V.-THE MOURNERS CAME AT BREAK OF

DAY.

HE mourners came at break of day

THE

Unto the garden-sepulchre;

With darkened hearts to weep and pray,
For Him, the loved one buried there.

What radiant light dispels the gloom?
An angel sits beside the tomb.

The earth doth mourn her treasures lost,
All sepulchred beneath the snow;
When wintry winds, and chilling frost
Have laid her summer glories low;

The spring returns, the flowerets bloom-
An angel sits beside the tomb.

Then mourn we not beloved dead,

E'en while we come to weep and pray;

The happy spirit far hath fled

To brighter realms of endless day:

Immortal Hope dispels the gloom!
An angel sits beside the tomb.

VI.-O PLEASANT LIFE!

(PARAPHRASED FROM THE SPANISH OF LUIS DE LEON.

life!

PLEASANThe soul can win her way

From out the world's dark strife;

And fly to depths fair-haunted

By spirits who have panted

To quit earth's shadows for immortal day

O pleasant life!

O happy breast!

Nor care of courts, nor pride of birth,

Can ruffle thy smooth rest;

No scene of gilded riot

Disturbs thy star-lit quiet

Nor dims thy dream of heaven with mists of earth. O happy breast!

O blessed soul!

What care hast thou that flatt'ring fame

Thy daily acts enroll?

No breath of hers it tasketh,

Thy life-long deed but asketh

One smile of Truth to light thy passing name—
O blessèd soul!

VII.-PART IN PEACE! IS DAY BEFORE US?

ART in peace! Is day before us?

PART

Praise His name for life and light;
Are the shadows lengthening o'er us?
Bless His care who guards the night.

Part in peace! With deep thanksgiving,
Rendering, as we homeward tread,
Gracious service to the living,

Tranquil memory to the dead.

Part in peace! Such are the praises
God our Maker loveth best;
Such the worship that upraises
Human hearts to heavenly rest.

Richard Chenevix Trench.

1807-1886.

THE poetry of Richard Chenevix Trench is represented, with that of the general poets of his time, in Vol. IV. of the POETS AND POETRY OF THE CENTURY, where particulars of his life and work in literature are given. Though scarcely claiming double representation, it is impossible, in view of the religious and didactic character of much of his verse, to omit him from a volume devoted to the sacred poetry of the period. Two or three examples of his more definitely religious verse are therefore added here.

A firm faith in an all-wise, all-loving, over-ruling providence, and a sense of human unworthiness and weakness, in view of divine love and power, find tender expression in his religious verse, as the following nameless fragments will show :-

I.

Not Thou from us, O Lord, but we
Withdraw ourselves from Thee.

When we are dark and dead,
And Thou art covered with a cloud,
Hanging before Thee, like a shroud,
So that our prayer can find no way,
Oh! teach us that we do not say,
"Where is Thy brightness fled?

But that we search and try

What in ourselves has wrought this blame,
For thou remainest still the same,
But earth's own vapours earth may fill
With darkness and thick clouds, while still
The sun is in the sky.

II.

If there had anywhere appeared in space
Another place of refuge, where to flee,
Our hearts had taken refuge in that place,
And not with Thee.

For we against creation's bars had beat

Like prisoned eagles, through great worlds had sought Though but a foot of ground to plant our feet, Where Thou wert not.

And only when we found in earth and air,

In heaven or hell, that such might nowhere be-
That we could not flee from Thee anywhere,
We fled to Thee.

III.

Lord, many times I am aweary quite
Of mine own self, my sin, my vanity-
Yet be not Thou, or I am lost outright,
Weary of me.

And hate against myself I often bear,

And enter with myself in fierce debate:
Take Thou my part against myself, nor share

In that just hate.

Best friends might loathe us, if what things perverse
We know of our own selves, they also knew:
Lord, Holy One! if Thou who knowest worse
Should loathe us too!

Aspiration after purer, truer life, through the tempered discipline of divine mercy, is beautifully expressed in the selections which follow.

ALFRED H. MILES.

POEMS.

RICHARD CHENEVIX TRENCH.

1.- WHAT, MANY TIMES I MUSING ASKED.

WHAT,

HAT, many times I musing asked, is man,
If grief and care

Keep far from him? he knows not what he can,
What cannot bear.

He, till the fire had proved him, doth remain
The main part dross :

To lack the loving discipline of pain
Were endless loss.

Yet when my Lord did ask me on what side
I were content

The grief, whereby I must be purified,
To me were sent,

As each imagined anguish did appear,
Each withering bliss,

Before my soul, I cried, "Oh! spare me here,
Oh no, not this!"-

Like one that having need of, deep within,
The surgeon's knife,

Would hardly bear that it should graze the skin,
Though for his life.

Till He at last, who best doth understand
Both what we need,

And what can bear, did take my case in hand,

Nor crying heed.