My Father and my God! Safe on thine arm I lean when storms arise, If slander lifts her forked tongue, Thy hand shall grasp the glitt'ring spear, Thy breath shall chase them, as when whirlwinds rise Salvation to my God and king, While life endures, and then above I'll tune a nobler song to praise the God of love. AN ELEGY: OCCASIONED BY THE DEATH OF THE REV. DR. GIFFORD, WHO FELL ASLEEP IN CHRIST, THE 19TH OF JUNE, 1784; IN THE EIGHTY-FOURTH YEAR OF HIS AGE. WHEN the loud din of war, and clash of arms Of sweet serenity. No more the sound Of thund'ring cannon shakes the trembling ground: He listens to the lark and linnet's lay, Enjoys the calm, as much at ease as they; Bids ev'ry rude tumultuous passion cease, So Rev'rend Gifford lays his armour by, Quits the low earth, and soars above the sky. Long in the field the christian soldier stood, And wrestled; not with foes of flesh and blood, But pow'rs of darkness, rulers of the air, Whose fiery darts ten thousand horrors bear. Oft in black storms the barbed mischief flies, Obscures the sun, and darkens all the skies. But Gifford, great in arms, maintain'd the fight, And, unappal'd march'd on, through shades of night, Till brighter day arose: secure he stood, In all the glorious panoply of God; And the last foe subdu'd, he quits the place, Receives a glorious welcome to the sky. He tunes his golden harp, and joins the throng Thy name they sing, O lamb of God! for thou Seraphs shall, pleas'd, attend, then join the lay, And saints and angels shall thy love display: The glorious theme shall run from choir to choir, Come gentle Muse, in softest lays record Sav'd by this grace himself, he long'd to tell For mourning souls, by sin's sad serpent stung. Zealous for holy gospel liberty: Firm as a brazen pillar, Gifford stood, And liv'd, and wrote, and preach'd the truth of God: Like favor'd John, was oft indulg'd to rest: H There mild beneficence sat up her throne, Vast was his mind; for contemplation made: Vast were the pow'rs his active mind display'd. Thro' nature's most stupendous works it run, Measu'rd the stars, and circumscrib'd the sun; From link to link, of the great chain, descends, And only with creation's ending, ends : Thro' fields of science sought the deity, Led by thy hand, O fair philosophy! But chiefly thine, O science all divine! To whom all others must the palm resign. Creation proves a God, but how to know, To fear, and love, and to enjoy him too.... Creation here is mute; and all the rest, Can but by revelation be express'd. Hail! then, O Spirit! who only can display To sinners' hearts, the new and living way. Gifford, led on by thee, explor'd the road, And learn'd to know the hidden things of God. Hail! sacred knowledge, science all divine, Distinct from thee, philosophy can shine But with a glow-worm lustre; the vast mind By arts and erudition most refin'd, So comprehensive, as to grasp the ball; Untaught by thee, is ignorant of all. For God is all....and not that God to know, |