2 Watchman! does its beauteous ray
Aught of hope or joy foretell?
Traveller! yes; it brings the day,
Promised day of Israel.
3 Watchman! tell us of the night;
Higher yet that star ascends.
Traveller blessedness and light,
Peace and truth, its course portends.
4 Watchman! will its beams alone
Gild the spot that gave them birth?
Traveller! ages are its own;
See, it bursts o'er all the earth.
5 Watchman! tell us of the night,
For the morning seems to dawn.
Traveller darkness takes its flight;
Doubt and terror are withdrawn.
6 Watchman! let thy wanderings cease;
Hie thee to thy quiet home.
Traveller! lo! the Prince of Peace,
Lo! the Son of God, is come.
I AND will the Judge descend?
And must the dead arise?
And not a single soul escape
His all-discerning eyes?
2 How will my heart endure
The terrors of that day,
When earth and heaven, before His face,
Astonished, shrink away?
3 But, ere the trumpet shakes
The mansions of the dead,
Hark! from the gospel's cheering sound
What joyful tidings spread!
4 Come, sinners, seek His grace,
Whose wrath ye cannot bear ;
Fly to the shelter of His cross,
And find salvation there.
I DAY of judgment, day of wonders!
Hark! the trumpet's awful sound,
Louder than a thousand thunders,
Shakes the vast creation round:
How the summons
Will the sinner's heart confound!
2 See the Judge, our nature wearing,
Clothed in majesty divine:
You, who long for His appearing,
Then shall say, "This God is mine:"
Gracious Saviour,
Own me in that day for Thine.
3 At His call the dead awaken,
Rise to life from earth and sea;
All the powers of nature, shaken
By His looks, prepare to flee:
Careless sinner,
What will then become of thee?
4 But to those who have confessèd,
Loved and served the Lord below,
He will say, "Come near, ye blessed!
See the kingdom I bestow:
Shall my love and glory know.”
I Lo! He comes, with clouds descending,
Once for favoured sinners slain :
Thousand thousand saints attending
Swell the triumph of His train :
2 Every eye shall now behold Him,
Robed in dreadful majesty!
Those who set at naught and sold Him,
Pierced, and nailed Him to the tree,
Deeply wailing,
Shall the true Messiah see.
3 Now the Saviour, long expected,
See, in solemn pomp appear;
All His saints, by man rejected,
Now shall meet Him in the air:
Hallelujah!
See the day of God appear.
I THAT awful day will surely come,
Th' appointed hour makes haste,
When I must stand before my Judge,
And pass the solemn test.
2 Thou lovely Chief of all my joys,
Thou Sovereign of my heart,
How could I bear to hear Thy voice
Pronounce the sound, "Depart!"
3 Jesus, I throw my arms around
And hang upon Thy breast;
Without a gracious smile from Thee,
My spirit cannot rest.
4 O, tell me that my worthless name
Is graven on Thy hands!
Show me some promise in Thy book,
Where my salvation stands !
I WHEN Thou, my righteous Judge, shalt come
To take Thy ransomed people home,
Shall I among them stand?
Shall such a worthless worm as I,
Who sometimes am afraid to die,
Be found at Thy right hand?
2 I love to meet Thy people now,
Before Thy feet with them to bow,
Though vilest of them all;
But can I bear the piercing thought ?—
What if my name should be left out,
When Thou for them shalt call?
3 O Lord, prevent it by Thy grace;
Be Thou my only hiding-place,
In this th' accepted day;
Thy pardoning voice, O let me hear,
To still my unbelieving fear,
4 And when the final trump shall sound,
Among Thy saints let me be found,
To bow before Thy face:
Then in triumphant strains I'll sing,
While heaven's resounding mansions ring
With praise of sovereign grace.
BRIEF life is here our portion,
Brief sorrow, short-lived care;
The life that knows no ending,
The tearless life, is there!
O happy retribution !
Short toil, eternal rest;
For mortals and for sinners
A mansion with the blest!
2 And now we fight the battle,
But then shall wear the crown
Of full and everlasting
And passionless renown.
And He, whom now we trust in,
Shall then be seen and known;
And they that know and see Him
Shall have Him for their own.
3 The morning shall awaken,
The shadows shall decay,
And each true-hearted servant
Shall shine as doth the day.
There God, our King and Portion,
In fulness of His grace,
Shall we behold for ever,
And worship face to face.
4 O sweet and blessed country,
The home of God's elect!
O sweet and blessed country
That eager hearts expect :
Jesu, in mercy bring us
To that dear land of rest;
Who art, with God the Father,
And Spirit, ever blest.
BERNARD OF CLUNY, trans. J. M. NEALE.
"FOR ever with the Lord;"
Amen! so let it be;
Life from the dead is in that word,
"Tis immortality.
2 Here in the body pent,
Absent from Him, I roam,
Yet nightly pitch my moving tent
A day's march nearer home.
3 My Father's house on high-
Home of my soul-how near,
At times, to faith's foreseeing eye
The golden gates appear!
"For ever with the Lord!"
Father, if 'tis Thy will,
The promise of that faithful word
E'en here to me fulfil.
5 So when my latest breath
Shall rend the veil in twain,
In death I shall escape from death,
And life eternal gain.
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