Hora Novissima

The world is very evil;

The times are waxing late:

Be sober and keep vigil;

The Judge is at the gate:

The Judge That comes in mercy,

The Judge That comes with might,

To terminate the evil,

To diadem the right.

When the just and gentle Monarch

Shall summon from the tomb,

Let man, the guilty, tremble,

For Man, the God, shall doom.

Arise, arise, good Christian,

Let right to wrong succeed;

Let penitential sorrow

To heavenly gladness lead;

To the light that hath no evening,

That knows nor moon nor sun,

The light so new and golden,

The light that is but one.

And when the Sole-Begotten

Shall render up once more

The Kingdom to the Father

Whose own it was before,—

Then glory yet unheard of

Shall shed abroad its ray,

Resolving all enigmas,

An endless Sabbath-day.

Then, then from his oppressors

The Hebrew shall go free,

And celebrate in triumph

The year of Jubilee;

And the sunlit Land that recks not

Of tempest nor of fight,

Shall fold within its bosom

Each happy Israelite:

The Home of fadeless splendour,

Of flowers that fear no thorn,

Where they shall dwell as children,

Who here as exiles mourn.

Midst power that knows no limit,

And wisdom free from bound,

The Beatific Vision

Shall glad the Saints around:

The peace of all the faithful,

The calm of all the blest,

Inviolate, unvaried,

Divinest, sweetest, best.

Yes, peace! for war is needless,—

Yes, calm! for storm is past,—

And goal from finished labour,

And anchorage at last.

That peace—but who may claim it?

The guileless in their way,

Who keep the ranks of battle,

Who mean the thing they say:

The peace that is for heaven,

And shall be for the earth:

The palace that re-echoes

With festal song and mirth;

The garden, breathing spices,

The paradise on high;

Grace beautified to glory,

Unceasing minstrelsy.

There nothing can be feeble,

There none can ever mourn,

There nothing is divided,

There nothing can be torn:

'Tis fury, ill, and scandal,

'Tis peaceless peace below;

Peace, endless, strifeless, ageless,

The halls of Syon know.

O happy, holy portion,

Refection for the blest:

True vision of true beauty,

Sweet cure of all distrest!

Strive, man, to win that glory;

Toil, man, to gain that light;

Send hope before to grasp it,

Till hope be lost in sight:

Till Jesus gives the portion

Those blessed souls to fill,

The insatiate, yet satiate,

The full, yet craving still.

That fulness and that craving

Alike are free from pain,

Where thou, midst heavenly citizens,

A home like theirs shalt gain.

Here is the warlike trumpet:

There life set free from sin;

When to the last Great Supper

The faithful shall come in:

When the heavenly net is laden

With fishes many and great;

So glorious in its fulness,

Yet so inviolate:

And perfect from unperfected,

And fall'n from them that stand,

And the sheep-flock from the goat-herd

Shall part on either hand:

And these shall pass to torment,

And those shall triumph then;

The new peculiar nation,

Blest number of blest men.

Jerusalem demands them:

They paid the price on earth,

And now shall reap the harvest

In blissfulness and mirth:

The glorious holy people,

Who evermore relied

Upon their Chief and Father,

The King, the Crucified:

The sacred ransomed number

Now bright with endless sheen,

Who made the Cross their watchword

Of Jesus Nazarene:

Who, fed with heavenly nectar,

Where soul-like odors play,

Draw out the endless leisure

Of that long vernal day:

And through the sacred lilies,

And flowers on every side,

The happy dear-bought people

Go wandering far and wide.

Their breasts are filled with gladness,

Their mouths are tun'd to praise,

What time, now safe forever,

On former sins they gaze:

The fouler was the error,

The sadder was the fall,

The ampler are the praises

Of Him Who pardoned all.

Their one and only anthem,

The fulness of His love,

Who gives, instead of torment,

Eternal joys above:

Instead of torment, glory;

Instead of death, that life

Wherewith your happy Country,

True Isarelites! is rife.

Brief life is here our portion;

Brief sorrow, short-liv'd care;

The life that knows no ending,

The tearless life, is there.

