A CRADLE SONG. SWEET dreams, form a shade Sweet sleep, with soft down Weave thy brows an infant crown! Sweet sleep, angel mild, Hover o'er my happy child! Sweet smiles, in the night Sweet moans, dovelike sighs, Sweet moan, sweeter smile All the dovelike moans beguile! Sleep, sleep, happy child! All creation slept and smiled. Sleep, sleep, happy sleep! While o'er thee doth mother weep. Sweet babe, in thy face Holy image I can trace; Sweet babe, once like thee Thy Maker lay, and wept for me! Wept for me, for thee, for all, Heavenly face that smiles on thee! Smiles on thee, on me, on all, Heaven and earth to peace beguile. THE DIVINE IMAGE. To mercy, pity, peace, and love, For mercy, pity, peace, and love, For Mercy has a human heart, And Love, the human form divine; Then every man, of every clime, And all must love the human form, There God is dwelling too. HOLY THURSDAY. 'TWAS on a Holy Thursday, their innocent faces clean, Came children walking two and two, in red, and blue, and green: Grey-headed beadles walk'd before, with wands as white as snow, Till into the high dome of Paul's, they like Thames' waters flow. O what a multitude they seem'd, these flowers of London town, Seated in companies they were, with radiance all their own: The hum of multitudes was there, but multitudes of lambs, Thousands of little boys and girls raising their innocent hands. Now like a mighty wind they raise to heaven the voice of song, Or like harmonious thunderings the seats of heaven among : Beneath them sit the aged men, wise guardians of the poor. Then cherish pity, lest you drive an angel from your door. NIGHT. THE sun descending in the west, The moon, like a flower In heaven's high bower, Sits and smiles on the night. Farewell, green fields and happy grove, Where flocks have ta'en delight; Where lambs have nibbled, silent move Unseen, they pour blessing, And each sleeping bosom. They look in every thoughtless nest, They visit caves of every beast, If they see any weeping |