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COME TO ME, DREAMS OF HEA EN.

COME to me, dreams of heaven!

My fainting spirit bear

On your bright wings, by morning given, Up to celestial air.

Away, far, far away,

From bowers by tempests riven,

Fold me in blue, still, cloudless day,

O blessed dreams of heaven!

Come but for one brief hour,

Sweet dreams! and yet again,

O'er burning thought and memory shower Your soft effacing rain!

Waft me where gales divine,

With dark clouds ne'er have striven,

Where living founts for ever shine

O blessed dreams of heaven!

THE ANGELS' CALL.

"Hark! they whisper! angels say,
Sister spirit come away!"

COME to the land of peace!

Come where the tempest hath no longer sway,
The shadow passes froin the soul away,
The sounds of weeping cease!

Fear hath no dwelling there!

Come to the mingling of repose and love,
Breathed by the silent spirit of the dove
Through the celestial air!

Come to the bright and blest

And crowned for ever!-'midst that shining band, Gathered to Heaven's own wreath from every land, Thy spirit shall find rest!

Thou hast been long alone:

Come to thy mother!-on the sabbath shore,

The heart that rocked thy childhood back once more Shall take its wearied one.

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THE FOUNTAIN OF MARAH.

"And when they came to Marah, they could not drink of the wars of Marah, for they were bitter.

"And the people murmured against Moses, saying, What shall e drink?

"And he cried unto the Lord; and the Lord showed him a tree, hich when he had cast into the waters, the waters were made veet."-Exod. xv. 23-25.

WHERE is the tree the prophet threw

Into the bitter wave?

Left it no scion where it grew,

The thirsting soul to save ?

Hath nature lost the hidden power
Its precious foliage shed?

Is there no distant eastern bower,
With such sweet leaves o'erspread,

Nay, wherefore ask?-since gifts are ours,
Which yet may well irabue

Earth's many-troubled founts with showers
Of Heaven's own balmy dew.
Oh! mingled with the cup of grief,
Let faith's deep spirit be;
And every prayer shall win a leaf
From that blest healing tree!

THINGS THAT CHANGE.

KNOWEST thou that seas are sweeping

Where cities once have been? When the calm wave is sleeping, Their towers may yet be seen; Far down below the glassy tide

Man's dwelling's where his voice hath died! Knowest thou that flocks are feeding

Above the tombs of old,

Which kings, their armies leading,

Have lingered to behold?

A short, smooth greensward o'er them spread
Is all that marks where heroes bled.

Knowest thou that now the token
Of temples once renowned,
Is but a pillar, broken,

With glass and wall-flowers crowned ?
And the lone serpent rears her young
Where the triumphant lyre hath sung?
Well, well, I know the story

Of ages passed away,

And the mournful wrecks that glory
Has left to dull decay.

But thou hast yet a tale to learn
More full of warnings sad and stern

Thy pensive eye but ranges

O'er ruined fane and hall,

Oh! the deep soul has changes

More sorrowful than all.

Talk not, while these before thee throng
Of silence in the place of song.

See scorn-where love has perished;
Distrust-where friendship grew;
Pride-where once nature cherished

All tender thoughts and true!
And shadows of oblivion thrown
O'er every trace of idols gone.
Weep not for tombs far scattered,
For temples prostrate laid-
In thine own heart lie shattered
The altars it had made.

Go, sound its depths in doubt and fear!
Heap up no more its treasures here.

THE POETRY OF THE PSALMS. NOBLY thy song, O minstrel! rushed to meet The Eternal on the pathway of the blast, With darkness round him, as a mantle, cast, And cherubim to waft his flying seat. Amidst the hills, that smoked beneath his feet, With trumpet voice thy spirit called aloud, And bade the trembling rocks his name repeat, And the bent cedars and the barsting cloud, But far more gloriously to earth made known By that high strain, than by the thunder's tone, Than flashing torrents or the ocean's roll; Jehovah spoke through the inbreathing fire, Nature's vast realms for ever to inspire

With the deep worship of a living soul.

THE SABBATH.

How many blessed groups this hour are bending Through England's primrose meadow paths their way Toward spire and tower, 'midst shadowy elms ascending, Whence the sweet chimes proclaim the hallowed day. The halls, from old heroic ages gray,

Pour their fair children forth; and hamlets low, With whose thick orchard blooms the soft winds play, Send out their inmates in a happy flow, Like a free vernal stream. I may not tread With them those pathways-to the feverish bed Of sickness bound; yet, oh, my God! I bless Thy mercy, that with sabbath peace hath filled My chastened heart, and all its throbbings stilled To one deep calm of lowliest thankfulness.

