A Sheaf Gleaned in French Fields/The Complaint of the Afflicted Church (Anonymous)
THE COMPLAINT OF THE AFFLICTED CHURCH.
ANONYMOUS.
Our hearts, O Lord, to Thee look up,
Our cries and groans implore Thine aid:
Behold what clouds our welkin overshade,
And mark how bitter is our cup.
Take cognisance of all our ills,
And draw us from the frightful precipice,
Before we sink down in the abyss,
And death our clamorous voices stills.
Our poor tribes fugitive afar,
Thine altars everywhere o'erthrown,
Thy torches quenched, Thy flocks dispersed, to moan
In deserts, and without a star;
Here, consciences no longer free,
There, cherished feelings wronged, and hearts in fears,
And eyes for ever bathed in tears,
All, all, call dolefully on Thee.
Our girls in some sad convent pent,
Our workmen stretched on dungeon-floor,
Our best as martyrs deluged in their gore,
Our preachers to the galleys sent,
Our sick, neglected, left to die,
Our dying who the sacraments have not,
Our dead on shambles cast to rot,
Appeal to Thee: look down from high.
'Tis a privilege of Thy Grace
To bend the stubborn human heart,
But sacrilegious man usurps Thy part
And wrongs Thee, Lord, before Thy face.
Not by persuasions mild
But tortures, is the conscience forced, in ways
Unknown in earlier Christian days,
And so Thy Spirit is reviled.
What cries and lamentations hoarse
May show our children's sad estate!
Victims of parents' sins, unfortunate,
Plucked from their mothers' breasts by force
And doomed, oh, woeful destiny!
To bloody Moloch by inhuman hands,
And to sin's pains and fatal brands,
Before they know iniquity.
Ah! Born in such conditions dire,
To live in fears from day to day,
Marked by Remorse's furies as a prey,
The heralds of eternal ire;
And then to die beneath the curse,
And Christ in the heart to the last resist,
Yea, live and die as atheist,—
O God, can any fate be worse?
The tyrants weigh us down with chains,
One woe succeeds another woe,
They close up heaven, they open hell below,
Nor care for God, nor heed our pains.
Who can withstand these men of blood?
They gnash on us like ghouls in saints' gore red,
They hurl us in the furnace dread,
Ah! that the Angel by us stood!
We had a longing, lingering hope
That, spite the torments that we feel,
A peace would come our mortal wounds to heal;
But now expectance has no scope.
Our sins have not permitted peace,
Thy wrath against our crimes, Thy fearful wrath
New lions sends across our path,
And our misfortunes never cease.
When all looks dark, behind, before,
Had we at least, O Lord, Thy Grace,
We might, assured, have boldly run our race:
But no, we see Thy Grace no more.
Ills upon ills press down severe
Upon us, and Thou deignest not to see;
The bricks are doubled by decree,
But Moses does not yet appear.
Where are Thy favours of the past?
Are they, alas! for ever gone?
We loved them, when Thy light upon us shone,
And love them yet, in darkness cast.
We see Thee, Lord, in vengeance raise
Thine arm, but still to Thee for shelter fly:
If in Thy justice we must die,
Our last thought shall that justice praise.
If to consume us be Thy will,
We shall retire within Thy breast;
Send chains and gibbets, famine, war and pest,
We shall adore and love Thee still.
In fears and ills of every sort
We shall obey Thee, long as reason lasts,
Well knowing that Thy roughest blasts
Lead us but quicker to the port.
May this our firm resolve and faith
Weak brethren help that wisdom lack,
The fallen raise, the wandering bring back,
The timid free from fear of death.
Draw down on us Thy favour, Lord,
And save us also from foes manifold,
And in our sorrows make us bold,
Through Jesus Christ the Incarnate Word.