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Leave to His sovereign sway

To choose and to command;

With wonder filled, thou then shalt own
How wise, how strong, His hand.
Thou comprehend'st Him not;
Yet earth and heaven tell,
God sits as sovereign on the throne -
He ruleth all things well.

Thou seest our weakness, Lord!

Our hearts are known to Thee;
O lift Thou up the sinking head,
Confirm the feeble knee!

Let us, in life and death,

Boldly Thy truth declare,

And publish with our latest breath

Thy love and guardian care.

P. GERHARDT.

LIVE AND HELP LIVE.

MIGHTY in faith and hope, why art thou sad?
Sever the green withes, look up and be glad!
See all around thee, below and above,

The beautiful, beautiful gifts of God's love!

What though our hearts beat with death's sullen

waves?

What though the green sod is broken with graves?

The sweet hopes that never shall fade from their bloom, Make their dim birth-chamber down in the tomb!

Parsee or Christianman, bondman or free,
Loves and humilities still are for thee;
Some little good every day to achieve,
Some slighted spirit no longer to grieve.

In the tents of the desert, alone on the sea,
On the far-away hills with the starry Chaldee;
Condemned and in prison, dishonored, reviled,
God's arm is around thee, and thou art His child.

Mine be the lip ever truthful and bold;
Mine be the heart never careless nor cold;
A faith humbly trustful, a life free from blame —
All else is unstable as flax in the flame.

And while the soft skies are so starry and blue;
And while the wide earth is so fresh with God's dew,
Though all around me the sad sit and sigh,

I will be glad that I live and must die.

ALICE CAREY.

RELIGIOUS CASUISTRY.

My heart is sick, my whole head drooping faints

With all this coil of Sabbaths and of saints:

Even as of yore the Pharisaic tribe,

Lawyer astute, and casuistic Scribe,

Their grievous loads on weak men's shoulders laid,
Yet would not, could not, lend a finger's aid,
So still God's Law, with human fancies fraught,
Is circumscribed, belied, and set at naught.

One damns the use of some indifferent dish,
And pins his hopes of heaven on Wednesday fish;
This shakes his head, and " doubts if grace be sent
To those who pray by Act of Parliament;"
That "hopes the best for Schismatists, but can't
See aught for them within the covenant."

Meantime the inquirer, penitent and lone,
Who gropes in darkness for the Altar Stone,
Disturbed by doubt, by wakening conscience vexed,
And the remembrance of some child-learnt text,
Ponders amazed, if one of these be true,
Where all the other sects are wandering to;
And turns from priest to priest with vacant eye,
"How shall I save my soul?" his anxious cry.

One preaching this for truth, and that another,
Proves himself fallible, if wrong his brother;
For all, with instinct's true consent, declare
God's covenant, a blessing, not a snare.
"Faith Catholic," they cry, "is to receive
What all men, always, everywhere believe:"
Well said - but O! how sadly missed the uses
Of this, their own, experimentum crucis—
While all dispute on points of doctrine, none
Doubt what Religion teaches to be DONE.

Bear sorrow here, and look to Heaven for blissThis thy theology, thy practice this :

Believe God's promises, his precepts keep,
Joy with the joyful, with the mourner weep,
Exalt Love's banner, evermore unfurled,
And keep thyself unspotted from the world.

O blest indeed, if thus we knew our good,
O blest even on this Earth, if but we would!
Sure that, though shades close densely round our way,
The path of Duty leads to perfect day.

BLACKWOOD'S Magazine.

THE FOUNTAIN OF GRACE.

"O Lord, open Thou my lips; and my mouth shall show forth Thy praise."

THE prayers
If Thou the spirit give by which I

I make will then be sweet indeed,

pray;

My unassisted heart is barren clay,
That of its native self can nothing feed:
Of good and pious works Thou art the seed

That quickens only where Thou say'st it may :
Unless Thou show to us Thine own true way
No man can find it: Father! Thou must lead.
Do Thou, then, breathe those thoughts into my mind
By which such virtue may in me be bred
That in Thy holy footsteps I may tread;
The fetters of my tongue do Thou unbind,
That I may have the power to sing of Thee,
And sound Thy praises everlastingly.

MICHAEL ANGELO. 1474-1564.

THE ELOQUENT PASTOR.

He taught the cheerfulness that still is ours,
The sweetness that still lurks in human powers;
If heaven be full of stars, the earth has flowers!

His was the searching thought, the glowing mind;
The gentle will to others' soon resigned;
But, more than all, the feeling just and kind.

His pleasures were as melodies from reeds,-
Sweet books, deep music and unselfish deeds,
Finding immortal flowers in human weeds.

True to his kind, nor of himself afraid,
He deemed that love of God was best arrayed
In love of all the things that God has made.

He deemed man's life no feverish dream of care, But a high pathway into freer air,

Lit up with golden hopes and duties fair.

IIe showed how wisdom turns its hours to years,
Feeding the heart on joys instead of fears,
And worships God in smiles, and not in tears.

His thoughts were as a pyramid up-piled,
On whose far top an angel stood and smiled,-
Yet in his heart was he a simple child.

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LAMAN BLANCHARD.—1803-1845.

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