normal develop- 
 ment of its future, must be supplied by the grand 
 system of the "Christian Year." Of this system 
 history is full. The Literature and Laws of Christian 
 Nations are entwined with it ; nay, it is interwoven 
 with Christian civilization in all its forms. Hence, 
 to have no associations with it is to be provincialized 
 and cut off from those sympathies with the remote 
 and the ancient which Dr. Johnson so justly recog- 
 nized as exalting a people in the scale of intelligent 
 being. 
 
 Such convictions prompted the Christian Ballads. 
 They were written in boyhood, and were not designed 
 to open " the Inner Temple " of our Holy Religion. 
 They celebrated the external beauties and perfections 
 of the Holy Catholic Church, in its primitive simplicity 
 and purity. 
 
 But it was not altogether unfairly said of the Bal- 
 lads, that they were lacking in the spirit of practical 
 piety. So it might be said of the tree, or the flower, 
 that these are not the fruit. The Ballads were only 
 designed to set forth " the Beautiful Gate" of the 
 Temple, as an introduction to the holy places. They 
 embellished the doorway, and invited the multitude 
 within, and that was all. 
 
 This book is the supplement to that. It is de- 
 signed to offer those who enter something more sub- 
 stantial, if indeed they hunger and thirst after 
 righteousness. In the former work, Wisdom cried in 
 the streets and proclaimed that she had builded her 
 house ; in this she speaks to her guests, within her 
 doors : " Eat of. my Bread, and drink of the Wine 
 
NOTES. 20I 
 
 which I have mingled." Such, at least, is the plan 
 and purpose of the two books, as compared and 
 contrasted. 
 
 In a great measure, the Christian Ballads have 
 served their purpose. The architecture, the manners 
 and customs, the idealized completeness of the Prayer- 
 book system which they portrayed, were things un- 
 known in America, except in books and pictures, and 
 in the exceptional case of pious Churchmen who had 
 travelled in Europe. The book appealed to the im- 
 agination and was warmly received, and for fifty years 
 has continued to be published, here and also in En- 
 gland, where, I am assured, it led to many transforma- 
 tions which have been wrought during the past genera- 
 tion. But what it essayed to picture to the imagination 
 is now part of common routine and daily observation. 
 Besides, it has been imitated, and has lost freshness. 
 Much that it commends has been spoiled by overdoing 
 and by petty details in which good taste perishes. Our 
 national disposition to exaggerate and work a good 
 idea to death, always reacts, till appetite is palled by 
 satiety. It was comforting, however, to be told by 
 a learned dignitary in England that churches now 
 stand open everywhere, for private prayers, all the 
 day and every day in the week, and that nothing has 
 contributed to this result more effectually than the 
 Ballads. So also said Mr. Parker, the eminent 
 publisher. 
 
 May "the Paschal" be blest with a holier and 
 more essential result, in making all who read it in 
 love with the Holy Scriptures, and especially with the 
 Church-lessons, as arranged for " the Christian Year." 
 The history of its production is given in the proem, 
 
202 NOTES. 
 
 which is a tribute to two of my kinswomen, the pre- 
 cious companions of my early youth. They were alike 
 beautiful in person and adorned with exceptional 
 graces of mind and of Christian character. One fell 
 asleep at Pau, where she rests under the shade of 
 the Pyrenees, and the other, who soon followed her, 
 reposes in a fair churchyard on the banks of the 
 Schuylkill, near Philadelphia, where her not less 
 lovely and highly cultivated mother is laid. Her 
 father, my beloved uncle, who died in the military 
 service of his country, in our late unhappy war, lies in 
 his honoured grave near Chattanooga, in Tennessee. 
 
 II. 
 
 €l)c |>U5cl)ttl ITeui-Jttoon. 
 
 Page 6. — When the Paschal new-moon shines, then 
 the devout Christian feels what is meant by the say- 
 ing of Moses, that God set the sun and moon "for 
 signs and for seasons." There are evidences in Scrip- 
 ture of something very much like the Paschal system 
 existing from the beginning of human .history, to 
 display " the Lamb slain from the foundation of the 
 world." Thus the first worship of which we have 
 any record is that of Abel, who brought a lamb for 
 sacrifice ; and by the marginal reading we see that it 
 was offered at an appointed time, apparently "at 
 the end of the days." But what days? The end of 
 the week? Or days of an appointed "season"? If 
 the latter, ending in a day of worship and of offering 
 a typical sacrifice of the lamb, the idea is complete. 
 This solemnity was revived binder Moses, in the 
 
NOTES. 203 
 
 institution of the Paschal, by the "ordinances of the 
 moon." By the Paschal full-moon, therefore, was 
 marked the time of the perfect sacrifice which the Son 
 of God made upon the cross ; and ever since it has 
 marked the Christian Paschal, or the Holy Week 
 and Easter. 
 
 The Council of Nice, a. d. 325, gave us the rules 
 for calculating Easter, which are still observed, and 
 which are found in our Prayer-books. The whole sys- 
 tem of the Moveable Feasts in each year is regulated 
 by these canons, and the Paschal full-moon is the 
 pivot on which all turns. Modern astronomy owes 
 its existence largely to the impulse given to the 
 study of this science by the Nicene Council, especially 
 at Alexandria, whose bishop was charged with the 
 duty of making the annual calculations and sending 
 through all the world the date of the next Easter. 
 This he did in the Epiphany Season. 
 
 Page 7. — The Church hath calendar' d thy time. 
 There has always been a great charm for me in this 
 fact, the response of the Church to the " ordinances 
 of the moon," by giving them a moral and sacred 
 significance through all time. The Moveable Feasts 
 introduce a beautiful variety into our years of life ; 
 and I have noted the pleasure children experience 
 with a new almanac, to find out when Easter falls in 
 the new year, and so, also, when the Whitsun-feasts 
 will be due. 
 
 Page 7. — The bow of Joseph. The dying Jacob, 
 in his incomparable ode, treats of Joseph as a type of 
 Christ, and " his bow " is connected with the mention 
 of " the Shepherd, the Stone of Israel." — Genesis, xlix. 
 24. And it is noteworthy that where Joseph's name 
 
204 NOTES. 
 
 appears in the corresponding ode of Moses, "the 
 precious things put forth by the moon " are marked 
 in Joseph's blessing. Were not these the " precious 
 promises " of the Paschal ? — Deut. xxxiii. 14. 
 
