Live, O for ever live and reign

The Lamb Whom His own love hath slain; And let Thy lost sheep live to inherit That kingdom which this Holy Cross did merit. Amen.

NO MAN WAS ABLE TO ANSWER HIM

NEITHER DURST ANY MAN FROM THAT DAY ASK HIM

ANY MORE QUESTIONS.—Matt. xxii. 46.

MIDST all the dark and knotty snares,

Black wit or malice can or dares,
Thy glorious wisdom breaks the nets,
And treads with uncontrolled steps.
Thy quell'd foes are not only now
Thy triumphs, but Thy trophies too.
They both at once Thy conquests be,
And Thy conquests' memory.
Stony amazement makes them stand
Waiting on Thy victorious hand,
Like statues fixèd to the fame
Of Thy renown, and their own shame,
As if they only meant to breathe,
To be the life of their own death.

1

'Twas time to hold their peace when they
Had ne'er another word to say:
Yet is their silence, unto Thee
The full sound of Thy victory;
Their silence speaks aloud, and is
Thy well pronounc'd panegyris.1
While they speak nothing, they speak all
Their share in Thy memorial.

1 Praise.

While they speak nothing, they proclaim
Thee with the shrillest trump of fame.
To hold their peace is all the ways
These wretches have to speak Thy praise.

ON THE WOUNDS OF OUR
CRUCIFIED LORD

O
THESE wakeful wounds of Thine!
Are they mouths? or are they eyes?
Be they mouths, or be they eyne,1
Each bleeding part some one supplies.

1

Lo! a mouth, whose full-bloom'd lips
At too dear a rate are roses :
Lo! a blood-shot eye that weeps,
And many a cruel tear discloses.

O Thou,2 that on this foot hast laid

Many a kiss, and many a tear; Now thou shalt have all repaid,

Whatsoe'er thy charges were.

This foot hath got a mouth and lips,
Το pay the sweet sum of thy kisses;
Το pay thy tears, an eye that weeps,

Instead of tears, such gems as this is.

The difference only this appears,
(Nor can the change offend)
The debt is paid in ruby tears,
Which thou in pearls didst lend.
1 Eyes.

2 Possibly St. Mary Magdalene.

UPON THE BLEEDING CRUCIFIX

A SONG

I

ESU, no more !

It is full tide;

From Thy hands and from Thy feet,
From Thy head, and from Thy side,
All the purple rivers meet.

II

What need Thy fair head bear a part

In showers, as if Thine eyes had none? What need they help to drown Thy heart, That strives in torrents of its own?

III

Water'd by the showers they bring,

The thorns that Thy blest brow encloses (A cruel and a costly spring)

Conceive proud hopes of proving roses.

IV

Thy restless feet now cannot go
For us and our eternal good,
As they were ever wont. What though?1
They swim, alas! in their own flood.

1 What though they cannot?

V

Thy hand to give Thou canst not lift,
Yet will Thy hand still giving be.

It gives, but O itself's the gift,

It gives though bound, though bound 'tis free.

VI

But, O Thy side, Thy deep-digg'd side,
That hath a double Nilus going:
Nor ever was the Pharoan tide

Half so fruitful, half so flowing.

VII

No hair so small, but pays his river

To this Red Sea of Thy blood; Their little channels can deliver Something to the general flood.

VIII

But while I speak, whither are run
All the rivers named before?

I counted wrong: there is but one;
But O that one is one all o'er.

IX

Rain-swol❜n rivers may rise proud,
Bent all to drown and overflow;
But when indeed all's overflow'd,

They themselves are drownèd too.

X

This Thy blood's deluge (a dire chance,
Dear Lord, to Thee) to us is found
A deluge of deliverance;

A deluge lest we should be drown'd.

Ne'er wast Thou in a sense so sadly true,
The well of living waters, Lord, till now.

TO THE NAME ABOVE EVERY
NAME, THE NAME OF JESUS

A HYMN

I

SING the Name which none can say
But touch'd with an interior ray :
The Name of our new peace, our good,
Our bliss, and supernatural blood.
The Name of all our lives and loves;
Hearken, and help, ye holy doves,
The high-born brood of Day, you bright
Candidates of blissful light,

The heirs elect of Love, whose names belong.
Unto the everlasting life of song.

All ye wise souls, who in the wealthy breast
Of this unbounded Name, build your warm nest.
Awake, my glory, Soul, (if such thou be,
And that fair word at all refer to thee),
Awake and sing,
And be all wing;

Bring hither thy whole self, and let me see What of thy parent Heaven yet speaks in thee.