I need Thy presence every passing hour:
What but Thy grace can foil the Tempter's

power?

Who like Thyself my guide and stay can be? Through cloud and sunshine, O abide with me! 24

I fear no foe with Thee at hand to bless:

Ills have no weight, and tears no bitterness.
Where is Death's sting? where, Grave, thy

victory?

-I triumph still, if Thou abide with me.

Hold Thou Thy Cross before my closing eyes; Shine through the gloom, and point me to the skies:

Heaven's morning breaks, and earth's vain

shadows flee:

In life and death, O Lord, abide with me!

1850.

28

32

Henry Francis Lyte.

THE WILL OF GOD

I WORSHIP Thee, sweet Will of God!
And all Thy ways adore,

And every day I live, I seem

To love Thee more and more.

Thou wert the end, the blessed rule
Of our Saviour's toils and tears;
Thou wert the passion of His Heart
Those Three-and-thirty years.

And He hath breathed into my soul

A special love of Thee,

A love to lose my will in His,

And by that loss be free.

He always wins who sides with God,

To him no chance is lost;

God's Will is sweetest to him, when

It triumphs at his cost.

When obstacles and trials seem

Like prison-walls to be,

12

16

THY way, not mine, O Lord,
However dark it be!

Lead me by Thine own hand,
Choose out the path for me.

Smooth let it be or rough,

It will be still the best;
Winding or straight, it leads
Right onward to Thy rest.

I dare not choose my lot;

I would not, if I might;
Choose Thou for me, my God;
So shall I walk aright.

4

8

12

1857.

The kingdom that I seek
Is Thine; so let the way
That leads to it be Thine;

Else I must surely stray.

Take Thou my cup, and it
With joy or sorrow fill,
As best to Thee may seem;

Choose Thou my good and ill;

Choose Thou for me my friends,
My sickness or my health;
Choose Thou my cares for me,
My poverty or wealth.

Not mine, not mine the choice,
In things or great or small;
Be Thou my guide, my strength,
My wisdom, and my all!

16

20

24

28

Horatius Bonar.

SENSITIVENESS

TIME was, I shrank from what was right
From fear of what was wrong;
I would not brave the sacred fight,
Because the foe was strong.

But now I cast that finer sense
And sorer shame aside;

Such dread of sin was indolence,

Such aim at Heaven was pride.

So, when my Saviour calls, I rise
And calmly do my best;
Leaving to Him, with silent eyes

Of hope and fear, the rest.

I step, I mount where He has led;
Men count my haltings o'er;—
I know them; yet, though self I dread,
I love His precept more.

1833. 1836.

John Henry Newman.

8

12

16

FLOWERS WITHOUT FRUIT

PRUNE thou thy words, the thoughts control That o'er thee swell and throng;

They will condense within thy soul,

Faith's meanest deed more favour bears,

Where hearts and wills are weigh'd, Than brightest transports, choicest prayers, Which bloom their hour and fade.

1833.

John Henry Newman.

12

"O MAY I JOIN THE CHOIR

INVISIBLE!"

O MAY I join the choir invisible

Of those immortal dead who live again
In minds made better by their presence: live
In pulses stirred to generosity,

In deeds of daring rectitude, in scorn

Of miserable aims that end with self,

In thoughts sublime that pierce the night like stars,

And with their mild persistence urge man's

search

To vaster issues.

So to live is heaven:

To make undying music in the world, Breathing as beauteous order that controls With growing sway the growing life of man. So we inherit that sweet purity

For which we struggled, failed, and agonized
With widening retrospect that bred despair.
Rebellious flesh that would not be subdued,
A vicious parent shaming still its child
Poor anxious penitence, is quick dissolved;
Its discords, quenched by meeting harmonies, 20
Die in the large and charitable air.