The Prayer of Nature
by George Gordon, Lord Byron
(composed: 29 December 1806)
(From Hours of Idleness - 1807)
1
- Father of Light! great God of Heaven!
- Hearst thou the accents of despair?
- Can guilt like mans be eer forgiven?
- Can vice atone for crimes by prayer?
2
- Father of Light, on thee I call!
- Thou seest my soul is dark within;
- Thou who canstmark the sparrows fall,
- Avert from me the death of sin.
3
- No shrine I seek, to sects unknown;
- Oh, point to me the path of truth!
- Thy dread omnipotence I own;
- Spare, yet amend, the faults of youth.
4
- Let bigots rear a gloomy fane,
- Let superstitition haile the pile,
- Let priests, to spread their sable reign,
- With tales of mystic rites beguile.
5
- Shall man confine his Makers sway
- To Gothic domes of mouldering stone?
- Thy temple is the face of the day;
- Earth, ocean, heaven, thy boundless throne.
6
- Shall man condemn his race to hell,
- Unless they bend in pompous form?
- Tell us that all, of one who fell,
- Must perish in the mingling storm?
7
- Shall each pretend to reach the skies,
- Yet doom his brother to expire,
- Whose soul a different hope supplies,
- Or doctrines less severe inspire?
8
- Shall these, by creeds they cant expound,
- Prepare a fancied bliss or woe?
- Shall reptiles, grovelling on the ground,
- Their great Creators purpose know?
9
- Shall those, who live for self alone,
- Whose years float on in a daily crime
- Shall they by Faith for guilt atone,
- And live beyond the bounds of Time?
10
- Father! no prophets laws I seek,
- Thy laws in Natures works appear;
- I own myself corrupt and weak,
- Yet will I pray, for thou wilt hear!
11
- Thou, who canst guide the wandering star
- Through trackness realms of others space;
- Who calmst the elemental war,
- Whose hand from pole to pole I trace.
12
- Thou, who in wisdom placed me here,
- Who, when thou wilt, canst take me hence,
- Ah! whilst I tread this earthly sphere,
- Extend to me thy wide defence.
13
- To Thee, my God, to thee I call!
- Whatever weal or woe betide,
- By thy command I rise or fall,
- In thy protection I confide.
14
- If, when this dust to dusts restored,
- My soul shall flout on airy wing,
- How sall thy glorious name adored
- Inspire her feedle voice to sing!
15
- But, if this fleeting spirit share
- With clay the gaves eternal bed,
- While life yet throbes I raise my prayer,
- Though doomd no more to quit the dead.
16
- To Thee I breathe my humble strain;
- Grateful for all thy mercies past,
- And hope, my God, to thee again
- This erring life may fly at last.
|
|