Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 460

Griefs which yet owned the soft control
Of hopes that all might still be well.

But ah, thou wast an injured guest!
How soon departed, soon forgot,
Were all the hopes of coming rest
That clustered round the Better Thought—
The tender griefs, the firm resolves,
The yearnings after better days,
Like transient sunlight which dissolves,
And leaves no traces of its rays!

Yet I despair not—through the night
That long has reigned with tyrant sway,
E'en now I see the opening light,
The harbinger of coming day;
To Heaven I now direct my prayer—
O God of love, forsake me not!
Grant that my waywardness may ne'er
Quench the returning Better Thought!

    Garvald.  J. F.

notes

1

Kynge Johan, a Play in Two Parts. By John Bale. Edited for the Camden Society by J. Payne Collier, Esq., F. S. A., from the Manuscript of the Author in the Library of the Duke of Devonshire. 1838.