Yon weather-beaten grey old finger-post
Stands like Time’s land-mark pointing to decay;
The very roads it once marked out are lost:
The common was encroached on every day
By grasping men who bore an unjust sway,
And rent the gift from Charity’s dead hands.
The post does still one broken arm display,
Which now points out where the New Workhouse stands,
As if it said “Poor man! those walls are all thy lands.”
Where o’er yon woodland-stream dark branches bow,
Patches of blue are let in from the sky,
Throwing a chequered underlight below,
Where the deep waters steeped in gloom roll by;
Looking like Hope, who ever watcheth nigh,
And throws her cheering ray o’er life’s long night,
When wearied man would fain lie down and die.
Past the broad meadow now it rolleth bright,
Which like a mantle green seems edged with silver light.
All things, save Man, this Summer morn rejoice:
Sweet smiles the sky, so fair a world to view;
Unto the earth below the flowers give voice;
Even the wayside-weed of homeliest hue
Looks up erect amid the golden blue,
And thus it speaketh to the thinking mind:—
“O’erlook me not! I for a purpose grew,
Though long mayest thou that purpose try to find,
On us one sunshine falls! God only is not blind!”
England, my country!—land that gave me birth!
Where those I love, living or dead, still dwell,
Most sacred spot—to me—of all the earth;
England! “with all thy faults I love thee well.”
With what delight I hear thy Sabbath bell
Fling to the sky its ancient English sound,
As if to the wide world it dared to tell
We own a God, who guards this envied ground,
Bulwarked with martyrs’ bones—where Fear was never found.
Here might a sinner humbly kneel and pray,
With this bright sky, this lovely scene in view,
And worship Him who guardeth us alway!—
Who hung these lands with green, this sky with blue,
Who spake, and from these plains huge cities grew;
Who made thee, mighty England! what thou art,
And asked but gratitude for all His due.
The Giver, God! claims but the beggar’s part,
And only doth require “a humble, contrite heart.”
London: Printed by Samuel Bentley, Bangor House, Shoe Lane.