The Starry Firmament on High

The star­ry fir­ma­ment on high

And all the glo­ries of the sky

Yet shine not to Thy praise

O Lord

So bright­ly as Thy writ­ten word.

The hopes that ho­ly word sup­plies

Its truths di­vine and pre­cepts wise—

In each a heav’n­ly beam I see

And ev­ery beam con­ducts to Thee.

When

taught by pain­ful proof to know

That all is van­ity below

The sin­ner roams from com­fort far

And looks in vain for sun or star

Soft gleam­ing then those lights di­vine

Through all the cheer­less dark­ness shine

And sweet­ly to his rav­ished eye

Disclose the day-spring from on high.

The heart in sen­su­al fet­ters bound

And barren as the win­try ground

Confesses

Lord

thy quick­en­ing ray—

Thy word can charm the spell away

With ge­ni­al in­flu­ence can be­guile

The froz­en wil­der­ness to smile;

Bid liv­ing waters o’er it flow

And all be para­dise bel­ow.

Almighty Lord! the sun shall fail

The moon for­get her night­ly tale

And deep­est si­lence hush on high

The ra­di­ant chor­us of the sky.

But

fixed

for ev­er­last­ing years

Unmoved amid the wreck of spheres

Thy word shall shine in cloud­less day

When Heav’n and earth have passed away.