His locks, like raven's plumes, or shining jet, And with love-knots their comely hangings deck. All heaven and earth, and all in both sustain; Her amber hair like to the sunny ray, With gold enamels fair the silver white; There heavenly loves their pretty sportings play, Firing their darts in that wide flaming light: Her dainty neck, spread with that silver mould, Where double beauty doth itself unfold In its fair silver shrines, and fairer borrowed gold. His breast a rock of purest alabaster, Where Love's self sailing, shipwrecked often sitteth; Hers a twin-rock, unknown but to th' ship-master, Which harbours him alone, all other splitteth. Where better could her love than here have rested? Or he his thoughts than here more sweetly feasted? Than both their love and thoughts in each are ever rested. Run, now, you shepherd swains, ah! run you thither, And haste you lovely maids, haste you together, With this sweet bride, while yet the sun-shine day Guides your blind steps; while yet loud summons call, That every wood and hill resounds withal: "Come, Hymen, Hymen, come, drest in thy golden pall." The sounding echo back the music flung, While heavenly spheres unto the voices played : But lo! the day is ended with my song, And sporting bathes with that fair ocean maid. Stoop now thy wing, my muse, now stoop thee low; RICHARD CRASHAW WAS born in London, but the year of his birth is uncertain; he was educated at the Charter-House, and took his degree at Cambridge, where he published his sacred poem of Steps to the Temple. He obtained a fellowship, but he was ejected from it for refusing to subscribe the Covenant. Soon after he went abroad, and conformed to the Roman Catholic faith. He died in Italy about 1650. The Poems of Crashaw are less known than they ought to be; they display delicate fancy, great tenderness, and singular beauty of diction. They have been highly recommended by the best critics; Coleridge considered his verses, On a Prayer-Book, as one of the greatest poems in the language. A HYMN IN MEDITATION OF THE DAY OF JUDGMENT. HEAR'ST thou, my soul, what serious things Of a sure Judge, from whose sharp ray O that fire! before whose face, O that trump! whose blast shall run An even round with th' circling sun, Horror of nature, hell and death! "We come! we come!" and all The caves of night answer one call. O that book! whose leaves so bright, O that Judge! whose hand, whose eye, Ah! thou poor soul, what wilt thou say? But thou givest leave, dread Lord, that we And, with the wings of thine own dove, Dear Lord, remember in that day Who was the cause Thou camest this way: Thy sheep was strayed, and Thou would'st be Even lost Thyself in seeking me. Shall all that labour, all that cost Of love, and even that loss, be lost? And this loved soul, judged worth no less Than all that way and weariness? Just mercy, then, thy reckoning be With my price, and not with me; Mercy, my Judge, mercy I cry, With blushing cheek, and bleeding eye: Oh! let thine own soft bowels pay Those mercies which thy Mary found, Though both my prayers and tears combine, Oh! when thy last frown shall proclaim When the dread "Ite1," shall divide Oh! hear a suppliant heart, all crushed And crumbled into contrite dust; My hope! my fear! my Judge! my friend Take charge of me, and of my end. CHORUS OF THE SHEPHERDS OF BETHLEHEM. WELCOME! all wonders in one sight, Eternity shut in a span; Summer in winter, day in night, Heaven in Earth, and God in Man. Great Little One, whose all-embracing birth 1 "Depart thou." Welcome! though not to gold nor silk, With many a rarely tempered kiss, That breathes at once both maid and mother, She sings thy tears asleep, and dips That in their buds yet blushing lie; Welcome! though not to these gay flies, But to poor shepherds' homespun things; Yet when young April's husband-showers To kiss thy feet, and crown thy head. To Thee, meek Majesty! soft King Each his pair of silver doves; Till burnt at last in fire of thy fair eyes, |