half-waking dreams,
   Like stormy lights on mountain streams,
Wavering and broken all, athwart the conscience glare.

   How shall we ’scape the o’erwhelming Past?
   Can spirits broken, joys o’ercast,
      And eyes that never more may smile:—
   Can these th’ avenging bolt delay,
   Or win us back one little day
The bitterness of death to soften and beguile?

   Father and Lover of our souls!
   Though darkly round Thine anger rolls,
      Thy sunshine smiles beneath the gloom,
   Thou seek’st to warn us, not confound,
   Thy showers would pierce the hardened ground
And win it to give out its brightness and perfume.

   Thou smil’st on us in wrath, and we,
   E’en in remorse, would smile on Thee,
      The tears that bathe our offered hearts,
   We would not have them stained and dim,
   But dropped from wings of seraphim,
All glowing with the light accepted love imparts.

   Time’s waters will not ebb, nor stay;
   Power cannot change them, but Love may;
      What cannot be, Love counts it done.
   Deep in the heart, her searching view
   Can read where Faith is fixed and true,
Through shades of setting life can see Heaven’s work begun.

   O Thou, who keep’st the Key of Love,
   Open Thy fount, eternal Dove,
      And overflow this heart of mine,
   Enlarging as it fills with Thee,
   Till in one blaze of charity
Care and remorse are lost, like motes in light divine;

   Till as each moment wafts us higher,
   By every gush of pure desire,
      And high-breathed hope of joys above,
   By every secret sigh we heave,
   Whole years of folly we outlive,
In His unerring sight, who measures Life by Love.

The Circumcision of Christ.

In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands.  Coloss. ii. 11.

   The year begins with Thee,
   And Thou beginn’st with woe,
To let the world of sinners see
   That blood for sin must flow.

   Thine infant cries, O Lord,
   Thy tears upon the breast,
Are not enough—the legal sword
   Must do its stern behest.

   Like sacrificial wine
   Poured on a victim’s head
Are those few precious drops of Thine,
   Now first to offering led.

   They are the pledge and seal
   Of Christ’s unswerving faith
Given to His Sire, our souls to heal,
   Although it cost His death.

   They to His Church of old,
   To each true Jewish heart,
In Gospel graces manifold
   Communion blest impart.

   Now of Thy love we deem
   As of an ocean vast,
Mounting in tides against the stream
   Of ages gone and past.

   Both theirs and ours Thou art,
   As we and they are Thine;
Kings, Prophets, Patriarchs—all have part
   Along the sacred line.

   By blood and water too
   God’s mark is set on Thee,
That in Thee every faithful view
   Both covenants might see.

   O bond of union, dear
   And strong as is Thy grace!
Saints, parted by a thousand year,
   May thus in heart embrace.

   Is there a mourner true,
   Who fallen on faithless days,
Sighs for the heart-consoling view
   Of those Heaven deigned to praise?

   In spirit may’st thou meet
   With faithful Abraham here,
Whom soon in Eden thou shalt greet
   A nursing Father dear.

   Would’st thou a poet be?
   And would thy dull heart fain
Borrow of Israel’s minstrelsy
   One high enraptured strain?

   Come here thy soul to tune,
   Here set thy feeble chant,
Here, if at all beneath the moon,
   Is holy David’s haunt.

   Art thou a child of tears,
   Cradled in care and woe?
And seems it hard, thy vernal years
   Few vernal joys can show?

   And fall the sounds of mirth
   Sad on thy lonely heart,
From all the hopes and charms of earth
   Untimely called to part?

   Look here, and hold thy peace:
   The Giver of all good
E’en from the womb takes no release
   From suffering, tears, and blood.

   If thou would’st reap in love,
   First sow in holy fear:
So life a winter’s morn may prove
   To a bright endless year.

Second Sunday after Christmas.

When the poor and needy seek water, and there is none, and their tongue faileth for thirst, I the Lord will hear them, I the God of Israel will not forsake them.  Isaiah, xli. 17.

And wilt thou hear the fevered heart
   To Thee in silence cry?
And as th’ inconstant wildfires dart
   Out of the restless eye,
Wilt thou forgive the wayward though
By kindly woes yet half untaught
A Saviours right, so dearly bought,
   That Hope should never die?

Thou wilt: for many a languid prayer
   Has reached Thee from the wild,
Since the lorn mother, wandering there,
   Cast down her fainting child,
Then stole apart to weep and die,
Nor knew an angel form was nigh,
To show soft waters gushing by,
   And dewy shadows mild.

Thou wilt—for Thou art Israel’s God,
   And Thine unwearied arm
Is ready yet with Moses’ rod,
   The hidden rill to charm
Out of the dry unfathomed deep
Of sands, that lie in lifeless sleep,
Save when the scorching whirlwinds heap
   Their waves in rude alarm.

These moments of wild wrath are Thine—
   Thine, too, the drearier hour
When o’er th’ horizon’s silent line
   Fond hopeless fancies cower,
And on the traveller’s listless way
Rises and sets th’ unchanging day,
No cloud in heaven to slake its ray,
   On earth no sheltering bower.

Thou wilt be there, and not forsake,
   To turn the bitter pool
Into a bright and breezy lake,
   This throbbing brow to cool:
Till loft awhile with Thee alone
The wilful heart be fain to own
That He, by whom our bright hours shone,
   Our darkness best may rule.

The scent of water far away
   Upon the breeze is flung;
The desert pelican to-day
   Securely leaves her young,
Reproving thankless man, who fears
To journey on a few lone years,
Where on the sand Thy step appears,
   Thy crown in sight is hung.

Thou, who did sit on Jacob’s well
   The weary hour of noon,
The languid pulses Thou canst tell,
   The nerveless spirit tune.
Thou from Whose cross in anguish burst
The cry that owned Thy dying thirst,
To Thee we turn, our Last and First,
   Our Sun and soothing Moon.

From darkness, here, and dreariness
   We ask not full repose,
Only be Thou at hand, to bless
   Our trial hour of woes.
Is not the pilgrim’s toil o’erpaid
By the clear rill and palmy shade?
And see we not, up Earth’s dark glade,
   The gate of Heaven unclose?

The Epiphany.

And lo, the star,