Oh God! we feel the emblem true--
Thy Mercy is eternal too,
Those Cherubs, with their smiling eyes,
That crown of Palm which never dies,
Are but the types of Thee above--
Eternal Life, and Peace, and Love!
[1] "The Scriptures having declared that the Temple of Jerusalem was a
type of the Messiah, it is natural to conclude that the Palms, which made
so conspicuous a figure in that structure, represented that Life and
Immortality which were brought to light by the Gospel."--"Observations on
the Palm, as a sacred Emblem," by W. Tighe.
[2] "And he carved all the walls of the house round about with carved
figures of cherubim, and palm-trees, and _open flowers_."--1 Kings,
VI. 29.
OH FAIR! OH PUREST!
SAINT AUGUSTINE TO HIS SISTER.
(AIR.--MOORE)
Oh fair! oh purest! be thou the dove
That flies alone to some sunny grove,
And lives unseen, and bathes her wing,
All vestal white, in the limpid spring.
There, if the hovering hawk be near,
That limpid spring in its mirror clear
Reflects him ere he reach his prey
And warns the timorous bird away,
Be thou this dove;
Fairest, purest, be thou this dove,
The sacred pages of God's own book
Shall be the spring, the eternal brook,
In whose holy mirror, night and day,
Thou'lt study Heaven's reflected ray;--
And should the foes of virtue dare,
With gloomy wing, to seek thee there,
Thou wilt see how dark their shadows lie
Between Heaven and thee, and trembling fly!
Be thou that dove;
Fairest, purest, be thou that dove.
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