Sing to the Lord, ye saints of his,
And tell how large his goodness is:
Let all your powers rejoice, and bless
While you record his holiness.
His anger but a moment stays:
His love is life and length of days:
Though grief and tears the night employ,
The morning star restores the joy.
404. C. M. H. K. WHITE.
The power and majesty of God.
THE Lord our God is full of might,
The winds obey his will;
He speaks, and in his heavenly height
The rolling sun stands still.
Rebel, ye waves, and o'er the land
With threatening aspect roar,
The Lord uplifts his awful hand
And chains you to the shore.
Howl, winds of night, your force combine;
Without his high behest
Ye shall not in the mountain-pine
Disturb the sparrow's nest.
His voice sublime is heard afar,
In distant peals it dies;
He yokes the whirlwinds to his car,
And sweeps the howling skies.
Ye nations bend, in reverence bend,
Ye monarchs wait his nod,
And bid the choral song ascend
To celebrate the God!
405. c. M. DR. THOMSON.
Omnipresence of God.
JEHOVAH God! thy gracious power
On every hand we see ;
O may the blessings of each hour
Lead all our thoughts to thee!
If on the wings of morn we speed
To earth's remotest bound,
Thy right hand will our footsteps lead,
Thine arm our path surround.
Thy power is in the ocean deeps,
And reaches to the skies;
Thine eye of mercy never sleeps,
Thy goodness never dies.
From morn till noon, till latest eve,
The hand of God we see;
And all the blessings we receive,
Ceaseless proceed from thee.
In all the varying scenes of time,
On thee our hopes depend;
In every age, in every clime,
Our Father and our friend!
THOU, mighty God, art God alone,
A King of majesty unknown:
And all thy dazzling glories rise
Beyond the reach of angels' eyes.
Yet through this earth thy works proclaim
Some notice of thy reverend name:
And where thy gracious gospel shines,
We read it in the fairest lines.
How rich, how glorious, how divine,
My God, that precious gift of thine!
How far above all mortal things,
The little pride of courts and kings!
O be it our supreme delight
To walk as in thy honour'd sight:
Still in thy precepts and thy fear
To life's last hour to persevere !
407. C. M.
The excellence of religious knowledge.
[Proverbs iii. 13.]
O HAPPY is the man who hears
Instruction's warning voice,
And who cœlestial wisdom makes
His early, only choice.
For she has treasures greater far
Than east or west unfold;
And her reward is more secure
Than is the gain of gold.
In her right hand she holds to view
A length of happy years;
And in her left, the prize of fame
And honour bright appears.
She guides the young with innocence
In pleasure's path to tread;
A crown of glory she bestows
Upon the hoary head.
According as her labours rise,
So her rewards increase;
"Her ways are ways of pleasantness, "And all her paths are peace.
The mercy of God revealed in the gospel.
THE weary traveller, lost in night,
Breathes many a longing sigh;
And marks the welcome dawn of light
With rapture in his eye.
Thus the sweet dawn of heavenly day
Lost weary sinners find;
When mercy with reviving ray
Beams o'er the fainting mind.
To slaves opprest with cruel chains
How kind, how dear the friend
Whose generous hand relieves their pains,
And bids their sorrows end!
Thus kind, thus dear, that friend divine
Who rescues captive souls,
Unbinds the galling chains of sin,
And all its power controls.
My God, to thy revealed light
My dawn of hope I owe;
Once wandering in the shades of night
And sunk in hopeless woe:
'Twas thy blest hand redeem'd the slave, And set the prisoner free:
Be all I am, and all I have,
Devoted, Lord, to thee!
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