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QUINQUAGESIMA SUNDAY
I do set My bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between Me and the earth. Genesis ix. 13.
Sweet Dove! the softest, steadiest plume, In all the sunbright sky, Brightening in ever-changeful bloom As breezes change on high; — |
Sweet Leaf! the pledge of peace and mirth, “Long sought, and lately won,” Bless’d increase of reviving Earth, When first it felt the Sun; — |
Sweet Rainbow! pride of summer days, High set at Heaven’s command, Though into drear and dusky haze Thou melt on either hand; — |
Dear tokens of a pardoning God, We hail ye, one and all, As when our fathers walk’d abroad, Freed from their twelvemonth’s thrall. |
How joyful from th’ imprisoning ark On the green earth they spring! Not blither, after showers, the lark Mounts up with glistening wing. |
So home-bound sailors spring to shore, Two oceans safely past; So happy souls, when life is o’er, Plunge in th’ empyreal vast. |
What wins their first and fondest gaze In all the blissful field, And keeps it through a thousand days? Love face to face reveal’d: |
Love imag’d in that cordial look Our Lord in Eden bends On souls that sin and earth forsook In time to die His friends. |
And what most welcome and serene Dawns on the Patriarch’s eye, In all the emerging hills so green, In all the brightening sky? |
What but the gentle rainbow’s gleam, Soothing the wearied sight, That cannot bear the solar beam, With soft undazzling light? |
Lord, if our fathers turn’d to Thee With such adoring gaze, Wondering frail man Thy light should see Without Thy scorching blaze; |
Where is our love, and where our hearts, We who have seen Thy Son, Have tried Thy Spirit’s winning arts, And yet we are not won? |
The Son of God in radiance beam’d Too bright for us to scan, But we may face the rays that stream’d From the mild Son of Man. |
There, parted into rainbow hues, In sweet harmonious strife We see celestial love diffuse Its light o’er Jesus’ life. |
God, by His bow, vouchsafes to write This truth in Heaven above: As every lovely hue is Light, So every grace is Love. |
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