To feel there is a union

'Twixt Nature's heart and mine;
To profit by affliction,

Reap truth from fields of fiction,
Grow wiser from conviction,
And fulfil God's grand design.

I live to hail that season,
By gifted ones foretold,
When men shall live by reason,
And not alone by gold;
When man to man united,
And every wrong thing righted,
The whole world shall be lighted
As Eden was of old.

I live for those who love me,

For those who know me true,
For the heaven that smiles above me,
And awaits my spirit too;

For the cause that lacks assistance,
For the wrong that needs resistance,
For the future in the distance,

And the good that I can do.

133 THE SPACIOUS FIRMAMENT ON

HIGH.

ADDISON'S paraphrase of the Nineteenth Psalm is a brief and popular compendium of natural theology. The psalm was one of the favourites of St. Augustine.

HE spacious firmament on high,
With all the blue ethereal sky,

And spangled heavens, - a shining frame,
Their great Original proclaim.

The unwearied sun, from day to day,
Doth his Creator's power display,
And publishes to every land
The work of an Almighty hand.

Soon as the evening shades prevail,
The moon takes up the wondrous tale,
And, nightly, to the listening earth,
Repeats the story of her birth:

Whilst all the stars that round her burn,
And all the planets in their turn,
Confirm the tidings as they roll,

And spread the truth from pole to pole.

What though, in solemn silence all
Move round this dark terrestrial ball;
What though no real voice nor sound
Amidst their radiant orbs be found;
In reason's ear they all rejoice,
And utter forth a glorious voice;
For ever singing as they shine
The hand that made us is Divine.

"When only a youngster at school," writes a correspondent in the Isle of Man, "Addison's hymn had more attraction for me than a story in the Arabian Nights." This is, perhaps, putting it rather strongly ; but, when a boy myself, I remember well committing it to memory, and the pleasure which it afforded me, pleasure which, curiously enough, is linked by association with the effect produced by the first time I read a translation of Hesiod.

Another correspondent says that "at eight this hymn first taught me what poetry meant."

XVI. - And All Ye are Brethren.

134-A JEWISH HYMN THAT HELPED.

THIS Collection of Hymns that have Helped would be incomplete without, at least, one specimen of a Jewish hymn, and one or two which have helped thousands in the Roman Communion. I asked Mr. M. H. Spielmann, editor of the Magazine of Art, to help me to the most helpful Jewish hymn. He replied as follows: —

66

Jews have no hymns,' properly so-called, though they have many poems of a hymnal sort, taking chiefly the form of praise. For myself, I may say that the 'Adown Olam' was to me the most helpful as a child and youth, and was the point de départ, and the base of all my subsequent reading, theological or philosophical. It is not merely a profession of faith, it is the complete exposition of the Jewish religion, and the supremest expression of comfort and consolation, so far as I am aware, in all our book of prayer."

The Rev. F. L. Cohen, joint editor of the Book of Synagogue Music, has kindly sent me a translation of the "Adôn 'Olam," the text of which is as follows:· :

ADÔN 'OLAM.

◄HE Universal Master reigned

There yet created things took shape;

His might proclaimed Him King of all
When He to all existence gave;

And after all shall pass away,

'Tis He alone shall grandly reign,

Who was, and is, and still shall be:
His glories all our worship have.

For He is One, no other power

Compares with Him, with Him consorts;

Without beginning, free from end,
Above what splendour men may crave.

[Without corporeality,

From change and variation free,
As unconjoined as undetached,
Alone in matchless power to save.]

He is my God, my Saviour lives,
My Rock in travail's time of woe;
My Banner and my Refuge He,
My Draught of Life when help I crave.

Into His hand my soul I trust,
Both when I sleep and when I wake;
And with my soul my body too:

God is with me, no fears enslave.

F. L. C. N.B. The verse in brackets above is usually omitted.

Speaking of this, Mr. Cohen says: "It is almost a literal translation, and reproduces the rhythm and the rhyme of the original Hebrew.

"We have a number of Table-Hymns (Zemiroth) chanted on the Sabbath before Grace. Of these, Psalm cxxvi. (we sing the Psalms in Hebrew, of course) and No. 10 Sabbath Rest' in the publication of mine I enclose (p. 25) have proved very precious helps to many of us. Much help, too, has been derived from the hymn Ma'ôz Tsur, for Hanucah (the anniversary of the Maccabean Dedication), a copy of my English version of which (again closely reproducing the rhythm and rhyme of the Hebrew) I give on the back of 'Ádôn 'Olam."

135.-AVE MARIA.

As many Protestants have never read the prayer which is said and sung all over Roman Christendom, I quote it here together with one of the best-known hymns to the Virgin:

HA The blessed art Thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of Thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen.

TAIL, Mary, full of grace; the Lord is with

AVE, Maria, gratia plena; Dominus tecum;

benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus ventris tui, Jesus. Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc et in hora mortis nostræ. Amen.

136.- AVE MARIS STELLA.

THIS is probably the oldest, it dates from the ninth century, best-known, most-used, and therefore, most helpful of all the hymns to the Mother of Jesus, which edify the Roman, and scandalise the Protestant, who forgets that if the spirit of the prayer or hymn be instinct with love, there are resources in the Chancery of Heaven for re-addressing petitions that may have been wrongly directed by mistake.

HAIL, bright Star of ocean,

God's own Mother blest,

Ever-sinless Virgin,

Gate of heavenly rest;

Taking that sweet Ave

Which from Gabriel came,
Peace confirm within us,
Changing Eva's name.

Break the captive's fetters;

Light on blindness

All our ills expelling,
Every bliss implore.

pour;