THE VOICE OF GOD.

"I heard thy voice in the garden and I was afraid."

AMIDST the thrilling leaves, thy voice,

A: evening's fall, drew near;
Father! and did not man rejoice
That blessed sound to hear!

Did not his heart within him burn,
Touched by the solemn tone?
Not so! for, never to return,
Its purity was gone.

Therefore, 'midst holy stream and bower,
His spirit shook with dread,

And called the cedars in that hour,

To veil his conscious head.

Oh! in each wind, each fountain flow,
Each whisper of the shade,

Grant me, my God, thy voice to know,
And not to be afraid!

And calmly, brightly, that pure life
Melted from earth away;

No cloud it knew, no parting strife,
No sorrowful decay;

He bowed him not, like all beside,
Unto the spoiler's rod,
But joined at once the glorified,
Where angels walk with God!

So let us walk!-the night must come
To us that comes to all;

We through the darkness must go home
Hearing the trumpet's call.
Closed is the path for evermore,

Which without death he trod;
Not so that way, wherein of yore
His footsteps walked with God!

A PRAYER.

FATHER in Heaven! from whom the simplest flower
On the high Alps or fiery desert thrown,
Draws not sweet odor or young life alone,
But the deep virtue of an inborn power
To cheer the wanderer in his fainting hour,

With thoughts of Thee; to strengthen, to infuse
Faith, love, and courage, by the tender hues
That speak thy presence; oh! with such a dower
Grace thou my song!-the precious gift bestow
From thy pure spirit's treasury divine,

To wake one tear of purifying flow,

To soften one wrung heart for thee and thine; Se shall the life breathed through the lowly strain,

Be as the meek wild-flowers-if transient, yet not vain.

THE ROD OF AARON.
(Numbers xvii. 8.)

WAS it the sigh of the southern gale
That flushed the almond bough?
Brightest and first the young spring to hail,
Still its red blossoms glow.

Was it the sunshine that woke its flowers
With a kindling look of love?

Oh, far and deep, and through hidden bowers
That smile of Heaven can rove!

No! from the breeze and the living light
Shut was the sapless rod;

But it felt in the stillness a secret might,
And thrilled to the breath of God.
E'en so may that breath, like the vernal air,
O'er our glad spirits move;

And all such things as are good and fair,
Be the blossoms, its track that prove!

PRAYER CONTINUED.

"What in me is dark

Llumine: what is low raise and support."-Milton.

FAR are the wings of intellect astray,

That strive not, Father! to thy heavenly seat; They rove, but mount not; and the tempests beat Still on their plumes; O source of mental day! Chase from before my spirit's track the array

Of mists and shadows, raised by earthly care In troubled hosts that cross the purer air, And veil the opening of the starry way,

Which brightens on to thee! Oh! guide thou right My thought's weak pinion, clear mine inward sight, The eternal springs of beauty to discern,

Welling beside thy throne; unsea' mine ear,
Nature's true oracles in joy to hear:

Keep my soul wakeful still to listen and to learn.

HE WALKED WITH GOD.
Genesis v. 24.

He walked with God, in holy joy,
Whilst yet his days were few;

The deep glad spirit of the boy

To love and reverence grew. Whether, each nightly star to count The ancient hills he trod,

Or sought the flowers by stream and fountAlike he walked with God.

The graver noon of manhood came,
The full of cares and fears;
One voice was in his heart--the same
It heard through child ood's years.
Amidst fair tents, and flocks, and swains,
O'er his green pasture-sod,

A shepherd-king on eastern plains-
The patriarch walked with God.

A PRAYER.

WRITTEN AT THE AGE OF NINE

OH! God, my Father and my Friend,
Ever thy blessings to me send;
Let me have Virtue for my guide,
And wisdom always at my side;
Thus cheerfully through life I'll go,
Nor ever feel the sting of wo;
Contented with the humblest lot,
Happy, though in the meanest cot.

THE OCEAN.

"They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in gre waters, these see the works of the Lord, and his wonders in the deep."-Psalm cvii. 23, 24.

He that in venturous barks hath been
A wanderer on the deep,
Can tell of many an awful scene,
Where storms for ever sweep.

For many a fair majestic sight
Hath met his wandering eye,
Beneath the streaming northern light,
Or blaze of Indian sky.

