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Apostles, Prophets, Pastors, all

Shall feel the shower of Mercy fall,
And starting at th' Almighty's call,
Give what He gave,

Till their high deeds the world appall,
And sinners save.

WHITSUNDAY.

And suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting and there appeared unto them cloven tongues, like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them: and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost. Acts ii. 2, 3.

WHEN God of old came down from Heaven,
In power and wrath he came;

Before his feet the clouds were riven,

Half darkness and half flame :

Around the trembling mountain's base
The prostrate people lay,

Convinc'd of sin, but not of grace;

It was a dreadful day.

But when He came the second time,
He came in power and love,
Softer than gale at morning prime
Hover'd his holy Dove.

The fires that rush'd on Sinai down
In sudden torrents dread,
Now gently light, a glorious crown,
On every sainted head.

Like arrows went those lightnings forth
Wing'd with the sinner's doom,
But these, like tongues, o'er all the earth
Proclaiming life to come:

And as on Israel's awe-struck ear

The voice exceeding loud,

The trump, that angels quake to hear, Thrill'd from the deep, dark cloud,

So, when the Spirit of our God

Came down his flock to find,

A voice from heaven was heard abroad,

A rushing, mighty wind.

Nor doth the outward ear alone

At that high warning start;

Conscience gives back th' appalling tone; "Tis echoed in the heart.

It fills the Church of God; it fills
The sinful world around;
Only in stubborn hearts and wills
No place for it is found.

To other strains our souls are set :
A giddy whirl of sin

Fills ear and brain, and will not let

Heaven's harmonies come in.

Come, Lord, come, Wisdom, Love, and Power,

Open our ears to hear;

Let us not miss th' accepted hour;

Save, Lord, by Love or Fear.

MONDAY IN WHITSUN-WEEK.

So the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth and they left off to build the city. Genesis xi. 8.

SINCE all that is not heav'n must fade,

Light be the hand of Ruin laid

Upon the home I love:

With lulling spell let soft Decay
Steal on, and spare the giant sway,
The crash of tower and grove.

Far opening down some woodland deep
In their own quiet glade should sleep
The relics dear to thought,

And wild-flower wreaths from side to side
Their waving tracery hang, to hide

What ruthless Time has wrought.

Such are the visions green and sweet
That o'er the wistful fancy fleet

In Asia's sea-like plain,

Where slowly, round his isles of sand,
Euphrates through the lonely land

Winds toward the pearly main.

Slumber is there, but not of rest;
There her forlorn and weary nest
The famish'd hawk has found,
The wild dog howls at fall of night,
The serpent's rustling coils affright
The traveller on his round.

What shapeless form, half lost on high',
Half seen against the evening sky,

Seems like a ghost to glide,

And watch, from Babel's crumbling heap,
Where in her shadow, fast asleep,

Is fall'n imperial Pride?

f See Sir R. K. Porter's Travels, ii. 387. "In my second visit to Birs Nimrood, my party suddenly halted, having descried several dark objects moving along the summit of its hill, which they construed into dismounted Arabs on the look out: I took out my glass to examine, and soon distinguished that the causes of our alarm were two or three majestic lions, taking the air upon the heights of the pyramid."

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