I, who have gone so far and long astray, Adding to primal guilt the mountains high Of trespass day by day, as if to try Thy long forbearance, still for mercy pray; For mercy even yet. Look ere thou slay, Great God! upon my tears; look where I lie Repentant; give, O give, before I die, Thy grace, and guide my feet into thy way. Reveal thy sufferings, thy blood and sweat: Short is my time; reveal thy bitter cross To my dark eyes, all used to other sight. Quench, O my God! all that unhallowed heat Of former life, which now I count but loss: Lord, thou hast ne’er despised a heart _contrite_. _From the Italian of Gabriel Fiamma._ Where sad _contrition_ harbours, there the heart Is truly acquainted with the secret smart Of past offences, hates the bosom sin The most, which most the soul took pleasure in; No crime unsifted, no sin unpresented Can lurk unseen, and seen, none unlamented; The troubled soul’s amazed with dire aspects Of lesser sins committed, and detects The wounded conscience; it cries amain For mercy--mercy; cries, and cries again. It sadly grieves, and soberly laments, It yearns for grace, reforms, returns, repents. Aye, this is incense whose accepted savour Mounts up the heavenly throne, and findeth favour: Aye, this it is whose valour never fails-- With God it stoutly wrestles and prevails: Aye, this it is that pierces heaven above, Never returning home, (like Noah’s dove,) But brings an olive leaf, or some increase, That works salvation and eternal peace. _Quarles._ All powerful is the penitential sigh Of true _contrition_; like the placid wreaths Of incense, wafted from the righteous shrine Where Abel ministered, to the blest seat Of Mercy, an accepted sacrifice, Humiliation’s conscious plaint ascends. _Samuel Hayes._ Lord! who art merciful as well as just, Incline thine ear to me, a child of dust! Not what I would, O Lord! I offer thee, Alas! but what I can. Father Almighty, who hast made me man, And bade me look to heaven, for thou art there, Accept my sacrifice and humble prayer. Four things which are not in my treasury, I lay before thee, Lord, with this petition:-- My nothingness, my wants, My sins, and my _contrition_. _Southey, imitated from the Persian._ O, my soul! thy lost condition Brought the gentle Saviour low! Hast thou felt one hour’s _contrition_ For those sins that pierced him so? Dost thou bear the love thou owest For such proof of grace divine? Can’st thou answer,--Lord thou knowest That this heart is wholly Thine? _C. Bowles._ COURAGE.