Go! ask him of the whirlpool's roar,
Whose echoing thunder peals
Loud, as if rushed along the shore
An army's chariot-wheels;

Of icebergs, floating o'er the main,
Or fixed upon the coast,
Like glittering citadel or fane,
'Mid the bright realms of frost

Of coral rocks from waves below
In steep ascent that tower,
And fraught with peril, daily grow,
Formed by an insect's power;

Of sea-fires, which at dead of night
Shine o'er the tides afar,
And make the expanse of ocean bright
As heaven, with many a star.

Oh God! thy name they well may praise,
Who to the deep go down,
And trace the wonders of thy ways,
Where rocks and billows frown.

If glorious be that awful deep,

No human power can bind,

What then art Thou, who bidst it keep
Within its bounds confined!

Let heaven and earth in praise unite,
Eternal praise to Thee,

Whose word can rouse the tempest's might,
Or still the raging sea!

THE TRUMPET.

THE trumpet's voice hath roused the land,
Light up the beacon pyre!

-A hundred hills have seen the brand
And waved the sign of fire.

A hundred banners to the breeze
Their gorgeous folds have cast-

And hark!-was that the sound of seas ?
-A king to war went past.

The chief is arming in his hall,

The peasant by his hearth;

The mourner hears the thrilling call,
And rises from the earth.
The mother on her first-born son

Looks with a boding eye-
They come not back, though all be won,
Whose young hearts leap so high.

The bard hath ceased his song, and bound
The falchion to his side;
E'en for the marriage altar crowned,
The lover quits his bride.

And all this haste, and change, and fear,
By earthly clarion spread !-

How will it be when kingdoms hear
The blast that wakes the dead?

THE STARS.

"The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth

as handy work."—Psalm xix. 1.

No cloud obscures the summer sky,
The moon in brightness walks on high,
And, set in azure, every star
Shines, like a gem of heaven, afar!

Child of the earth! oh! lif thy glance
To yon bright firmament's expanse;
The glories of its realm explore,
And gaze, and wonder, and adore!

Doth it not speak to every sense
The marvels of Omnipotence?
Seest thou not there the Almighty name,
Inscribed in characters of flame ?

Count o'er those lamps of quenchless light,
That sparkle through the shades of night!
Behold them!-can a mortal boast
To number that celestial host?

Mark well each little star, whose rays
'n distant splendor meet thy gaze,
Each is a world by Him sustained,
Who from eternity hath reigned.
Each, shining not for earth alone,
Hath suns and planets of its own,
And beings, whose existence springs
From Him the all-powerful King of kings.
Haply, those glorious beings know
Nor stain of guilt, nor tear of wo!
But raising still the adoring voice,
For ever in their God rejoice.

What then art thou, oh! child of clay!
Amid creation's grandeur, say?
-E'en as an insect on the breeze,
E'en as a dew-drop, lost in seas!

Yet fear thou not !-the sovereign hand,
Which spread the ocean and the land,
And hung the rolling spheres in air,
Hath, e'en for thee, a Father's care!
Be thou at peace!-the all-seeing eye,
Pervading earth, and air, and sky,
The searching glance which none may flee,
Is still, in mercy, turned on thee.

DIRGE OF A CHILD.

No bitter tears for thee be shed,
Blossom of being! seen and gone!
With flowers alone we strew thy bed,
O blest departed one!
Whose all of life, a rosy ray,
Blushed into dawn, and passed away.

Yes! thou art fled, ere guilt had power
To stain thy cherub soul and form,
Closed is the soft ephemeral flower,

That never felt a storm!

The sunbeam's smile, the zephyr's breath, All that it knew from birth to death.

Thou wert so like a form of light,

That Heaven benignly called thee hence,
Ere yet the world could breathe one blight
O'er thy sweet innocence:
And thou, that brighter home to bless,
Art passed, with all thy loveliness!

Oh! hadst thou still on earth remained,
Vision of beauty! fair as brief!
How soon thy brightness had been stained
With passion or with grief?
Now not a sullying breath can rise,
To dim thy glory in the skies.

We rear no marble o'er thy tomb,

No sculptured image there shall mourn; Ah! fitter far the vernal bloom

Such dwelling to adorn.

Fragrance, and flowers, and dews, must be
The only emblems meet for thee.

Thy grave shall be a blessed shrine,
Adorned with Nature's brightest wreath,
Each glowing season shall combine
Its incense there to breathe;

And oft, upon the midnight air,

Shall viewless harps be murmuring there.

And oh! sometimes in visions blest,
Sweet spirit! visit our repose,

And bear from thine own world of rest,
Some balm for human woes!

