The Vision of the Godhead

Unchanging and Unchangeable, before angelic eyes,

The Vision of the Godhead in its tranquil beauty lies;

And, like a city lighted up all gloriously within,

Its countless lustres glance and gleam, and sweetest worship win.

On the Unbegotten Father, awful well-spring of the Three,

On the Sole Begotten Son’s coequal Majesty.

On Him eternally breathed forth from Father and from Son.

The spirits gaze with fixed amaze, and unreckoned ages run.

 

Chorus:

Myriad, myriad angels raise

Happy hymns of wondering praise,

Ever through eternal days,

Before the Holy Trinity,

One Undivided Three!

 

Still the Fountain of the Godhead giveth forth eternal being:

Still begetting, unbegotten, still His own perfection seeing,

Still limiting His own loved Self with His dear coequal Spirit,

No change comes o’er that blissful Life, no shadow passeth near it.

And beautiful dread Attributes, all manifold and bright,

Now thousands seem, now lose themselves in one self-living light;

And far in that deep Life of God, in harmony complete,

Like crowned kings, all opposite perfections take their seat.

And in that ungrowing vision nothing deepens, nothing brightens,

But the living Life of God perpetually lightens;

 

And created life is nothing but a radiant shadow fleeing

From the unapproached lustres of that Unbeginning Being;

Spirits wise and deep have watched that everlasting Ocean,

And never o’er its lucid field hath rippled faintest motion;

In glory undistinguished never have the Three seemed One,

Nor ever in divided streams the Single Essence run.

 

There reigns the Eternal Father, in His lone prerogatives,

And, in the Father’s Mind, the Son, all self-existing, lives,

With Him, their mutual Jubilee, that deepest depth of love,

Lifegiving Life of two-fold source, the many gifted Dove!

O Bountiful! O Beautiful! can Power or Wisdom add

Fresh features to a life, so munificent and glad?

Can even uncreated Love, ye angels! give a hue

Which can ever make the Unchanging and Unchangeable look new?

 

The Mercy of the Merciful is equal to Their Might,

As wondrous as Their Love, and as Their Wisdom bright!

As They, who out of nothing called creation at the first,

In everlasting purposes Their own design had nursed,

As They, who in their solitude, Three Persons, once abode,

Vouchsafed of Their abundance to become creation’s God,—

What They owed not to Themselves They stooped to owe to man,

And pledged Their glory to him, in an unimaginable plan.

 

See! deep within the glowing depth of that Eternal Light.

What change hath come, what vision new transports angelic sight?

A creature can it be, in uncreated bliss?

A novelty in God? Oh what nameless thing is this?

The beauty of the Father’s Power is o’er it brightly shed,

The sweetness of the Spirit’s Love is unction on its head;

In the wisdom of the Son it plays its wondrous part,

While it lives the loving life of a real Human heart!

 

A Heart that hath a Mother, and a treasure of red blood,

A Heart that man can pray to, and feed upon for food!

In the brightness of the Godhead is its marvellous abode,

A change in the Unchanging, creation touching God!

Ye spirits blest, in endless rest, who on that Vision gaze,

Salute the Sacred Heart with all your worshipful amaze,

And adore, while with ecstatic skill the Three in One ye scan,

The Mercy that hath planted there that blessed Heart of Man!

 

All tranquilly, all tranquilly, doth that Blissful Vision last,

And Its brightness o’er immortalized creation will it cast;

Ungrowing and unfading, Its pure Essence doth it keep,

In the deepest of those depths where all are infinitely deep;

Unchanging and Unchangeable as It hath ever been,

As It was before that Human heart was there by angels seen,

So is it at this very hour, so will it ever be,

With that Human Heart within It, beating hot with love of me!

 

Chorus:

Myriad, myriad angels raise

Happy hymns of wondering praise,

Ever through eternal days,

Before the Holy Trinity,

One Undivided Three!

Journey of the Magi – T.S. Eliot

A cold coming we had of it,
Just the worst time of the year
For a journey, and such a long journey:
The ways deep and the weather sharp,
The very dead of winter.
And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory,
Lying down in the melting snow.
There were times when we regretted
The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces,
And the silken girls bringing sherbet.
Then the camel men cursing and grumbling
And running away, and wanting their liquor and women,
And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters,
And the cities dirty and the towns unfriendly
And the villages dirty and charging high prices:
A hard time we had of it.
At the end we preferred to travel all night,
Sleeping in snatches,
With the voices singing in our ears, saying
That this was all folly.

Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley,
Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;
With a running stream and a water mill beating the darkness,
And three trees on the low sky,
And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow.
Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wineskins.
But there was no information, and so we continued
And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon
Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.

All this was a long time ago, I remember,
And I would do it again, but set down
This set down
This: were we led all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly,
We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death.

Show Me Thy Face

Show me Thy face-one transient gleam

Of loveliness divine,

And I shall never think or dream

Of other love save Thine:

All lesser light will darken quite,

All lower glories wane,

The beautiful of earth will scarce

Seem beautiful again.

 

Show me Thy face-my faith and love

Shall henceforth fixed be,

And nothing here have power to move

My soul’s serenity.

My life shall seem a trance, a dream,

And all I feel and see,

Illusive, visionary Thou

The one reality!

 

Show me Thy face I shall forget

The weary days of yore,

The fretting ghosts of vain regret

Shall haunt my soul no more.

All doubts and fears for future years

In quiet trust subside,

And naught but blest content and calm

Within my breast abide.

 

Show me Thy face the heaviest cross

Will then seem light to bear;

There will be gain in every loss,

And peace with every care.

With such light feet the years will fleet,

Life seem as brief as blest,

Till I have laid my burden down,

And entered into rest.