Classic Poem

HYMN XVIII.

O Lord , how shall we frame a song
To celebrate thy fame!
Our highest flights are all too low
To reach thy loftier name.

Yet should the objects of thy love
Thy praises cease to shout,
To censure such ingratitude,
The stones would soon cry out.

What was there, Lord , in sinful man
That could thy pity move,
To draw him from the gates of hell
With charming bands of love!

A love, by many sorrows try'd,
And many a painful wound;
Whose flame could not be quench'd by death,
Could by no floods be drown'd;

No not by all those streams of blood
Which on thy cross did meet,
From thy pierc'd heart, and bleeding head,
And wounded hands and feet.

A love whose wonders far transcend
The reach of human view;
Whose myst'ries the inquiring crowd
Of cherubs look into.

O happy men who taste this grace,
Which angels so admire;
And feel the shines of that bright face,
Which they to see desire!

But when all mystick truth shall be
Plac'd in a clearer light;
What joy! Christ face to face to see
With full and endless sight!