Is theme of sweet instruction, telling
That errand angels make their dwelling
With man; untiring spirits they,
Who, or to bide, or fly, or roam,
With willing wings their Lord obey
On earth, as in their starry home.

Bethesda in the lapse of years

Who may recount the groans and tears, The hopes dashed down, the keen despair – All that the sickened heart can wear

Of human ill, that by thy side

Have clustered, mocking human pride?
Or of the thousands who have sat

Thus by thy well, in hope, how few
Seizing the precious moment that

Should heal, stepped in and found it true! And what's the world we tread, but one Bethesda, where the heirs of pain Are watchers - where the lost, undone, Expecting, wait, and wait in vain

Where multitudes lose Hope's sweet power, To one that finds the Angel's hour!

And one, among that waiting crowd,
For two-score years has, patient, bowed
Beneath his suff'rings. Time has past.
His youthful locks of glossy jet
Have whitened by these waters, yet
Is he unhealed. His manly cheek

Is scarred with lines that old age speak;

And he has seen Bethesda heal,
While on its virtues lay a seal
For him, a wretch to misery sold.
And he has seen the young, the old,
The timorous, doubting, and the bold
Go down, while he aside is cast.
Yet not for want of effort, he
Is left in his infirmity.

How often, when despair was nigh,
He checked the fiend!— his eager eye
Kindled once more with hope : - the cry
Went round, “THE ANGEL!” — then he strove
By thought of all that bound his love
To life, to rise and in the wave

Of healing, his disease to lave.
But e'en while coming, feebly, slow,
The stronger gained the pool below;
Another stepped before him,

hand

Was none to help, or guide his footNot one of kin, or friendship's band

The old man in the wave to put.

Yes! there was One drew near him then,
Of rich compassion, more than men.
He comes-no conqueror so great-
In lowly, meek, derided state.

His followers base esteemed, the scum
Of earth- the heirs of crowns to come.
And who is He! I know him now
By that pale cheek and wondrous brow;

That face with softest pity beaming,
That awful eye whence God is gleaming.
"Wilt thou be healed?" he kindly said;
Could He raise wishes, but to balk?
Oh, no! when JESUS speaks, the dead
Shall live, all mortal ills must die;
At His command diseases fly,

The sick shall take his bed and walk!

AFRICA.

GOD! while dusky Hindostan

Sees the light that comes from Thee,
While no more Mahratta's man

Gives to Boodh the knee,
While again the Grecian hears
On his Mars'-hill, truth, profound,
While the Crescent disappears
From Calvary's holy ground, -
Yea, while Smyrna far hath cast
Age's seven-fold bigot pall,
And for China word hath past
That overleaps her wall.

God! shall not the Negro's land
As other lands be blest?

Shall not Ethiopia's band
Enter into rest?

Shall Sahara's parched ranger
Never taste the rivulet?

Still shall Christendom the stranger
In the Moorish gate forget?
While thy Dove of Mystery
Every where is flying,
Will not leaves of healing be
Sent to Afric, dying?

Where Cleopatra the pearl

Mingled, is thy pearl forbid ?

Shall not men the Cross unfurl

On the Pyramid !

May not upon night again

Open the immortal morn, Where Cyprian taught, and Origen Adorned the priestly lawn? May not hamlets that festoon, Beautifully, Niger's flood, With Alexandria and Wednoon, Be given unto God?

On the coast of nations, look!

Where deceitful beams prevail —

Shall they not, at thy rebuke,

Pale, as stars at morning pale ? Wilt Thou not awake the dead? Captive lead captivity—

May not Ethiopia spread

Heart and hand to Thee!

May not, for the cries that went
Skyward, be the hymn of bliss ?
May not bloom a continent
Where was only oasis !

WEEP NOT FOR THE DEAD.

I hear the voice

Of the expecting grave. - Martyr of Antioch.

THE grave hath voice, and seems to say,
Weep ye who on my surface tread,
Condemned to bear the heat of day -
But weep not for the slumbering dead.
Weep ye for those for whom no tear

Is given, the sorrowing, the distressed, The troubled, whom there's none to cheer, But not for him that is at rest.

Weep for the living wretch, whose sighs
Go up for loss of friend and lover;
For him that as survivor dies,

Not him whose parting pangs are over.
Weep for the living ; —he's alone ;·

Few are the living; who may know How few, compared to the unknown Nations of men that sleep below!