To worship every monstrous shape
In fancied darkness free".

Vain thought, that shall not be at all!
Refuse we or obey,

Our ears have heard th' Almighty's call,
We cannot be as they.

We cannot hope the heathen's doom,
To whom God's Son is given,

Whose eyes have seen beyond the tomb,
Who have the key of Heaven.

Weak tremblers on the edge of woe,
Yet shrinking from true bliss,
Our rest must be " no rest below,”
And let our prayer be this:

"LORD, wave again thy chastening rod,
“Till every idol throne

"Crumble to dust, and Thou, O God,

b Ezekiel xx. 32. That which cometh into your mind shall not be at all, that ye say, We will be as the heathen, as the families of the countries, to serve wood and stone.

"Bring all our wandering fancies home,

"For Thou hast every spell,

"And 'mid the heathen where they roam, "Thou knowest, LORD, too well.

"Thou know'st our service sad and hard, "Thou know'st us fond and frail ;

"Win us to be belov'd and spar'd

"When all the world shall fail.

"So when at last our weary days

"Are well-nigh wasted here,

"And we can trace thy wondrous ways "In distance calm and clear,

"When in thy love and Israel's sin "We read our story true,

"We may not, all too late, begin

"To wish our hopes were new :

"Long lov'd, long tried, long spar'd as they, "Unlike in this alone,

"That, by thy grace, our hearts shall stay

"For evermore thine own."

NINETEENTH SUNDAY AFTER

TRINITY.

Then Nebuchadnezzar the King was astonied, and rose up in haste, and spake, and said unto his counsellors, Did not we cast three men bound into the midst of the fire? They answered and said unto the King, True, ( King. He answered and said, Lo, I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire, and they have no hurt; and the form of the fourth is like the Son of God. Daniel iii. 24, 25.

WHEN Persecution's torrent blaze

Wraps the unshrinking Martyr's head; When fade all earthly flowers and bays, When summer friends are gone and fled,

Is he alone in that dark hour,

Who owns the Lord of love and power?

Or waves there not around his brow

A wand no human arm may wield, Fraught with a spell no angels know,

His steps to guide, his soul to shield?

Thou, Saviour, art his charmed bower,
His magic ring, his rock, his tower.

And when the wicked ones behold

Thy favourites walking in thy light, Just as, in fancied triumph bold,

They deem'd them lost in deadly night, Amaz'd they cry, "What spell is this, "Which turns their sufferings all to bliss?

"How are they free whom we had bound,

66

Upright, whom in the gulf we cast?

"What wondrous helper have they found

"To screen them from the scorching blast? "Three were they-who hath made them four? "And sure a form-divine he wore,

"Even like the Son of God." So cried

The Tyrant, when in one fierce flame

The martyrs liv'd, the murderers died:
Yet knew he not what angel came
To make the rushing fire-flood seem

Like summer breeze by woodland stream.

Song of the Three Children, ver. 27. "As it had been a moist whistling wind."

He knew not, but there are who know:
The Matron, who alone hath stood,
When not a prop seem'd left below,

The first lorn hour of widowhood,
Yet cheer'd and cheering all, the while,
With sad but unaffected smile ;-

The Father, who his vigil keeps

By the sad couch whence hope hath flown, Watching the eye where reason sleeps,

Yet in his heart can mercy own,

Still sweetly yielding to the rod,

Still loving man, still thanking GoD ;

The Christian Pastor, bow'd to earth
With thankless toil, and vile esteem'd,

Still travailing in second birth

Of souls that will not be redeem'd,

Yet stedfast set to do his part,

And fearing most his own vain heart ;

These know on these look long and well, Cleansing thy sight by prayer and faith,