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All these fair ranks of trees. They in thy

sun

Budded, and shook their green leaves in thy breeze,

And shot toward heaven. The centuryliving crow,

Whose birth was in their tops, grew old and died

Among their branches, till, at last, they stood,

As now they stand, massy, and tall, and dark,

Fit shrine for humble worshipper to hold Communion with his Maker. These dim vaults,

These winding aisles, of human pomp or pride

Report not. No fantastic carvings show
The boast of our vain race to change the
form
Of thy fair works.

thou fill'st

But thou art here

The solitude. Thou art in the soft winds That run along the summit of these trees In music; thou art in the cooler breath That from the inmost darkness of the place Comes, scarcely felt; the barky trunks, the ground,

The fresh moist ground, are all instinct with thee.

Here is continual worship; - Nature, here, In the tranquillity that thou dost love, Enjoys thy presence. Noiselessly, around, From perch to perch, the solitary bird Passes; and yon clear spring, that, midst its herbs,

Wells softly forth and wandering steeps the roots

Of half the mighty forest, tells no tale
Of all the good it does. Thou hast not left
Thyself without a witness, in the shades,
Of thy perfections. Grandeur, strength,

and grace Are here to speak of thee. This mighty

oak

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Dost scare the world with tempests, set on fire

The heavens with falling thunder-bolts, or fill,

With all the waters of the firmament,
The swift dark whirlwind that uproots the
woods

And drowns the villages; when, at thy call,
Uprises the great deep and throws himself
Upon the continent, and overwhelms
Its cities - who forgets not, at the sight
Of these tremendous tokens of thy power,
His pride, and lays his strifes and follies
by?

Oh, from these sterner aspects of thy face Spare me and mine, nor let us need the wrath

Of the mad unchained elements to teach Who rules them. Be it ours to meditate, In these calm shades, thy milder majesty, And to the beautiful order of thy works Learn to conform the order of our lives.

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