Lord, with what care hast thou begirt us round!
Parents first season us: then schoolmasters
Deliver us to laws; they send us bound
To rules of reason, holy messengers.
Pulpits and Sundays, sorrow dogging sin,
Afflictions sorted, anguish of all sizes,
Fine nets and stratagems to catch us in
Bibles laid open, millions of surprises.
Blessings beforehand, ties of gratefulness,
The sound of glory ringing in our ears;
Without, our shame-within, our consciences;
Angels and grace, eternal hopes and fears.
Yet all these fences, and their whole array,
One cunning bosom-sin blows quite away.
G. Herbert
Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright,
The bridal of the earth and sky,
The dew shall weep thy fall to-night :
For thou must die.
Sweet rose, whose hue, angry and brave,
Makes the rash gazer wipe his eye,
Thy root is ever in its grave,
And thou must die.
Sweet Spring, full of sweet days and roses
A box where sweets compacted lie,
My music shows ye have your closes
And all must die.
Only a sweet and virtuous soul,
Like season'd timber never gives;
But though the whole world turn to coal, Then chiefly lives.
HOLY HABITS
Slowly fashioned, link by link,
Slowly waxing strong,
Till the spirit never shrink,
Save from touch of wrong.
Holy habits are thy wealth,
Golden, pleasant chains ;
Passing earth's prime blessing-health,
Endless, priceless gains;
Holy habits give thee place
With the noblest, best,
All most Godlike, of thy race,
And with seraphs blest ;
Holy habits are thy joy,
Wisdom's pleasant ways,
Yielding good without alloy,
Lengthening, too, thy days.
Seek them, Christian, night and morn,
Seek them noon and even ;
Seek them till thy soul be born
Without stains-in Heaven.
LITTLE THINGS
The flower is small that decks the field,
The bee is small that bends the flower,
But flower and bee alike may yield
Food for a thoughtful hour.
Essence and attributes of each
For ends profound combine;
And all they are, and all they teach,
Springs from the mind Divine.
Is there who scorneth little things?
As wisely might he scorn to eat
The food that bounteous Autumn brings
In little grains of wheat.
Methinks, indeed, that such an one
Few pleasures upon earth will find,
Where well nigh every good is won
From little things combined.
The lark that in the morning air
Amid the sunbeams mounts and sings;
What lifted her so lightly there?—
Small feathers in her wings.
What form too, then the beauteous dyes
With which all nature oft is bright,
Meadows and streams, woods, hills, and skies?—
Minutest waves of light.
And when the earth is sere and sad
From summer's over fervid reign,
How is she in fresh beauty clad ?———
By little drops of rain.
Yea, and the robe that Nature weaves,
Whence does it every robe surpass ?-
From little flowers, and little leaves,
And little blades of grass.
O sure, who scorneth little things,
If he were not a thoughtless elf,
Far above all that round him springs,
Would scorn his little self.
Lost! lost! lost!
A gem of countless price,
Cut from the living rock,
And graved in Paradise:
Set round with three times eight
Large diamonds, clear and bright,
And each with sixty smaller ones,
All changeful as the light.
Lost-where the thoughtless throng
In Fashion's mazes wind,
Where trilleth folly's song,
Leaving a sting behind.
Yet to my hand 'twas given,
A golden harp to buy,
Such as the white-robed choir attune
To deathless minstrelsy.
Lost! lost! lost!
I feel all search is vain;
That gem of countless cost
Can ne'er be mine again :
I offer no reward-
For till these heartstrings sever,
I know that Heaven's entrusted gift
Is reft away for ever.
But when the sea and land,
Like burning scroll have fled,
I'll see it in His hand,
Who judgeth quick and dead;
And when of scathe and loss
That man can ne'er repair,
The dread inquiry meets my soul,
What shall it answer there?
RELIGION NOT ADVERSE TO
PLEASURE
Religion does not censure or exclude
Unnumbered pleasures harmlessly pursued ;
To study, culture, and with artful toil,
To meliorate and tame the stubborn soil;
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