JERUSALEM. 163 Jerusalem. FAIR shines the moon, Jerusalem, 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, But where thy kings and prophets stood, Behold the living soul of God, 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 ;— Thy garments yet are daily rent- 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 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 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 suns of eighteen hundred years But where thy sacred steps were sent Thy garments yet are daily rent-- |