SONNETS AND OTHER SHORT POEMS

ON

SCRIPTURAL AND RELIGIOUS SUBJECTS.

Z

VOL. II.

It was the intention of the Author to have published a series of sonnets and other short poems, exclusively on Scriptural subjects, as a Christmas present. The greater part of the pieces in the present collection were written with this design, (which, as explained in the Memoir, was never executed,) about ten or twelve years before his death. To these are now added several others, of an expressly religious character, but in which the personality of the author is less concealed. The beautiful sonnet which I have placed at the close of the series, was written in a friend's house in the year 1848; the last of his mortal life. Respice finem.

THE BIBLE.

How very good is God! that he hath taught
To every Christian that can hear and see
Both what he is and what he ought to be,
And how and why the saints of old have fought.
Whate'er of truth the antique sages sought,
And could but guess of his benign decree,
Is given to Faith affectionate and free,
Not wrung by force of self-confounding thought.
How many generations had gone by
'Twixt suffering Job and boding Malachi !

"Twixt Malachi and Paul-how mute a pause !
Is the book finish'd? May not God once more
Send forth a prophet to proclaim his laws
In holy words not framed by human lore?

THE LITURGY.

OFT as I hear the Apostolic voice
Speaking to God, I blame my heart so cold
That with those words, so good, so pure, and old,
Cannot repent nor hope, far less rejoice.
Yet am I glad, that not the vagrant choice,
Chance child of impulse, timid, or too bold,
The volume of the heart may dare unfold
With figured rhetoric, or unmeaning noise.
Praying for all in those appointed phrases,
Like a vast river, from a thousand fountains,
Swoll'n with the waters of the lakes and mountains,
The pastor bears along the prayers and praises
Of many souls in channel well defined,

Yet leaves no drop of prayer or praise behind.

THE JUST SHALL LIVE BY FAITH.

"THE just shall live by faith,”—and why? That faith
By which they live is all that makes them just,
The sole antagonist to the inborn lust

And malice that subjects them to the death
Which Adam earn'd, Cain, Abel suffer'd, Seth
Bequeath'd to all his progeny; who must
Suffer the primal doom of dust to dust,
And for uncertain respite hold their breath.
Think not the faith by which the just shall live
Is a dead creed, a map correct of heaven,
Far less a feeling fond and fugitive,

A thoughtless gift, withdrawn as soon as given.
It is an affirmation and an act

That bids eternal truth be present fact.