Why should my foolish heart complain,
When wisdom, truth, and love, Direct the stroke, inflict the pain, And point to joys above.
How short are all my sufferings here!
How needful every cross!
Away my unbelieving fear,
Nor call my gain a loss.
Then give, dear Lord, or take away,
I'll bless thy sacred name :
My Jesus, yesterday, to-day,
For ever--is the same.
O LORD, my best desire fulfil,
And help me to resign
Life, health, and comfort to thy will,
And make thy pleasure mine.
Why should I shrink at thy command, Whose love forbids my fears?
Or tremble at the gracious hand
That wipes away my tears?
No, rather let me freely yield
What most I prize to thee;
Who never hast a good withheld,
Or wilt withhold from me.
Thy favour all my journey through,
Thou art engag'd to grant ;
What else I want, or think I do,
'Tis better still to want.
Wisdom and mercy guide my way,
Shall I resist them both?
And crush'd before the moth!
But ah! my inward spirit cries,
Still bind me to thy sway;
Else the next cloud that veils my skies,
Drives all these thoughts away.
As needles point towards the pole,
When touch'd by the magnetic stone,
So faith in Jesus gives the soul
A tendency before unknown.
Till then, by blinded passions led,
In search of fancied good we range,
The paths of disappointment tread,
To nothing fix'd but love of change.
But when the Holy Ghost imparts
A knowledge of the Saviour's love,
Our wandering, weary, restless hearts,
Are fix'd at once, no more to rove.
Now a new principle takes place,
Which guides and animates the will;
This love, another name for grace,
Constrains to good, and bars from ill.
By love's pure light we soon perceive
Our noblest bliss and proper end;
And gladly every idol leave,
To love and serve our Lord and Friend.
Thus borne along by faith and hope,
We feelthe Saviour's words are true;
And I, if I be lifted up,
Will draw my followers upward too."
THE PATH OF SORROW.
THE path of sorrow, and that path alone
Leads to the land where sorrow is unknown!
No trav❜ller ever reached that blest abode,
Who found not thorns and briars in his road.
The world may dance along the flow'ry plain,
Cheer'd as they go by many a sprightly strain,
Where nature has her mossy velvet spread,
With unshod feet they yet securely tread,
Admonish'd, scorn the caution and the friend,
Bent all on pleasure, heedless of its end.
But He, who knew what human hearts would prove,
How slow to learn the dictates of his love,
That, hard by nature, and of stubborn will,
A life of ease would make them harder still:
In pity to the souls his grace designed
To rescue from the ruins of mankind,
Call'd for a cloud to darken all their years,
And said, "Go spend them in the vale of tears."
O balmy gales of soul-reviving air!
O salutary streams that murmur there!
These flowing from the fount of grace above;
Those breath'd from lips of everlasting love.
The flinty soil, indeed, their feet annoys!
Chill blasts of trouble nip their springing joys;
An envious world will interpose its frown,
To mar delights superior to its own;
And many a pang, experienc'd still within,
Reminds them of their hated inmate, sin :
But ills of ev'ry shape and ev'ry name,
Transform'd to blessings, miss their cruel aim ;
And ev'ry moment's calm that soothes the breast,
Is giv'n in earnest of eternal rest.
Ah, be not sad, although thy lot be cast
Far from the flock, and in a boundless waste;
No shepherd's tent within thy view appear;
But the chief Shepherd even there is near;
Thy tender sorrow, and thy plaintive strain,
Flow in a foreign land, but not in vain ;
Thy tears all issue from a source divine,
And ev'ry drop bespeaks a Saviour thine!
HAPPINESS! thou lovely name,
Where's thy seat? O tell me where !
Learning, pleasure, wealth, and fame,
All cry out, "It is not here."
Not the wisdom of the wise
Can inform me where it lies,
Nor the grandeur of the great,
Can the bliss I seek, create.
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