Babes and the gladfome throng
Who to Thy Church belong,

Unite to fwell the fong

To CHRIST OUR KING.*

CLEMENS ALEX.

III.

GOD.

HE great, auguft, Immortal King,
Th' Eternal Potentate, I fing!

Let earth be filent while I raise

The voice of prayer, the note of

praise.

Hushed be the moaning of the breeze;

The murmur of the waving trees:
Be ftilled the foft, melodious note
Of each aerial warbler's throat:
Let tranquil æther, tranquil air,
Attend the hymn, attend the prayer;
And deep in ocean's charmed breast,
Let all the gathered waters reft!

SYNESIUS.+

* The above hymn, though found in the works of Clemens Alexandrinus, is believed to have been of earlier date than his time, and may have been the hymn which Pliny fpeaks of in his letter to the Emperor Trajan, A.D. 104, as being fung "Chrifto, quafi Deo, fecum invicem."

+ A Platonist, converted to Chriftianity in the 3rd century.

IV.

LIFE.

F veiled our eyes, their piercing fight
Can yet difcern fome glimmering
light;

And Pilgrims wandering here below,
With fome celeftial impulse glow,

When fleeing this domain of life,
They tread the pure and hallowed way
Up to their Father's realm of day.
How bleft the foul, which having fled
The toils that o'er its path were spread,
At one light bound from matter springs,
And feeks its God on Rapture's wings!
How bleft is he, who, after all
The ills and changes that befall,
Hath trod the intellectual way,
And viewed where beams of glory play,
The fount of light, the throne of day!
Let every wish and thought afpire,
On wings of love, on wings of fire;
And O may refolution nerve

Thy breast, untaught to yield or fwerve.
Then will thy Heavenly Parent stand,
And proffer, with paternal hand,
To lead thee to a kindred band.

An orb of fire will blaze before Thee,
Reveal the fair ætherial plain,

Where beauty first began her reign,
And light Thee to the realm of glory.

Awake, my foul, and quaff thy fill,
Drink freely of that fountain-rill,
Whose wave impregned with bleffing flows,
The Lethe of terreftrial woes-
Bend lowly at thy Father's fhrine,
To earth the cares of earth refign,
And rife to life and joy divine;

To dwell in union with thy God; perchance
A God thyfelf to move in Heaven's eternal
dance!

SYNESIUS.

V.

CHRIST.

JEDEEMER of the Nations, come! Ransom of earth, here make Thy home!

R

Bright Sun, O dart Thy flame to earth,

For fo fhall God in Chrift have birth!

Thou comeft from Thy kingly Throne,
O Son of God, the Virgin's Son!
Thou Hero of a twofold race,

Doft walk in might earth's darkest place.

Thou stoopest once to fuffer here,
And rifest o'er the ftarry sphere;

Hell's gates at Thy descent were riven,
Thy afcent is to highest Heaven.

One with the Father! Prince of might!
O'er Nature's realm affert Thy right.
Our fickly bodies pine to know

Thy heavenly ftrength, Thy living glow.

How bright Thy lowly manger beams!
Down earth's dark vale its glory ftreams,
The fplendour of thy natal night
Shines through all Time in deathless light.

ST. AMBROSE, 4th Cent.

VI.

SLEEP.

AKER of all, the Lord,

And Ruler of the height,

Who, robing day in light, haft poured
Soft flumbers o'er the night,

That to our limbs the power

Of toil may be renewed,

And hearts be raised that fink and cower,

And forrows be fubdued.

ST. AMBROSE.