Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Joseph Friedlander, comp. The Standard Book of Jewish Verse. 1917.

By David Levi

The Bible

AS to an ancient temple

Whose vast proportions tower

With summit inaccessible

Among the stars of Heaven;

While the resistless Ocean

Of peoples and of cities

Breaks at its feet in foam,

Work that a hundred ages

Hallow; I bow to Thee.

From out thy mighty bosom

Rise hymns sublime, and melodies

Like to the Heavens singing

Praises to their Creator;

While at the sound, an ecstasy,

A trance, fills all my being

With terror and with awe—

I feel my proud heart thrilling

With throbs of holy pride.

Oh! come, Thou high, beneficent

Heritage of my fathers,

Our country, altar, prophet!

Thou art our all, Thou only.

Through doubt, through pain, through outrage,

Through pangs of dissolution

Wringing our tortured hearts;

Come, open the rosy portals

Of hope to us once more!

In Thee, eternal, limitless,

The Earth is bound to Heaven;

The ages in immensity

Are one in Thine infinity;

Rapt by Thy power, the Spirit

Springs ever high and higher

Through care and grief and love,

Groans in mysterious ecstasy,

Exults in bitter pain.

Idylls of love and tenderness,

Home joys and pure affections,

Voices of Hope unconquered

By torture or by agony,

Austere and fruitful suffering,

Terror and doubt and faith,

Oh! for the whole Creation

A voice is found in Thee.

Like an inspired Sibyl

Thou thunderest in anger,

Tyre, Babylon, demolished,

Vanish with throne and altar;

Thou singest, Heaven lets open,

Mankind awakes to harmony

And holy truth and peace;

Like blessed springs descending,

Thou fillest all the world.

Ah me! what countless miseries,

What tears all unregarded

Hast Thou consoled and softened

With gentle voice and holy!

How many hearts that struggle

With doubt, remorse, anxiety,

With all the woes of ages,

Dost Thou, on ample pinions,

Lift purified to Heaven!