Splendor paternae gloriae, De luce lucem proferens, Lux lucis et fons luminis Dies diem illuminans! "Votis vocemus et Patrem, Patrem potentis gratiae, Patrem perennis gloriae: Culpam releget lubricam! "Confirmet actus strenuos, Dentes retundat invidi, Casus secundet asperos, Donet gerendi gratiam! "Christus nobis sit cibus, Potusque noster sit fides: Laeti bibamus sobriam Ebrietatem spiritus! "Laetus dies hic transeat, Pudor sit ut diluculum, Fides velut meridies, Crepusculum mens nesciat!"[A] [Footnote A: Splendor of the Father's glory, Bringing light with cheering ray, Light of light and fount of brightness, Day, illuminating day! In our prayers we call thee Father, Father of eternal glory, Father of a mighty grace: Heal our errors, we implore thee! Form our struggling, vague desires; Power of spiteful spirits break; Help us in life's straits, and give us Grace to suffer for thy sake! Christ for us shall be our food; Faith in him our drink shall be; Hopeful, joyful, let us drink Soberness of ecstasy! Joyful shall our day go by, Purity its dawning light, Faith its fervid noontide glow, And for us shall be no night!] The hymn in every word well expressed the character and habitual pose of mind of the singer, whose views of earthly matters were as different from the views of ordinary working mortals as those of a bird, as he flits and perches and sings, must be from those of the four-footed ox who plods. The "_sobriam ebrietatem spiritus_" was with him first constitutional, as a child of sunny skies, and then cultivated by every employment and duty of the religious and artistic career to which from childhood he had devoted himself. If perfect, unalloyed happiness has ever existed in this weary, work-day world of ours, it has been in the bosoms of some of those old religious artists of the Middle Ages, whose thoughts grew and flowered in prayerful shadows, bursting into thousands of quaint and fanciful blossoms on the pages of missal and breviary. In them the fine life of color, form, and symmetry, which is the gift of the Italian, formed a rich stock on which to graft the true vine of religious faith, and rare and fervid were the blossoms.