Page:The Christian Year 1887.djvu/47

      But there are storms within
   That heave the struggling heart with wilder din,
      And there is power and love
   The maniac's rushing frenzy to reprove,
      And when he takes his seat,
   Clothed and in calmness, at his Savour's feet,
   Is not the power as strange, the love as blest,
As when He said, "Be still," and ocean sank to rest?

      Woe to the wayward heart,
   That gladlier turns to eye the shuddering start
      Of Passion in her might,
   Than marks the silent growth of grace and light; -
      Pleased in the cheerless tomb
   To linger, while the morning rays illume
   Green lake, and cedar tuft, and spicy glade,
Shaking their dewy tresses now the storm is laid.

      The storm is laid—and now
   In His meek power He climbs the mountain's brow,
      Who bade the waves go sleep,
   And lashed the vexed fiends to their yawning deep.
      How on a rock they stand,
   Who watch His eye, and hold His guiding hand!
   Not half so fixed, amid her vassal hills,
Rises the holy pile that Kedron's valley fills.

      And wilt thou seek again
   Thy howling waste, thy charnel-house and chain,
      And with the demons be,
   Rather than clasp thine own Deliverer's knee?
      Sure 'tis no Heaven-bred awe
   That bids thee from His healing touch withdraw;
   The world and He are struggling in thine heart,
And in thy reckless mood thou bidd'st thy Lord depart.

      He, merciful and mild,
   As erst, beholding, loves His wayward child;
      When souls of highest birth
   Waste their impassioned might on dreams of earth,
      He opens Nature's book,
   And on His glorious Gospel bids them look,
   Till, by such chords as rule the choirs above,
Their lawless cries are tuned to hymns of perfect love.