Speak, O Lord, in voice of thunder, show Thy footsteps on the deep,
Pour Thy sunshine from the heavens on the blinded eyes that weep,
Till the harmonies of nature and exalted human love
Make the universe a mirror of the glorious God above.
THE STING OF DEATH.
“Is Sin, then, fair?”
Nay, love, come now
Put back the hair
From his sunny brow;
See, here, blood-red
Across his head
A brand is set,
The word—“Regret.”
“Is Sin so fleet
That while he stays
Our hands and feet
May go his ways?”
Nay, love, his breath
Clings round like death,
He slakes desire
With liquid fire.
“Is Sin Death’s sting?”
Ay, sure he is,
His golden wing
Darkens man’s bliss;
And when Death comes,
Sin sits and hums
A chaunt of fears
Into man’s ears.
“How slayeth Sin?”
First, God is hid,
And the heart within
By its own self chid;
Then the maddened brain
Is scourged by pain
To sin as before
And more and more,
For evermore.
TE JUDICE.
Dost thou deem that thyself
Art as white from sin
As a platter of delf,—
Outside and in?
When thine eyes behold
Christ’s kind face lean
From His throne of gold
To test what is told
Of the life that hath been,
Like a leper of old,
Thou wilt cry, “Unclean!
Unclean! Unclean!”