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Shall each pretend to reach the skies,
Yet doom his brother to expire,
Whose soul a different hope supplies,
Or doctrines less severe inspire?
Shall these, by creeds they can't expound,
Prepare a fancied bliss or wo?
Shall reptiles, grovelling on the ground,
Their great Creator's purpose know?
Shall those, who live for self alone,
Whose years float on in daily crime-
Shall they by Faith for guilt atone,

And live beyond the bounds of time?
Father! no prophet's laws I seek-
Thy laws in Nature's works appear :-
I own myself corrupt and weak,

Yet will I pray, for thou wilt hear!
Thou, who canst guide the wandering star
Through trackless realms of ether's space!
Who calmst the elemental war,

Whose hand from pole to pole I trace; Thou, who in wisdom placed me here,

Who, when thou wilt, can take me hence,

Ah! whilst I tread this earthly sphere,
Extend to me the wide defence.
To thee, my God, to thee I call,
Whatever weal or wo betide,
By thy command I rise or fall,
In thy protection I confide.
If, when this dust to dust restored,
My soul shall float on airy wing,

How shall thy glorious name adored
Inspire her feeble voice to sing!
But, if this fleeting spirit share

With clay the grave's eternal bed,
While life yet throbs I raise my prayer,

Though doomed no more to quit the dead.
To thee I breathe my humble strain,
Grateful for all thy mercies past,

And hope, my God, to thee again
This erring life may fly at last.

MORNING HYMN.

BY CHARLES FENNO HOFFMAN.

"LET THERE BE LIGHT!" The Eternal spoke, And from the abyss where darkness rode The earliest dawn of nature broke,

And light around creation flow'd.

The glad earth smiled to see the day,
The first-born day, come blushing in;
The young day smiled to shed its ray
Upon a world untouch'd by sin.

"Let there be light!" O'er heaven and earth, The GOD who first the day-beam pour'd,

Utter'd again his fiat forth,

And shed the gospel's light abroad,

And, like the dawn, its cheering rays
On rich and poor were meant to fall;
Inspiring their Redeemer's praise,
In lowly cot and lordly hall.

Then come, when in the orient first
Flushes the signal-light for prayer;
Come with the earliest beams that burst
From God's bright throne of glory there.
Come kneel to him who through the night
Hath watch'd above thy sleeping soul,
To Him whose mercies, like his light,
Are shed abroad from pole to pole.

CONTENT.

Contentment walks

The sunny glade, and feels an inward bliss

Spring o'er his mind, beyond the power of kings
To purchase.

Thomson.

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