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The prison'd winds to fearful combat leap,
And rouse the wrathful spirit of the deep,
The impatient storms arose—their sleep was past,
The thunder roar'd a hoarse and dreadful blast,
The troubled bark was tost upon the wave,
The cleaving billows shew'd a ready grave,
The lightnings blaz'd insufferably bright,
Forth rode a spirit on the wing of night;
An unseen hand was there, whose strong control,
Requir'd in that dread hour the sick man's soul,
It struggled and was gone! to hear no more
The whirlwinds sweeping, and the torrents roar,
The rending skies, the loud and troubled deep,
The agonizing friend, that wak'd to weep;
No more to shrink before the tempest's breath,
No more to linger in the pangs of death;
No more! no more! it saw a purer sphere,
Nor surging sea—nor vexing storms were there;
Before his eye a spotless region spread,
Where darkness rested not—or doubt or dread,
And sickness sigh'd not there, and mortal ills were fled.