 III. 
 
 fltoplKCl). 
 
 Page 9. — In this poem I have done little else than 
 paraphrase an incomparable figure of Archbishop 
 Leighton. "In the whole course of my studies," 
 says Coleridge, "I do not remember to have read so 
 beautiful an allegory ; so various and detailed, and 
 yet so just and natural." Leighton's Works, Vol. III. 
 p. 99. Ed. 1870. 
 
 Page 9. — Sweet Spring. See Genesis, ii, 10. "A 
 river went out from Eden to water the garden, and 
 from thence it was parted and became into four heads." 
 See also how the Eternal Eden supplies that of which 
 this was only the figure : the " river of water of life, 
 clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God 
 and of the Lamb." — Rev. xxii. 1. So the Psalmist : 
 '•' There is a river the streams whereof shall make 
 glad the city of God." — Ps. xlvi. 4. 
 
 Page 9. — Four mighty streams. " The early 
 Church," says West of Nairn, in his precious edition 
 of Leighton, " understood this river to mean the 
 Gospel of Christ, sent into the four corners of the 
 world and contained in the writings of the four 
 Evangelists." So St. Jerome very beautifully ex- 
 pounds it : and the four sections of the cross are 
 often identified with this same geographical idea. 
 
NOTES. 205 
 
 Page 10. — The Serpent's head. This text (Gen. 
 iii. 15) is the well-head of Scripture, of prophecy, 
 and narrative ; it is the original Gospel. 
 
 Page 10. — That sea above. The sea of glass (Rev. 
 iv. 6) is spoken of, and yet there shall be "no more 
 sea." — Rev. xxi. 1. The bitter and boisterous sea 
 we know here shall be no more, but peace and tran- 
 quillity shall be there unbounded and vast and clear as 
 glass, and so lar like a sea. 
 
 Page 10. — Flooding the world. Compare Ecclesi- 
 asticus (xxiv. 30). " I, Wisdom, also came out as a 
 brook from a river, and as a conduit into a garden. 
 I said, I will water my best garden, and will water 
 abundantly my garden-bed ; and lo ' my brook be- 
 came a river and my river became a sea. ' 
 
 IV. 
 Mel 
 
 Page 11. — Behold the first altar and the first sacri- 
 fice of which we have any record : Abel brought, of 
 the firstlings of his flock, a lamb for the oblation. And 
 this he did by faith, says St. Paul : wherefore he un- 
 derstood that God had promised to provide the Lamb 
 at the sacrifice for sin. 
 
 Page 12 — The Sacrifice of Cain. Cain despised 
 the atonement. Such was the root-sin of his offering. 
 He was the first Deist, who worshipped with tokens 
 of " natural religion," and rejected revelation and 
 the covenant of God through "the Seed of the 
 woman." So Christ was rejected by the Jews. Com- 
 pare St. Matthew, xxvii. 18, and I. John, iv. 12. 
 
2o6 NOTES. 
 
 V. 
 
 Page 13. — Melchizedek is not called ' : a priest," 
 but " the priest of the Most High God." This is the 
 first appearance of the word priest in human history. 
 All heathen priests were counterfeits, but their exist- 
 ence corroborates the sacred story. The Mosaic priests 
 were shadows of the One only true priest, and types 
 of His then future work. Christian priests are the 
 instruments by whose hands and lips the Great High 
 Priest does His work on earth, while He intercedes 
 for us " within the veil," in Heaven. The argument 
 of St. Paul (Hebrews v.— vii.) is based on Genesis, 
 xiv. 18 and Psalms, ex. He shows that Melchizedek 
 who appeared to Abraham was no created being ; was 
 " without father, without mother, without beginning of 
 days or end of life " ; and this same Melchizedek, he 
 says, "abideth a priest forever. " He further explains 
 that Melchizedek was a mere name for the appari- 
 tion or similitude of " the King of Righteousness." 
 So, " King of Salem " means " the Prince of Peace." 
 Such is the interpretation of St. Ambrose. Other 
 orthodox divines suppose that it was the patriarch 
 Shem who thus appeared to Abraham ; but they agree 
 that if so/ he was but a type or shadow of the true 
 Melchizedek. See Ambrose, de Abraam, i. cap. 4. 
 
 Page 9. — Abraham sazv Christ's day. The Father 
 of the Faithful saw him as Melchizedek, which the 
 apostle tells us is but his name, in the similitude of 
 an earthly king. To this event our Lord Himself 
 seems to have referred, when He said : " Your father 
 
NOTES. 207 
 
 Abraham rejoiced to see my day, and he saw it and 
 was glad." So Isaac saw him in the marvellous 
 visit of the three men, one of whom was the Angel- 
 Jehovah. Jacob saw him, as the same angel with 
 whom he wrestled and of whom he said, ' ' I have seen 
 God face to face." Moses saw him in the Burning 
 Bush, and afterwards when he passed by on the 
 Mount. 
 
 Joshua beheld him, a': Jericho, as " the Captain of 
 the Lord's Host," and was thus taught his own 
 shadowy character ; the true Joshua, which is the 
 name Jesus, in its Hebrew form, being the true leader 
 of the army of Israel, the " Lord of Hosts." 
 
 Long afterwards he was seen with the Three Chil- 
 dren in the fiery furnace, "like unto the Son of 
 God." 
 
 No marvel, then, that this same " Angel-Jehovah "' 
 she>» ed himself to the Father of the Faithful, as the 
 great High Priest, as the King of Kings. 
 
 So beautiful the plan of God, in giving thus early 
 to Faith a manifestation of the Messiah, God and 
 Man. 
 
 Page 12. — Forth comes the bread and wine. This 
 Eternal Priest " brings forth bread and wine " : and 
 is adored by Abraham, who pays him tithes, as an 
 acknowledgment of his Everlasting Priesthood. 
 
 This enables St. Paul to prove that the Levitical 
 priesthood was a mere type and shadow of a Priest- 
 hood that was before it, and should endure forever, 
 while that .of Levi's sons should pass away. 
 
