BETA

“ Mysterious Night !  when our first
parent knew1
Thee from report divine, and heard thy
name,2
Did he not tremble for this lovely
frame,3
This glorious canopy of light and blue ?4
Yet ’neath a curtain of translucent
dew,5
Bathed in the rays of the great setting
flame,6
Hesperus with the host of heaven
came,7
And lo !  creation widened in man’s
view.8
Who could have thought such darkness
lay concealed,9
Within thy beams, O sun ?  or who
could find,10
Whilst sky and leaf and insect stood
revealed,11
That to such countless orbs thou mads’t
us blind ?12
Why do we thus shun death with
anxious strife ?13
If light can thus deceive, wherefore not
Life ?”14