Specimens of English poetry. For the use of Charterhouse school

I ask not proud Philosophy

To teach me what thou art.

Still seem, as to my childhood's sight,

A midway station given

For happy spirits to alight

Betwixt the earth and heaven.

Can all that optics teach, unfold

And yet, fair bow, no fabling dreams,
But words of the Most High,

Have told why first thy robe of beams
Was woven in the sky.

When o'er the green undeluged earth

Heaven's covenant thou didst shine,
How came the world's grey fathers forth
To watch thy sacred sign!

And when its yellow lustre smiled
O'er mountains yet untrod,

Each mother held aloft her child
To bless the bow of God.

Methinks thy jubilee to keep,
The first-made anthem rang

On earth deliver'd from the deep,
And the first poet sang.

Nor ever shall the Muse's eye
Unraptured greet thy beam:
Theme of primeval prophecy,

Be still the prophet's theme!

The earth to thee her incense yields,
The lark thy welcome sings,
When glittering in the freshen'd fields

The snowy mushroom springs.

How glorious is thy girdle, cast

O'er mountain, tower, and town, Or mirror'd in the ocean vast,

A thousand fathoms down! As fresh in yon horizon dark,

As young thy beauties seem
As when the eagle from the ark
First sported in thy beam:

For, faithful to its sacred page,
Heaven still rebuilds thy span,
Nor lets the type grow pale with age
That first spoke peace to man.

ON PRAYER.

PRAYER is the soul's sincere desire,

Utter'd or unexprest;

The motion of a hidden fire

That trembles in the breast.

Prayer is the burden of a sigh,
The falling of a tear;

The upward glancing of an eye,
When none but God is near.

CAMPBELL.

Prayer is the simplest form of speech

That infant lips can try;

Prayer the sublimest strains that reach
The Majesty on high.

Prayer is the Christian's vital breath,

The Christian's native air;

His watchword at the gates of death :
He enters heaven by prayer.

Prayer is the contrite sinner's voice,
Returning from his ways;
While angels in their songs rejoice,
And say, "Behold he prays!"

In prayer on earth the saints are one;
They are one in word and mind,
When with the Father and his Son

Sweet fellowship they find.

No prayer is made on earth alone:
The Holy Spirit pleads;

And Jesus, on the eternal throne,

For sinners intercedes.

O, Thou, by whom we come to God;
The Life, the Truth, the Way;

The path of prayer thyself hast trod;
Lord, teach us how to pray!

J. MONTGOMERY.

THE EVENING CLOUD.

A CLOUD lay cradled near the setting sun;
A gleam of crimson tinged its braided snow;
Long had I watch'd the glory moving on,
O'er the still radiance of the lake below

Tranquil its spirit seem'd, and floated slow;
Ev'n in its very motion there was rest;

While every breath of eve that chanced to blow, Wafted the traveller to the beauteous west. Emblem, methought, of the departed soul!

To whose white robe the gleam of bliss is given; And by the breath of mercy made to roll Right onward to the golden gates of heaven; Where, to the eye of Faith, it peaceful lies, And tells to man his glorious destinies.

WILSON.

HYMN.

WHEN Spring unlocks the flowers,
To paint the laughing soil;
When Summer's balmy showers
Refresh the mower's toil;
When Winter binds in frosty chains
The fallow and the flood;
In God the earth rejoiceth still,
And owns his Maker good.

The birds that wake the morning,

And those that love the shade;