Page:Memoir and poems of Phillis Wheatley, a native African and a slave.djvu/81

Rh So may our breasts with ev'ry virtue glow,

The living temples of our God below!

Filled with the praise of him who gives the light,

And draws the sable curtains of the night,

Let placid slumbers soothe each weary mind,

At morn to wake, more heavenly, more refined;

So shall the labors of the day begin

More pure, more guarded from the snares of sin.

Night's leaden sceptre seals my drowsy eyes,

Then cease my song, till fair Aurora rise.

, heavenly Muse, what king, or mighty God,

That moves sublime from Idumea's road?

In Bozrah's dyes, with martial glories joined,

His purple vesture waves upon the wind.

Why thus enrobed delights he to appear

In the dread image of the Power of war?

Compressed in wrath, the swelling wine-press groaned;

It bled, and poured the gushing purple round.

"Mine was the art," the Almighty Saviour said,

And shook the dazzling glories of his head;

"When all forsook, I trod the press alone,

"And conquered by omnipotence my own;