Dinah Maria Craik

Sunday Morning Bells

FROM the near city comes the clang of bells:
Their hundred jarring diverse tones combine
In one faint misty harmony, as fine
As the soft note yon winter robin swells.--
What if to Thee in Thine Infinity
These multiform and many-colored creeds
Seem but the robe man wraps as masquers' weeds
Round the one living truth Thou givest him--Thee?
What if these varied forms that worship prove,
Being heart-worship, reach Thy perfect ear
But as a monotone, complete and clear,
Of which the music is, through Christ's name, Love?
Forever rising in sublime increase
To 'Glory in the Highest,--on earth peace?'