Martinsburg gazette. [volume] (Martinsburg, Va. [W. Va.]) 1833-1855, 1842-03-24
P0HTE0o
7 I N E..

mr. AaELtA.
Al hail thou viewless one, whose lonely wings
Sweep DER the earth unwearied and sublime
Mysterious agent Of the King of kings.
Whom coDquerers ebey. and man calls Time!
Compared with thee, even centuries in their might
Seem but like atoms in the suns broad ray;
Thou sweep'st them on in thy majestic fight,
Scattering them from Thy plumes like drops Of
spray
Cast from the ocean in its scornful play.
Shrined as thou art in my sublimest thought,
How shall my spirit hail thee Ger the earth
Thou, with ten-thousand worlds that srrang frcm
nsught,
Begsn'st thy wanderings at crestion's birth,
Masing on thee, the expanding spirit filed
With thoughts too vast for human eloqusnee.
Shrinks irrmslng, like a womans heat when
thrilled
With loves deIiciou, throe., Till thong hi intense
10 lost amid its own magn6cence.
Thou foaie.t impercsptible TO sight.
God.hse, diHusug life and death around.
Swift stars shoot round thee 10 thy rapid fight,
Dropping like gens from mdnight's blue pro-
found;
Swept on with thee though vast immensely
Each blazing sphere in its swift course ievolves
The sunny streams go singing to the sea,
And the blue upon the beach dissolves
solves.
Even every hearth beat in the bosom's cell
Steals DER the spirit like funeral toll;
Each solemn stroke is like passing-bel
Heard mid the bushes of the startled soul
The waves OF feeling tossing TO and fro
Like ocean pillows restless and sublime;
The crimson life-dIops they ebb and flow,
And the quick pulse with its unequal chime,
All beat with muffied strokes the march Of time
Each year, that seems so long 10 US, to thee
10 but one sweep Of thy majestic plume,
Bearing pale millions to the eternal sea
Through the dim pathway Of the midnight tomb !;
rhon TOUGHEST the young and beautiful, and 10!
Gone are the charms thou never canst restore,
The fsir and glossy tress turns white as snow,
And the young voice that MARBLES DER and Ger,
Drops its low bird.like note. and sings no more.
Yet in the rosy dawn of chiidhood's day,
How swift the joyous moments seem O fee;
They watt themselves like happ, thoughts sway,
Or melt like snow-H,k,s d. oppipg on the sea;
lis pastine then 20 laugh AWAY the hours
That lightly mngle in thy eircling race,
Like dancing. girls all linked with wreaths Of flowers
Or like swift ripple. that each other chase,
Or despning dnples DER laughing face.
Thought, like bird. may pierce the blue abyss
OF the vast deep, and soar from cline to cline,
May float sersph near the realms Of bliss
Mute as eternity, and swift as time;
But thought will fold It's weary wing while thine
In its swift flight uncheck'd doth onward roll,
Srll working on, the Almighiys great design
The earth thy course, eternity Thy goal
Thy victims all things, save the human soul.
All save the human soul! that exiled thing
Chained like a captive 10 its cumbrous clod,
Yet calmly leaning thine awful wing
To watt it onward to its Maker-God.
1t sits unchanged amid the wrecks Of time.
Like some vast rock imprisoned in the main,
Whose awful form in grandeur raised sublime.
Beats back the brislling surge like drops of rain
Dashng them at its feet in mute disdain.
Night unto nigh, succeeds. and day to day,
Swelling Thy power, and adding to thy fame.
Thou wav'si thine awful wand. and kings obey,
And yet thou'rt but the shadow OF name,
A moment OF eternity, span,
| Circling creation, until time is Der;
| Then will thy gloIes end as they began,
And undising ushed on the eternal shore
| Be lost forever, and forever more.