Alfred H. Miles, ed. The Sacred Poets of the Nineteenth Century. 1907.
By Hymns. IV. The Agony (“O soul of Jesus”)Frederick William Faber (1814–1863)
O
Thy blood and prayer together plead;
My sins have bowed Thee to the ground,
As the storm bows the feeble reed.
Upon Thy tortured heart doth lie;
Still the abhorred procession winds
Before Thy spirit’s quailing eye.
All darkly on Thy human soul;
And clouds of supernatural gloom
Around Thee are allowed to roll.
Drives over Thee with pressure dread;
And, forced upon the olive roots,
In deathlike sadness droops Thy head.
Thy science fathoms all their guilt;
Thou sickenest heavily at Thy heart,
And the pores open,—blood is spilt.
Even to the limit of Thy strength,
While hours, whose minutes were as years.
Slowly fulfilled their weary length.
And shrunk with an astonished fear,
As if Thou couldst not bear to see
The loathsomeness of sin so near.
Have made Thy lower nature faint;
All, save the love within Thy heart,
Seemed for the moment to be spent.
That I should sin so lightly now,
And think no more of evil thoughts,
Than of the wind that waves the bough?
As if no dreadful deed were done,
As if Christ’s blood had never flowed
To hinder sin, or to atone.
Smile at the sunshine, breathe the air
Do my own will, nor ever heed
Gethsemane and Thy long prayer.
Wilt Thou not work this hour in me
The grace Thy passion merited,
Hatred of self and love of Thee?
Beneath the olive’s moon-pierced shade,
My God, alone, outstretched, and bruised,
And bleeding, on the earth He made.
As though no other sins there were,
That was to Him who bears the world
A load that He could scarcely bear!