Then pours she on the Christian heart
That warning still and deep,
At which high spirits of old would start
E’en from their Pagan sleep.
Just guessing, through their murky blind
Few, faint, and baffling sight,
Streaks of a brighter heaven behind,
A cloudless depth of light.
Such thoughts, the wreck of Paradise,
Through many a dreary age,
Upbore whate’er of good and wise
Yet lived in bard or sage:
They marked what agonizing throes
Shook the great mother’s womb:
But Reason’s spells might not disclose
The gracious birth to come:
Nor could the enchantress Hope forecast
God’s secret love and power;
The travail pangs of Earth must last
Till her appointed hour.
The hour that saw from opening heaven
Redeeming glory stream,
Beyond the summer hues of even,
Beyond the mid-day beam.
Thenceforth, to eyes of high desire,
The meanest thing below,
As with a seraph’s robe of fire
Invested, burn and glow:
The rod of Heaven has touched them all,
The word from Heaven is spoken:
“Rise, shine, and sing, thou captive thrall;
Are not thy fetters broken?
“The God Who hallowed thee and blest,
Pronouncing thee all good—
Hath He not all thy wrongs redrest,
And all thy bliss renewed?
“Why mourn’st thou still as one bereft,
Now that th’ eternal Son
His blessèd home in Heaven hath left
To make thee all His own?”