OUR LORD'S LAST PRAYER

"Forgive them, Sire! They know not what they do."—

Ah, Christ! how at that face to face God-plea,

The Demon and his legions, mocking thee

With every generation, brought to view,

Flashed with dismay, and, boltless lightening through

The ages, thunder down Eternity,

'Till faint as the sound in shells, far from the sea;

For that thy prayer would be vouchsafed, they knew.

All grandeurs, gathered as a dazzling crown

For thee, in barter for thy knee's least bend,

The Demon dashed to fragments to Time's end.

There, born anew in spirit, we look down

And, in the ocean of thy prayer, Amen'd,

See but earth's monsters, with the demons drown.