In heaven again shall waken, The harps of heaven steal o'er me, So sang the parting spirit, While round flow'd many a tear, THE SILENT EXPRESSION OF NATURE. "There is no speech nor language-their voice is not heard." PSALM Xix. 3. WHEN, thoughtful, to the vault of heaven I lift my wondering eyes, To night resign the skies,— A secret rapture fills my breast, Unheard, the dews around me fall, With sounds unheard by mortal ears, Night reigns, in silence, o'er the pole, And pours his golden streams; The hand that moves, and regulates, Their amaranthine bowers; On silent wing their station take, And watch the allotted hours. Sick of the vanity of man, His noise, and pomp, and show,— I'll wait the upper sphere; LIFE AND DEATH. O FEAR not thou to die! But rather fear to live; for life But life!—the spirit shrinks to see How full, ere Heaven recalls the breath, The cup of wo may be. O fear not thou to die! No more to suffer or to sin; No snares without, thy faith to try, No traitor heart within: But fear, O! rather fear, The gay, the light, the changeful scene, The flattering smiles that greet thee here, From heaven thy heart to wean. Fear, lest, in evil hour,— Thy pure and holy hope o'ercome The covering throws of fell despair; And deems itself the unforgiven, O fear not thou to die! To die, and be that blessed one, May feel that never more The tear of grief or shame shall come, THE SONG OF SAUL BEFORE HIS LAST BATTLE. WARRIORS and Chiefs! should the shaft or the sword Heed not the corse, though a king's in your path, Thou who art bearing my buckler and bow, Farewell to others! but never we part, THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB. THE Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold, And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold; And the sheen of their spears was like stars in the sea When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee. Like the leaves of the forest when summer is green, For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast, still! And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide, And there lay the rider distorted and pale, With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his mail; And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail, |