And had he not high honor, -
The hillside for a pall

To lie in state while angels wait
With stars for tapers tall,

And the dark rock-pines like tossing plumes

Over his bier to wave,

And God's own hand, in that lonely land,

To lay him in the grave?

In that strange grave without a name Whence his uncoffined clay

Shall break again, O wondrous thought!
Before the judgment-day,

And stand with glory wrapt around
On the hills he never trod,

And speak of the strife that won our life
With the Incarnate Son of God.

O lonely grave in Moab's land!

O dark Beth-Peor's hill!

Speak to these curious hearts of ours,
And teach them to be still.

God hath his mysteries of grace,
Ways that we cannot tell;

He hides them deep, like the hidden sleep

Of him he loved so well.

E. H. SEARS.

[U. S. A.]

CHRISTMAS HYMN.

CALM on the listening ear of night

Come Heaven's melodious strains, Where wild Judæa stretches far

Her silver-mantled plains!

Celestial choirs, from courts above,
Shed sacred glories there;
And angels, with their sparkling lyres,
Make music on the air.

The answering hills of Palestine
Send back the glad reply;

And greet, from all their holy heights,
The dayspring from on high.

On the blue depths of Galilee

There comes a holier calm,

And Sharon waves, in solemn praise, Her silent groves of palm.

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ALL'S WELL.

SWEET-VOICED Hope, thy fine discourse
Foretold not half life's good to me :
Thy painter, Fancy, hath not force
To show how sweet it is to Be!
Thy witching dream

And pictured scheme

To match the fact still want the power; Thy promise brave

From birth to grave

Life's boon may beggar in an hour.

-

Ask and receive, -'t is sweetly said; Yet what to plead for know I not; For Wish is worsted, Hope o'ersped,

Life's youngest tides joy-brimming flow
For him who lives above all years,
Who all-immortal makes the Now,
And is not ta'en in Time's arrears:
His life's a hymn
The seraphim

Might hark to hear or help to sing,
And to his soul

The boundless whole

Its bounty all doth daily bring.

"All mine is thine," the sky-soul saith: "The wealth I am, must thou become : Richer and richer, breath by breath, Immortal gain, immortal room!" And since all his

Mine also is,

If I would pray,

I've naught to say

But this, that God may be God still;

For Him to live Is still to give,

And drowns the dream

In larger stream,

As morning drinks the morning star.

ROYALTY.

THAT regal soul I reverence, in whose eyes

Suffices not all worth the city knows To pay that debt which his own heart he owes;

For less than level to his bosom rise The low crowd's heaven and stars: above their skies

Runneth the road his daily feet have pressed;

A loftier heaven he beareth in his breast, And o'er the summits of achieving hies With never a thought of merit or of meed; Choosing divinest labors through a pride Of soul, that holdeth appetite to feed Ever on angel-herbage, naught beside; Nor praises more himself for hero-deed Than stones for weight, or open seas for tide.

RICHARD CHENEVIX TRENCH.

THE KINGDOM OF GOD.

I SAY to thee, do thou repeat
To the first man thou mayest meet,
In lane, highway, or open street,

That he, and we, and all men move
Under a canopy of Love,

As broad as the blue sky above:

"He is! They are!" in distance seen On yon Olympus high,

In those Avernian woods abide,

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And walk this azure sky:

They are! They are!" to every show Its eyes the baby turned,

And blazes sacrificial, tall,

On thousand altars burned:

"They are! They are!"-On Sinai's top

Far seen the lightning's shone,
The thunder broke, a trumpet spoke,
And God said, " am One."

God spake it out, "I, God, am One";
The unheeding ages ran,
And baby thoughts again, again,

Have dogged the growing man:
And as of old from Sinai's top

God said that God is One,
By Science strict so speaks he now
To tell us, There is None!
Earth goes by chemic forces; Heaven 's
A Mécanique Céleste!

And heart and mind of human kind
A watch-work as the rest!