THE LORD WILL PROVIDE.
O! The lilies of the field,
How their leaves instruction yield;
Hark to Nature's lesson given
By the blessed birds of heaven!
Every bush and tufted tree
Warbles sweet philosophy:
"Mortal, fly from doubt and sorrow;
God provideth for the morrow!
"Say with richer crimson glows
The kingly mantle than the rose?
Say, have kings more wholesome fare
Than we poor citizens of air?
Barns nor hoarded grain have we,
Yet we carol merrily.
Mortal, fly from doubt and sorrow;
God provideth for the morrow!
"One there lives whose guardian eye
Guides our humble destiny;
One there lives who, Lord of all,
Keeps our feathers lest they fall;
Pass we blithely then the time,
Fearless of the snare and lime,
Free from doubt and faithless sorrow;
God provideth for the morrow!"
Bishop Heber.