208 NOTES. 
 
 VI. 
 €t)c <J5reat ij'tgl) friest. 
 
 Page 15. — Unsired, unborn. St. Paul expressly 
 asserts that Melchizedek, ' ' without father, without 
 mother, without descent, having neither heginning of 
 days nor end of life, . . . abideth a priest contin- 
 ually." He declares this of the same Melchizedek 
 who met Abraham; and he tells us that the similitude 
 " King of Salem," means only that He is " the 
 Prince of Peace," as the name Melchizedek means 
 only that He is the King of Righteousness. The 
 parenthesis, "made like unto the Son of God," no 
 more affects the sense than when it is said in Daniel, 
 "One like the Son of Man came with clouds." 
 
 Page 16. — God's fellow. " The man that is My 
 fellow, saith the Lord of Hosts " (Zech. xiii. 7). 
 
 Page t6. — Ancient of Days. In Daniel's vision we 
 behold the Royal Priest more expressly portrayed, of 
 whom Zechariah says, " He shall be a Priest upon 
 His throne." 
 
 Page 16. — Of Ages the Great Rock (Isaiah, xxiv. 4). 
 We should read the margin of our bibles and the 
 texts there cited for comparison. This true and close 
 rendering of the Hebrew is only in the margin of our 
 English version. 
 
 VII. 
 
 Jttaralj. 
 
 Page 17. — The name of Mary is found in the Old 
 Testament in Marah, and in Miriam. The poem 
 
NOTES. 209 
 
 designs to show how highly symbolical are these 
 names, and how truly prophetic. For Marah, see 
 Exodus, xv. 23. 
 
 Page 17. — The Branch (Jeremiah, xxiii. 5 ; also, 
 Zech. iii. 8, and vi. 12). The Branch is a name of 
 Christ, and occurs in many places of Holy Scripture. 
 Notably, as we learn in the margin of our bibles, " the 
 Dayspring " of St. Luke, i. 78, may be rendered the 
 Branch, or the Sunrising. 
 
 18. Marah and Miriam. These, like Maria and 
 Mary, are forms of the same name ; and we find both 
 together in the story of the first Paschal (Exodus, xv. 
 20). So, too, Miriam's leprosy (Numbers, xii. 10) 
 expresses, as Marah does, the bitter taint of our 
 natural sinfulness, and the Branch is again brought 
 into view, as the Healer. The Mosaic System begins 
 with this significant introduction of the hidden Christ : 
 "I am the Lord that healeth Thee." All its sym- 
 bolism rebukes the false idea of "the Immaculate 
 Conception " of Mary, and shows that this destroys 
 one of the root-principles of the Gospel. It seems to 
 have originated with Mohammed. 
 
 Page 17. — With healing in his wings. The Day- 
 spring, as I have said, is also the Branch ; and the 
 healing Branch seems coupled with " the Sunrising," 
 in the prophetic promise of Malachi, iv. 2, "Unto 
 you that fear my name shall the Sun of Righteous- 
 ness arise with healing in his wings." 
 
 Page iS. — The. Magnificat, though very naturally 
 connected with Christmas, is, in fact, an Easter-song, 
 and such is the song of Miriam, with which connects 
 the Eternal Paschal hymn (Rev. xv. 3\ called "the 
 Song of Moses and of the Lamb." We celebrate the 
 
2IO NOTES. 
 
 Conception of our Lord, in close connection with the 
 Paschal season, on the 25th of March, and that is the 
 date of the Magnificat. Christ's suffering, at this 
 time, the Fathers say, was " like the kid seethed in his 
 mother's milk." In this fanciful way they illustrate 
 the cruelty of those who crucified the Lord, in the 
 presence of His mother, and at the time of His 
 Annunciation. 
 
 Page 18. — Of Gilead's Tree. The forests of 
 Gilead abounded in spice-bearing shrubs and bal- 
 samic trees. Jeremiah, viii. 22, is therefore beauti- 
 fully suggestive of the tree of Marah, and its medi- 
 cinal power, as also of the Good Physician. 
 
 Page 18. — Reigns from the Tree. The Cross is 
 made Messiah's throne, and I have made use of an 
 old reading of Psalm xcvi. 10, of which some of the 
 Primitive Fathers were very fond. Pilate's inscription 
 on the cross was meant as derision, but it was written 
 in three languages, as if in response to the Psalmist's 
 words : " Tell it out among the heathen that the 
 Lord is King." It is undoubtedly true that the Jew- 
 ish Scribes altered their copies of the Scriptures in no 
 less than eighteen places, two, at least, of which were 
 meant to obliterate prophecies of the Crucifixion. 
 See Pearson on the Creed, art. iv.. p. 335. 
 
 Thus Tertullian (against Marcion, iii. 19) says : 
 11 The Lord reigneth from the Tree, means Christ, who 
 overcame death by His suffering on the Cross, and 
 thence reigned — as death reigned before, from Adam 
 to Moses." So also Justin Martyr, who accuses the 
 Jews of erasing the words he quotes from the Psalms : 
 " The Lord hath reigned from the wood ; but no one 
 of your people ever reigned thus, save only He who 
 
NOTES. 211 
 
 was crucified, and who now liveth and reigneth among 
 the nations." I condense my quotation — for he goes 
 on to quote the whole Psalm. He seems to connect 
 with this idea the twelfth verse, ' ' Then shall all the 
 trees of the wood rejoice before the Lord," as if the 
 very trees could rejoice that the wood of the Cross 
 was transfigured into the Tree of Life. See Ante- 
 Nicene Fathers (Am. Edition, Buffalo and New York, 
 1885-6), Vol. I. p. 176, n. 4, also p. 235 ; and Vol. 
 III. p. 337, n - 3- 
 
 VIII. 
 
 fhwrijal <£mblcm0. 
 
 Page 29. — For Cain's oblation, see Note IV. 
 
 Page 2g — On Jacob' 's dying eye. The reader will 
 please turn to the incomparable dithyrambic ode of 
 the dying Jacob (Gen xlix., verses 8, 22, 24, etc.), for 
 the references here introduced. 
 
 Page 29. — The Uzzian's hand {see Job, xix. 23-27). 
 No ingenuity has been able to rob this superb passage 
 of its Messianic character, as maintained in our Eng- 
 lish Version. Even the Revised Version sufficiently 
 supports this, and the Septuagint alone is testimony 
 that so it was understood before Christ came. See Dr. 
 Pusey's Daniel, p. 504. 
 
 IX. 
 
 €l)e .Stamoiir. 
 