What form more lovely could be given
Than thine, to messenger of Heaven?

THE LANDING OF THE PILGRIM FATHERS

THE breaking waves dashed high

On a stern and rock-bound coast,
And the woods, against a stormy sky,
Their giant branches tossed;

And the heavy night hung dark
The hills and waters o'er,

When a band of exiles moored their bark
On the wild New England shore.

Net as the conqueror comes,

They, the true-hearted came, Not with the roll of the stirring drums, And the trumpet that sings of fame ;

Not as the flying come,

In silence and in fear,

They shook the depths of the desert's gloom
With their hymns of lofty cheer.

Amidst the storm they sang,

And the stars heard and the sea!

And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang To the anthem of the free!

The ocean-eagle soared

From his nest by the white wave's foam,
And the rocking pines of the forest roared-
This was their welcome home!

There were men with hoary hair,
Amidst that pilgrim-band-
Why had they come to wither there
Away from their childhood's land?

There was woman's fearless eye,

Lit by her deep love's truth;

There was manhood's brow serenely high,
And the fiery heart of youth.
What sought they thus afar?

Bright jewels of the mine?

The wealth of seas, the spoils of war?
-They sought a faith's pure shrine !

Ay, call it holy ground,

The soil where first they trod !

They have left unstained what there they found. Freedom to worship God!

THE HEBREW MOTHER.

THE rose was rich in bloom on Sharon's plain,
When a young mother with her first-born thence
Went up to Zion, for the boy was vowed
Unto the temple-service;-by the hand
She led him, and her silent soul, the while,
Oft as the dewy laughter of his eye

Met her sweet serious glance, rejoiced to think
That aught so pure, so beautiful, was hers,
To bring before her God. So passed they on,
O'er Judah's hills; and wheresoe'er the leaves
Of the broad sycamore made sounds at noon,
Like lulling rain-drops, or the olive-boughs,
With their cool dimness, crossed the sultry blue
Of Syria's heaven, she paused, that he might rest;
Yet from her own meek eyelids chased the sleep
That weighed their dark fringe down, to sit and watch
The crimson deepening o'er his cheek's repose,
As at a red flower's heart. And where a fount
Lay like a twilight star 'midst palmy shades,
Making its banks green gems along the wild,
There too she lingered from the diamond wave
Drawing bright water for his rosy lips,
And softly parting clusters of jet curls

To bathe his brow. At last the Fane was reached,
The earth's One Sanctuary-and rapture hushed
Her bosom, as before her, through the day,
It rose, a mountain of white marble, steeped
In light, like flowing gold. But when that hour
Waned to the farewell moment, when the boy
Lifted, through rainbow-gleaming tears, his eye
Beseechingly to hers, and half in fear

Turned from the white-robed priest, and round her arm
Clung as the ivy clings-the deep spring tide
Of Nature then swelled high, and o'er her child
Bending, her soul broke forth, in mingled sounds
Of weeping and sad song. "Alas," she cried,
"Alas! my boy, thy gentle grasp is on me,
The bright tears quiver in thy pleading eyes,
And now fond thoughts arise,

And silver cords again to earth have won me;
And like a vine thou claspest my full heart-
How shall I hence depart?

"How the lone paths retrace where thou wert playing
So late, along the mountains, at my side?
And I, in joyous pride,

By every place of flowers my course delaying
Wove, e'en as pearls, the lilies round thy han,
Beholding the co fair!

"And oh! the home whence thy bright smile hath paried Will it not seem as if the sunny day

Turned from its door away?

While through its chambers wandering, weary-hearted,
1 languish for thy voice, which past me still
Went like a singing rill!

“Under the palm-trees thou no more shall meet me,
When from the fount at evening I return,
With the full water-urn;

Nor will thy sleep's low dove-like breathings greet me,
As midst the silence of the stars I wake,
And watch for thy dear sake.

"And thou, will slumber's dewy cloud fall round thee, Without thy mother's hand to smooth thy bed?

Wilt thou not vainly spread

Thine arms, when darkness as a veil hath wound thee,
To fold my neck, and lift up, in thy fear,
A cry which none shall hear?

"What have I said, my child! Will He not hear thee,
Who the young ravens heareth from their nest?
Shall He not guard thy rest,

And, in the hush of holy midnight near thee,
Breathe o'er thy soul, and fill its dreams with joy?
Thou shalt sleep soft, my boy!

“I give thee to thy God—the God that gave thee,
A well-spring of deep gladness to my heart!

