Love, sweetest thought that ever came
To stir the human soul;
And love, the saddest, if thy fame
Blend not with God's control.
Far backward through the vale of years
We see a mother's love;
While looking through the mist of tears
An angel smiles above.
Oh! mother, with thy mighty love,
So tender, true, and strong;
From thy sweet thoughts we never rove,
You ever pray no wrong
May compass round our wayward feet
Wherever we may stray;
Yet you have joined the heavenly fleet
Far up God's holy way.
Oh! love, how sweet thy echoes are,
When infant tongues are thine;
We bring our treasures from afar
To cast them at his shrine;
For baby's king, and who shall dare
Invade this monarch's realm;
He guides us with his fingers fair,
Our hearts are but the helm.
Yet there are other loves than these,
Though not so pure and sweet;
We brought them down life's rugged ways
Until our bleeding feet
Refused to hear the breaking heart
Bowed beneath sorrow's cross;
And oh! how sad, when love departs,
We find our gold is dross.
Perhaps, our Father, looking through
The changing scene of years,
That come to us in life, He knew
That in this vale of tears
If he had given to our hearts
The human love we crave,
We ne'er had sought the higher arts
That live beyond the grave.
Oh! Father, Saviour, God in one,
Thy love is with us all;
And while this earthly race we run,
It watcheth, lest we fall.
Oh! love so great that human ken
Can never fathom half;
It caused a God to die for men,
And sorrow's cup to quaff.
Then if the cross he bids us bear
Seems greater than our strength,
We know a crown is waiting there,
And robe, whose snowy length
Hath never known the dust of earth;
Where, in those streets of gold,
We'll wander, with the loved of earth,
And with the friends of old.