 Page 36. — "Joshua" is a marvellous name in the 
 history of revealed truth. Thus, " Hoshea " becomes 
 
212 NOTES. 
 
 "Jehoshua," by the prophetic act of Moses (Num. 
 xiii. 16), and adds to the idea of Salvador) that of 
 Jehovah ; i.e., " Jehovah-Salvation." This becomes 
 "Joshua" in the person of the typical "Jesus," 
 referred to in Heb. iv. 8. Now, the angel gives 
 this name at last to Him who was' the end of types : 
 " Thou shalt call His name Joshua (Jesus), for He 
 shall save His people from their sins." The divine 
 Saviour, "Jehoshua," combines the names "Jeho- 
 vah" and " Salvation." 
 
 X. 
 
 % £)X}\\\\\ of JFattl). 
 
 Page 53. — The intolerably prosaic character of 
 vulgar minds is often outrivalled by the dulness of 
 strong intellects if they are merely mechanical in their 
 operations. This hymn celebrates the domain of 
 Faith ; not as hostile to Science, but as illuminating 
 Science, and yet restraining Imagination. There are 
 those who cannot smell the most fragrant flower, and 
 many cannot distinguish colours ; so, others have no 
 ear for music. All nature with its "incense-breath- 
 ing " seasons, and its profusion of radiant tints at 
 morn and even, is lost on such minds. What can they 
 see in the intense poetry of Scripture ? The lyrics of 
 the prophets are full of Pindaric touches and allusions 
 which are lost on them, because we cannot make 
 them express anything, mathematically. Instead of 
 enjoying a rose, they bring a crucible or a retort and 
 treat it chemically, finding nothing in it but so much 
 carbon. In spite of such critics, we enjoy a garden, 
 and we find it in Scripture. 
 
NOTES. 213 
 
 XI. 
 $ol\) Week. 
 
 Page 61. — The Church, with true instinct, reads 
 this prophecy of Isaiah (lxiii. 1) in Holy Week, and in 
 close connection with Palm Sunday. Many imagine 
 that it should be kept till Easter week, because it 
 foretells the Conqueror. The answer is — That is pre- 
 cisely what Palm Sunday foretells ; it antedates the 
 victory, and does not admit that the triumph is less 
 certain on Palm Sunday than on Easter Day. The 
 prophet descries the dyed garments, before they were 
 dyed, and this he intimates when he drops the pro- 
 phetic future of history and adopts the grammatical 
 future, in the words — " their blood shall be sprinkled 
 upon my garments, and / will slain all my raiment." 
 The whole passage mixes the future and the historic 
 on a familiar principle of prophecy, which " callcth 
 those things which be not as though they were " 
 (Rom. xviii. 17). In these verses this view is taken 
 of the two prophecies : Zechariah depicts the scene as 
 it should occur, the meek and lowly Nazarene coming 
 to Jerusalem on the ass's foal ; Isaiah, as it should be 
 seen by failh, "the Lamb slain from the foundation 
 of the world," and in that view full of wounds and 
 blood-stains, while also the Lion of the tribe of 
 Judah, and not less the Conqueror, from the founda- 
 tion of the world. 
 
 Palm Sunday, then, receives its double character 
 from this twofold view. As the first day of Holy 
 Week, the Sunday of the Cross, it borrows a pro- 
 foundly sombre and penitential cast from the succeed- 
 
214 NOTES. 
 
 ing days ; and yet, as the Hosanna Sunday and the 
 Day of Palms, it is a festival in which the Victim and 
 the soldier are already seen, by faith, as the glorified 
 Priest and the Conqueror with dyed garments, whose 
 triumph was sure, from the foundation of the world. 
 
 XII. 
 
 ^[)c illcsatal). 
 
 Page 63. — The " Anointed One," for such is the 
 sense of the Hebrew Messiah and the Greek Christ, is 
 here conceived of as recognized by Mary of Bethany 
 in her loving act, which was inspired possibly by the 
 remarkable passage from the Canticles here prefixed 
 as a motto. He had accepted such a tribute from the 
 " woman which was a sinner." She now offers a like 
 anointing on the part of "the virgins," and to show 
 their love. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 €l)c SMmpcr. 
 
 Page 69. — The ancient church at Speyer has been 
 recently " restored " with costly and even magnificent 
 want of judgment. It has become a modern church 
 to all intents, and is no unfair symbol of the Latin 
 Church as modernized by the recent " new dogmas" 
 which have been so fatal to her catholicity. But the 
 quaint old mound in the south precinct has been re- 
 stored in a manner which, no doubt, faithfully repro- 
 duces the mediaeval effect of the original, and it is 
 very striking when seen in a moment of loneliness 
 
NOTES. 215 
 
 and meditation. The poem is a truthful statement of 
 the impressions it seems capable of producing on a 
 thoughtful visitor. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 %ljc Council. 
 
 Page 75. — Come, then, pedestrian Muse. There are 
 occasions when "pedestrian " art, thus recognized by- 
 Horace, becomes legitimate in poetry. I have felt 
 that my desire to render that famous passage in the 
 Book of Wisdom, as literally as the form of verse will 
 permit, furnishes a just occasion for the invocation 
 here introduced. It is a pity that any Christian 
 should not feel the force of such a scripture, though 
 Apocryphal, as proving that Isaiah and other prophets 
 had sufficiently forewarned the Jews of their great 
 peril, in the day of Messiah's coming. See Archbishop 
 Leighton on Ps. xxxix. 10, and the Note in West's 
 edition, Vol. V. p. 62. Compare Plato, Republic^ II. 
 5 ; and Cicero, Republic, III. 17. It is not improbable 
 that' Plato, thinking of his master, Socrates, had yet 
 been influenced by learned Jews to moralize as he 
 does so prophetically. Jones of Nayland (Lect. ix.) 
 has a striking passage on Plato's " Just One " (Works, 
 ed. 1801, Vol. IV. p. 206). 
 
 XV. 
 
 fJonttus fJUnte. 
 
 Page 80. — Some say he was a Teuton. The idea 
 that Pilate was from Mayence was current in an old 
 
2l6 NOTES. 
 
 legend, and has been revived of late by the discovery 
 of the graves of an old Hebrew legion on the Rhine; 
 which suggests that Jews had been quartered there, 
 while the natives were sent to Judea, a well-known 
 expedient of the Emperors. A governor who could 
 talk to them in their own dialect would have sug- 
 gested a reason for such transfer. 
 
