Religious Thought in Old English Verse

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Sampson Low, 1892 - 456 pages

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Page 215 - All may of Thee partake ; Nothing can be so mean Which with this tincture, ' for Thy sake,' Will not grow bright and clean. A servant with this clause Makes drudgery divine ; Who sweeps a room, as for Thy laws, Makes that, and the action, fine.
Page 269 - cloisters pale, And love the high embowe'd roof, With antic pillars massy proof, And storied windows richly dight Casting a dim religious light; There let the pealing organ blow To the full-voiced quire below In service high, and anthems clear, As may with sweetness, through mine ear. Dissolve me into ecstasies, And bring all heaven before mine eyes.
Page 275 - Before their eyes in sudden view appear The secrets of the hoary deep, a dark Illimitable ocean, without bound, Without dimension, where length, breadth, and height, And time, and place are lost; where eldest Night And Chaos, ancestors of nature, hold Eternal anarchy, amidst the noise Of endless wars, and by confusion stand. 2
Page 363 - Will rising wonders sing : I cannot go Sustaining all yon orbs, and all their suns ; From seeming evil still educing good, And better thence again, and better still In infinite progression. But I lose Myself in Him—in Light ineffable. Come then, expressive Silence, muse His praise. 1 The works of Edward Young (1681-1765) are about as
Page 270 - Weep no more, woful Shepherds, weep no more, For Lycidas your sorrow is not dead, Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor ; So sinks the day-star in the ocean bed, And yet anon repairs his drooping head, And tricks his beams, and with new spangled ore Flames in the forehead of the morning sky : So Lycidas sank low, but mounted high.
Page 279 - Where the remote Bermudas ride In th' ocean's bosom unespied, From a small boat that row'd along The list'ning winds received this song : ' What should we do but sing His praise That led us through the watery maze Unto an isle so long unknown, And yet far kinder than our own.
Page 206 - make men better be ; Or standing long, an oak, three hundred year, To fall a log at last, dry, bald, and sere : A lily of a day Is fairer far in May, Although it fall and die that night; It was the plant and flower of light. In small proportions we just beauties see, And in short measures life may perfect be.
Page 271 - In the blest kingdoms meek of Joy and Love. There entertain him all the saints above, In solemn troops and sweet societies, That sing, and singing in their glory move, And wipe the tears for ever from his eyes. In
Page 295 - After the sun's remove. I see them walking in an air of glory, Whose light doth trample on my days ; My days which are at best but dull and hoary, Mere glimmerings and decays. High as the heavens above ! These are your walks, and you have showed them me,
Page 268 - prompting which grows daily upon me, that by labour and intent study, which I take to be my portion in this life, joined with the strong propensity of nature, I might perhaps leave something so written to after times, as they would not willingly let it die.

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