n, of thy sons forgot?
Hast thou forgot the innocent flocks, that lay
Prone on thy sunny banks, or frisk'd in play
Amid thy lilied meadows? Wilt thou turn
A deaf ear to thy supplicants, who mourn
Downcast in earth's far corners? Unto thee
Wildly they turn in their lone misery;
For wheresoe'er they rush in their despair,
The pitiless Destroyer still is there!

Eden of earth! despisest thou the sighs
From the slave's heart that rise
To thee, amid his fetters--who can dare
Still to hope on in his forlorn despair--
Whose morn and evening tears for thee fall down
Like dews on Hermon's thirsty crown--
And who would blessed be in all his ills,
Wander'd his feet once more even on thy desert hills!

But not is Hope's fair star extinguish'd quite
In rayless night;
And, Sion, as thy fortunes I bewail,
Harsh sounds my voice, as of the birds that sail
The stormy dark. Let but that star be mine,
And through the tempest tremulously shine;
So, when the brooding clouds have overpast,
Rejoicing, with the dawn, may come at last,
Even as an instrument, whose lively sound
Makes the warm blood in every bosom bound,
And whose triumphant notes are given
Freely in songs of thanksgiving to Heaven!

Bethel!--and as thy name's name leaves my tongue,
The very life-drops from my heart are wrung!
Thy sanctuary--where, veil'd in mystic light,
For ever burning, and for ever bright,
Jehovah's awful majesty reposed,
And shone for aye heaven's azure gates unclosed--
Thy sanctuary!--where from the Eternal flow'd
The radiance of his glory, in whose power
Noonday itself like very darkness show'd,
And stars were none at midnight's darkest hour--
Thy sanctuary! oh _there!_ oh _there!_ that I
Might breathe my troubled soul out, sigh on sigh,
_There_, where thine effluence, Mighty God, was pour'd
On thine Elect, who, kneeling round, adored!

Stand off! the place is holy. Know ye not,
Of potter's clay the children, that this spot
Is sacred to the Everlasting One--
The Ruler over heaven, and over earth?
Stand off, degraded slaves, devoid of worth!
Nor dare profane again, as ye have done,
This spot--'tis holy ground--profane it not!

Oh, might I cleave, with raptured wing, the waste
Of the wide air, then, where in splendour lie
Thy ruins, would my sorrowing spirit haste,
Forth to outpour its flood of misery!--
There, where thy gran