The North Aisle: The Lord's Prayer XI

Blest words come from the holiest shrine,
Ye that on Jesus' lips divine,
Ye that with Saints from age to age
Have been throughout their pilgrimage
In triumph and in agony
Ye went between them and the sky,—
A road where aiding Angels came ;
May we in you partake their flame,
Bond of strange union when we kneel,
Think as they thought, and with them feel,
With Saints on earth and Saints on high,
Bound in mysterious sympathy !
By day and night there may we flee,
As to a sheltering sanctuary,
The refuge of a Father's name
Which only doth abide the same.

Thro' life, as change and chance succeed,
That Prayer to Heaven doth bear our need,
And with Thine inspiration warm
Turns our dead thoughts to living form :
As when goes forth thy quickening breath,
Kindling the wrecks and dust of Death
Into the shapes of varied Life,
Trees, flowers, and streams, all beauty rife, —
Man, beast, and bird, one kindred strife, —
Earth, Sea, and Sky, uniting raise
A living temple to Thy praise.

Thus have our earthly wishes turn'd
To wings that have with glory burn'd,
Fann'd into pure serene desires,
They clothe them with celestial fires,
Borne on the breath of our own Lord,
And instinct with the living Word,
But unto what shall we compare
The boundless hopes embosom'd there ?

How beauteous here the Moon at night
Walks forth amid her hosts of light;
And Evening looks, a pilgrim sage,
Out of his western hermitage ;
And Earth and Sea, whose voices rise
In solemn and dread harmonies ;
Then what shall be the spirit's home,
When Thy true Kingdom shall have come ?

If in the flower such beauty lies.
Which blooms at morn, at evening dies ;
And in each form of life around
Mysterious wisdom hides profound ;
What shall our heavenly bodies be
When cloth'd with immortality ?
If in Thy guiding hand above
The glorious hosts are seen to move,
And all creation here below
Thy daily ordering seems to know ;
How much more Thine unseen control
Must be around the human soul,
Prepar'd, beyond the starry skies,
To put on endless destinies !