O set my heart at liberty!
May I seize what Thou dost give,
Seize tremblingly; and live.’
‘Very flat, I know,’ the author says, in his usual undecorative manner; but he adds: ‘I wrote it the night before you went; I wanted to show it you, that you might do one on “He that testifieth these things saith: Surely I come quickly”; and then, after the verse, to finish with: “Even so, come, Lord JESUS.” I think that so it might make a composition on which some people’s thoughts would run.[135] You may think all this
bother; but I cannot help fancying that this sort of arrangement is worth some little trouble.’ Hurrell’s poem stands collocated with Keble’s ‘Encouragement’ in the Lyra, with its opening ‘Fear not’: and its heartening beauty is almost a direct address to the burdened spirit who called it forth:
‘Surely the time is short:
Endless the task and art
To brighten for the ethereal Court
A soiled earth-drudging heart!
But He, the dread Proclaimer of that hour,