 In these stanzas I have tried to treat his character 
 as the inspired writers, and as our Lord Himself, seem 
 to teach us to do. We must " judge nothing before 
 the time ; " and it is lawful to reflect that mercy to 
 the "chief of sinners" may be vouchsafed through 
 the "Chief of all the Sons of Men," whose name is 
 Jehovah-Salvation. I have ventured to treat his case 
 as a symbol of that of all the unevangelized ; of all, 
 in short, for whom the glorious Redeemer prayed, 
 when He said, " They know not what they do." 
 
 XVI. 
 
 Calnart). 
 
 Page 96. — The xxv. of Isaiah is a marvellous tis- 
 sue embroidered with Messianic symbols. And how 
 striking the text here versified : " He shall spread 
 forth His hands in the midst of them, as he that 
 swimmeth spreadeth forth his hands to swim." The 
 following chapter is an Easter lesson, and the third 
 verse reads (see margin) : " For the Lord Jehovah is 
 the Rock of Ages." In the writings of Tertullian, we 
 meet with a striking exposition of Moses' outstretched 
 arms as an emblem of the victory of the Cross. See 
 A gains -l Marcion, b. iii. cap. 18. 
 
NOTES. 217 
 
 XVII. 
 
 €l)c Jttiin of 5orrouj0. 
 
 Page 107. — The child who frames a cross. In the 
 carpenter shop of Joseph, the child Jesus is represented 
 by Overbeck, I suppose following older masters, as 
 sawing out a cross, in sorrowful child-play. It is a 
 very touching embodiment of the opinion of the 
 Fathers, that all His life long our Lord's soul was 
 "straitened" (St. Luke, xii. 50) by a sense of the 
 baptism He was yet to be baptized with. 
 
 Page 107. — Those senses five, etc. I have here sug- 
 gested the crucifixion of sense, in its specialties, as 
 well as in its general form, as part of our Lord's suf- 
 ferings. The indulgence of our senses, unchastened 
 by self-denial and fasting, strikes me as forcibly 
 rebuked by the meditations I have here given. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 'Qtfje 'ftijrce Crosacs. 
 
 Page TI2. — The Thief's Repentant Cross. " The 
 planet Mercury," says one, " is rarely discovered; Co- 
 pernicus never saw it ; it shines too near the sun. 
 And so there is an object, in itself most luminous, 
 which attracts too little attention, for a like reason. 
 I mean the cross of the repentant thief, so near the 
 cross of his Redeemer that few reflect how marvellous 
 it is in its history, how full of instruction is the exam- 
 ple it displays of awakened conscience and spontane- 
 
2l8 NOTES. 
 
 ous faith, and, in short, how it glorifies the Cross of 
 Christ itself, by manifesting its power to convert, to 
 save, to regenerate, to sanctify, and to glorify." I 
 quote from a sermon of my own venerated father, 
 written and preached in his earliest professional days, 
 which is said to have been a matchless outburst of 
 eloquence, of feeling, and of power. This exordium 
 has been feebly reproduced in my verses. 
 
 Page II 5. — The earth its depth, etc. The midway 
 stake of the cross betokens the depth and height ; and 
 the antennce, the breadth of its divine Mystery, the 
 all-embracing, the all-amazing Atonement. This is a 
 favourite view of' the Fathers. 
 
 XIX. 
 
 Page 118. — That minute event in the history of the 
 Crucifixion — mentioned by St. Johii only, in the 
 words, " and put it upon hyssop " — is one which con- 
 nects the Cross with some of the most significant of 
 the Mosaic types. For hyssop was used in sprinkling, 
 and denoted the cleansing power of the blood of 
 Jesus. But why so ? It was foreseen, this mere 
 accident of the Passion ; and from this the Mosaic 
 ritual receives its exposition. We read that Solomon 
 " spake of trees, from the cedar tree that is in Leba- 
 non, even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the 
 wall ; " and here note that all analogy leads us to be- 
 lieve that the Cross was cedar, while the hyssop is what 
 we have said, and the wall is seen in Gen. xlix. 22. 
 Joseph's blessing — his vine, overrunning the Jewish 
 
NOTES. 219 
 
 wall of separation, and blessing the outside Gentile 
 world — alike with purifying hyssop and invigorating 
 wine. " Purge me with hyssop," says the Psalmist. 
 The Paschal was instituted in the sprinkling of blood 
 with hyssop (Exod. xii. 22\ and so Moses estab- 
 lished the Old Covenant, sprinkling alike the Book 
 and the people (Heb. ix. 19). See, also, the leper's 
 cleansing (Levit. xiv. 4). 
 
 XX. 
 
 tVtcflt>emii0. 
 
 Page 122. — St. John introduces Nicodemus, assist- 
 ing Joseph at the burial, with a reference to his first 
 coming to Jesus by night. That most interesting 
 story gives us no clew to the impressions with which 
 the ruler left the Divine Teacher, but soon after (St. 
 John, vii. 50) we read of honourable conduct which 
 made him suspected by his fellow-Pharisees. Perhaps 
 their words (verses 47, 48) had a slant at Nicodemus, 
 and were meant to hint at their resolution to tolerate 
 no defection among their number. In verse 52, they 
 treat him with a warning in form of a question, and 
 with a scornful reference to the Galilean teacher. 
 What, then, was the decisive moment that brought 
 him to discipleship ? It seems to me that when he 
 learned of the Crucifixion as an accomplished fact his 
 mind must have recurred to (St. John, hi. 14, 15) those 
 words, " As Moses lifted up," etc. This would have 
 brought back all the marvellous words that followed, 
 and which were not comprehended at the time, with a 
 power unspeakable. They produced their effect, and 
 
220 NOTES. 
 
 Nicodemus came forward, boldly, to claim the place 
 to which Isaiah had summoned " the rich," so many- 
 ages beforehand (Isa. liii. 9). 
 
 XXI. 
 
 %\)c ^-cyulcljrc. 
 
