For Christ is born of Mary, And, gathered all above. While mortals sleep, the angels keep Their watch of wondering love. O morning stars, together Proclaim the holy birth! And praises sing to God the King, And peace to men on earth. How silently, how silently, The wondrous gift is given! So God imparts to human hearts The blessings of His heaven. No ear may hear His coming, But in this world of sin, Where meek souls will receive Him still, The dear Christ enters in. O holy Child of Bethlehem! Descend to us, we pray; Cast out our sin, and enter in, Be born in us to-day. We hear the Christmas angels The great glad tidings tell; Oh come to us, abide with us, Our Lord Emmanuel! PHILLIPS BROOKS. * * * * * THE ANGELS' SONG. It came upon the midnight clear, That glorious song of old, From angels bending near the earth To touch their harps of gold: "Peace to the earth, good-will to men From heaven's all-gracious King!" The world in solemn stillness lay To hear the angels sing. Still through the cloven skies they come, With peaceful wings unfurled; And still their heavenly music floats O'er all the weary world: Above its sad and lowly plains They bend on heavenly wing, And ever o'er its Babel sounds The blessèd angels sing. Yet with the woes of sin and strife The world has suffered long; Beneath the angel-strain have rolled Two thousand years of wrong; And man, at war with man, hears not The love-song which they bring: O, hush the noise, ye men of strife, And hear the angels sing! And ye, beneath life's crushing load Whose forms are bending low; Who toil along the climbing way With painful steps and slow,-- Look now! for glad and golden hours Come swiftly on the wing; O, rest beside the weary road, And hear the angels sing. For lo! the days are hastening on, By prophet-bards foretold, When with the ever-circling years Comes round the age of gold; When Peace shall over all the earth Its ancient splendors fling, And the whole world send back the song Which now the angels sing. EDMUND HAMILTON SEARS. * * * * * EPIPHANY. "We have seen his star in the east." --MATTHEW ii. 2. Brightest and best of the sons of the morning, Dawn on our darkness, and lend us thine aid; Star of the East, the horizon adorning, Guide where our infant Redeemer is laid. Cold on his cradle the dew-drops are shining, Low lies his head with the beasts of the stall; Angels adore him in slumber reclining, Maker and Monarch and Saviour of all. Say, shall we yield him, in costly devotion, Odors of Edom, and offerings divine? Gems of the mountain, and pearls of the ocean, Myrrh from the forest, or gold from the mine?