CHURCHING OF WOMEN. IS there, in bowers of endless spring, More exquisitely bland! Here let him speed: to-day this hallow'd air Is fragrant with a mother's first and fondest prayer. Only let Heaven her fire impart, No richer incense breathes on earth: "A spouse with all a daughter's heart," Fresh from the perilous birth, To the great Father lifts her pale glad eye, Like a reviving flower when storms are hush'd on high. O what a treasure of sweet thought Is here! what hope and joy and love All in one tender bosom brought, For the all-gracious Dove To brood o'er silently, and form for heaven Each passionate wish and dream to dear affection given. Her fluttering heart, too keenly blest, Sees Thee by faith on Mary's breast, Slight tremblings only of her veil declare Soft answers duly whisper'd to each soothing prayer. We are too weak, when Thou dost bless, To bear the joy-help, Virgin-born! By thine own mother's first caress, That wak'd thy natal morn! Help, by the unexpressive smile, that made A heaven on earth around the couch where Thou wast laid! a When the woman comes to this office, the rubric (as it was altered at the last review) directs that she be decently apparelled, i. e. as the custom and order was formerly, with a white covering or veil. Wheatley on the Common Prayer, c. xiii. sect. i. 3. COMMINATION. THE prayers are o'er: why slumberest thou so long, Thou voice of sacred song? Why swell'st thou not, like breeze from mountain cave, High o'er the echoing nave, The white-rob'd priest, as otherwhile, to guide, Up to the altar's northern side?— A mourner's tale of shame and sad decay Keeps back our glorious sacrifice to-day: The widow'd Spouse of Christ: with ashes crown'd, Her Christmas robes unbound, She lingers in the porch for grief and fear, O is it nought to you? that idly gay, Or coldly proud, ye turn away? But if her warning tears in vain be spent, Lo, to her alter'd eye the Law's stern fires are lent. Each awful curse, that on Mount Ebal rang, Peals with a direr clang Out of that silver trump, whose tones of old And who can blame the mother's fond affright", Her infant sees, and springs with hurried hand But surer than all words the silent spell When to her bird, too early scap'd the nest, Smiling he turns and spreads his little wing, So yearns our mother o'er each truant son, Wayward and spoil'd she knows ye: the keen blast, That brac'd her youth, is past: The rod of discipline, the robe of shame She bears them in your name : b Alluding to a beautiful anecdote in the Greek Anthology, tom. i. 180. ed. Jacobs. See Pleasures of Memory, p. 133. Only return and love. But ye perchance Are deeper plung'd in sorrow's trance: Your God forgives, but ye no comfort take Till ye have scourg'd the sins that in your conscience ache. O heavy laden soul! kneel down and hear Thy penance in calm fear: With thine own lips to sentence all thy sin; For ever with thy sullen heart, Nor on remorseful thoughts to brood, and stain The glory of the Cross, forgiven and cheer'd in vain. |