O happy retribution!

Short toil, eternal rest;

For mortals and for sinner

A mansion with the blest!

That we should look, poor wand'rers,

To have our Home on high!

That worms should seek for dwellings

Beyond the starry sky!

To all one happy guerdon

Of one celestial grace;

For all, for all, who mourn their fall,

Is one eternal place:

And martyrdom hath roses

Upon that heavenly ground:

And white and virgin lilies

For virgin-souls abound.

There grief is tamed to pleasure;

Such pleasure, as below

No human voice can utter,

No human heart can know.

And after fleshly scandal,

And after this world's night,

And after storm and whirlwind,

Is calm, and joy, and light.

And now we fight the battle,

But then shall wear the crown

Of full and everlasting

And passionless renown:

And now we watch and struggle,

And now we live in hope,

And Syon, in her anguish,

With Babylon must cope:

But He Whom now we trust in

Shall then be seen and known,

And they that know and see Him

Shall have Him for their own.

The miserable pleasures

Of the body shall decay:

The bland and flattering struggles

Of the flesh shall pass away:

And none shall there be jealous;

And none shall there contend:

Fraud, clamour, guile—what say I?

All ill, all ill shall end!

And there is David's Fountain,

And life in fullest glow,

And there the light is golden,

And milk and honey flow:

The light that hath no evening,

The health that hath no sore,

The life that hath no ending,

But lasteth evermore.

There Jesus shall embrace us,

There Jesus be embraced,—

That spirit's food and sunshine

Whence earthly love is chas'd.

Amidst the happy chorus,

A place, however low,

Shall show Him us; and showing,

Shall satiate evermo.

By hope we straggle onward,

While here we most be fed,

By milk, as tender infants,

But there by Living Bread.

The night was full of terror,

The morn is bright with gladness:

The Cross becomes our harbour,

And we triumph after sadness:

And Jesus to His true ones

Brings trophies fair to see:

And Jesus shall be loved, and

Beheld in Galilee:

Beheld, when morn shall waken,

And shadows shall decay,

And each true-hearted servant

Shall shine as doth the day:

And every ear shall hear it:—

Behold thy King's array:

Behold thy God in beauty,

The Law hath passed away!

Yes! God, my King and Portion,

In fulness of His grace,

We then shall see forever,

And worship face to face.

Then Jacob into Israel,

From earthlier self estranged,

And Leah into Rachel

Forever shall be changed:

Then all the halls of Syon

For aye shall be complete,

And, in the Land of Beauty,

All things of beauty meet.

For thee, O dear, dear Country!

Mine eyes their vigils keep;

For very love, beholding

Thy happy name, they weep:

The mention of thy glory

Is unction to the breast,

And medicine in sickness,

And love, and life, and rest.

O one, O onely Mansion!

O Paradise of Joy!

Where tears are ever banished,

And smiles have no alloy;

Beside thy living waters

All plants are, great and small,

The cedar of the forest,

The hyssop of the wall:

With jaspers glow thy bulwarks;

Thy streets with emeralds blaze;

The sardius and the topaz

Unite in thee their rays:

Thine ageless walls are bonded

With amethyst unpriced:

Thy Saints build up its fabric,

And the corner-stone is Christ.

The Cross is all thy splendour,

The Crucified thy praise:

His laud and benediction

Thy ransomed people raise:

Jesus, the Gem of Beauty,

True God and Man, they sing:

The never-failing Garden,

The ever-golden Ring:

The Door, the Pledge, the Husband,

The Guardian of His Court;

The Day-star of Salvation,

The Porter and the Port.

Thou hast no shore, fair ocean!

Thou has no time, bright day!

Dear fountain of refreshment

To pilgrims far away!

Upon the Rock of Ages

They raise thy holy tower:

Thine is the victor's laurel,

And thine the golden dower:

Thou feel'st in mystic rapture

O Bride that know'st no guile,

The Prince's sweetest kisses,

The Prince's loveliest smile:

Unfading lilies, bracelets

Of living pearl thine own:

The Lamb is ever near thee,

The Bridegroom thine alone:

The Crown is He to guerdon,

The Buckler to protect,

And He Himself the Mansion,

And He the Architect.

