Sure Thou, Almighty, canst not act
From cruelty or wrath!

Oh, free my weary eyes from tears,
Or close them fast in death!

But if I must afflicted be,

To suit some wise design;

Then man my soul with firm resolves
To bear and not repine!

ROBERT BUrns.

JANUARY 15.

CALL NO MAN HAPPY TILL HIS DEATH.

MAN ought his future happiness to fear

If he be always happy here;

He wants the bleeding mark of grace,
The circumcision of the chosen race.
If no one part of him supplies
The duty of a sacrifice,

He is (we doubt) reserv'd entire
As a whole victim for the fire.
Besides, ev'n in this world below,

To those who never did ill-fortune know,
The good does nauseous or insipid grow.
Consider man's whole life, and you'll confess
The sharp ingredient of some bad success

Is that which gives the taste to all his happiness.
But the true method of felicity

Is when the worst

Of human life is plac'd the first,

And when the child's correction proves to be

The cause of perfecting the man.

Let our weak days lead up the van;

Let the brave second and Triarian band
Firm against all impression stand :

The first we may defeated see,

The virtue and the force of these are sure of victory.

ABRAHAM COWLEY.

JANUARY 16.

GRACIOUS GOD! presumptuous man,

With random guesses, makes pretence

To sound Thy searchless providence,
From which he first began;

Thy patient thunder he defies,

Lays down false principles, and moves
By what his vicious choice approves,

And when he's vainly wicked thinks he's wise.
Return, return, too long misled!

With filial fear adore thy God:

Ere the vast deep of heav'n was spread,
Or bodies first in space abode,

Glories ineffable adorned his head. . .

On the vast ocean of his wonders here,

We momentary bubbles ride,

Till, crush'd by the tempestuous tide,
Sunk in the parent flood we disappear :

We, who so gaudy on the waters shone,

Proud, like the showery bow, with beauties not our own. But, at the signal giv'n, this earth and sea

Shall set their sleeping vassals free,

And the belov'd of God,

The faithful and the just,

Like Aaron's chosen rod,

Tho' dry, shall blossom in the dust :

Then, gladly bounding from their dark restraints,

The skeletons shall brighten into saints,

And, from mortality refin'd, shall rise

To meet their Saviour coming in the skies.
Instructed then by intuition, we

Shall the vain efforts of our wisdom see;
Shall then impartially confess

Our demonstration was but guess;

That knowledge, which from human reason flows,

Unless Religion guides its course,

And Faith her steady mounds oppose,

Is ignorance at best, and often worse.

ELIJAH FENTON.

O Do not use me

JANUARY 17.

After my sinnes! look not on my desert,
But on Thy glorie; then Thou wilt reform,
And not refuse me; for Thou onely art
The mighty God, but I a sillie worm :
O, do not bruise me !

O do not urge me;

For what account can Thy ill steward make?
I have abus'd Thy flock, destroy'd Thy woods,
Suckt all Thy magazens; my head did ake,
Till it found out how to consume Thy goods:
O, do not scourge me!

O, do not fill me

With the turn'd viall of Thy bitter wrath!
For Thou hast other vessels full of blood,
A part whereof my Saviour empti'd hath,
Ev'n unto death: since He died for my good,
O, do not kill me !

But O, reprieve me!

For Thou hast life and death at Thy command;
Thou art both Judge and Saviour, feast and rod,
Cordiall and corrosive: put not Thy hand
Into the bitter box; but, O my God,

My God, relieve me!

GEORGE HERBERT.

JANUARY 18.

THE PILGRIMAGE.

As travellers, when the twilight's come,
And in the sky the stars appear,
The past day's accidents do summe,

With "Thus wee saw there and thus here,"

Then, Jacob-like, lodge in a place—

A place, and no more, is set down

Where, till the day restore the race,

They rest and dream homes of their own,

So for this night I linger here,
And, full of tossings to and fro,
Expect still when Thou wilt appear
That I may get me up and go.

I long and groan and grieve for Thee,
For Thee my words, my tears do gush;

Oh! that I were but where I see!
Is all the note within my bush.

As birds robbed of their native wood,
Although their diet may be fine,

Yet neither sing nor like their food,
But with the thought of home do pine;

B

So do I mourn and hang my head,

And, though Thou dost me fulness give, Yet look I for far better bread,

Because by this man cannot live.

O feed me then! and since I may

Have yet more days, more nights to count, So strengthen me, Lord, all the way,

That I may travel to Thy mount.

HENRY VAUGHAN.

JANUARY 19.

AVE.

MOTHER of the Fair Delight,
Thou handmaid perfect in God's sight,
Now sitting fourth beside the Three,
Thyself a woman-Trinity,-

-:

Being a daughter born to God,
Mother of Christ from stall to rood,
And wife unto the Holy Ghost
Oh, when our need is uttermost,
Think that to such as death may strike,
Thou once wert sister, sister-like!
Thou headstone of humanity,
Groundstone of the great Mystery,
Fashioned like us, yet more than we!
Soul, is it Faith, or Love or Hope
That lets me see Her standing up
Where the light of the Throne is bright?
Unto the left, unto the right,

The cherubim, succinct, conjoint,

Float inward to a golden point,