LXXXIV. From heaven's bright orb, and purest day, Through chancel-window's many-coloured glass*, More truly falls not emblematic ray On missal, priest, or gazing crowds at mass, Than doctrine radiates from the human mind The lasting tints there long before combined. LXXXV. Devotion, seated in our peasant's soul, Shines praise and prayer o'er Scripture's every page, All doubt dispels, can wayward thoughts control, Sees guardian spirits on our earth descend, LXXXVI. Thus round devoted Moses angels dwell; An angel's was the smile that favour won When Jochebed each rising fear did quell, Resume the mother, and conceal her son. *This allusion to the interference of popery in distorting and discolouring the truth, whose rays directed through a holier and a more natural medium might be made benignly to fall upon the gradual and grateful expansions of the human mind, is meant to awaken, in those who employ either force or artifice to crush the intellectual energies, a sense of the inadequacy and danger of their ungodly purpose. His brow and temples thus spoke heaven's resolve LXXXVII. While, 'mid the fertile Nile's papyrus green, The beauteous babe floats, wrapt in pleasing sleep, Near Levi's daughter are bright angels seen Upon the shady banks to sit and weep. One lovely child makes all her sorrow flow, LXXXVIII. When torn affection shed a parting tear Upon the mother's bloom-lost, grief-worn face; When prayers of faith, deep sighed through pangs of fear, Mysterious whispers made Thermutis guide LXXXIX. Along its flowery brink some cherub leads, In sportive rings, the fair harmonious band, XC. The child now speaks his dictates on her ear: While round the ark the maids enraptured dwell, XCI. Soon Jochebed before them looks the nurse: She seems to smile upon the proffered gold, Though to her soul it strike a tyrant's curse: Thermutis thinks she sees that smile unfold An avaricious mind: the nurse retains ; Then walks the mother to the softest strains. XCII. High as the river's source these strains ascend, With melody that moves, or sweeps the string: Sweet vernal scent through sun-gilt groves distils; With various praise the glorious landscape thrills. XCIII. In gorgeous splendour Pharaoh's daughter glides, O'er all her thoughts th' adopted son presides; The foe 's discouraged, and the slave made tame. XCIV. While tones mellifluent charmed the balmy air, Where Egypt's knights and dames did oft repair, XCV. Far other views possess our Christian hinds, In Amram's son they view lost Israel's Lord. If man by woman fell, she too does save; The Nile fair Moses seals; Christ bursts the grave. XCVI. Euphrates, to the Boor, wears angels' gloom; Their wrath wafts more than thunder in its sound, When Adam's dread irrevocable doom In vengeance peals, and roars through hell profound : But Jordan's clear, calm breast reflects their smile; Their frowns and smiles invest the rising Nile. XCVII. Their looks its tyrant's secret thoughts lay bare; Remorse and fear his guilty conscience tear; XCVIII. Sulphureous vapours choke the despot's breath, Where writhing agony his limbs benumbs; Till hell's red darts, rough barbed by demons' toil, D |