The City of the Dreadful Night

A Recusant

James Thomson


THE CHURCH stands there beyond the orchard-blooms:
    How yearningly I gaze upon its spire!
Lifted mysterious through the twilight glooms,
    Dissolving in the sunset’s golden fire,
Or dim as slender incense morn by morn
    Ascending to the blue and open sky.
For ever when my heart feels most forlorn
    It murmurs to me with a weary sigh,
How sweet to enter in, to kneel and pray
    With all the others whom we love so well!
All disbelief and, doubt might pass away,
    All peace float to us with its Sabbath bell.
Conscience replies, There is but one good rest,
Whose head is pillowed upon Truth’s pure breast.


The City of the Dreadful Night - Contents


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