A Hymn of Morning.
1 Sweet morn! from countless cups of gold,
Thou liftest reverently on high
More incense fine than earth can hold,
To fill the sky.
2 Where'er the vision's boundaries glance,
Existence swells with living power,
And all the illumined earth's expanse
Inhales the hour.
3 In man, O morn! a loftier good,
With conscious blessing, fills the soul,--
A life by reason understood,
Which metes the whole.
4 To thousand tasks of fruitful hope,
With skill against his toil, he bends,
And finds his work's determined scope
Where'er he wends.
5 From earth and earthly toil and strife
To deathless aims his soul may rise,
Each dawn may wake to better life,
With purer eyes.
6 Such grace from Thee, O God, be ours,
Renewed with every morning's ray,
And freshening still with added flowers
Each future day.
7 To man is given one primal star;
One dayspring's beam has dawned below;
From Thine our inmost glories are,
With Thine we glow.
8 Like earth awake and warm and bright,
With joy the spirit moves and burns;
So up to Thee, O Fount of Light,
Our light returns.