The Church Bell

When glowing in the eastern sky,
The Sabbath morning meets the eye,
And o’er a weary, care-worn scene,
Gleams like the ark-dove’s leaf of green,
How welcome over hill and dale,
Thy hallow’d summons loads the gale,
Sweet bell! Church bell!
When earthly joys and sorrows end,
And towards our long repose we tend,
How mournfully thy tone doth call
The weepers to the funeral,
And to the last abode of clay,
With solemn knell mark out the way,
Sad bell! Church bell!
If to the clime where pleasures reign,
We through a Saviour’s love attain,
If freshly to an angel’s thought,
Earth’s unforgotten scenes are brought,
Will not thy voice, that warn’d to prayer,
Be gratefully remember’d there,
Bless’d bell? Church bell?