The Safety of the Enfant Dead. They only can be said to possess a child for ever, who have lost one in infancy. OUR beauteous child we laid amidst the silence of the dead; We heaped the earth, and spread the turf above the cherub-head; We turned again to sunny life, to other ties as dear, And the world has thought us comforted, when we have dried the tear. And time has rolled its onward tide, and in its ample range Has poured along the happiest paths vicissitude and change; The flexile forms of infancy their earliest leaves have shed, And the tall, stately forest trees are waving in their stead. We guide not now our children's steps, as we were wont before, For they have sprung to manhood, they lean on us no more; We gaze upon the lofty brow, and time and thought have cast A shade, through which we seek in vain the memory of the past. And do we mourn the other change, which mocks our memory here? Ah no! 't is but the answered wish of many a secret prayer: Centre of all our fondest hopes, we live but in their fame, But our love, as to a little child, how can it be the same? We still have one-and only one-secure in sacred trust; It is the lone and lovely one that's sleeping in the dust. We fold it in our arms again, we see it by our side In the helplessness of innocence, which sin has never tried. All earthly trust, all mortal years, however light they fly, But darken on the glowing cheek, and dim the eagle eye; But there, our bright, unwithering flower-our spirit's hoarded store We keep through every chance and change, the same for evermore. The Spirit's Song of Consolation.* DEAR parents, grieve no more for me; Than even with you before. And gained a world where I shall rest Our Father bade me come to him, I heard the voice you could not hear, I saw, too, what you could not see— * Supposed to be addressed by the departed spirit of a boy to his parents, who had lost two other children before him. My spirit to their blessed abode, To live for ever there. Then think not of the mournful time In heaven shall meet again. F. W. P. GREENWOOD. Epitaph on a Child. SLEEP on, my babe! thy little bed Thou may'st no more return to me; And sound our sleep shall be, my child, Till He, the pure, the undefiled, Who once, like thee, an infant smiled, Then if to Him, with faith sincere, Though rent apart with many a tear, Shall be renewed in heaven. R. HUIE. |