THE USES OF SORROW.
Reading edition
Oh, grieve not for the early dead,
Whom God himself hath taken;
But deck with flowers each holy bed—
Nor deem thyself forsaken,
When, one by one, they fall away,
Who were to thee as summer day.
Weep for the babes of guilt, who sleep
With scanty rags stretch’d o’er them,
On the dark road, the downward steep
Of misery; while before them
Looms out afar the dreadful tree,
And solemn, sad Eternity!
Nor weep alone; but when to Heaven
The cords of sorrow bind thee,
Let kindest help to such be given,
As God shall teach to find thee;
And, for the sake of those above,
Do deeds of Wisdom, Mercy, Love.
The child that sicken’d on thy knee,
Thou weeping Christian mother,
Had learn’d in this world, lispingly,
Words suited for another.
Oh, dost thou think, with pitying mind,
On untaught infants left behind?