 Page 126. — I have regarded the Canticles as a store- 
 house of poetical imagery, applicable to the facts 
 revealed concerning the Bridegroom and the Bride. 
 Chapter iii. (verses 5-7) supplies the conformities I have 
 borrowed here. From chapter ii. 7, I have borrowed 
 the closing stanza. It may be well to note here that 
 the Canticles are an idyllic amplification of Psalm 
 xlv., and this must be expounded by Ephes. v. 25-33. 
 It is to be regretted that oven the Revision retains the 
 unhappy renderings (Cant. vii. 1-3) which confound 
 articles of the Bride's dress with the parts of the 
 body they covered — as if the epaulettes of an officer 
 wer-e translated his "shoulders." There is strong 
 reason to favour the idea thai this idyl, while it glorifies 
 wedded love, and proves its innocence and its mystic 
 reference to Christ and His Church, celebrates, also, 
 the conversion of Solomon to a life of conjugal purity 
 and of absolute devotion to her who can say, " I am 
 my Beloved's, and my Beloved is mine" (Cant. vi. 3). 
 
 XXII. 
 
 Caster. 
 
 Page 129. — The amazing unity of Scripture furnishes 
 the believer a strong ground for confidence, which 
 
NOTES. 221 
 
 blind unbelief can never take away. Abel's Lamb 
 reappears in the Apocalypse, and so does Judah's 
 Lion ; and everywhere this imagery is kept - up 
 throughout the Scriptures. This Easter-song is based 
 upon real references and analogies. And here let the 
 rule of heraldry be kept in view : when the Lion is 
 emblazoned, we see only his noble and royal qualities. 
 The cat-like treachery of the animal is reserved to 
 describe the enemy, who "goeth about seeking whom 
 he may devour." Now let us observe these texts : 
 
 1. It is evident that our Lord sprang out of Judah. 
 Heb. viii. 3. 
 
 2. Judah is a lion's whelp ... he stooped 
 down, he couched as a lion, and as an old lion ; who 
 shall rouse him up ? Gen. xlix. 9. 
 
 3. The Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of 
 David, hath prevailed. Rev. v. 5. 
 
 Other texts referred to, or quoted, are as follows : 
 
 1. He hath broken the gates of brass, and cut the 
 bars of iron in sunder. Ps. cvii. 16. 
 
 2. Free among the dead. Ps. lxxxviii. 5, 7. 
 
 3. Led captivity captive. Ephes. iv. 8 
 
 4. The lion did tear in pieces enough for his whelps. 
 Nahum, ii. 12. 
 
 5. Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more. 
 Rom. vi. 9. 
 
 6. A garden inclosed ... a spring shut up, a 
 fountain sealed. Cant. iv. 12. 
 
 7. The sting of death is sin. I. Cor. xv. 56. 
 
 8. I am tormented in this flame. Luke, xvi. 24. 
 
 9. One of the elders saith unto me, Weep not. 
 Rev. v. 5. 
 
 10. Worthy is the Lamb that was slain. Rev. v. 12. 
 
222 NOTES. 
 
 XXIIL 
 
 ®lje Btrir ^ottfl. 
 
 Page 135. — Describing the hills of Naphtali, says a 
 modern traveller: "The perfume of a thousand flowers 
 filled the air, poppies, anemones, marigold, convol- 
 vulus ... a glowing mosaic of rainbow hues. 
 We turned into a wild glen, where the voice of the 
 turtle floated from tree to tree, and the cooing of 
 countless wood-pigeons ran like a stream of soft 
 melody along the jagged cliffs above us." — Porter's 
 Giant Cities, p. 267. 
 
 XXIV. 
 
 (£iJ0tcr <E0$)0. 
 
 Page 139. — A French writer has remarked : " Toute 
 l'antiquite s'est accordee a reconnoitre dans les oiseaux 
 quelque chose de divin. . . . Aristdphane, dans 
 sa comedie Des Oiseaux, fait allusion a cette tradi- 
 tion." 
 
 The mockery of the King of Assyria has supplied me 
 with a text to which I have tried to give an orthodox 
 use, taking forth honey out of a dead carcass. There 
 is much to be said of birds ; and I wonder so little 
 has been written of these wonderful creatures, their 
 eggs, their habits of migration, their amazing beauty, 
 their songs, and the miracle of their triumph over 
 gravitation, their inexplicable hold upon thin air, 
 their power of wing, their strange life in mid-ocean, 
 their mysterious loves and nest-buildings, their ex- 
 
NOTES. 223 
 
 quisite delicacy and decency of sexual formation, and 
 the lavish hand with which God has adorned them 
 and displayed His power in them, making them such 
 tokens of His skill, from the humming-bird to" the 
 eagle. * 
 
 XXV. 
 
 ®l)c Ttopal l)arn. 
 
 Page 145. — A popular travel- writer speaks fre- 
 quently of the scarlet robes which are worn in Syria, 
 even in our times, as a token of rank. " The Village 
 Sheikh," he says, "was there to welcome us, con- 
 spicuous in his scarlet robe, which, to this day, is the 
 badge of royalty, or power, among the inhabitants of 
 Palestine." — Porter's Giant Cities, p. 173. 
 
 Page 145. — Zarah's wrist. — Gen. xxxviii. 28. The 
 illuminating faith of the early Christians is beau- 
 tifully seen in the views of Irensexis touching this 
 sign. He regards it as Christ's token on the seed 
 of Judah, withdrawing its faith from Him, but still 
 claimed by Him, for a future birth in the Gospel. 
 " This scarlet token upon Him is the passion of the 
 Just One, prefigured by Abel, and by the prophets 
 delineated, but in the last days perfected by the Son 
 of God." — Irenseus's Against Heresies, iv. 2. 
 
 Page 145. — Rahab 's window. — St. Clement says: 
 '• The spies gave her a sign to this purpose, that she 
 should display from her dwelling a scarlet thread, 
 thus making it plain that redemption should flow, 
 through the blood of the Lord, to all that believe and 
 hope in God." Others of the Fathers give similar 
 expositions (Joshua, ii. 18). 
 
224 NOTES. 
 
 Page 146. — Scarlet wool. — Heb. iv. 19. " He took 
 the blood of calves and of goats, with water and 
 scarlet wool and hyssop, and sprinkled both the Book 
 and all the people, saying, This is the blood of the 
 Covenant." 
 
 Page 146. — Scarlet 'robe. — St. Matthew, xxvii. 28. 
 The scarlet robe was embroidered with purple of 
 reddish tinge, and the robe was described accordingly 
 as purple or scarlet. 
 
 Page 146. — The Bride. — Cant. iv. " Thy lips are 
 a thread of scarlet, and thy speech is comely." 
 
