Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Alfred H. Miles, ed. The Sacred Poets of the Nineteenth Century. 1907.

By Rose’s Diary (1850). “How beautiful it is to be alive!”

Henry Septimus Sutton (1825–1901)

HOW beautiful it is to be alive!

To wake each morn as if the Maker’s grace

Did us afresh from nothingness derive

That we might sing “How happy is our case!

How beautiful it is to be alive!”

To read in God’s great Book, until we feel

Love for the love that gave it; then to kneel

Close unto Him Whose truth our souls will shrive,

While every moment’s joy doth more reveal

How beautiful it is to be alive.

Rather to go without what might increase

Our worldly standing, than our souls deprive

Of frequent speech with God, or than to cease

To feel, through having wasted health or peace,

How beautiful it is to be alive.

Not to forget, when pain and grief draw nigh,

Into the ocean of time past to dive

For memories of God’s mercies, or to try

To bear all sweetly, hoping still to cry

“How beautiful it is to be alive!”

Thus ever towards man’s height of nobleness

Strive still some new progression to contrive;

Till, just as any other friend’s, we press

Death’s hand; and, having died, feel none the less

How beautiful it is to be alive.