NOT FOR NOUGHT.

Do and suffer nought in vain :
Let no trifling be:

If the salt of life is pain,

Let e'en wrongs bring good to thee; Good to others, few or many;

Good to all or good to any.

If men curse thee, plant their lies
Where, for truth, they best may grow;
Let the railers make thee wise,

Preaching peace, where'er thou go:
God no useless plant hath planted,
Evil (wisely used) is wanted.

If the nation-feeding corn
Thriveth under icéd snow;
If the small bird, on the thorn,
Useth well its guarded sloe;
Bid thy cares thy comforts double ;
Gather fruit from thorns of trouble.

See the Rivers! how they run,

Strong in gloom, and strong in light! Like the never-wearied sun,

Through the day and through the night,

Each along his path of duty,

Turning coldness into beauty!

EBENEZER ELLIOTT.-1781-1845.

FAITH.

YE who think the truth ye sow
Lost beneath the winter's snow,
Doubt not, Time's unerring law
Yet shall bring the genial thaw.
God in nature ye can trust,
Is the God of mind less just?

Read we not the mighty thought
Once by ancient sages taught?
Though it withered in the blight
Of the medieval night,

Now the harvest we behold;
See! it bears a thousand fold.

Workers on the barren soil,
Yours may seem a thankless toil;
Sick at heart with hope deferred,
Listen to the cheering word:

Now the faithful sower grieves;
Soon he'll bind his golden sheaves.

If Great Wisdom have decreed
Man may labor, yet the seed
Never in this life shall grow,

Shall the sower cease to sow ?

The fairest fruit may yet be born

On the resurrection morn!

FRITZ AND LEOLETT.

A SIGHT OF HEAVEN IN SICKNESS.

OFT have I sat in secret sighs

To feel my flesh decay,

Then groaned aloud with frighted eyes To view the tottering clay.

But I forbid my sorrows now,
Nor dares the flesh complain;
Diseases bring their profit too;
The joy o'ercomes the pain.

My cheerful soul now all the day
Sits waiting here and sings;
Looks through the ruin of her clay,
And practises her wings.

Faith almost changes into sight
While from afar she spies

Her fair inheritance, in light

Above created skies.

Had but the prison walls been strong
And firm, without a flaw,

In darkness she had dwelt too long,
And less of glory saw.

But now the everlasting hills

Through every chink appear,

And something of the joy she feels
While she's a prisoner here.

The shines of heaven rush sweetly in
At all the gaping flaws,
Visions of endless bliss are seen,
And native air she draws.

O may these walls stand tottering still,
The breaches never close,

If I must here in darkness dwell,
And all this glory lose!

Or rather let this flesh decay,
The ruins wider grow,

Till, glad to see the enlargéd way,

I stretch my pinions through.

ISAAC WATTS. — 1674-1748.

FOR HELP IN TROUBLE.

LOWLY and solemn be

Thy children's cry to Thee,
Father divine!

A hymn of suppliant breath,
Owning that life and death

Alike are Thine!

O Father! in that hour

When earth all succoring power
Shall disavow;

When spear, and shield, and crown,
In faintness are cast down,—

Sustain us, Thou!

By Him who bowed to take
The death-cup for our sake,
The thorn, the rod;

From whom the last dismay
Was not to pass away,
Aid us, O God!

Tremblers beside the grave,
We call on Thee to save,
Father divine!

Hear, hear our suppliant breath,
Keep us in life and death,
Thine, only Thine!

THE LORD'S CHASTENING.

"Whom the Lord loveth, He chasteneth."

WISH not, dear friends, my pain away,Wish me a wise and thankful heart, With God, in all my griefs, to stay,

Nor from His loved correction start.