A DOUBTER'S HYMN.
God of the Heart ! whose love immense In each of us half quenched unseen Darts its pure light at times between The prison bars of sin and sense, We know Thou art, for there did move, In guise of mortal nature, One, Flesh of our flesh, bone of our bone, Whose life and death were naught but love.
Thirst we, then, hope that we, who plod Up the steep path of wrong or right, Yet bear within our hearts a light, The earnest of the perfect God ?
God of the Mind! whose Dower is given To some of us in part to trace The glories of Thy hidden face, The secrets of the earth and heaven, No man hath ever known Thee quite, We pant, 0 God ! we pant to find Some great apostle of the mind, To lift the veil and show us light.
But no ; by turns we fling away Each faithless guide, and learn that he Who fain would pierce the mystery, Himself must grope to find the day.
And must we then in doubt and fear Watch on, watch ever for each star That glimmers on us faint and far, And know the dawn will not appear?
And is the dream that human kind Is marching on from age to age, To claim its perfect heritage, Mere vision of an idle mind ?
We know not, but for him, we know, Who loveth and who prayeth well, Some flash of God's own truth shall quell The doubts that bow his spirit low.
Then bate not what thou hest of breath, In thee hath dwelt, and yet shall dwell, 0 man ! a love that knows not Death, And reaches past the grasp of Hell.
In thee shall dwell, it may befall, The knowledge of the truth of things, The mind to hold high communings With Him who is the Cause of all.
New College, Oxon.
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