II.

UPON Thy face, O God, Thy world
Looks ever up in love and awe;
Thy stars, in circles onward hurled,
Still weave the sacred chain of law.

In alternating antiphons

Stream sings to stream and sea to sea; And moons that set and sinking suns Obeisance make, O God, to Thee.

The swallow, winter's rage o'erblown, Again, on warm May breezes borne, Revisiteth her haunts well-known; The lark is faithful to the morn.

The whirlwind, missioned with its wings To drown the fleet and fell the tower, Obeys thee as the bird that sings

Her love-chant in a fleeting shower.

Amid an ordered universe

Man's spirit only dares rebel:

With light, O God, its darkness pierce! With love its raging chaos quell!

III.

ALL but unutterable Name!

Adorable, yet awful, sound!

Thee can the sinful nations frame

Save with their foreheads to the ground?

Soul-searching and all-cleansing Fire!
To see Thy countenance were to die:
Yet how beyond the bound retire
Of Thy serene immensity?

Thou mov'st beside us, if the spot

We change a noteless, wandering tribe; The orbits of our life and thought

In Thee their little arcs describe.

In the dead calm, at cool of day,

We hear Thy voice, and turn, and flee : Thy love outstrips us on our way:

From Thee, O God, we fly-to Thee.

They murmur, "Show us but thy Son."

The childlike heart shall enter in ;

The virgin soul its God shall see :—
Mother, and maiden pure from sin,
Be thou the guide: the Way is He.

The mystery high of God made Man
Through thee to man is easier made:
Pronounce the consonant who can

Without the softer vowel's aid!

Dei Genitrix.

V.

I SEE Him: on thy lap He lies
'Mid that Judæan stable's gloom :
O sweet, O awful Sacrifice!

He smiles in sleep, yet knows His doom.

Thou gav'st Him life! But was not this
That life which knows no parting breath?
Unmeasured life? unwaning bliss ?

Dread Priestess, lo! thou gav'st Him death!

Beneath the tree thy mother stood:

Beneath the cross thou too shalt stand:

O Tree of Life! O bleeding Rood!
Thy shadow stretches far its hand.

That God who made the sun and moon

In swaddling bands lies dumb and bound!

Love's Captive! darker prison soon

Awaits Thee in the garden ground.

He wakens.

Paradise looks forth

Beyond the portals of the

grave.

Life, life thou gavest! life to Earth,

Not Him. Thine Infant dies to save.

Virgo Virginum.

VI.

WHEN from their lurking place the Voice
Of God dragged forth that fallen pair,
Still seemed the garden to rejoice;
The sinless Eden still was fair.

They, they alone, whose light of grace
But late made Paradise look dim,

Stood now, a blot upon its face,

Before their God; nor gazed on Him.

They glanced not up; or they had seen
In that severe, death-dooming eye
Unutterable depths serene

Of sadly-piercing sympathy.

Not them alone that Eye beheld,

But, by their side, that other Twain,

In whom the race whose doom was knelled

Once more should rise; once more should reign.