Let one sole wish pervade the breast,
Which erst ten thousand fired;
To rest within the Source of rest,
By heav'nly love inspired;
Then shall he find, where blessings meet,
No more seduced to roam
In Jesu's house, at Jesu's feet,
His everlasting home!
GOD IS LOVE.-1 JOHN IV. 16.
I KNOW Him as a God of love! For He hath given to me my breath, For He hath shielded me from death, For He hath died to make me His, Hath sealed to me eternal bliss ; A sonship to His creature given, The crown and heritage of heav'n. Hence in my breast, and in my eye, Awakes a fire that cannot die; I gaze up to the heav'ns above, And own Him as a God of love!
I know Him as a God of love! The sun, that shines so bright on high, And wakes the life his beams supply,
The placid moon and stars, that keep
Their silent watch, while myriads sleep,
Or, if a wanderer meet their sight,
Lend their kind lustre thro' the night;
The sea, that spreads her restless form,
Or smoothed, or dashed abroad by storm;
Earth with her breast of bounty strewn,
For man an offered board and throne;
The flowers, that gem the spreading vale,
And fling their odours on the gale;
The little birds upon the wing,
That heav'nward soar, and soaring sing;
The lowing kine, soft pacing by,
With tinkling bell, and speaking eye;
The lizard green, and spotted snake,
Rustling their terrors in the brake;
The teeming hosts around, above,
In harmony their voices blending,
The concave wide of heav'n rending,
The strain re-echo-God is love!
I know Him as a God of love! E'en here, where fire and storm contend, And in one mass their forces blend; Where iron is the blackened soil, And steaming vapours eddying boil;
While, from the scoop'd abyss beneath,
The blasting of his anger's breath
Roars upward, as a fiend were there,
Chained to the wheel of his despair;
Where cones of living fire around,
Circle the baked and burning ground,
While crystal wreathes their light diffuse
In brilliance of ten thousand hues-
Yet even here, on Sinai's mount,
Beside the liquid lava's fount,
'Mid plains of burning barrenness,
Without a sun the eye to cheer,
Or star to beam, or breeze to bless,
'Mid sounds of woe, and sights of fear—
Where'er I turn, where'er I rove,
I know Him as a God of love!
True! I am here a helpless worm,
A leaf, the plaything of the storm;
Where might my scorched footsteps haste,
If the bold flames within that roar,
Like waters on a broken shore,
Should, thundering, burst the blackened waste,
In reckless turbulence of power,
And down a fiery tempest shower;
While rolls, with hardening trail, amain,
An iron deluge to the plain!
Could thy frail arm, poor worm of clay!
Withstand it on its headlong way,
Stem the red tide, and fearless raise
Thy head unscathed amid the blaze?
Alas! a child of dust, my arm
Is weaker than the weakest bough,
Nor may I boast a heathen charm,
To still or chain the fiends below!
Yet ONE there is who works His will,
And He would be my Refuge still;
A shelter for His own provide,
A Zoar on the mountain's side!
I see Him on His throne above,
And feel secure-for God is love!
What though it meet that Sovereign will,
To loose the fire upon His child,
In all its burst of fury wild,
And bid it smite, and smite to kill-
What though he check his aiding hand,
As sinks the crust whereon I stand,
And on my head the tempest fall,
Despite my prayer-despite my call,-
Though the red lava course the side
And whelm me in its molten tide,
Or thickening vapours, fraught with death,
My head embathe and suck my breath;
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