For the Southern Literary Messenger.
THE OLD PARISH CHURCH.
MR. WHITE,—The attention of the traveller through Lower Virginia, is often powerfully arrested by the fine old churches in a state of dilapidation and decay, and he reverts with a melancholy feeling to the days when they were built, and the people who worshipped within them. During our last war with Great Britain, these churches served as quarters for our soldiery, and sometimes as stables for the horses of our cavalry.
NUGATOR.
| Yon ruined church! how it dimly stands With its windows sunk and broken— Of the parent scoff'd at the children's hands, 'Tis a sad and a guilty token. Thou'rt a noble work and a lofty pile! With thy spacious, vaulted ceiling; These massy pillars, and long deep aisle, Touch the heart with a holy feeling. 'Twas a proud, proud day, when our fathers laid This stone of the mould'ring corner; Ah! they did not dream 'twould so soon be made A jest for the passing scorner. Cold, cold in death are the hearts which throbb'd To view thy rising glory— Are we their sons, who have basely robb'd What Time had left so hoary? Long years have pass'd, now silent fane! Since you rang with the solemn warning, And years may pass, but for thee, in vain The return of the Sabbath morning. Ye slumbering dead! what a change is here, Where once ye worshipp'd—kneeling— No sound is heard but my hollow steps, near Where the full tones once were pealing. Lo! the sacred desk where your pastor read, While angels smiled—impending— There the ceaseless worm hath in silence, fed With your dust, 'tis slowly blending. God's tables torn from the sacred wall! What hand was so rashly daring? And their whiteness stain'd by the fiend-like scrawl Of some lost spirit—despairing. Oh, sight of woe!—the altar gone! That spot of the Christian union, Where once ye sought the eternal throne, With the cup of the lov'd communion. E'en soldiers here, beneath this roof, Have held their midnight orgies, And without hath tramp'd the charger's hoof, Till the grave well nigh disgorges. Adieu! adieu! lone house of God! I shrink from thy profaning— The impious foot of war hath trod Where the Prince of Peace was reigning. |
For the Southern Literary Messenger.