"Behold the fowls of the air!"-MATTHEW VI.
WHEN my breast labours with oppressive care,
And o'er my cheek descends the falling tear;
While all my warring passions are at strife,
Oh let me listen to the words of life!
Raptures deep-felt His doctrine did impart,
And thus He raised from earth the drooping heart.
Think not, when all your scanty stores afford,
Is spread at once upon the sparing board;
Think not, when worn the homely robe appears,
While, on the roof, the howling tempest bears;
What farther shall this feeble life sustain,
And what shall clothe the shivering limbs again.
Say, does not life its nourishment exceed?
And the fair body its investing weed?
Behold! and look away your low despair—
See the light tenants of the barren air:
To them nor stores nor granaries belong,
Nought but the woodland and the pleasing song:
Yet your kind heavenly Father bends His eye
On the least wing that flits along the sky.
To Him they sing when spring renews the plain,
To Him they cry in winter's pinching reign;
He hears the gay and the distressful call,
And with unsparing bounty fills them all.
Observe the rising lily's snowy grace,
Observe the various vegetable race;
They neither toil nor spin, but careless grow,
Yet see how warm they blush! how bright they glow!
What regal vestments can with them compare!
What king so shining! or what queen so fair!
If ceaseless thus the fowls of heaven He feeds,
If o'er the fields such lucid robes He spreads,
Will He not care for you, ye faithless, say?
Is He unwise? or are ye less than they?
JAMES THOMSON, 1700-1748.
HIGHER, higher will we climb
Up the mount of glory,
That our names may live through time
In our country's story;
Happy, when her welfare calls,
He who conquers, he who falls.
Deeper, deeper let us toil
In the mines of knowledge;
Nature's wealth and learning's spoil
Win from school and college;
Delve we there for richer gems
Than the stars of diadems.
Onward, onward will we press
Through the path of duty;
Virtue is true happiness,
Excellence true beauty;
Minds are of supernal birth,
Let us make a heaven of earth.
Close and closer then we knit
Hearts and hands together,
Where our fireside comforts sit
In the wildest weather:
Oh! they wander wide, who roam,
For the joys of life, from home.
Nearer, dearer bands of love
Draw our souls in union,
To our Father's house above
To the saints' communion;
Thither every hope ascend,
There may all our labours end.
JAMES MONTGOMERY, 1771-1854.
"REST!"-thou must not seek for rest
Until thy task be done;
Thou must not lay thy burthen down
Till setting of the sun.
Thou must not weary of the life,
Nor scorn thy lowly lot,
Nor cease to work, because such work
Thy neighbour prizeth not.
Thou must not let thy heart grow cold,
Nor hush each generous tone,
Nor veil the bright love in thine eye;
Thou must not live alone.
When others strive, thou too must help,
And answer when they call;
The power to love God gave to thee,
Thou must employ for all.
"Freedom and Rest" thou wouldest have:
Freedom is service meet;
And rest of soul is but a name
For toil amid life's heat.
Unmoved to gaze upon the strife,
Is not true liberty;
To others thou must minister,
Wouldst thou be truly free.
In the outward world 'tis vain to seek
The Eden thou wouldst win;
That ancient paradise is gone—
Thine Eden is within.
O DWELLERS in the valley land,
Who in deep twilight grope and cower,
Till the slow mountain's dial-hand
Shortens to noon's triumphal hour,
While ye sit idle, do ye think
The Lord's great work is idle too? That light dare not o'erleap the brink
Of morn, because 'tis dark with you?
Though yet your valleys sleep in night,
In God's ripe fields the day is cried, And reapers, with their sickles bright, Troop, singing down the mountain-side; Come up, and feel what health there is In the frank dawn's delighted eyes
As, bending with a pitying kiss,
The night-shed tears of earth she dries!
The Lord wants reapers; oh mount up Before night comes, and says, "Too late!"
Stay not for taking scrip or cup,
The Master hungers while ye wait; 'Tis from these heights alone your eyes
The advancing spears of Day can see, Which o'er the eastern hill-tops rise,
To break your long captivity.
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