That is the heart for watchman true

Waiting to see what God will do,

As o'er the Church the gathering twilight falls:

No more he strains his wistful eye,

If chance the golden hours be nigh,

By youthful Hope seen beaming round her walls.

Forc'd from his shadowy paradise,

His thoughts to Heaven the steadier rise: There seek his answer when the world reproves : Contented in his darkling round,

If only he be faithful found,

When from the east th' eternal morning moves.

Note: The expression, "calm decay," is borrowed from a friend: by whose kind permission the following stanzas are here inserted.

TO THE RED-BREAST.

UNHEARD in Summer's flaring ray,

Pour forth thy notes, sweet singer,

Wooing the stillness of the autumnn day :

Bid it a moment linger,

Nor fly

Too soon from winter's scowling eye.

The blackbird's song at even tide,

And hers, who gay ascends,
Filling the heavens far and wide,
Are sweet. But none so blends,

As thine,

With calm decay, and peace divine.

TWENTY-SECOND SUNDAY AFTER

TRINITY.

Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? St. Matthew xviii. 21.

WHAT liberty so glad and gay,

As where the mountain boy,

Reckless of regions far away,
A prisoner lives in joy?

The dreary sounds of crowded earth,
The cries of camp or town,

Never untun'd his lonely mirth,

Nor drew his visions down.

The snow-clad peaks of rosy light

That meet his morning view,

The thwarting cliffs that bound his sight,

They bound his fancy too.

Two ways alone his roving eye

For aye may onward go,

Or in the azure deep on high,

Or darksome mere below.

O blest restraint! more blessed range!
Too soon the happy child

His nook of homely thought will change
For life's seducing wild:

Too soon his alter'd day dreams show
This earth a boundless space,
With sun-bright pleasures to and fro
Sporting in joyous race:

While of his narrowing heart each year,
Heaven less and less will fill,
Less keenly, through his grosser ear,
The tones of mercy thrill.

It must be so: else wherefore falls

The Saviour's voice unheard,

While from His pardoning Cross He calls, "O spare as I have spar'd ?"

By our own niggard rule we try

The hope to suppliants given;

We mete out love, as if our eye
Saw to the end of heaven.

Yes, ransom'd sinner! would'st thou know

How often to forgive,

How dearly to embrace thy foe,

Look where thou hop'st to live:

When thou hast told those isles of light,
And fancied all beyond,
Whatever owns, in depth or height,
Creation's wondrous bond;

Then in their solemn pageant learn
Sweet mercy's praise to see:
Their Lord resign'd them all, to earn
The bliss of pardoning thee.

TWENTY-THIRD SUNDAY AFTER

TRINITY.

Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto His glorious body, according to the working whereby He is able even to subdue all things unto Himself. Philippians iii. 21.

RED o'er the forest peers the setting sun,

The line of yellow light dies fast away

That crown'd the eastern copse: and chill and dun
Falls on the moor the brief November day.

Now the tir'd hunter winds a parting note,

And Echo bids good-night from every glade; Yet wait awhile, and see the calm leaves float Each to his rest beneath their parent shade.

How like decaying life they seem to glide!

And yet no second spring have they in store, But where they fall forgotten to abide,

Is all their portion, and they ask no more.