By cool Siloam's shady rill How fair the lily grows! How sweet the breath, beneath the hill, Of Sharon's dewy rose! | Lo! such the child whose early feet The paths of peace have trod, Whose secret heart, with influence sweet, Is upward drawn to God. | By cool Siloam's shady rill The lily must decay; The rose that blooms beneath the hill Must shortly fade away. | And soon, too soon, the wintry hour Of man's maturer age Will shake the soul with sorrow's power, And stormy passion's rage. | O thou whose infant feet were found Within thy Father's shrine, Whose years, with changeless virtue crowned, Were all alike divine, | Dependent on thy bounteous breath, We seek thy grace alone, In childhood, manhood, age, and death, To keep us still thine own. | |