And precious, as thou art,
And pure as dew of Hermon, He shall have thee,
My own, my beautiful, my undefiled!

And thou shalt be his child

"Therefore, farewell! I go, my soul may fail me, As the hart panteth for the water-brooks,

Yearning for thy sweet looks— But thou, my first-born, droop not, nor bewail me; Thou in the Shadow of the Rock shalt dwell,

The Rock of Strength. Farewell!"

SPANISH EVENING HYMN.

AVE! now let prayer and music
Meet in love on earth and sea!
Now, sweet Mother! may the weary
Turn from this cold world to thee!

From the wide and restless waters

Hear the sailor's hymn arise!
From his watch-fire 'midst the mountains,
Lo! to thee the shepherd cries!

Yet, when thus full hearts find voices
If o'erburdened souls there be,
Dark and silent in their anguish,
Aid those captives! set them free!

Touch them, every fount unsealing,
Where the frozen tears lie deep;
Thou, the Mother of all Sorrows,
Aid, oh! aid to pray and weep!

DEATH OF AN INFANT. DEATH found strange beauty on that cherub brow, And dashed it out. There was a teint of rose On cheek and Jip-he touched the veins with ice, And the rose faded; forth from those blue eyes There spoke a wishful tenderness-a doubt Whether to grieve or sleep, which innocence Alone can wear. With ruthless haste he bound The silken fringes of their curtaining lids For ever; there had been a murmuring sound, With which the babe would claim its mother's ear, Charming her even to tears. The spoiler se! His seal of silence. But there beamed a smile So fixed and holy from that marble browDeath gazed, and left it there; he dared not steal The signet-ring of Heaven.

THE HEBREW MELODIES

OF

LORD BYRON.

SHE WALKS IN BEAUTY.
SHE walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Runs mellowed to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half-impaired the nameless grace,
Which waves in every raven tress,

Or softly lightens o'er her face:
Where thoughts serenely sweet express

How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,

The smiles that win, the teints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,

A mind at peace with all below,

A heart whose love is innocent.

HE HARP THE MONARCH MINSTREL SWEPT.

THE harp the monarch minstrel swept,

The king of men, the loved of Heaven,
Which music hallowed while she wept

O'er tones her heart of hearts had given.
Redoubled be her tears, its chords are riven!

It softened men of iron mould,

It gave them virtues not their own;

No ear so dull, no soul so cold,

That felt not, fired not to the tone,

Till David's lyre grew mightier than his throne.

It told the triumphs of our king,
It wafted glory to our God;

It made our gladdened valleys ring,

The cedars bow, the mountains nod;

Its sound aspired to Heaven, and there abode! Since then, though heard on earth no more, Devotion and her daughter Love

Still bid the bursting spirit soar

To sounds that seem as from above,

In dreams that day's broad light can not remove.

IF THAT HIGH WORLD.

Ir that high world, which lies beyond
Our own, surviving love endears;
If there the cherished heart be fond,

The eye the same, except in tears-
How welcome those untrodden spheres!
How sweet this very hour to die!
To soar from earth, and find all fears
Lost in thy light-Eternity!

It must be so: 'tis not for self
That we so tremble on the brink;
And striving to o'erleap the gulf,
Yet cling to being's severing link.
O, in that future let us think

To hold each heart the heart that shares,
With them the immortals' waters drink
And soul in soul grow deathless theirs!

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O WEEP for those that wept by Babel's stream,
Whose shrines are desolate, whose land a dream;
Weep for the harp of Judah's broken shell:
Mourn-where their God hath dwelt the godless dwell

And where shall Israel lave her bleeding feet?
And when shall Zion's songs again seem sweet?
And Judah's melody once more rejoice
The hearts that leaped before its heavenly voice?

Tribes of the wandering foot and weary breast,
How shall ye flee away and be at rest?
The wild-dove hath her nest, the fox his cave;
Mankind their country-Israel but the grave.

ON JORDAN'S BANKS.

On Jordan's banks the Arab's camels stray,
On Sion's hill the False One's votaries pray,
The Baal-adorer bows on Sinai's steep-

Yet there even there-O God! thy thunders seep.

There--where thy finger scorched the tablet stone!
There where thy shadow to thy people shone !
Thy glory shrouded in its garb of fire:
Thyself-none living see and not expire!

O! in the lightning let thy glance appear!

Sweep from his shivered hand the oppressor's spear; How long by tyrants shall thy land be troa?

How long thy temple worshipless, O God?

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