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BOOK II. Sun of righteousness, arise ! Warm our hearts, and bless our eyes * Let our pray r thy bowels move, Make this year a time of love.

1 HARK! how Time s wide-sounding bell Strikes on each attentive ear ! Tolling loud the solemn knell Of the late departed year : Years, like mortals, wear away, Have their birth and dying day, Youthful spring and wintry age Then to others quit the stage.

2 Sad experience may relate What a year the last has been : Crops of sorrow have been great From the fruitful seeds of sin : Oli .1 what numbers, gay and blithe, Fell by Death s unsparing scythe, While they thought the world their own, Suddenly toe mow d them down !

3 See how War, with dreadful stride, Marches at the Lord s command, Spreading desolation wide Through a once much-favour d land : War, with heart and arms of steel, Preys on thousands at a meal ; Daily drinking human gore, Still he thirsts and calls for more.

4 If the God whom we provoke Hither should his way direct ; What a sin-avenging stroke May a land like this expect ! They who now securely sleep, Quickly then would wake and weep And too late would learn to fear When they saw the danger near Rh