NIGHT! how I love thy silent shades, My spirits they compose; The bliss of heaven my soul pervades, In spite of all my woes. While sleep instils her poppy dews In every slumbering eye, I watch, to meditate and muse, In blest tranquillity. And when I feel a God immense Familiarly impart, With every proof He can dispense, His favour to my heart; My native meanness I lament, Though most divinely filled With all the ineffable content That Deity can yield. His purpose and His course he keeps; Treads all my reasonings down; Commands me out of nature's deeps, And hides me in His own. When in the dust, its proper place, Our pride of heart we lay, 'Tis then a deluge of His grace Bears all our sins away. Thou whom I serve, and whose I am, Whose influence from on high Refines, and still refines my flame, And makes my fetters fly; How wretched is the creature's state Who thwarts Thy gracious power; Crushed under sin's enormous weight, Increasing every hour! The night, when passed entire with Thee How luminous and clear; Then sleep has no delights for me, Lest Thou shouldst disappear. My Saviour! occupy me still In this secure recess; Let reason slumber if she will, My joy shall not be less: Let reason slumber out the night; But if Thou deign to make My soul the abode of truth and light, Ah, keep my heart awake! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...EPIGRAM: 118. ON GUT by BEN JONSON THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 2D SERIES. THE COURTIN' by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL A SERIOUS REFLECTION ON HUMAN LIFE, SELECTION by HENRY BAKER LINES ON REVISITING CATHCART by THOMAS CAMPBELL THE HOUSE OF PAIN by FLORENCE EARLE COATES |