The only art thou needest,

Thanksgiving for thy lot:

The only joy thou seekest,

The Life where Death is not:

And all thine endless leisure

In sweetest accents sings,

The ill that was thy merit,—

The wealth that is thy King's!

Jerusalem the golden,

With milk and honey blest,

Beneath thy contemplation

Sink heart and voice oppressed:

I know not, O I know not,

What social joys are there!

What radiancy of glory,

What light beyond compare!

And when I fain would sing them

My spirit falls and faints,

And vainly would it image

The assembly of the Saints.

They stand, those halls of Syon,

Conjubilant with song,

And bright with many an angel,

And all the martyr throng:

The Prince is ever in them;

The daylight is serene;

The pastures of the Blessed

Are decked in glorious sheen.

There is the throne of David,—

And there, from care released,

The song of them that triumph,

The shout of them that feast;

And they who, with their Leader,

Have conquered in the fight,

For ever and for ever

Are clad in robes of white!

O holy, placid harp-notes

Of that eternal hymn!

O sacred sweet refection,

And peace of Seraphim!

O thirst, forever ardent,

Yet evermore content!

O true, peculiar vision

Of God cunctipotent!

Ye know the many mansions

For many a glorious name,

And divers retributions

That divers merits claim:

For the midst constellations

That deck our earthly sky,

This star than that is brighter,—

And so it is on high.

Jerusalem the glorious!

The glory of the Elect!

O dear and future vision

That eager hearts expect:

Even now by faith I see thee:

Even here thy walls discern:

To thee my thoughts are kindled,

And strive and pant and yearn:

Jerusalem the onely,

That look'st from heaven below

In thee is all my glory;

In me is all my woe!

And though my body may not,

My spirit seeks thee fain,

Till flesh and earth return me

To earth and flesh again.

O none can tell thy bulwarks,

How gloriously they rise:

O none can tell thy capitals

Of beautiful device:

Thy loveliness oppresses

All human thought and heart:

And none, O peace, O Syon,

Can sing thee as thou art.

New mansion of new people,

Whom God's own love and light

Promote, increase, make holy,

Identify, unite.

Thou City of the Angels!

Thou City of the LORD!

Whose everlasting music

Is the glorious decachord!

And there the band of Prophets

United praise ascribes,

And there the twelvefold chorus

Of Israel's ransomed tribes:

The lily-beds of virgins,

The roses' martyr-glow,

The cohort of the Fathers

Who kept the faith below.

And there the Sole-Begotten

Is LORD in regal state;

He, Judah's mystic Lion,

He, Lamb Immaculate.

O fields that know no sorrow!

O state that fears no strife!

O princely bow'rs! O land of flow'rs!

O realm and home of Life!

Jerusalem, exulting

On that securest shore,

I hope thee, wish thee, sing thee,

And love thee evermore!

I ask not for my merit:

I seek not to deny

My merit is destruction,

A child of wrath am I:

But yet with Faith I venture

And Hope upon my way;

For those perennial guerdons

I labour night and day.

The Best and Dearest Father

Who made me and who saved,

Bore with me in defilement,

And from defilement laved:

When in His strength I struggle,

For very joy I leap,

When in my sin I totter,

I weep, or try to weep:

And grace, sweet grace celestial,

Shall all its love display,

And David's Royal Fountain

Purge every sin away.

O mine, my golden Syon!

O lovelier far than gold!

With laurel-girt battalions,

And safe victorious fold:

O sweet and blessed Country,

Shall I ever see thy face?

O sweet and blessed Country,

Shall I ever win thy grace?

I have the hope within me

To comfort and to bless!

Shall I ever win the prize itself?

O tell me, tell me, yes!

Exult, O dust and ashes,

The LORD shall be thy part:

His only, His for ever,

Thou shalt be, and thou art!

Exult, O dust and ashes!

The LORD shall be thy part:

His only, His for ever,

Thou shalt be, and thou art!