The Alexandria Herald

THE FOUNT.

OUR SAVIOUR'S PASSION.

Behold the astonish'd sun starts back,
No light his blackened beams display;
Darkness her sable wing expands,
And gloomy night invades the day:
But yet though night maintains her reign,
No planets sail along the skies,
No moon, the lovely queen of night,
No glorious constellations rise:
One dark black dismal gloom of clouds
Broods o'er the earth from pole to pole;
One face of horror spreads around,
And veils the universal whole.

See how the rending clouds divide!
How forky lightnings glaring fly!
Hark! how the awful thunders roar,
And rumble through the angry sky.
The rifted rocks are burst in twain;
The everlasting mountains shake;
The yawning earth her bosom opes,
And from their graves the dead awake.
Ten thousand furious whirlwinds rage;
Along the trembling ground they sweep:
And swell from its immense abyss
The surges of the bellowing deep'
Thou deep! why dost thou lash the shore?
Ye furious winds! why do you roar!
Why do the dead awake?
Ye hills! why do ye shake?
Why do the rocks divide?
Why burst with opening wide?
Why do the thunders shake the pole?
[roll?
Why do the volumed lightnings
Why art thou hid, thou sun, on high?
[sky,
Thou moon and stars that fill the
Why is your pleasing light
Involved in gloom and night?
See, yonder! where the Lord of Life,
The great Messiah's us'd with scorn!
See how the trickling blood descends,
They crown his sacred head with thorn!
See with contempt they drag along
My King! my Saviour, and my God!
O sight! inhuman sight of woe!
His flesh is furrowed with the rod!
And now(!) ! horror-bearing scene!
With nails they pierce his feet and hands,
And innocence upon the cross,
The executioner extends!
Mark how his tender body writhes,
To heaven he lifts failing eyes;
Th' Incarnate bows his blameless head,
And for his very murd'rers dies.
For this, the dead awake!
For this, the mountains shake;
For this, the cheerful light
Is veiled in gloomy night;
For this the rocks divide,
For this, the wind and tide
Resound against the shore;
For this the thunders roar;
For this. the lightnings flame;
For this convulsions tear the universal frame.