SAW ye that cloud which arose in the west,
As the burning sun sank down to rest,
How it spread so wide, and towered so high,
On the molten gold, of that glowing sky,
That it seemed, oh it seemed, like some arched way,
As it beamed and gleamed, in that glorious ray,
     Where the spirit freed,
     From its earthly weed,
     And robed, in the white,
     Of the saints in light,
Might pass, from the realms of sin and woe,
To that world, where ceaseless pleasures flow.

Ye saw that cloud; how it towered alone,
Like an archéd path, o'er the billows thrown;
How its pillars of purple and azure, stood
And mocked at the dash of the angry flood;
While it beamed, oh it beamed, from its battlements high,
As it gleamed and streamed, in that western sky,
Such a flood of mellow and golden light,
As charmed and fixed, the ravished sight,
And shed, on earth's benighted way,
The peace said joy, of celestial day.

Such, as we haste to our better home,
Saviour, such, be the sights that come;
Thus, while the visions of time flit by,
And the fashion of earth, grows dim to our eye,
Then let the light, oh the light, of Thy love,
Beam bright, on our sight, from the mansions above,
     Rending the gloom,
     That enwraps the tomb,
     And guiding our eye,
     To that world on high,
Where the people that love Thee, forever shall share,
The rest, Thou hast purchased, and gone to prepare.

Project Canterbury