I lost her, and the passionate angel came
With heavenly glitter in her glowing wings,
And words of comfort, and a crown like flame:
Such change, such gradual recompence time brings,
Touching, transforming many an early aim.
Through heaven we passed together, and we saw
With sighs of rapture and with trembling awe
Love's perfect goal: we conquered love and fame.

In heaven we dwelt together for long years
And plucked white wondrous blossoms for a token,
To bear away if e'er the dream was broken,
And earth with all her retinue of fears

A GIFT was given us once, a gift most rare,
To keep:
A child, with God's own sunshine in her hair
And God's own heart of love most pure and deep.

We understood her not. Her ways were not
Like ours.
We understood her not, because she brought
Held tight in childish hands heaven's unknown flowers.

And, seeing that her flowers were not of earth
Indeed,
We pained her soul and mocked her simple mirth
And called her choicest flower a worthless weed.

Her choicest sweetest flower was perfect trust,
Sublime:

In the Name of M.O.D. and the Author

Scarron, as Goldsmith tells the tale,
When his own cheer was wont to fail,
Wou'd send a card to ev'ry friend,
At four his Levee to attend.
Each guest, as suited his own taste,
Wou'd bring a dish to crown the feast.
The garnish far excell'd the meat,
The sauce from fancy's sweet retreat;
Some brought the song and merry glee,
And some the social repartee;
Good-humour took the foremost place;
And stingless jest pronounc'd the grace.
Thus from an het'rogeneous crew,

Our refuge is the Lord, Most High,
A help in trouble ever nigh;
The earth may quake, the mountains rock,
But we unmov'd will stand the shock.

There is a stream of copious grace,
It cheers Jehovah's dwelling place —
The place where God delights to dwell,
And vain are all th' assaults of hell.

The world's alarm'd, and fill'd with dread;
Jehovah speaks — the earth hath fled;
Jehovah, God of hosts, appears,
For our defence, to quell our fears.

Come, see Jehovah's mighty deeds!
When he is wroth, creation bleeds;

This is the secret of triumphant Art, —
To lose itself in Nature, pour its heart
Upon the winds away.
Not to turn pale-hued at the storm-blast's drum,
Nor bugles of the wild waves when they come
Fanfaring past the headland grey.

To lose its single self, and to suspire
With Nature's breath; to know the clouds' desire,
The life of stars and trees;
To hold itself suspended in the mid
Large tide of things; to lurk most safely hid
Within the soft plumes of the breeze;

This is the life of Art, the life of man:

I.

We shall not lonely be:
The breakers of death's sea
Fringe with their white line no inhuman shore
Within death's valleys meet
The faces we found sweet,
The hearts and hands that sought our own of yore
Upon death's uplands, lo!
Full many a voice we know
And flowers like those our living green earth bore.

II.

All, young and old, are there;

Hail pleasing spot! the scene of former joys,
Where free from bustle, and the city's noise,
The insant mind was train'd in virtue's sway.
Unaw'd by threats or stern correction's sway.

Tho' distant far the scenes my heart once knew,
Still fleeting fancy, brings them to my view;
Once more befits, as musing here I stand,
The childish play-thing to my ready hand;
I see the tops in circling orbits roll,
And balls swift bounding reach the destin'd goal;
The tow'ring kite on well-poiz'd pinions soar,

All ye, to whom these presents come,
Take note that Ned has gone to roam
In the wild regions of Apollo,
And dares among the Muses hollow.
No more in sober sense you'll find him,
But pelting with a Muse behind him,
Despising ev'ry earthly steed,
On Pegasus three quarter speed;
Slap dash thro' thick and thin he flew,
With laural crown and bays in view.

 His brain on rhymes was always gadding,
And all his faculties went madding.
On classic ground he constant stood,
And hanker'd for poetic food.
If with a friend he chance'd to sup,

No mother owns a son. — Their lives are drawn
Together for a time. O'er valley and lawn
Of this our earth they pass.
But as they older grow, their spheres divide:
One seeks by choice the ice-blue mountain-side:
The other loves the daisied sunlit grass.

Many have lived before. Christ had derived
From many a star wherein his soul had lived
Soul-learning, lessons high:
Perhaps had suffered for another race;
Others perhaps had loved the royal face;
Another cross perhaps had seen him die.

And this is genius. — Genius has rehearsed

The Lord for ever guards the just,
His ears attend their cry;
When broken spirits dwell in dust,
The God of grace is nigh.

What though the sorrows here they taste,
Be sharp and tedious too,
The Lord, who saves his saints at last,
Is their supporter now.

Evil shall smite the wicked dead;
But God secures his own;
Prevents the mischief when they slide,
Or heals the broken bone.

When desolation, like a flood,
O'er the proud sinner rolls;
Saints find a refuge in their God,
For he redeems their souls.