 The Church speaks with comely words, when her 
 lips are baptized with the blood of the Lamb. The 
 same Greek word which is rendered scarlet is some- 
 times rendered crimson, as in Isa. i. 18. 
 
 Page 146. — The living Bird. — Levit. xiv. 6. The 
 rabbins tell us that the bird was bound to the cedar 
 by the scarlet yarn. 
 
 XXVI. 
 
 €a0tcr tit f)atttt00. 
 
 Page 151. — The Day the Lord had made. — The 
 Lord's Day pre-eminently (Ps. cxviii. 24) is the An- 
 nual Paschal, but every Lord's Day is a lesser Easter. 
 Without attempting to settle the critical question 
 whether it was Easter-Day when St. John saw, once 
 more, the risen Lord, I adopt a Paschal interpretation 
 of the whole Book, as a key to its divine imagery and 
 intent. And such is the argument of this poem, 
 which I humbly trust is auxiliary to its truth. 
 
NOTES. 225 
 
 XXVII. 
 
 ffcl>* ^VnQcls on ttjc ilrfc. 
 
 Page 154. — The Ark of the Covenant is one of the 
 most striking testimonies to the evangelical nature of 
 the Hebrew mysteries. It was enshrined within the 
 veil ; no eye beheld it there, save only the high 
 priest's once a year, and even he could do this not 
 without the most solemn purifyings and acts of atone- 
 ment for himself and for the people. When carried 
 through -the wilderness, its terrible sanctity was 
 guarded in the most remarkable manner, and awful 
 punishments fell on those who profaned it, by curi- 
 osity or even by a too familiar care for it. May I ven- 
 ture here to warn against the blasphemous profane - 
 ness of making counterfeits of the Ark, and using this 
 symbol of the Divine Presence in the rites of modern 
 societies, as is said to be done? Compare I. Sam. vi. 
 19, 20, and II. Sam. vi. 6, 7. The cherubim, whose 
 figures were wrought into the pure gold of the cover, 
 and not screwed on to it, seem to intimate the unity 
 of angelic and human beings in the Divine system ; 
 and they were so placed as to look down upon the 
 " mercy-seat," — the burnished lid, resplendent with 
 supernatural light, which closed upon the Ark, cover- 
 ing over the tables of the Law within. Thus was 
 suggested the Law, with its direful threats of justice, 
 hidden by the mercy of God, in the Atonement of 
 Christ : a system so marvellous and comprehensive 
 that '"the angels desire to look into it" (I. Peter, 
 i. 12). So St. James says : " Mercy rejoiceth against 
 judgment ; " an apparent reference to the glorified 
 15 
 
226 NOTES. 
 
 mercy-seat, over against the stone tables of Law, 
 which it hid from sight. The text which I have 
 made a motto to this poem uplifts the same thought 
 to the heavens. All heaven learns new lessons of the 
 Divine Love from the salvation of sinners, and from 
 the experiences of the Church Militant here on earth. 
 This lends unutterable grandeur to the expressions of 
 St. Paul, "Seen of Angels" (I. Tim. iii. 16), as 
 applied to " God, manifest in the flesh." 
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 £lje Cartljqiuvfec. 
 
 Page 165. — Great Pan revives. — The reader will 
 recall a mysterious story of Plutarch, concerning 
 what happened one day, in the time of Tiberius, to 
 a party sailing on the Ionian gulf, near the Echin- 
 ades. Voices in the air cried out, Great Pan is dead ; 
 and Christians have attributed the phenomenon to 
 " some powers of the air," in their consternation, 
 when the earth trembled at the death of Christ. 
 Tiberius was alarmed when told of the incident ; and 
 this is a noteworthy fact as the one response of history 
 to the natural inquiry, Did the Caesar receive any 
 intimation of the amazing event which makes his 
 ignoble reign so memorable in human annals ? May 
 not the official report of Pilate have afforded him the 
 real ground of his alarm when he heard this story, 
 allowing certain " Acts of Pilate " to have been a 
 real' base for the fabrication that bears the name ? 
 See Dacier's Plutarque, Vol. VIII. , p. 285. I have 
 imagined a corresponding impression produced upon 
 
NOTES. 227 
 
 Thamus (the pilot of the story) by the concussion of 
 the air on " Easter Morning." 
 
 XXIX. 
 
 %\)c llnbaptyc*. 
 
 Page 176. — Hath He not said the Christian's child, 
 etc. " Else were your children unclean, but now 
 are they holy ; ' (1. Cor. vii. 14). "If the root be 
 holy, so are the branches " (Rom. xi. i6\ This 
 poem is designed for the comfort of over-scrupulous 
 consciences, and o.ver-anxious inquirers about the 
 heathen ; of whom I have found examples in pastoral 
 experience, among some of the best of men and 
 women. 
 
 XXX. 
 
 % €l)OU0|)t for tlje jFatrjcra. 
 
 Page 182. — St. Augustine is not the earliest of the 
 Fathers to enlarge upon the text 1 have chosen for a 
 motto, nor do I recollect that he anywhere follows an 
 earlier authority in the pretty conceit of the figure of 
 the cross made by the outstretched wings of the bird. 
 But he thus expresses himself as to the burden : 
 "Christ's burden hath wings, another's hath weight. 
 If thou pluck off the wings of a bird, thou removest 
 a sort of weight ; but the more of that burden thou 
 removest, the more to earth the bird must cleave. 
 She flieth not, because thou hast unburdened her ; 
 give her back the weight — she flieth." See Com- 
 mentary on the Psalms. Ps. lix. 7, African Psalter 
 
228 NOTES. 
 
 (lx. 6, Anglican). S. Aug. Opp. Tom. IV., p. 719. 
 Paris : Migne, 1865. 
 
 St. Bernard copies the great African doctor as fol- 
 lows : " Leve Salvatoris onus, quo crescit amplius, eo 
 portabilius est. Nonne et aviculas levat, non onerat 
 pennarum sive plumarum numerositas ipsa ? Tolle 
 eas, et reliquum corpus pondere suo fertur ad ima. 
 Sic disciplinam Christi, sic suave jugum, sic onus 
 leve, quo deponimus, eo deprimimur ipsi : quia 
 portat potius quam portatur." S. Bernard. Epist. 
 ccclxxxv. Opp. Vol. I., p. 691. Ed. Paris, 1839. 
 
 XXXI. 
 
 .SUiwrantlj. 
 
