When for the breathing Earth, and sparkling Sea,
Is but a fiery deluge without shore,
Heaving along the abyss profound and dark,
A fiery deluge, and without an Ark.
Lord of all power, when thou art there alone
On thy eternal fiery-wheeled throne,
That in its high meridian noon
Needs not the perished sun nor moon:
When thou art there in thy presiding state,
Wide-sceptred Monarch o'er the realm of doom:
When from the sea depths, from earth's darkest womb,
The dead of all the ages round thee wait;
And when the tribes of wickedness are strewn,
Like forest leaves in the autumn of thine ire,
Faithful and True! thou still wilt save thine own!
The Saints shall dwell within the unharming fire;
Each white robe spotless, blooming every palm,
Each safe as we, by thy still fountain's side,
So shall the Church, thy bright and mystic Bride,
Sit on the stormy gulf a halcyon bird of calm.
Yes, mid yon angry and destroying signs,
O'er us the rainbow of thy mercy shines,
We hail, we bless the covenant of its beam
Almighty to revenge, Almightiest to redeem!
ARK! from the deep of heaven, a trumpet sound
Thunders the dizzy universe around,
From north to south, from east to west it rolls,
A blast that summons all created souls:
The dead awaken from their dismal sleep:
The sea has heard it; coiling up with dread,
Myriads of mortals flash from out their bed!
The graves fly open, and, with awful strife,
The dust of ages startles into life!
All who have breathed, or moved, or seen, or felt;
All they around whose cradles kingdoms knelt;
Tyrants and warriors, who were throned in blood;
The great and mean, the glorious and the good,
Are raised from every isle, and land, and tomb,
To hear the changeless and eternal doom.
But while the universe is wrapt in fire
Ere yet the splendid ruin shall expire,
Beneath a canopy of flame behold,
With starry banners at his feet unrolled,
Earth's Judge: around seraphic minstrels throng,
Breathing o'er golden harps celestial song;
While melodies aërial and sublime
Weave a wild death-dirge o'er departing Time.
Imagination! furl thy wings of fire,
And on eternity's dread brink expire;
Vain would thy red and raging eye behold
Visions of immortality unrolled!
The last, the fiery chaos hath begun;
Quenched is the moon, and blackened is the sun:
The stars have bounded through the airy roar;
Crushed lie the rocks, and mountains are no more;
The deep unbosomed, with tremendous gloom
Yawns on the ruin, like creation's tomb!
And lo! the living harvest of the earth,
Reaped from the grave, to share a second birth;
Millions of eyes, with one deep dreadful stare,
Gaze upward through the burning realms of air;
While shapes, and shrouds, and ghastly features gleam,
Like lurid snow-flakes in the moonlight beam,
Upon the flaming earth one farewell glance!
The billows of eternity advance:
No motion, blast, or breeze, or walking sound!
In fiery slumber glares the world around.
'Tis o'er; from yonder cloven vault of heaven,
Throned on a car of living thunder driven,
Arrayed in glory, see, the Eternal come!
And, while the universe is still and dumb,
And hell o'ershadowed with terrific gloom,
To immortal myriads deal the judgment doom!
Winged on the wind, and warbling hymns of love,
Behold! the blessed soar to realms above.
The cursed, with hell uncovered to their eye,
Shriek-shriek, and vanish in a whirlwind cry!
Creation shudders with sublime dismay,
And in a blazing tempest whirls away!
THE DESTRUCTION OF THE WORLD, AND CREATION OF A NEW ONE.
OR yet had vengeance done. The guilty Earth,
Inanimate, debased, and stained by sin,
Seat of rebellion, of corruption, long,
And tainted with mortality throughout,-
God sentenced next; and sent the final fires
Of ruin forth, to burn and destroy.
The saints its burning saw, and thou mayst see.
Look yonder round the lofty golden walls
And galleries of New Jerusalem,
Among the imagery of wonders past;
Look near the southern gate; look and behold,
On spacious canvas, touched with living hues,-
The conflagration of the ancient Earth,
The handiwork of high archangel, drawn
From memory of what he saw, that day.
See! how the mountains, how the valleys burn;
The Andes burn, the Alps, the Apennines,
Taurus and Atlas; all the islands burn;
The ocean burns, and rolls her waves of flame.
See how the lightnings, barbed, red with wrath,
Sent from the quiver of Omnipotence,
Cross and recross the fiery gloom, and burn
Into the centre!-burn without, within.
And help the native fires, which God awoke,
And kindled with the fury of his wrath.
As inly troubled, now she seems to shake;
The flames, dividing, now a moment; fall;
And now in one conglomerated mass,
Rising, they glow on high, prodigious blaze!
Then fall and sink again, as if within,
The fuel, burnt to ashes, was consumed.
So burned the Earth upon that dreadful day,
Yet not to full annihilation burned.
The essential particles of dust remained,
Purged by the final, sanctifying fires,
From all corruption; from all stain of sin,
Done there by man or devil, purified.
The essential particles remained, of which
God built the world again, renewed, improved,
With fertile vale and wood of fertile bough;
And streams of milk and honey, flowing song;
And mountains cinctured with perpetual green;
In climé and season fruitful, as at first,
When Adam woke, unfallen, in Paradise.
And God, from out the fount of native light,
A handful took of beams, and clad the sun
Again in glory; and sent forth the moon
To borrow thence her wonted rays, and lead
Her stars, the virgin daughters of the sky.
And God revived the winds, revived the tides;
And touching her, from his almighty hand,
With force centrifugal, she onward ran,
Coursing her wonted path, to stop no more.
HE golden palace of my God
Towering above the clouds I see;
Beyond the cherub's bright abode,
Higher than angel's thoughts can be!
How can I in those courts appear
Without a wedding-garment on?
Conduct me, thou Life-giver, there;
Conduct me to thy glorious throne!
And clothe me with thy robes of light,
And lead me through sin's darksome night.
(HIS world is all a fleeting show,
For man's illusion given;
The smiles of joy, the tears of woe,
Deceitful shine, deceitful flow;
There's nothing true but heaven.
And false the light on glory's plume,
As fading hues of even:
And Love, and Hope, and Beauty's bloom,
Are blossoms gathered from the tomb;
There's nothing bright but heaven.
Poor wanderers of a stormy day,
From wave to wave we're driven;
And Fancy's flash, and Reason's ray,
Serve but to light the troubled way:
There's nothing calm but heaven.
"There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God."-HEP. iv 9
'HERE is an hour of peaceful rest,
To mourning wanderers given;
There is a joy for souls distressed,
A balm for every wounded breast-
'Tis found above-in heaven!
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