While He, whose blood for man was shed,
Has placed upon his servant's head
A crown that fadeth never!

And think that, (in that awful day,

When darkness sun and moon is shading,)
The form that, 'midst its kindred clay,
Your trembling hands prepare to lay,
Shall rise to life unfading!

Then weep no more for him, who's gone
Where sin and suffering ne'er shall enter;
But on that great High Priest alone,
Who can for guilt like ours atone,
Your own affections centre!

For thus, when round your lowly bier
Surviving friends are sadly bending,
Your souls, like his, to Jesus dear,
Shall wing their flight to yonder sphere,
Faith lightest pinions lending.

And thus, when to the silent tomb

Your lifeless dust like his is given, Like faith shall whisper, 'midst the gloom, That yet again, in youthful bloom,

That dust shall smile in heaven!

THE WORLD WE HAVE NOT SEEN.

THERE is a world we have not seen,

That time shall never dare destroy,

Where mortal footstep hath not been, Nor ear hath caught its sounds of joy.

There is a region, lovelier far

Than sages tell or poets sing,
Brighter than summer beauties are,
And softer than the tints of spring.

There is a world,—and O how blest!—
Fairer than prophets ever told;
And never did an angel guest

One half its blessedness unfold.

It is all holy and serene,

The land of glory and repose; And there, to dim the radiant scene, The tear of sorrow never flows.

It is not fann'd by summer gale;

'T is not refresh'd by vernal showers; It never needs the moonbeam pale,

For there are known no evening hours.

No: for this world is ever bright
With a pure radiance all its own;

The streams of uncreated light

Flow round it from the Eternal Thron

There, forms that mortals may not see,
Too glorious for the eye to trace,
And clad in peerless majesty,
Move with unutterable grace.

In vain the philosophic eye

May seek to view the fair abode,

Or find it in the curtain'd sky :

:

It is THE DWELLING-PLACE OF GOD.

THE BETTER LAND.

"I HEAR thee speak of the better land;
Thou call'st its children a happy band;
Mother! oh, where is that radiant shore?—
Shall we not seek it, and weep no more?-
Is it where the flower of the orange blows,

And the fire-flies dance through the myrtle boughs?" "Not there, not there, my child!"

"Is it where the feathery palm-trees rise,
And the date grows ripe under sunny skies?-
Or 'midst the green islands of glittering seas,
Where fragrant forests perfume the breeze,
And strange bright birds, on their starry wings,
Bear the rich hues of all glorious things?"

-“Not there, not there, my child!”

"Is it far away, in some region old,

Where the rivers wander o'er sands of gold,
Where the burning rays of the ruby shine,
And the 'diamond lights up the secret mine,
And the pearl gleams forth from the coral strand?
Is it there, sweet mother! that better land?"

-"Not there, not there, my child!

"Eye hath not seen it, my gentle boy!
Ear hath not heard its deep sounds of joy;
Dreams cannot picture a world so fair;
Sorrow and death may not enter there;
Time doth not breathe on its fadeless bloom;
Beyond the clouds, and beyond the tomb;

-It is there, it is there, my child!"

THE GRAVE TO THE BELIEVER A PLACE OF REST.

FEW are thy days, and full of wo,
O man of woman born!

Thy doom is written, "Dust thou art,
And shalt to dust return."

Behold the emblem of thy state
In flowers that bloom and die;
Or in the shadow's fleeting form,
That mocks the gazer's eye.

Guilty and frail, how shalt thou stand
Before thy sovereign Lord?
Can troubled and polluted springs
A hallow'd stream afford?

Determined are the days that fly
Successive o'er thy head;
The number'd hour is on the wing
That lays thee with the dead.

Great God! afflict not, in thy wrath,

The short allotted span

That bounds the few and weary days
Of pilgrimage to man.

All nature dies, and lives again:

The flower that paints the field,

The trees that crown the mountain's brow,
And boughs and blossoms yield,

Resign the honors of their form
At winter's stormy blast,

And leave the naked leafless plain.
A desolated waste.

Yet soon reviving plants and flowers
Anew shall deck the plain;

The woods shall hear the voice of spring,
And flourish green again.

But man forsakes this earthly scene,

Ah! never to return;

Shall any following spring revive

The ashes of the urn?

The mighty flood, that rolls along
Its torrents to the main,
Can ne'er recall its waters lost
From that abyss again.

So days, and years, and ages past,
Descending down to night,
Can henceforth never more return
Back to the gates of light:

And man, laid in his lonesome grave,
Shall sleep in death's dark gloom,
Until the eternal morning wake
The slumbers of the tomb.

O may the grave become to me
The bed of peaceful rest,

Whence I shall gladly rise at length,
And mingle with the bless'd!