If love, the noblest, purest, best,

If truth, all other truth above,

May claim return from every breast,

O, surely Jesus claims our love!

There’s not a hope with comfort fraught,

Triumphant over death and time,

But Jesus mingles in that thought,

Forerunner of our course sublime.

His image meets us in the hour

Of joy, and brightens every smile;

We see him, when the tempests lower,

Each terror soothe, each grief beguile.

We see him in the daily round

Of social duty, mild and meek;

With him we tread the hallowed ground,

Communion with our God to seek.

We see his pitying, gentle eye,

When lonely want appeals for aid;

We hear him in the frequent sigh,

That mourns the waste that sin has made.

We meet him at the lowly tomb,

And weep where Jesus wept before;

And there, above the grave’s dark gloom,

We see him rise,—and weep no more.