"Rise," says the Prince of mercy, "rise!" With joy and pity in his eyes:

"Rise, and behold my wounded veins,

"Here flows the blood to wash thy stains.

He said: and lo, the Father smil'd;
The joyful cherubs clapp'd their wings,
And sounded grace on all their strings.

YOUNG MEN AND MAIDENS, OLD MEN AND BABES, PRAISE YE THE LORD.

PSALM CXLVIII. 12.

SONS of Adam, bold and young,

In the wild mazes of whose veins

A flood of fiery vigour reigns,

And wields your active limbs, with hardy sinews strung;

Fall prostrate at the eternal throne,

Whence your precarious powers depend; Nor swell as if your lives were all your own, But choose your Maker for your friend ;

His favour is your life, his arm is your support, His hand can stretch your days, or cut your minutes

short.

Virgins, who roll your artful eyes,
And shoot delicious danger thence;
Swift the lovely lightning flies,
And melts our reason down to sense;

Boast not of those withering charms That must yield their youthful grace To age and wrinkles, earth and worms; But love the Author of your smiling face; That heavenly Bridegroom claims your blooming hours:

O make it your perpetual care

To please that Everlasting Fair;

His beauties are the sun, and but the shade is

Infants whose different destinies

yours.

Are wove with threads of different size;
But from the same spring-tide of tears,
Commence your hopes, and joys, and fears,
(A tedious train !) and date your following years:
Break your first silence in his praise

Who wrought your wondrous frame :
With sounds of tenderest accent raise
Your honours to his name;
And consecrate your early days
To know the Power Supreme.

Ye heads of venerable age,

Just marching off the mortal stage,
Fathers, whose vital threads are spun

As long as e'er the glass of life would run,

Adore the hand that led your way

Through flowery fields, a fair long summer's day; Gasp out your soul in praises to the sovereign power

That set your west so distant from your dawning hour.

FLYING FOWL, AND CREEPING THINGS PRAISE YE THE LORD.

PSALM CXLVIII. 10.

SWEET flocks, whose soft enamell'd wing
Swift and gently cleaves the sky;
Whose charming notes address the spring
With an artless harmony.

Lovely minstrels of the field,

Who in leafy shadows sit,

And your wondrous structures build,

Awake your tuneful voices with the dawning light: To Nature's God your first devotions pay,

Ere you salute the rising day,

"Tis he calls up the sun, and gives him every ray.

Serpents, who o'er the meadows slide,

And wear upon your shining back

Numerous ranks of gaudy pride,

Which thousand mingling colours make;
Let the fierce glances of your eyes
Rebate their baleful fire:

In harmless play twist and unfold
The volumes of your scaly gold:
That rich embroidery of your gay attire,
Proclaims your Maker kind and wise.

Insects and mites, of mean degree,

That swarm in myriads o'er the land,
Moulded by Wisdom's artful hand,

And curl'd and painted with a various dye;
In your innumerable forms

Praise him that wears the ethereal crown,
And bends his lofty counsels down
To despicable worms.

THE COMPARISON AND COMPLAINT.

INFINITE Power, eternal Lord,

How sovereign is thy hand!

All nature rose to obey thy word,
And moves at thy command.

With steady course thy shining sun
Keeps his appointed way;
And all the hours obedient run
The circle of the day.

But ah! how wide my spirit flies,
And wanders from her God!
My soul forgets the heavenly prize,
And treads the downward road.

The raging fire, and stormy sea,
Perform thine awful will,
And every beast and every tree,
Thy great designs fulfil:

While my wild passions rage within,
Nor thy commands obey;
And flesh and sense, enslav'd to sin,
Draw my best thoughts away.

Shall creatures of a meaner frame
Pay all thy dues to thee;
Creatures, that never knew thy name,

That never lov'd like me?

Great God, create my soul anew,
Conform my heart to thine,
Melt down my will and let it flow,
And take the mould divine.