458 PEACE IN BELIEVING. Belief smooths down our thorny cares, And every chord to music wakes, Springs up with life and beauty's bloom. When night comes murky, drear, and damp, Belief will feed and screen our lamp, Upon our feet her sandals bind, Then lend a staff, and lead the way, When all the fountains of the deep Belief hath eyes so heavenly bright, Bent o'er our world in peace, to show When through a dry and thirsty land 459 PEACE IN BELIEVING. Belief brings distant prospect near, With fruit, and bowers, and fountains clear, Where, when he strikes his tent, he'll be An heir of immortality." While Unbelief would ever bring A chain about our spirit's wing, Hannah F. Gould. . Blessed are the Dead. And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth.-REV. xiv. 13. Он, how blessed are ye whose toils are ended! From the cares which keep us still in prison. We are still as in a dungeon living, Still oppressed with sorrow and misgiving ; Are but toils, and troubles, and heart breakings. Christ has wiped away your tears for ever; Songs which yet no mortal ear have haunted. Ah! who would not, then, depart with gladness, Who here would languish Longer in bewailing and in anguish? BLESSED ARE THE DEAD. 461 Come, oh Christ, and loose the chains that bind us! Lead us forth, and cast this world behind us! With thee, the Anointed, Finds the soul its joy and rest appointed. Henry W. Longfellow. Of Many Martyrs. SING we the peerless deeds of martyred saints, Them in their day the insatiate world abhorred, Because they did forsake it, Lord, for Thee; Finding it all a barren waste, devoid Of fruit, or flower, or tree. They trod beneath them every threat of man, And came victorious all torments through; The iron hooks which piecemeal tore their flesh, Could not their souls subdue. Scourged, crucified, like sheep to slaughter led, In patient virtue great. |