Angels! for ye behold Him; and with songs
And choral symphonies, day without night,
Circle his throne, rejoicing. Ye, in Heaven.-
On Earth, join, all ye Creatures, to extol

Him first, Him last, Him midst, and without end.
Fairest of Stars! last in the train of night.-

If better thou belong'st not to the dawn,—
Sure pledge of day! that crown'st the smiling morn
With thy bright circlet,-praise Him in thy sphere,
While day arises, that sweet hour of prime.
Thou Sun! of this great world both eye and soul,
Acknowledge Him thy greater; sound his praise
In thy eternal course, both when thou climb’st,
And when high noon hast gained, and when thou fall'st.
Moon! that now meet'st the orient sun, now fly'st
With the fixed stars-fixed in their orb, that flies-
And ye five other wandering fires, that move
In mystic dance not without song,-resound
His praise, who, out of darkness, called up light.
Air, and ye elements! the eldest birth

Of Nature's womb; that, in quaternion, run
Perpetual circle, multiform; and mix

And nourish all things-let your ceaseless change
Vary to our great Maker still new praise.
Ye Mists and Exhalations! that now rise
From hill or steaming lake, dusky, or gray,
Till the sun paint your fleecy skirts with gold,—
In honour to the world's Great Author rise!
Whether to deck with clouds the uncolour'd sky,
Or wet the thirsty earth with falling showers-
Rising or falling, still advance His praise.

His praise, ye Winds! that from four quarters blow,
Breathe soft, or loud! and wave your tops, ye Pines,
With every Plant, in sign of worship wave!
Fountains! and ye that warble, as ye flow,
Melodious murmurs, warbling, tune His praise.
Join voices, all ye living Souls! ye Birds,
That singing up to Heaven gate ascend,

Bear on your wings, and in your notes, His praise,
Ye that in waters glide, and ye that walk

The earth, and stately tread, or lowly creep!
Witness if I be silent, morn or even,

To hill, or valley, fountain, or fresh shade,
Made vocal by my song, and taught His praise.
Hail, universal Lord! be bounteous still

To give us only good; and if the night
Have gathered aught of evil or concealed,
Disperse it as now light dispels the dark.

4.-APOSTROPHE TO LIGHT.-Milton.

Hail, holy light! offspring of heaven, first-born!
Or, of the Eternal, co-eternal beam;

May I express thee, unblam'd? since God is light,
And never, but in unapproachèd light
Dwelt from eternity; dwelt then in thee,-
Bright effluence of bright essence increate.

Or hear'st thou rather, pure ethereal stream, Whose fountain who shall tell? Before the sun. Before the heavens, thou wert; and, at the voice Of God, as with a mantle, didst invest

The rising world of waters dark and deep,
Won from the void and formless infinite.

Thee I revisit now, with bolder wing,
Escap'd the Stygian pool; though long detain'd
In that obscure sojourn; while, in my flight,
Through utter and through middle darkness borne,
With other notes than to the Orphean lyre,
I sung of Chaos and eternal Night;
Taught by the heavenly Muse to venture down
The dark descent, and up to re-ascend,
Though hard and rare. Thee I revisit safe,
And feel thy sovereign vital lamp; but thou
Revisit'st not these eyes, that roll in vain
To find thy piercing ray, and find no dawn;
So thick a drop-serene hath quench'd their orbs,
Or dim suffusion veiled. . . . . Thus with the year
Seasons return; but not to me returns
Day, or the sweet approach of even, or morn,
Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer's rose,
Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine;

R

But cloud instead, and ever-during dark
Surrounds me; from the cheerful ways of men
Cut off; and, for the book of knowledge fair,
Presented with a universal blank

Of Nature's works-to me expung'd and ras'd,—
And wisdom, at one entrance, quite shut out.
So much the rather thou, Celestial Light,

Shine inward, and the Mind through all her powers
Irradiate; there plant eyes! All mists from thence
Purge and disperse ! that I may see, and tell,

Of things invisible to mortal sight.

5.-SAMSON'S LAMENTATION FOR HIS LOSS OF SIGHT.-Milton.

O loss of sight, of thee I most complain! Blind, among enemies! 0 worse than chains, dungeon, or beggary, or decrepit age. Light, the prime work of God, to me is extinct; and all her various objects of delight annulled, which might in part my grief have eased;-inferior to the vilest now become, of man or worm. The vilest here excel me; they creep, yet see: I, dark in light, exposed to daily fraud, contempt, abuse, and wrong, within doors, or without; still, as a fool, in power of others, never in my own! Scarce half I seem to live! dead more than half!.. O dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon; irrecoverably dark; total eclipse, without all hope of day! O, first-created beam, and thou, great Word, "Let there be light," and light was over all ;—why am I thus bereaved Thy prime decree? The sun to me is dark, and silent as the moon, when she deserts the night, hid in her vacant interlunar cave. Since light so necessary is to life, and almost life itself—if it be true that Light is in the Soul, she all in every part ;—why was the sight to such a tender ball as the eye confin'd,— so obvious and so easy to be quench'd? and not, as feeling, through all parts diffused, that she might look at will through every pore? Then had I not been thus exiled from light; as in the land of darkness, yet in light; to live a life half dead, a living death, and buried; but, O yet more miserable! myself my sepulchre,-a moving grave! buried, yet not exemptby privilege of death and burial—from worst of other evils, pains, and wrongs but made hereby obnoxious more to all the miseries of life; life in captivity among inhuman foes!... Nor am I in the list of them that hope; hopeless are all my evils, all are remediless: this one prayer yet remains, might I be heard no long petition,-speedy death, the close of all my miseries, and the balm.

