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FROM THE ROOF OF THE GOVERNOR'S HOUSE ON THE NORTH

JERUSALEM.

163

Jerusalem.

FAIR shines the moon, Jerusalem,
Upon the hills that wore
Thy glory once, their diadem

Ere Judah's reign was o'er:

The stars on hallowed Olivet

And over Zion burn;

But when shall rise thy splendor set?

Thy majesty return?

The peaceful shades that wrap thee now

Thy desolation hide;

The moon-lit beauty of thy brow

Restores thine ancient pride;

Yet then when Rome thy Temple rent,

The dews of midnight wet

The marble dome of Omar's tent,

And Aksa's minaret.

Thy strength, Jerusalem, is o'er,
And broken are thy walls;
The harp of Israel sounds no more
In thy deserted halls:

But where thy kings and prophets stood,
Triumphant over death,

Behold the living soul of God,
The Christ of Nazareth.

The halo of His presence fills

Thy courts, thy ways of men;

His footsteps on thy holy hills

Are beautiful as then;

The prayer, whose bloody sweat betray'd

His human agony,

Still haunts the awful olive shade

Of old Gethsemane,

Woe unto thee, Jerusalem!

Slayer of Prophets thou,

That in thy fury stonest them

God sent, and sends thee now ;—
Where thou, O Christ! with anguish spent,
Forgave thy foes, and died;

Thy garments yet are daily rent-
Thy soul is crucified!

They darken with the Christian name

The light that from thee beam'd;

And by the hatred they proclaim

Thy Spirit is blasphemed.

JERUSALEM.

Unto thine ears the prayers they send

Were fit for Belial's reign; And Moslem cimeters defend The temple they profane.

Who shall rebuild Jerusalem?

Her scatter'd children bring

From Earth's far ends, and gather them
Beneath her shelt'ring wing?

For Judah's scepter broken lies,

And from his kingly stem No new Messiah shall arise

For lost Jerusalem!

But let the wild ass on her hills

Its foal unfrighted lead;

And by the source of Kedron's rills

The desert adder breed:

For when the love of Christ has made

Its mansion in the heart,

He builds in pomp that will not fade
Her heavenly counterpart.

How long, O Christ! shall men obscure

Thy holy charity?

How long the godless rites endure

Which they bestow on thee?

165

Thou, in whose soul of tenderness
The Father's mercy shone,
Who came, the sons of men to bless
By Truth and Love alone.

The suns of eighteen hundred years
Have seen thy reign expand,
And Morning, on her pathway, hears
Thy name in every land;

But where thy sacred steps were sent
The Father's will to bide,

Thy garments yet are daily rent--
Thy soul is crucified!

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