Its weakness in her arms to bear;
To cherish on her breast,
Feed it from love's own fountain there,
And lull it there to rest;
Then, while it slumbers, watch its breath,
As if to guard from instant death;
This is a mother's love.
To mark its growth from day to day,
Its opening charms admire,
Catch from its eye the earliest ray
Of intellectual fire;
To smile and listen while it talks,
And lend a finger when it walks ;
This is a mother's love.
And can a mother's love grow cold?
Can she forget her boy?
His pleading innocence behold,
Nor weep for grief-for joy?
A mother may forget her child,
While wolves devour it on the wild;
-Is this a mother's love?
Ten thousand voices answer "No!"
Ye clasp your babes and kiss;
Your bosoms yearn, your eyes o'erflow;
Yet, ah! remember this;
The infant, rear'd alone for earth,
May live, may die,-to curse his birth : -Is this a mother's love?
A parent's heart may prove a snare;
The child she loves so well,
Her hand may lead, with gentlest care,
Down the smooth road to hell;
Nourish its frame,—destroy its mind :
Thus do the blind mislead the blind,
Ev'n with a mother's love.
Blest infant! whom its mother taught
Early to seek the Lord,
And pour'd upon his dawning thought
The day-spring of the word;
This was the lesson to her son,
-Time is Eternity begun;
Behold that mother's love.
Blest mother! who, in wisdom's path, By her own parent trod,
Thus taught her son to flee the wrath, And know the fear of God:
Ah! youth, like him enjoy your prime, Begin Eternity in time,
Taught by that mother's love.
That mother's love!-how sweet the name!
What was that mother's love?
-The noblest, purest, tenderest flame,
That kindles from above
Within a heart of earthly mould,
As much of heaven as heart can hold,
Nor through eternity grows cold:
This was that mother's love.
THAT is not home, where day by day
I wear the busy hours away.
That is not home, were lonely night
Prepares me for the toils of light-
"Tis hope, and joy, and memory, give
A home in which the heart can live-
These walls no lingering hopes endear,
No fond remembrance chains me here.
Cheerless I heave the lonely sigh-
Eliza, canst thou tell me why?
"Tis where thou art, is home to me,
And home without thee cannot be.
There are who strangely love to roam,
And find in wildest haunts their home;
And some in halls of lordly state,
Who yet are homeless, desolate.
The sailor's home is on the main,
The warrior's on the tented plain,
The maiden's in her bower of rest,
The infant's on his mother's breast-
But where thou art, is home to me,
And home without thee cannot be.
There is no home in halls of pride,
They are too high, and cold, and wide:
No home is by the wanderer found:
'Tis not the place: it hath no bound.
It is a circling atmosphere
Investing all the heart holds dear ;-
A law of strange attractive force,
That holds the feelings in their course;
It is a presence undefin'd,
O'er-shadowing the conscious mind,
Where love and duty sweetly blend
To consecrate the name of friend;-
Where'er thou art, is home to me,
And home without thee cannot be.
My love, forgive the anxious sigh-
I hear the moments rushing by,
And think that life is fleeting fast,
That youth with us will soon be past.
O! when will time, consenting, give
The home in which my heart can live?
There shall the past and future meet,
And o'er our couch, in union sweet,
Extend their cherub wings, and shower
Bright influence on the present hour.
O! when shall Israel's mystic guide,
The pillar'd cloud, our steps decide,
Then, resting, spread its guardian shade,
To bless the home which love hath made?
Daily, my love, shall thence arise
Our hearts' united sacrifice;
And home indeed a home will be,
Thus consecrate and shar'd with thee.
"Twas summer evening's soft and shadowy calm;
When a fair-hair'd and graceful Village Girl,
Upon whose gentle cheek the ripening rose
Had scarcely blush'd to womanhood, stole forth
From the fond shelter of her father's cot,
To meet the youth she lov'd!—The trysting place
Seem'd a fit spot, chosen by Nature's self,
For love to build his shrine in !—overhead,
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