 Page 184. — Not here are amaranthine bowers. The 
 flowers of June made me pensive even as a child : to 
 see them fade so soon tortured me. I remember the 
 thrill with which I heard my father quote those lines 
 of Cowper's " Task " : 
 
 " The only amaranthine flower on earth 
 
 Is virtue • the only lasting treasure — Truth." 
 
 He explained to me this word " amaranthine," and 
 gave its etymology. The impression has never faded 
 from my mind and heart. 
 
 Page 185. — There is a rainbow round the throne. 
 Just so the evanescent splendour of the rainbow was 
 painful, till I learned to dwell on the truth expressed 
 in this stanza. I longed for something imperishable. 
 I find it in the vision of Patmos : " There was a rain- 
 bow round about the throne, in sight like unto an 
 
NOTES. 229 
 
 emerald ; " the mixed light of amethyst and top-az pre- 
 dominating. It was a spring-like rainbow, in which 
 the fiery heats of July were not reflected ; so, it seemed 
 to me, vve ought to understand it. So too the dreams 
 of Fra Angelico and the nimbus of his holy ones seem 
 to be justified in this text : "I saw another mighty 
 angel come down from heaven, clothed with a cloud, 
 and a rainbow was upon his head.'''' Thus Revelation 
 struggles with human language when it speaks of the 
 ineffable glories of the Blessed. 
 
 Page 185. — For sure as in the soul are powers, etc. 
 The ninth stanza in the preceding poem aims, like 
 this, to express a refreshing idea, which is beautifully 
 rendered by Ancillon as follows: "II y a dans les 
 affections du cceur quelque chose de pur et de desin- 
 teresse, qui annonce l'excellence et la dignite de 
 Tame humaine." 
 
 XXXII. 
 
 {fcljc -Slsccnston. 
 
 Page 186. — Who bowed to taste the wayside rill. 
 Psalm ex. 7. After Pompey's defeat, says Plutarch, 
 "etant arrive a Tempe, brulant de soif, il se jeta a. 
 terre sur le visage, but dans la riviere, et s'etant 
 releve il traversa la vallee," etc. This illustrates the 
 idea of the Psalmist, in a manner ; but Messiah bowed 
 to taste the dark river, only to " lift up His head" 
 and live and reign forever. See Dacier's Plutarque, 
 Vol. V. p. 478. 
 
230 NOTES. 
 
 xxxin. 
 
 €l)f ^Lvjo $)cntccctst0. 
 
 Page 191. — Goodness my glory is. "And he said : 
 I beseech Thee shew me thy glory. And He said, I 
 will make all my goodness pass before Thee." Exod. 
 xxxiii. 18, 19. The immense significance of this 
 Scripture, where it stands, in connection with Sinai 
 and the second inscription of the Decalogue upon 
 tables of stone, is what the poem designs to illustrate. 
 Compare Deut. xxxiv. 1-5. Was it not at this time 
 that " all His goodness " was made to pass before 
 Moses, prophetically? 
 
 Page 191. — The still small voice, etc. I. Kings, 
 xix. 12. In the extremity of Israel's degeneracy 
 Elijah goes back to Horeb, as if to ask wheiher 
 "the fiery Law " would never be avenged. How 
 significant the answer God vouchsafed : a premoni- 
 tion of the second and more glorious Pentecost, the 
 mission of the Comforter. 
 
 XXXIV. 
 
 Wi)\tsiin'i)a\). 
 
 Page 192. — In connection with Isaiah, xi. 2, 3, it 
 is instructive to observe (Rev. i. 4, iii. 1, iv. 5, and 
 v. 6) : the prominence given to the sevenfold gifts 
 of the Spirit, in the great Prophecy of the New Cove- 
 nant. This Pentecostal Hymn aims in some degree 
 to celebrate the practical blessings of these gifts. 
 
NOTES. 231 
 
 XXXV. 
 
 €i)c ^rinitt). 
 
 Page 192. — Let me give the translation of this most 
 ancient hymn of the Church as arranged, from Bishop 
 Andrewes, in a modern Oxford edition : 
 
 " O Joyful Light 
 Of the Holy Glory of the Father, 
 Immortal, Heavenly, Holy, Blessed, 
 
 Jesus Christ s 
 Beholding the Evening light, 
 We glorify 
 The Father and the Son. 
 And the Holy Spirit of God. 
 Worthy art Thou, in all seasons, 
 With sacred voices to be hymn&d, 
 Son of God, 
 Giver of Hope ; 
 Wherefore the world glorifieth Thee, 
 O Joyful Light, 
 Of the Holy Glory, 
 Amen." 
 
 I have rearranged the stichometry, and ventured to 
 repeat the first lines as a refrain at the close. I have 
 always thought it must have been sung with such a 
 refrain, unless, indeed, it concluded with one of St. 
 Paul's doxologies ; which I am persuaded he often 
 borrows from the Church's hymns. See Ante-Nicene 
 Fathers, American edition, Vol II. p. 79, note 2, and 
 p. 298. 
 
 This they sang even in the dark Catacombs, where, 
 though they noted the accustomed hour of the day's 
 decline, they could behold no other light than Christ's 
 shining in their souls. Who has not seen the Chris- 
 
232 NOTES. 
 
 tian lamps taken from their tombs, marked by the acros- 
 tical IX&T^S, and the XP, or the apocalyptic Alpha 
 and Omega ? When Padre Marchi showed me such 
 relics in the Jesuit College at Rome — " Observe," said 
 I to the venerable man, " how these early Christians 
 worshipped Jesus and the Trinity, not Mary and ' the 
 Star of the Sea ' ; and how closely they stuck to Holy 
 Scripture." The Jesuit looked unutterable things ; 
 but he answered nothing to the purpose. 
 
 When I have taken one of these Christian relics in 
 my hand, I have seemed to see some Christian vestal 
 about to be thrown to the lions on the morrow, but 
 trimming her lamp to go forth and meet the Bride- 
 groom, as she chanted her sweet even-song of faith 
 and hope — " O Joyful Light ! " With this idea, please 
 read it over. Innumerable Christians have sung it on 
 the eve of martyrdom. It moves me to tears as I 
 recite it with this thought. Bishop Andrevves' copy 
 of the original Greek was found in his private prayer- 
 book bedewed with his weeping. Take then this 
 hymn of the martyr Christians at the close of day, as 
 evidence of their faith and piety. 
 
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