Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Asia: Vols. XXI–XXIII. 1876–79.
Mount Horeb
By John Keble (17921866)T
Through many a waste heart-sickening page
Hath traced the works of man:
But a celestial call to-day
Stays her, like Moses, on her way,
The works of God to scan.
Where like a solitary child
He thoughtless roamed and free,
One towering thorn was wrapt in flame,—
Bright without blaze it went and came:
Who would not turn and see?
The scattered sheep at will may glean
The desert’s spicy stores:
The while, with undivided heart,
The shepherd talks with God apart,
And, as he talks, adores.
Well may ye gather round the rock
That once was Sion’s hill:
To watch the fire upon the mount
Still blazing, like the solar fount,
Yet unconsuming still.
Lost branches of the once-loved vine,
Now withered, spent, and sere,
See Israel’s sons, like glowing brands,
Tost wildly o’er a thousand lands
For twice a thousand year.
But lifts them like a beacon light
The apostate Church to scare;
Or like pale ghosts that darkling roam,
Hovering around their ancient home,
But find no refuge there.
There be, who love the ways to view
Of kings and kingdoms here,
(And sure, ’t is worth an angel’s gaze,
To see throughout the dreary maze,
God teaching love and fear):
Is there a spot to win your glance,
So bright, so dark as this?
A hopeless faith, a homeless race,
Yet seeking the most holy place,
And owning the true bliss!