Childhood Piety. (1180)
By cool Siloam's shady rill,
How fair the lily grows!
How sweet the breath, beneath the hill,
Of Sharon's dewy rose!
2 Lo! such the child whose early feet
The paths of peace have trod,
Whose secret heart, with influence sweet,
Is upward drawn to God.
3 By cool Siloam's shady rill
The lily must decay;
The rose that blooms beneath the hill
Must shortly fade away.
4 And soon, too soon, the wintry hour
Of man's maturer age
Will shake the soul with sorrow's pow'r.
And stormy passions rage.
Reginald Heber, 1812.