6.-HYMN ON THE SEASONS.--Thomson.

These, as they change, Almighty Father! these are but the varied God. The rolling year is full of Thee. Forth in the pleasing Spring thy beauty walks, Thy tenderness and love. Wide flush the fields; the softening air is balm; echo the mountains round; the forest smiles; and every sense, and every heart is joy. Then comes Thy glory in the Summer months, with light and heat refulgent. Then Thy sun shoots full perfection thro' the swelling year: and oft Thy voice in dreadful thunder speaks; and oft-at dawn, deep noon, or falling eve, by brooks and groves—in hollow-whispering gales. Thy bounty shines in Autumn unconfined, and spreads a common feast for all that lives. In Winter, awful Thou! with clouds and storms around Thee thrown, tempest o'er tempest rolled;—majestic darkness! on the whirlwind's wing, riding sublime, Thou bidd'st the world adore, and humblest Nature with thy northern blast.

Nature, attend! join, every living soul beneath the spacious temple of the sky; in adoration join; and, ardent, raise one general song! Το Him, ye vocal gales, breathe soft, whose Spirit in your freshness breathes : O talk of Him in solitary glooms! where, o'er the rock, the scarcelywaving pine fills the brown shade with a religious awe. And ye whose bolder note is heard afar, who shake the astonished world, lift high to heaven the impetuous song, and say from whom you rage. His praise, ye brooks, attune, ye trembling rills; and let me catch it as I muse along. Ye headland torrents, rapid, and profound; ye softer floods, that lead the humid maze along the vale; and thou, majestic main, a secret world of wonders in thyself, sound His stupendous praise-whose greater voice or bids you roar, or bids your roarings fall.

Soft roll your incense, herbs, and fruits, and flowers, in mingled clouds to Him, whose sun exalts, whose breath perfumes you, and whose pencil paints. Ye forests, bend, ye harvests, wave to Him; breathe your still song into the reaper's heart, as home he goes beneath the joyous moon. Ye that keep watch in heaven, as earth asleep unconscious lies, effuse your mildest beams, ye constellations! while your angels strike, amid the spangled sky, the silver lyre. Great source of day! best image here below of thy Creator, ever pouring wide, from world to world, the vital ocean round; on nature write with every beam His praise. The thunder rolls: be hush'd, the prostrate world; while cloud to cloud returns the solemn hymn. Bleat out afresh, ye hills: ye mossy rocks, retain the sound: the broad responsive low, ye valleys, raise; for the great Shepherd reigns; and His unsuffering kingdom yet will come. Ye woodlands all, awake :-a boundless song burst from the groves! and when the restless day, expiring, lays

the warbling world asleep, sweetest of birds! sweet Philomela, charm the listening shades, and teach the night His praise!

Ye chief, for whom the whole creation smiles, at once the head, the heart, and tongue of all, crown the great hymn! In swarming cities vast, assembled Men, to the deep organ join the long-resounding voice, oft breaking clear, at solemn pauses, through the swelling bass; and, as each mingling flame increases each, in one united ardour rise to heaven. Or, if you rather choose the rural shade, and find a fane in every sacred grove ; there let the shepherd's flute, the virgin's lay, the prompting seraph, and the poet's lyre, still sing the God of seasons, as they roll. For me, when I forget the darling theme, whether the blossom blows, the Summer ray russets the plain, inspiring Autumn gleams, or Winter rises in the blackening east; be my tongue mute! may fancy paint no more, and, dead to joy, forget my heart to beat.

Should fate command me to the farthest verge of the green earth, to distant barbarous climes, rivers unknown to song; where first the sun gilds Indian mountains, or his setting beam flames on the Atlantic isles; 'tis nought to me: since God is ever present, ever felt, in the void waste, as in the city full; and where He vital breathes there must be joy.—When even at last the solemn hour shall come and wing my mystic flight to future worlds, I cheerful will obey; there, with new powers, will rising wonders sing: I cannot go where Universal Love not smiles around, sustaining all yon orbs and all their suns; from seeming evil still educing good, and better thence again, and better still, in infinite progression. But I lose myself in Him, in Light ineffable!...Come then, expressive Silence, muse His praise!

7.-THE GOLDEN AGE.-Thomson.

The first fresh dawn then waked the gladdened race
Of uncorrupted man, nor blushed to see

The sluggard sleep beneath its sacred beam.
For, their light slumbers gently fumed away;
And up they rose as vigorous as the sun,—
Or to the culture of the willing glebe,
Or to the cheerful tendance of the flock.

Meantime the song went round; and dance and sport,
Wisdom and friendly talk, successive, stole

Their hours away: while, in the rosy vale,

Love breathed his infant sighs, from anguish free.

Nor yet injurious act nor surly deed,